Chapter Seventeen
When the phone rang, Elliott was elbow-deep in a batch of brioche dough, the kind that required precisely timed folds and absolutely no interruptions.
But when Milly's name flashed on her screen, she wiped one hand on her apron and answered nevertheless, still working the butter into the dough with her other hand.
"Milly. You're up early. I thought you were supposed to be retired." She swallowed down the stab of guilt she felt at still not having visited.
"Old people don't sleep, you know. It's one of the great injustices of aging.
" Milly's voice was warm but thinner than Elliott remembered.
"All those mornings of wishing for just five more minutes in bed, and now I’m awake with the birds anyway.
Just thought I'd check in. See how my favorite grump is doing. "
"I'm not grumpy. I'm focused."
"You've been grumpy since you were seventeen and showed up at my door looking like a drowned cat with an attitude problem." Milly coughed, a wet, rattling sound that made Elliott's hands still on the dough.
"That cough sounds bad."
"It's nothing. Just a tickle. The heating in this place is dreadful, you know. Dries everything out." Another cough. "I'm fine, love. Stop fussing."
"I'm not fussing."
"You're fussing. I can hear it in your voice." Milly paused. "You should come and visit, you know. It's been weeks. I'm starting to think you've forgotten where I live." Trust Milly not to tiptoe around matters.
Elliott's stomach tightened. The thought of seeing Milly there, not here, not with sleeves rolled up to her elbows and flour on her face… "I've been busy," she said. "The bakery, the cookbook…"
"The pretty blonde you're pretending to date?"
"Shay told you about that?"
"Shay tells me everything. It's very entertaining." Milly's voice softened. "I'm not going anywhere, Elliott. You can come and see me. I promise I won't look too different."
That was exactly what Elliott was afraid of. Not seeing the Milly that she knew. "I'll come soon," Elliott said. "I promise."
"Mmm." Milly didn't sound convinced. "How's the cookbook coming?"
"Good. Nearly done."
"And the new owner? Julia? Shay says she's hopeless in the kitchen but very pretty."
"Shay needs to stop giving you reports on my life."
"Shay is a wonderful girl and I adore her updates." Another cough, longer this time. "Right, I should let you go. It’s just about brioche making time, I think, and you won’t want to mess up the folds."
"Milly…"
"I'm fine, love. Really. Just old." Her voice went gentle. "Take care of yourself. And visit soon. Before I forget what you look like."
The line went dead.
Elliott stood there for a long moment, phone pressed to her ear, listening to silence. Then she set it down and turned back to her dough with hands that weren't quite steady.
THE DAY WENT badly from there.
Elliott over-proofed her croissants, something that hadn't happened since she was nineteen. She burned a batch of scones. She dropped an entire tray of perfectly piped éclairs and had to start over.
And Julia noticed, because Julia noticed everything.
"Are you alright?" Julia asked at around noon, when Elliott emerged from the kitchen looking like she'd lost a fight with a bag of flour.
"Fine."
"You don't look fine. You look like you want to murder someone. More than usual, I mean."
"I said I'm fine."
Julia's face did something acrobatic, fleeting between hurt, then understanding, then careful neutrality. "Okay. Well, if you want to talk…"
"I don't."
"Right. Of course." Julia turned back to her customer, her smile snapping into place like a mask.
Elliott retreated to the kitchen and tried not to feel guilty about the flash of hurt she'd seen in Julia's eyes.
She didn't want to talk. Talking meant explaining, and explaining meant admitting that she was scared.
Scared of Milly getting older. Scared of losing the one person who'd believed in her when no one else had.
The afternoon batch of bread came out dense and heavy. Elliott stared at it like it had personally betrayed her. Which it had. Bastard bread.
"Wow," Tara said, peering over her shoulder. "That's… not great."
"Thank you for your insightful commentary."
"Just saying. You're usually scary good at this."
Elliott took a deep breath. "It's nothing. Just an off day."
"Sure." Tara didn't look convinced. "I'll, um… go help Julia."
The kitchen door swung shut, and Elliott was alone with her failed bread and her spiraling thoughts.
THE BELL ABOVE the door chimed at half past five, and Elliott knew before she even looked that it would be Gabby Richardson.
She appeared at the worst possible moments, like a particularly well-dressed harbinger of doom. Today she came in wearing a burgundy coat, her dark hair immaculate, her smile sharp enough to wound.
"Darling!" Gabby's voice carried through the shop. "I was in the neighborhood."
As usual. Elliott was beginning to suspect she'd moved into a tent on the high street. And, of course, it was no coincidence that Jamie was just opening up next door for the evening.
Through the kitchen doorway, Elliott could see Julia's shoulders go rigid. Poor woman. Having Gabby Richardson as a mother must be like living with a judgmental tornado.
"Mum!" Julia's voice was bright and false. "What a lovely surprise."
Elliott steeled herself and stepped out of the kitchen. Time to perform.
Gabby's eyes found her immediately. "Elliott. Wonderful. I was hoping to catch you both."
"Mrs. Richardson." Elliott moved to Julia's side and slid an arm around her waist. Julia leaned into her automatically now, which was either good acting or… something else that Elliott absolutely wasn’t going to examine too closely.
