Chapter 17
The Bad-Day Brownies tasted like dirt. Not actual dirt.
Adeline hadn’t made that mistake since she was fourteen and accidentally channeled frustration instead of comfort into a batch.
But these were close. She’d taken one bite and spit it into the trash.
Then she’d tried a Time-Twirl cinnamon roll and waited for the rush of a happy memory.
Nothing came. She felt nothing. Just sugar and cinnamon and the hollow absence of magic.
She’d baked three batches since four-thirty this morning. All of them wrong. Luckily, she still had all the pastries left over from her frantic baking yesterday after she’d had lunch with her grandmother.
“Adeline.” Emory strolled into the bakery’s kitchen holding a croissant at arm’s length—big butter tears rolling down its flaky sides. “Your pastry is literally crying butter tears. We need to talk.”
“I know.” Adeline pressed her palms against the counter. “I know. I know.”
Emory set the weeping croissant on the counter and put her hands on Adeline’s shoulders. “Adeline. Your magic is off. Your customers can taste it. Penny Barlow tried a Cocoa-Courage Truffle and said it made her feel like hiding under a blanket.”
“That’s the opposite of courage, Adeline,” Princess Muffin Top observed. “That’s cowardice in chocolate form. Poor girl has probably been set back five years.”
Adeline groaned. She knew what was happening. Kitchen magic was tied to intent and emotion. When she was happy, the magic flowed. When she was focused, the baked goods practically hummed with purpose. But when she was hurting—really, deeply hurting—the magic went sideways.
And right now, everything inside her felt broken.
She hadn’t slept a wink last night. She’d driven home from the station and just sat in the Beetle Bus in her driveway for twenty minutes, staring at the steering wheel.
Princess Muffin Top had sat beside her in uncharacteristic silence.
When they’d finally gone inside, Adeline had crawled into bed fully dressed and stared at the ceiling until dawn.
All she could think about was the emotional pull she’d felt the entire day from her fight with Grandmother Lavinia to her confrontation with Mrs. Abernathy to her blowout with Mason.
And she couldn’t help but hear his words on repeat in her head as he callously dismissed her. “Go back to your bakery, Adeline. I’ll handle the law side of things from here.”
Dismissed and overlooked…just like she’d been so many times in her life.
“Go back to your bakery, Adeline. I’ll handle the law side of things from here.”
The words played on a loop in her head, over and over.
They’d been so dismissive and hurtful coming from him.
Like she was just some civilian interfering with police business, not the woman he’d kissed in the moonlight two nights ago.
He’d spoken to her like she was a problem to be managed, not a person to be heard.
“Go back to your bakery, Adeline. I’ll handle the law side of things from here.”
She’d done the right thing. She knew she had, and she’d stand by her decision. She’d figured out who the vandal was, and once she’d confirmed it, she’d brought Mrs. Abernathy straight to him. She hadn’t tried to cover it up. She’d chosen honesty over coverup, and he’d punished her for it.
The overhead bell chimed, and Adeline looked up to see who’d entered her empty bakery—even Mr. Harwick and Herschel hadn’t stayed long today.
She knew word was out on the street to stay away.
She tried to school her face from showing disappointment when one of her regulars walked in.
She shouldn’t be looking for him. If he wanted to see her, he knew where she worked.
She strode into the bakery and smiled at the married fairy couple who came in every Monday for Zest-for-Life scones.
Why hadn’t she made those yesterday instead of early this morning?
She held her breath as they took the scones and bit into them.
They made it three steps before the wife turned around.
“Is something...off today, Adeline?” she asked.
“We’re having a minor magical adjustment,” Emory said smoothly as she steered the couple toward her coffee side of the store. “Can I interest you in a Honey-Lavender Latte? Absolutely no kitchen magic involved. Just good coffee and excellent vibes.”
The couple followed Emory through the archway, glancing back at Adeline with the kind of concern and sympathy people usually reserved for someone who’d just received bad news. Which, she supposed, she had.
The bell chimed again. And again Adeline looked up.
It was Granny Edna dressed in purple pants and a floral shirt. The elderly fairy crossed the bakery in four steps and pulled Adeline into a bear hug that smelled like Werther’s Originals and lavender hand cream.
“Oh, sweetling,” Granny Edna murmured. “I heard.”
“About Mrs. Abernathy?” Adeline’s voice came out smaller than she’d intended.
“About everything.” Granny Edna pulled back and cupped Adeline’s face in both hands.
