Page 57

“What actually stopped working?” Mara asked.

Karina raised an eyebrow. “Apart from the two fairly important things behind you?”

“I mean everything else. Your mixers work. Your refrigerators work. You can still mix everything here, can’t you?”

Karina glanced around as though she were seeing the kitchen differently now. “Yes. I can prep here. That isn’t the problem.”

“So you don’t need to move your bakery into Gabe’s.” Mara stepped closer to the nearest rack. “You need somewhere to bake what you make.”

Gabe looked at her, then at Karina.

Karina was quiet for a moment. “That’s still a lot of trays going back and forth.”

“It is,” Mara said. “But it’s a smaller problem than moving your whole operation. Figure out what has to be baked first, what can wait, and what actually needs to go to Mountain View tonight. Tomorrow you can keep doing the prep work you normally do here.”

Evan propped himself against the counter. “And I can stay out of your way while I pull these apart again in the morning.”

“You say that as though you’ve ever been capable of staying out of the way,” Karina said.

“I’m extremely unobtrusive,” Evan said defensively. “It’s a skill I’ve honed for years.”

Gabe snorted. The exchange was small, but it was the first time since they had arrived that Karina sounded remotely like the woman Mara had met at Mountain View.

She looked at Gabe again. “Are you really sure about this?”

“Yes.”

“You haven’t even worked out how we’re going to fit everything through your ovens.”

“We’ll work that out.”

Karina opened her mouth, but Gabe shook his head. “Don’t talk yourself out of accepting help because we haven’t solved every problem yet.”

She looked at him. Then she let out a long breath. “All right.”

Gabe nodded as though that settled it. And apparently, with him, it did.

The next half hour was less frantic than Mara had expected. Once Karina stopped trying to solve the entire fundraiser bake at once, the decisions became practical. A couple of racks needed to go tonight. Some trays. Carriers for transporting finished pastries back again. The rest could stay exactly where it was until morning.

Gabe and Evan started moving the heavier things toward the back door while Karina checked what she would need first. Mara found herself beside her at one of the counters, matching labels to the trays Karina had already prepared.

“I hate this,” Karina said quietly.

“The ovens?”

“Needing everybody.”

Mara looked at her.

Karina gave a small shrug. “I’m usually the person people call. I bring food. I cover things. I say yes before I’ve worked out where I’m going to find the time.” She slid another tray into place. “It feels different when you’re the one standing here with nothing working.”

Mara knew that feeling better than she’d have liked. “Gabe said you wouldn’t have called unless you’d already tried everything you could think of.”

Karina glanced toward him. He and Evan were maneuvering a rack through the doorway, arguing mildly about which one of them was making it harder. “He knows me too well.”

“I think that’s probably why he came.”

Karina smiled faintly. “People always come here when something goes wrong. Bear Creek, Bear Bluff, it doesn’t really matter. Someone hears about it and suddenly there are trucks in the parking lot and people asking what needs doing.” Her gaze dropped to the tray in front of her. “I just prefer being one of the people who comes.”