Page 144 of A Taste of Vanilla

I shrug. “It doesn’t say anything untrue, technically.”

The kitchen goes silent as I continue with my lamination, and to my surprise, Warren is the one to break it.

“It does,” he says quietly.

My head snaps up. “He has a point.”

His eyes stay on mine. “No, Halston. He doesn’t.”

I turn. “You’ve been here for a few days.”

“And it’s been long enough,” he says, looking around. “How many things have gone wrong here? We were testing baked goods the other day. I see the way you interact with customers.”

“No, not long enough.” I grab my bench scraper from the table because my hands need to hold something. I hug it to my chest. “You don’t know what Bitter Bloom was like before, and you don’t know what his first review did for me. Or what it felt like for that kind of man to say I was worth trying.”

“I know that people come back,” he says, quieter now, and it feels like all of the air leaves the room. Like it’s just us, and Marley and Oliver are in another building altogether.

“That’s different,” I whisper.

“Yeah,” he says, throwing his hands up. “It’s more important.”

I hate him for saying all of the right things.

Marley steps in, and my bubble pops. “He’s doing this because of Grant, and for no other reason.”

“We don’t know that,” I say.

Oliver looks like he wants to strangle me. “Yes,” he deadpans. “We do.”

“I know a lot of things about this breakup, but Barrett wrote this because of me.”

Dev moves in the doorway. “For what it’s worth, the Legacy Latte is still iconic.”

I close my eyes. “Thank you, Dev.”

“And gimmick is a mean word used by people who don’t understand whimsy.”

My eyes open, and I expect to see a grin across his face. Instead, Dev’s eyes are earnest.

Lisa nods beside him as she peeks around the door. “He’s right.”

“And for the record,” Dev adds, “discipline beneath the glitter sounds like a drag brunch theme.”

“He’s actually right,” Oliver mutters.

And I almost smile. Almost.

And then the front bell jingles. Everyone freezes like we’re caught doing something wrong.

A woman steps inside with her phone in her hand. I recognize her vaguely. She came in yesterday for a Legacy Latte and took three photos of the chalkboard before ordering.

Today, she looks around the bakery, her gaze moving quickly from me—a forced smile on my lips—to the pastry case and then the chalkboard.

Finally, her gaze shifts to Marley behind me and drops to the phone in her hand.

Her gaze meets mine, and my stomach tightens.

She smiles politely.