“Mrs. Abernathy called me from the station last night. She’s fine.
Gerald—you know, your grandmother’s butler—apparently showed up at nine o’clock last night with a blanket, a three-course meal, and a stern lecture for the chief about loyalty and love. Can you believe that?”
Despite everything, Adeline almost laughed. “Grandmother Lavinia sent Gerald?”
“She did. Your grandmother called Beulah at home and demanded to know the conditions of the holding cell.” Granny Edna’s eyes twinkled. “Your grandmother may have her faults, sweetheart, but she’s not about to let a ninety-seven-year-old witch go hungry and be cold in a jail cell. Not in her town.”
“That’s the most Grandmother Lavinia thing I’ve ever heard,” Princess Muffin Top said from her bed. “What would be even better is if she’d have sent a nail file in the dessert.”
Granny Edna pressed a Werther’s Original into Adeline’s palm and closed her fingers around it.
“Now, tell me what’s really wrong. And don’t say it’s Mrs. Abernathy because I can see it in your pastries, child.
” She glanced at the weeping croissant Emory had brought with her from the kitchen now sitting on her counter and leaned in closer.
“That croissant is openly weeping, dear.”
Laughing shakily, Adeline unwrapped the candy and shoved it into her mouth. The butterscotch dissolved slowly on her tongue. “I think I really liked him, Granny Edna.”
The old fairy’s face softened. “Liked who? Chief Wolfe?”
Adeline nodded. “I told him the truth about Mrs. Abernathy. And he...” She swallowed past the lump in her throat.
“He told me to go back to my bakery. Like I was just some...some civilian getting in his way.” Tears filled her eyes.
“And it hurt to be dismissed by him. Just like it hurts when Grandmother Lavinia does it.” She swiped quickly at the tears before they could fall.
“Why am I letting him get to me? He obviously didn’t care about me.
Or like me like I liked him, even though he kissed me.
Once he thought I’d deceived him, he didn’t listen to reason. He just dismissed me.”
Granny Edna led her to a table near the window.
“Let me tell you something about wolves, Adeline. Wolves and gargoyles are alike in that they have this fierce need to protect. When a wolf lets you into his or her life, it’s not casual.
It’s not something they do lightly. And with your wolf specifically, I’d say if he feels the trust has been broken—even if it hasn’t—it will take a minute to sort through.
Wolves feel everything big. The love is big, the loyalty is big, and the hurt is big. ”
“So what do I do?”
“Nothing, today. Today you just let yourself feel what you feel. You let your magic be messy. You eat candy and you sit with your best friend and your loquacious cat, and you don’t try to fix anything.” She patted Adeline’s hand. “Tomorrow, you bake. By then, you should feel better.”
“What if the magic doesn’t come back?”
Granny Edna smiled. “It will. It always does. Your magic isn’t broken, sweetheart.
Your heart is just figuring out where to put everything.
And hearts are messy. Even kitchen witch’s hearts.
” Granny Edna stood, leaned over and hugged her again and pressed another candy into her hand before heading for the door.
She paused at the threshold. “One more thing, Adeline.”
“Yes?”
“I saw the way that wolf looks at you.” She smiled. “That’s not a man who’s going to stay distant for long. That’s a man who’s trying to figure out how to say he’s sorry.” She opened the door. “Give him time.”
The door closed behind her, and the bakery was quiet except for the distant clatter of dishes and the occasional laughter from Emory’s side of the building.
She went to stand behind the counter and looked at the display cases.
Half empty. Everything she’d made yesterday when her magic was working was gone.
Now there were just brownies she couldn’t sell.
Scones that didn’t soothe. Cinnamon rolls that didn’t trigger memories.
She glanced at the croissant that had wept real butter tears on the counter and was now just a sad, soggy lump of pastry.
She picked up the croissant and held it in her palm. “I know just how you feel.”
Princess Muffin Top stretched and sauntered over to her, pressing her warm, furry side against Adeline’s legs. “Granny Edna’s right. Your magic isn’t broken. And neither are you.”
Adeline looked down at her cat. “Since when did you become a motivational speaker?”
“Since you started making brownies that taste like cardboard and crushed dreams. Someone has to intervene.” Princess Muffin Top sniffed. “Now throw that croissant away. It’s embarrassing both of us.”
Adeline laughed. It was small and watery, but it was a genuine laugh. She tossed the croissant in the trash and headed to the archway that separated her store from Emory’s. She had a sudden craving for a hot chai.