Chapter 4

Sarah stood over the heavy steel mixer, staring down at a bowl of honey sponge. The batter didn't look like a cake base; it looked like thick, weeping paste. Sarah lifted the whisk from the bowl. The batter fell back in heavy ropes instead of ribbons. A thin ring of melted butter had gathered around the edge.

"How warm was the honey-butter mixture when you folded it in?" I asked.

"Warm. Like you showed me."

I touched the bottom of the bowl. "This wasn't warm. It was hot. You melted the foam."

"I followed the card," Sarah said, wiping her palm on her apron. "But we were twenty minutes behind, and Lucas said the first sample tray has to be ready by noon."

Mara stood at the next station, cracking eggs into a steel bowl. "I told her to wait for it to cool," Mara said, her voice tight.

"And I told both of you that the shop's schedule doesn't stop for a temperature check," Lucas said from the doorway. He walked out of his office carrying a worn brown book. He set it on the central prep island and opened it to the honey-sponge page.

Behind him, Sophia trailed, holding a folded white apron over her arm. I caught the embroidery on the chest before she tucked it against her side: SOPHIA BELL.

"Tomorrow is the public tasting for the local brides," Lucas said to Sophia, his tone clipped. "If they ask where the honey cake came from, you need an answer that doesn't sound memorized."

Sophia looked down at the open book. Her fingers hovered over the margin notes—the cramped, precise handwriting of a woman who had spent decades perfecting her craft.

"Do I need the actual book for that?" Sophia asked.

"You need to know what's in the margins," Lucas said. "That's where people believe the story."

"They don't want a story," I said, stepping toward the island. "They want the truth." I stood on the opposite side of the table, staring at the book. "Do you even know who wrote those notes?" I asked Sophia.

Sophia looked at the page, then at me. "Lucas said the shop owned the history of the brand."

"What was her name?" I asked.

Sophia blinked, her fingers tightening on the edge of the leather binding. "Whose?"

"The woman whose handwriting you're looking at."

Sophia went quiet. She looked at the faded ink, the little coffee stain on the corner of the page—then back at me. She didn't have an answer.

"Ruth Walker," I said. "Her name was Ruth. She was my mother."

Sophia looked toward the front window, where her name sat beneath five cakes. "The reel is already under my name," she said.

"Then take it down."

"Five brides already paid for cakes with my name attached to them."

"That doesn't make the book yours."

"No," Sophia said. She looked toward the door, her eyes finding a place to land that wasn't mine. "I spent six years writing captions for bridal planners who signed their own names under every campaign. I styled the tables. I fixed their photos. I answered brides at midnight. No one ever knew I was there."

"So you know what it feels like," I said.

"I know what it feels like to watch someone else stand in front of work I helped sell."

"You didn't help make these cakes."

"No," Sophia said. "But Lucas was the first person who offered to put my name where people could see it."

"On my work."

Sophia looked at the worn book. "I didn't ask whose name had to come off first." Sophia leaned in, her fingers tightening on the edge of the leather binding. "If I walk away now, Lucas goes back into that office and I become the woman who lied on camera."

"You did lie on camera," I said.

Sophia looked at the worn cover. "I know." She folded the apron over the book and lifted them together. The embroidered name SOPHIA BELL faced me.

"Her name was Ruth," I said.

Sophia held my eyes for a moment. Then she followed Lucas into the office.

Behind me, Sarah released the ruined bowl from the mixer base. "Can this be saved?" she asked.

I looked at the butter gathered around the edge. "No," I said. "Throw it out."