Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
DAHLIA
By noon, they had a complete picture.
It wasn’t pretty.
“Two weeks of normal operation.” Cal studied his phone, scrolling through the spreadsheet he’d built. “Maybe three if you cut the honey-dependent products to half your usual output. After that, you’re looking at a fundamental shift in your business model.”
“You mean I become a regular bakery.”
“I mean, you lose your competitive advantage.” He looked up from the phone, meeting her stare directly.
“But that’s assuming we can’t find an alternative source.
The Ursa apiaries are still operating—Magnus can’t shut those down without direct confrontation with my sleuth.
If I can convince the Torres family to resume supply, or find another apiary willing to resist the pressure. ..”
“You think you can do that?”
“I have to try.” A fierce light entered his features—a glimpse of the alpha underneath the corporate polish. “Magnus doesn’t get to win. Not like this. Not by strangling businesses into submission.”
The conviction in his voice caught her off guard. This wasn’t corporate calculation. This was personal. Protective. The fury that came from somewhere deeper than business strategy.
Dahlia busied herself with organizing the paperwork they’d scattered across her workbench.
She needed to do something with her hands.
Needed to not look at him too closely, because looking at him made her think about touching him, and thinking about touching him made her think about things she had no business thinking about.
Her hand brushed a stack of papers she’d pulled from her desk and hadn’t meant to include in the inventory.
The cream-colored envelope slid out from between recipe cards, landing face-up on the workbench.
Patisserie Lumière. Paris, France.
Dahlia’s heart stopped.
She reached for it, but Cal was faster. His hand closed over the envelope, brow furrowing as he read the return address.
“What’s this?”
“Nothing.” She grabbed for it. He held it out of reach, not maliciously, but with genuine curiosity. “It’s nothing. Private correspondence.”
“Patisserie Lumière.” He turned the envelope over, examining the embossed seal. “I know that name. It’s one of the most prestigious pastry schools in Europe. Why are they writing to you?”
Dahlia stopped reaching. The fight drained out of her, replaced by a weariness she felt in her chest. She didn’t have the energy to hide anymore.
“They offered me a residency.” She sighed. “Third time. The first was my grandmother’s doing—she arranged it before she died. Wanted me to have the chance she never did.”
Cal’s brow furrowed deeper. “A residency. At Patisserie Lumière.”
“Six months in Paris. Study under the masters. Learn techniques I’d never access otherwise.” The words tumbled out, bitter and longing in equal measure.
“When’s the deadline?”
“Two months.”
Cal set the envelope down on the workbench. His features had shifted—less curiosity now, more intensity. Concern. Understanding, maybe.
“Are you going?”
“No.” The word came out automatically. Practiced. The answer she’d been giving herself for months. “I can’t. The bakery needs me.”
“That’s the worst reason I’ve ever heard to give up a dream.”
Dahlia went still.
Cal’s voice was quiet. Direct. Not judging—observing.
The tone of a man stating facts, however uncomfortable.
“You’ve been handed an opportunity most people would kill for.
A chance to learn from the best, to grow, to become more than what you are now.
And you’re turning it down because other people need you? ”
“They do need me.”
The wall she’d built so carefully—brick by careful brick over years of putting everyone else first, years of smiling and nodding and making everything easier for everyone around her—splintered.
And what came out wasn’t soft. Wasn’t sweet. Wasn’t the nurturing Dahlia everyone expected.
“That’s rich.” Her voice turned sharp, cutting. The edge she’d buried so deep even she’d forgotten it existed. “Coming from a man who hasn’t taken a vacation in—what, a decade? Longer?”
Cal’s expression shuttered. But he didn’t interrupt. Didn’t defend himself.
“Don’t lecture me about giving up dreams when you’ve been using work as an excuse to avoid living.
” Dahlia stepped closer, riding the wave of anger that felt unfamiliar and liberating and terrifying all at once.
“Don’t tell me I’m sacrificing too much when you’ve sacrificed everything—rest, community, your bear, your family—to prove you’re not your father. ”
The words hit their mark. She could see it in the way his shoulders stiffened, the way his hands curled at his sides. In the flash of pain that crossed his features before he locked it down.
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know you showed up in this town looking half-dead from exhaustion. I know your bear went dormant because you’ve been ignoring every instinct that told you to slow down.
I know you came back here because you had no choice, and you’re planning to leave the moment you’ve ‘fixed’ things because staying feels like failure.
” She held his stare, refusing to flinch.
“I see people, Callum. It’s what I do. And I see you. ”
Silence crashed between them.
Cal stared at her. Really stared, as if seeing her for the first time. The soft baker who handed out comfort pastries and listened to everyone’s problems. The woman who smiled and nodded and made everything easy peasy.
