Ruth checked her watch. “She’s usually got the case half-full by now.”
Ida peered through the front window, cupping her hands around her eyes. “I can see a light in the back. Kitchen light.”
Nans was already pulling her keys from her coat pocket. Lexy had given her a spare years ago.
She unlocked the front door and pushed it open. The bell above the door chimed softly, a cheerful sound that felt out of place.
“Lexy?” Nans called.
Nothing.
They moved through the darkened bakery in a tight group, past the empty display cases and the tables waiting for customers.
Nans pushed the swinging kitchen door open and stopped.
The kitchen was wrecked. Flour covered everything — the counter, the floor, the equipment — in a fine white layer that made the room look like something out of a snow globe. The back door hung at an angle, one hinge torn completely from the frame, cold air pouring through the gap. Broken eggshell crunched under Nans’ shoe. A smear of honey trailed across the tile like amber blood.
And Lexy was on the floor.
She lay on her side near the base of the counter. A bruise was spreading across her temple, dark purple against her skin, and there was a small cut near her hairline where she’d hit something sharp on the way down.
Helen was beside her in an instant, two fingers pressed gently to Lexy’s neck. “Pulse is strong.” Her voice was calm, but her face was tight. “Lexy? Sweetheart, can you hear me?”
No response.
Ida was already digging in her enormous patent leather bag that contained, at any given time, enough supplies to sustain a small expedition. She produced a small tin of smelling salts and held it out to Helen.
Ruth stared at her. “You carry smelling salts?”
“Emergency supplies,” Ida said, as though this were the most obvious thing in the world. “Also bandages, a flashlight, three granola bars, and a sewing kit.”
Helen cracked the tin and waved it gently under Lexy’s nose.
Lexy’s face scrunched. She turned her head away, then groaned. Her eyes opened, unfocused, blinking against the kitchen light.
“Lexy.” Nans crouched beside her, her voice warm but steady. “You’re all right. We’re here. Don’t try to sit up yet.”
Lexy’s eyes found Nans’ face and held on like an anchor. “Nans.” Her voice was hoarse, barely a whisper. She winced and lifted a hand to her temple. “My head.”
“I know. You took a fall.” Nans looked at Helen, who gave a small nod —she seems okay, but she needs a doctor. “What happened?”
It came out in pieces, halting, Lexy wincing between sentences. The bag of special Moulin Laurent flour on the back step with no label. The diamonds — loose, mixed into the powder, dozens of them glittering under the kitchen lights. Two men. The big one swept everything off the table. Into a duffel bag. The flour, the diamonds, the bowls, the ingredients.
“The recipe,” Lexy said, and her voice cracked in a way that had nothing to do with her head injury. “Great-grandma Rose’s recipe card. It was on the table. He took everything. Just raked it all in.”
Helen’s hand went to her mouth.
“I tried to grab the bag.” Lexy’s eyes were bright, wet. “I told him I needed the recipe. He shoved me and I hit the counter and then the floor and that’s—” She pressed her palm to her eyes. “That’s all I remember.”
Nans stood slowly. Her expression was the one her friends knew well — the one that looked calm on the surface but had something hard and sharp moving beneath it.
“Ruth, call Jack.”
Ruth already had her phone out. “On it.”
Jack arrived in twelve minutes. He came through the front door fast, his coat half-buttoned, his face drawn tight with concern. He knelt beside Lexy, touched her face gently, checked her eyes, and asked her the same questions Helen had — how many fingers, what day is it, do you feel nauseous.
He called in a forensics team for the back door. He took Lexy’s statement again, slowly, making her repeat the details. Two men. Big one in a leather jacket, thin one in an oversized coat. A black duffel bag. Diamonds in the flour.
