Bo didn’t listen any longer. He raced around the desk to grab his coat and hat, and then jogged through the office. “Tell Winter I’ll be back,” he shouted at the receptionist and jogged to the Buick.

A couple of miles. She’d be there until two thirty, at least. He could make it if he hurried.

He sped out of the warehouse and onto the Embarcadero, cutting down Folsom. When traffic slowed, he honked his horn and shouted at a delivery truck, whose driver flashed him a middle finger, which Bo returned with gusto. He just wanted to get there. So badly, in fact, that as he waited for a police car to help a stalled car blocking the road, he almost considered abandoning his car and running the rest of the way.

By the time he finally made it to Market Street and found a parking space, it was 2:45 P.M.

Please don’t let her be gone. He raced down the sidewalk, dodging pedestrians, and came to a sudden stop in front of the department store entrance.

There she was.

Blond curls. Foxlike eyes. Stubborn chin. Devious smile. Scent of roses.

His.

He was the scholar, and she was the girl running up the road to meet him, and he caught her and crushed her in his arms, kissing her hair and face and mouth, holding on as tight as he could, uncaring what anyone thought about the spectacle.

You are mine, he told her with his body. Mine, and I will never let you go.

EPILOGUE

TEN YEARS LATER, CHINESE NEW YEAR, FEBRUARY 1939

“There it is!” Astrid shouted, leaning over the balcony of Aida’s spiritualism storefront on Grant Avenue, where thousands of celebrants thronged the sidewalks beneath painted banners and red lanterns to watch the annual parade in Chinatown.

It was the largest Chinese New Year’s celebration in years—aided by an organized effort in Chinatowns across the nation to raise money for the war in China—and the San Francisco police projected that more than a hundred thousand people would stand along the parade route to watch acrobats, lion dancers, and hundreds of Chinatown’s residents festively clad in traditional attire. Astrid’s family had gathered here in the apartment over Aida’s shop every year, but this was the first time they’d done more than just watch the parade.

“Daddy! It’s your float!” Astrid’s daughter said. May had just turned eight, and was unusually tall for a girl. Unusually pretty, too. She stood on the balcony’s bottom rail and peered over the top, grinning Astrid’s grin—a smile that went all the way up to eyes that looked just like her father’s.

And the man who’d given her those eyes now stood next to her, hoisting their five-year-old son in his arms. “Look, Ty,” Bo said. “Do you see it?”

Pulled by a truck, the float trailer was covered in ferns and flowers that spelled out MAGNUSSON AND YEUNG FISH COMPANY around the sides. And in the center was a giant papier-mâché representation of the company logo: a nine-tailed golden fox with a fish in its mouth. The tails moved up and down on sticks held by company employees, who walked behind the trailer.

“It looks good,” Winter said over Bo’s shoulder.

“Damn near majestic,” Lowe agreed, slinging his arm around Hadley as the children whooped and cheered around him—a lot of children. In addition to Astrid and Bo’s two, Winter and Aida had four, Stella was in her teens now, and Dr. Moon and his wife, Le-Ann’s, two girls were here, too. All of them were crammed into the small space, bobbing and jumping to see over the railing. Astrid held a Brownie camera above all the bouncing heads to snap a good photograph.

“All right, I took five shots,” she shouted as the giant fox slipped farther down the street and a new float took its place. “Hopefully one of them won’t be blurry.”

“Can we have our red envelopes now?” May asked, tugging on her dress.

A traditional Chinese New Year’s present. The red envelopes—red for luck—held money. Bo and Astrid gave them out to the entire Magnusson clan every year. Red envelopes for their Chinese side, and semla cream buns on Shrove Tuesday for their Swedish side—made by Greta and Lena.

“No envelopes until the parade’s over,” she told May.

Astrid hadn’t been able to catch her breath. She’d come straight from a meeting at the radio station that morning, but the parade route had blocked off the street and parking was a nightmare, forcing her to walk several blocks from their apartment to get here on time. And only barely. Now she pulled May closer and grinned at her husband.

“The float looked wonderful,” she said loudly.

He pointed to his ear and grinned back, but there was a question behind his eyes. She knew why, but they hadn’t been able to talk privately yet. And as she leaned over May’s head to kiss her son’s cheek, making him squirm with delight, Bo wrapped a hand around the back of her neck and spoke into her ear. “Downstairs.”

She nodded. “Stay here with your cousins,” she told May as Aida held out her hands for Ty.

“Auntie will hold you so you can see better,” she told him, and he didn’t hesitate to jump into her arms.

Astrid mouthed thank you to Aida and handed the camera to Stella before Bo grabbed her hand to lead her out of the family gathering.

Strains of music from an approaching marching band floated over the roar of the crowd as they descended the stairs into Aida’s shop. It was much quieter here. The intense punch of the parade’s din was slightly muffled by the locked door, and afternoon sun silhouetted the bodies of revelers pressing against the windows through the shades.