Chapter 4 - Smoke Over Reyes Bakery
By the time Camila reached Reyes Bakery, smoke was already pouring from the back alley.
She jumped out of Adrian’s car before it fully stopped.
“Camila!”
She ignored him.
The bakery was everything she had left.
Her grandmother’s battered copper pans.
Her mother’s handwritten invoices from the first year.
The tiny stool her younger brother Mateo used to sit on while doing homework behind the counter.
The recipe notebook.
She ran toward the rear door.
Adrian caught her around the waist.
“No.”
“Let me go!”
“The building is on fire.”
“My notebook is inside!”
“I don’t care about the notebook.”
“I do!”
She fought him until a firefighter shouted at both of them to get back.
Flames had climbed into the storage room but had not yet reached the front.
Sirens filled the street.
Neighbors gathered in pajamas.
Camila stood barefoot on the sidewalk—she had lost one shoe somewhere between the car and the alley—watching firefighters break through the side door.
Adrian took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders.
She almost refused.
Then she started shaking.
Not crying.
Shaking.
“This is my fault,” she whispered.
“No.”
“I should have walked away.”
“From your own work?”
“From them.”
Adrian looked at the burning building.
“They did this.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know the text came minutes before the fire.”
Camila closed her eyes.
The fire marshal approached an hour later.
“Ms. Reyes?”
“Yes.”
“We found evidence of forced entry at the back door.”
Her stomach dropped.
“Accelerant?” Adrian asked.
The marshal glanced at him. “We’re testing.”
Camila looked through the broken front window.
The dining area was wet and blackened but standing.
The back kitchen was destroyed.
Then a firefighter emerged carrying a soot-covered metal box.
Camila gasped.
“My grandmother’s recipe tin.”
The lid was warped, but intact.
She took it with both hands.
The firefighter smiled. “Found it under a prep table.”
Camila nearly cried then.
Nearly.
Her phone rang.
This time the number was familiar.
Her landlord.
She answered.
“Mr. Hughes?”
“Camila, we need to talk.”
“If this is about the fire, I have insurance—”
“It’s not about the fire.”
Her chest tightened.
“I received an offer on the building.”
“What?”
“A cash offer. Triple market value.”
“From who?”
There was a pause.
“Hartwell Hospitality Holdings.”
Adrian’s face changed when he heard the name.
Camila noticed.
“You know them.”
He did not answer immediately.
“Adrian.”
“Hartwell is controlled by the Langford family.”
Camila went still.
Her landlord kept talking through the phone.
“They want to close within ten days. Your lease allows termination if the property is sold for redevelopment.”
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, Mr. Hughes, you promised me another year.”
“That was before someone offered me three million dollars.”
The call ended.
Camila stared at the black screen.
Adrian swore under his breath.
The fire.
The threat.
The building purchase.
This was no tantrum.
Victoria was not trying to embarrass Camila.
She was trying to erase her.
Then Adrian’s phone rang.
He listened for ten seconds.
His eyes hardened.
“What?” Camila asked.
He lowered the phone.
“That was my attorney.”
“And?”
“Victoria’s family filed a trademark application two weeks ago.”
“For what?”
He turned the screen toward her.
The words made Camila’s knees weaken.
REYES & DAHLIA DESSERTS.
Underneath was a logo built around the exact flower Camila had drawn on every bakery box since she was nineteen.
Someone had not just planned to steal her cake.
May you like
They had planned to steal her name.
