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Emily stood at her station, both hands on the counter, and took a slow breath.

One thing at a time. Just keep going.

She reached for the cinnamon to add to the second batch.

She picked it up and tipped it over the bowl.

The lid wasn’t on.

A full jar of cinnamon came down in one brown avalanche, covering the dough completely. Emily stood there, holding the empty jar, and looked at what had been her last chance and felt something go very quiet inside her.

She looked at her station. At the batch of undercooked cookies on the rack. The ruined batch in the bowl.

Her eyes lifted to the clock. One hour left.

She’d have to start over—again.

Emily was standing there, psyching herself up to start over when she heard it.

A high-pitched yowl, followed by barking and thundering paws. Captain had clearly gotten into the kitchen and was chasing Nutmeg.

Chaos erupted.

Nutmeg streaked through the kitchen door, ears flat, tail like a bottle brush, running for his life. Captain barreled through two seconds behind him, ears flying, barking like a crazy pup with his leash trailing behind him.

The leash caught the leg of Emily’s prep table on the way past.

The table lurched.

Emily watched in horror as her table tipped, sending everything crashing to the floor. Eggs cracked across the tile, flour and sugar mixed in, and her glass bowl shattered into glittering pieces at her feet.

Cole was already moving. He stepped out from his station, caught Captain’s trailing leash, and pulled the dog back before he could do any more damage. Captain sat down, tongue out, enormously pleased with himself. Nutmeg was nowhere to be seen.

Emily looked at the floor—the eggs, the flour, the broken glass, her entire morning in pieces—then she looked at Cole, standing there holding his dog’s leash, and every single thing that had gone wrong today funneled into a single point.

Her hands shook. She felt the sting behind her eyes, the dangerous pressure building in her chest, and she was not going to cry—she was not going to cry in the middle of a competition, on a livestream, in her own bakery—but the frustration had nowhere else to go.

“You!” Emily said, rounding on him. “You let him in,” she said, her voice sharp as the glass at her feet. “You let that dog in here on purpose.”

“Emily—”

“Don’t.” The word broke in the middle. She pressed her hand to her forehead, turned away from him, turned back. The kitchen was silent. Everyone was watching. “The oven temperature. The rum. The cinnamon jar. And now this.” She gestured at the floor, at the ruined ingredients, at the entire catastrophic morning. Her voice was climbing, she could hear it climbing, and she couldn’t stop it. “Everything I’ve touched today has fallen apart, and every single time I turn around—” She stopped. Swallowed. “You sabotaged me.”

TWENTY-FOUR

COLE

Saturday, December 19th

The kitchen went absolutely still.

Five contestants at their stations. Three judges, frozen at the table visible through the propped door. A crowd of townsfolk pressed shoulder to shoulder along the walls, half in the kitchen doorway, half spilling into the front of the bakery. Elsie’s phone, still raised, still recording. Emily had just accused him of sabotaging her—of cheating—in the middle of the Christmas Bake-Off, on camera, in front of every person in Maple Falls who mattered.

Every single eye was on him.

He knew this feeling. He’d known it since he was ten years old, standing in a school hallway while a story got told about his family. He’d been here a million times. Already judged, everyone just waiting for him to confess.

He felt the emotions move through him and he let them pass, the way he’d taught himself to all those years ago.