Lexy stood perfectly still, a diamond between her flour-dusted fingers, her mind trying very hard to make sense of what she was seeing and failing completely.
Behind her, the back door exploded inward.
CHAPTER TWO
Lexy spun around.
The door was hanging off its hinges. Cold air rushed into the kitchen, and the flour on the counter stirred in the draft, tiny white particles spinning in the light.
Two men filled the doorway.
The first was built like a refrigerator — wide shoulders, thick neck, a leather jacket that looked like it had been through things it didn’t want to talk about. His head was shaved close, and his jaw was the kind that suggested he’d been hit in it many times and hadn’t minded much. He carried a large black duffel bag in one hand, the strap wrapped around his fist like a leash.
The second man was his opposite — thin, narrow-shouldered, swimming in an overcoat two sizes too big. He had quick, darting eyes that moved around the kitchen like a bird checking for predators. His hands were shoved in his pockets, and he had the general posture of someone who wished he were somewhere else.
They didn’t knock. They didn’t announce themselves. They just stepped into Lexy’s kitchen like they owned it.
Lexy’s hand closed around the diamond she was holding. Her other hand gripped the edge of the prep table. Her brain was stillthree steps behind — still trying to processdiamonds in the flourwhen it needed to be processingtwo strange men in my kitchen at four in the morning.
The big one’s eyes swept the room and landed on the prep table — the open flour bag, the mixing bowl full of glittering powder, and the stone pinched between Lexy’s flour-dusted fingers. His expression didn’t change. He just said, “Give it.”
Lexy’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. Her hand tightened on the diamond.
The big man stepped forward, his boots leaving wet prints on the tile. “The flour. All of it. Now.”
“I don’t — who are you? You can’t just—” Lexy’s voice came out higher than she wanted it to.
He didn’t wait for her to finish. He moved fast for a man his size — three long strides to the prep table, and then his arm swept across the surface like a wrecking ball. Everything went into the duffel in one brutal motion. The flour bag, trailing a white cloud. The diamonds. The mixing bowl. The measuring cups, the vanilla extract, the jar of honey. The butter dish. The eggs, which cracked and oozed immediately.
And the recipe card.
Rose’s recipe card. It slid off the table with everything else and disappeared into the duffel bag like it was nothing. Like it was junk.
Something broke open in Lexy’s chest. Not fear — fury.
“Wait!” She lunged for the bag, grabbing at the strap. “I need that recipe — you can’t take that, please, it’s my great-grandmother’s?—”
The big man turned. He didn’t swing at her. He didn’t need to. He put one hand flat against her shoulder while the other plucked the diamond out of her hand. Then, he shoved.
The force of it sent her backward and sideways. Her hip caught the edge of the counter — a bright, hot flare of pain — and then her feet were gone, out from under her, and she was falling.
The ceiling spun. The fluorescent lights streaked into white lines. She had time to thinkthe recipeand then the back of her head hit the tile floor and the world cracked open like an egg.
She thought she heard a car engine. She thought she heard the waterfall.
She thought about the recipe card — Rose’s handwriting, the lavender measurements in fading ink — somewhere in that bag, crumpled between a broken jar of honey and a bunch of stolen diamonds, disappearing down a road she couldn’t see.
Then everything went dark.
CHAPTER THREE
Nans knewsomething was wrong before they reached the door.
The Cup and Cake opened at eight, but Lexy usually had the lights on, the coffee brewing, and something warm coming out of the ovens well before then.
Today the front of the bakery was dark. No lights in the display cases. No warm glow from the kitchen reaching the front windows. The “Closed” sign was still turned outward. Something was wrong.
“That’s odd,” Helen said quietly, pulling her coat tighter against the morning chill.
