“Yeah? Damn, I’ve never felt one before.”

“Pretty sure I’m right.” She reached over and turned on a light.

A second later, the rumble was followed by shaking and rolling. The light blinked. The pictures on the walls swayed. Books jumped from the shelves. Somewhere in the distance, several alarms sounded.

Peach rolled off her and sat up. “What do we do?”

She pulled him to a doorway and grabbed on to the frame for maybe thirty seconds, which felt like a lifetime. Peach held her with one arm. “Damn, girl. We made the earth move. Cool.”

“Ha, ha.” She couldn’t help smiling, but as soon as the shaking stopped, she said, “Let’s go check on Grandy, make sure he’s okay.”

“We’d better get dressed first,” he said, grinning at her.

They threw on clothes and raced downstairs together. Grandy was sitting up in bed, putting in his hearing aids. The lights flickered again, then stayed on.

“Everything okay?” Natalie asked him.

He put on his spectacles and gazed at her, then at Peach, taking in her hastily donned Giants T-shirt and Peach’s bare chest, his jeans with the top button undone. “Everything is fine,” he said. “I’m going to turn on the news.”

“Oh God. He knows,” Natalie said as they went down and entered the bookstore.

“He’s always known.” Peach took hold of her shoulders from behind and nuzzled her neck.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He said something almost as soon as I got to work on his place. Sometimes I wasn’t sure if he was talking about you or your mom.”

“What did he say?”

Peach turned her in his arms. “That you’ve been disappointed in love. But you’ve never disappointed anyone.” He placed his lips on her forehead and held still, gently pressing. “I won’t disappoint you, Natalie. You picked a good one.”

She shut her eyes and leaned into him. At last, she thought.

“Hey,” Peach whispered, brushing his thumb across her cheek. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re my glimmer.” She blotted her tears with her shirtsleeve.

“I’m a glimmer?”

“A short time ago, the shop was going into receivership. I was about to take my grandfather to court to have him declared incompetent so I could make the decision to sell it. I needed a glimmer. Just one little glimmer of hope.” She looked up at him, put the flat of her hand on his bare chest, over his heart. “That’s what you are.”

“Oh, baby—”

“But I’m moving, and you have to stay here for Dorothy, and I don’t see how—” The lights blinked yet again. This time they went out. “Oh, no. Now what?”

Peach went to the front door and looked out. “The rest of the neighborhood’s still on. Let’s check the breakers.” He turned on his phone flashlight and moved the beam around the room.