And underneath all that—the sharp edge. The steel she’d buried so deeply, even she’d forgotten it was there.
“You’re right.”
Dahlia blinked. “What?”
“You’re right.” He dragged his fingers through his hair, disheveling it further. “I’m a hypocrite. I’ve been running for over a decade, and I have no business telling you how to live your life.”
She hadn’t expected him to admit it. Had braced herself for defense, for counterattack, for the argument that left both parties wounded and nothing resolved.
Instead, he agreed.
“But.” Cal’s voice softened. Vulnerability flickered in those dark eyes—the same exhaustion she’d seen the first day, but stripped now of its defenses.
“That doesn’t mean I’m wrong about Paris.
You want to go. I can see how you look at that envelope.
You want it so badly the longing is written all over you, and you’re letting everyone else’s needs be the excuse you use to deny yourself. ”
Dahlia’s throat tightened. “It doesn’t matter what I want.”
“It should.” He picked up the envelope. Pressed it into her hands, his fingers brushing hers in the process.
That spark again. That heat that had nothing to do with anger and everything to do with a pull she wasn’t ready to name. His skin against hers. His breath, closer than it should be. The scent of him filling her lungs.
Neither of them pulled away.
“Think about it.” His voice was low. Rough. The voice of a man holding himself back. “Please.”
Then he stepped back. Grabbed his phone from the workbench. Headed for the door with the rigid posture of someone forcing themselves to walk when they wanted to stay.
“Where are you going?”
“To talk to the Torres family.” He paused at the door, not looking back. “Someone has to fix this. Might as well be the hypocrite who’s already here.”
He hesitated. Then, without turning, he said, “One more thing. Wyatt has a theory about the honey supply—that it may have been tampered with. He’s still investigating. Until we know more, don’t use the Torres stock you have left. Any of it.”
The bell above the front door chimed as he left.
Dahlia stood alone in her kitchen, holding the Paris letter, still feeling the echo of his touch on her fingers. Still feeling the heat of him, the pull toward him that she couldn’t explain and couldn’t ignore.
Marzipan jumped onto the workbench. The cat’s tail curled around her paws, gaze bright with feline assessment.
That was unexpected.
“Which part?” Dahlia’s voice sounded strange to her own ears. Shaky. Raw.
You. Being sharp. Showing teeth. Marzipan’s mental voice held approval. I didn’t know you still had those.
“Neither did I.”
She looked down at the envelope in her hands. Cream-colored paper, slightly crumpled now from being gripped too tightly. Her grandmother’s dream, handed to her across time and death and sixteen years of saying not yet, not now, not me.
You want it so badly, the longing is written all over you.
Damn him for seeing that. Damn him for saying it out loud.
Damn him for making her feel things she’d spent years trying not to feel.
He filled my water bowl. Marzipan’s observation came seemingly out of nowhere.
“I noticed.”
Without being asked. Without making a show of it. Noticed it was empty and fixed it. The cat’s tail swished. That’s not nothing.
Dahlia sank onto the stool by her workbench. Her legs didn’t want to hold her anymore. Too much emotion, too much revelation, too much everything packed into a single morning.
“He’s infuriating.”
Yes.
“He’s a hypocrite who lectures about following dreams while running from his own life.”
Also yes.
“He’s going to leave soon and go back to Seattle and forget any of this happened.”
Marzipan was silent for a moment. Then: Are you trying to convince me? Or yourself?
Dahlia didn’t answer. Because the truth was, she didn’t know anymore.
What she knew was this: Callum Ursa had walked into her life four days ago and managed to see past every mask she wore. Had looked at her soft exterior and found the sharp underneath. Had challenged her, infuriated her, made her feel things she’d convinced herself she didn’t have room for.
And now he was out there, fighting her battles, trying to save her business from a threat that wasn’t even really about her.
Sitting here, still feeling the heat where Cal’s fingers had touched hers, she was starting to realize she might want a different sensation too.
Something complicated. Something terrifying. Something that had broad shoulders and dark eyes and a bear that had gone quiet the moment it scented her.
Trouble. Marzipan’s mental voice carried an edge of sympathy. I told you he was trouble.
“Yeah.” Dahlia tucked the Paris letter back into its envelope. Pressed it against her heart. “You did.”
But trouble, she was beginning to think, might be exactly what she needed.
The bell above the front door chimed. Another customer. Another demand on her time and energy and carefully constructed smile.
Dahlia stood. Smoothed her apron. Tucked the envelope safely in her pocket this time, close to her heart where it belonged.
And went back to work, carrying Cal’s words with her. The memory of his touch. The question he’d asked that she was finally, after thirty-eight years, learning how to answer.
What do you need?
She was starting, finally, to figure that out.