"Gabby, please. We're practically family." The words dripped with implications. She looked Elliott up and down. "You know, we really should spend a little time together, you and I. Get to know each other better. I've been meaning to have a proper chat with you, Elliott. About your background."
Elliott's stomach dropped. "My background?"
"Your training. Your experience." Gabby's smile didn't waver. "I like to know who my daughter is involved with. Professionally speaking, of course."
"Of course."
"So." Gabby leaned on the counter like she was settling in for a long interrogation. "Where did you train? Le Cordon Bleu? The Culinary Institute? I hear the pastry program at…"
"Elliott doesn’t need to provide you with her CV," Julia said.
Both Elliott and Gabby turned to stare at her.
Julia's chin lifted. "She works for me. I’m the boss here, the only person she needs to report to is me."
Gabby's eyebrows rose. "You?"
"Yes." Julia's voice was firm in a way Elliott had never heard before. "Me."
Elliott couldn't breathe. Julia, who flinched at her mother's every word, who apologized for existing, who made herself small to avoid taking up space, that Julia was standing here defending Elliott like a mother bear one of her cubs.
Gabby's expression flickered. Surprise, maybe. Or reassessment.
"Well," she said after a moment. "That's certainly… one way of looking at things."
"It's true." Julia's arm tightened around Elliott's waist. "Elliott works for me."
The door chimed again. Jamie appeared, took one look at the scene, and immediately grasped the situation.
"Gabby!" His smile was warm and welcoming and absolutely calculated to defuse tension. "I was just opening up next door and thought I saw you through the window. Perfect timing, I've been wanting to show you the new tasting menu. Get your professional opinion."
Gabby's attention shifted like a weather vane catching a new wind. "A tasting menu?"
"Seven courses. Very experimental. I'd value your input." Jamie held the door open. "Shall we?"
"Well." Gabby smoothed her coat and graced him with a seductive smile. "I suppose I could spare an hour. For professional purposes." She turned back to Julia. "We'll continue this conversation later, darling."
"Of course, Mum."
Gabby swept out, Jamie shooting them a conspiratorial wink over his shoulder before the door closed behind them.
Silence.
Elliott realized she was still holding Julia. Still pressed against her side, arm around her waist, close enough to feel her blood pulsing through her veins. "You didn't have to do that," she said quietly.
"Do what?"
"Defend me. To her." Elliott pulled away, needing the distance to think clearly. "She's your mother. I know how hard it is for you to…"
"She was wrong." Julia's voice was simple. Certain. "You don’t owe her explanations. She’s just trying to make trouble."
Elliott's chest did something funny. Something that felt like walls cracking, like light getting in and touching places it wasn’t supposed to touch. "That's…" She cleared her throat. "Thank you."
"You're welcome." Julia smiled, and it reached her eyes in a way that made Elliott's heart do inconvenient things. "Partners, remember? That's what we do."
The back door banged open, and Tara appeared, looking annoyed.
"So I was taking out the rubbish," she said, "and guess who I found poking around our bins?"
"Please don't say Candice," Julia groaned.
"Candice." Tara crossed her arms. "She was going through our recycling like she was looking for evidence. God knows what."
Elliott's jaw tightened. "What did she say?"
"That she was looking for her cat. Which is a lie, because everyone knows Candice doesn't have a cat. She has a small angry dog called Mr. Whiskers, which is a very stupid name for a dog."
"She's digging," Elliott said. "Looking for proof that something's off."
"But proof of what?" Julia asked. "We're running a legitimate bakery. I mean, you're doing all the baking, but that's not illegal. Lots of bakeries have head bakers."
"She doesn't know about our arrangement," Elliott said slowly. "Not the full details. But she suspects something."
They stood there in the empty shop, the evening light fading through the windows, and Elliott felt the precariousness of everything they'd built. The fake relationship. The business arrangement. The fragile peace they'd found with each other.
One wrong move and it could all come crashing down.
"We need to be more careful," she said finally. "Both of us."
Julia nodded. "Agreed."
Tara looked between them. "You two are weird. Just so you know."
"Thank you, Tara. Very helpful."
"I try." She grabbed her bag. "I'm off. Try not to get exposed as frauds while I'm gone."
The door swung shut behind her.
Elliott turned to Julia. "I should…"
"Finish up in the kitchen. I know." Julia's smile was soft. "Go. I'll close up out here."
Elliott retreated to the kitchen, but she paused at the door and looked back.
Julia was straightening display cases on the counter, humming something under her breath, completely unaware she was being watched.
The light caught her hair, turning it golden.
She looked… comfortable. Like she belonged here, in this bakery that wasn't really hers, in this life that wasn't supposed to be permanent.
Maybe Shay was right, Elliott thought. Maybe the universe had been looking out for her, sending Julia crashing through her door with a suitcase and a complete inability to bake.
Julia was growing on her.
Like moss, or a particularly persistent weed, but growing nevertheless.
Which was ridiculous, obviously. This was a business arrangement. A fake relationship. A temporary solution to a complicated problem.
But as Elliott turned back to her kitchen, she couldn't quite shake the warmth in her chest.