How to Stir a Baker's Heart

by Candice Sue Patterson

  His fingers curled into his hair. “I didn’t know what to do. How to help you. I’d never seen you like that—talking but not making any sense, that strange, hollow look in your eyes. And visiting a mental facility…” He threw his hands out. “Yes, I’m a coward.”

  The word hung in the air like thick morning fog over the harbor. After several seconds, Justin ran his hand over his tie. “It was a lot for a guy to take in.”

  “Try being the one living it.” She curled her arms around herself. “You can’t come back now that the worst is over and expect to continue our plans. You’ll always hold a special place inside me, Justin, but you’ll never be my person.”

  “Please don’t say that.” He grabbed her arms again. “You’re my person. I don’t know how to live without you.”

  “You’ll find your way, just as I did. I’ll pray for a wonderful woman to come into your life who can give you all the things I can’t.”

  Justin’s lips tightened in hard line, his jaw like granite. “I don’t want anyone else. I want you.”

  Too late.

  Olivia gazed around the bakery, the stillness eerie compared to the day’s crazy rush. “I’m with someone.”

  “I know.”

  Olivia studied his features for motive.

  Justin swallowed. “Your dad told me. Three months ago.”

  She pulled her hoodie tighter around her middle. That’s when he’d started texting her. “Yet you waited to come.”

  He looked at her, his eyes so fierce with determination it made her spine turn cold. “I told you. I wanted to be absolutely sure I knew what I’d be fighting for.”

  Her heart broke for him.

  Before her fuzzy brain could comprehend what was happening, Justin had a hold on her waist, pulling her hard against him. She could hardly move.

  “You’ve known him for a year. We’ve known each other our whole lives.” His mouth crashed down on hers, the desperation of his kiss stealing her breath. She tried to get away, but it all happened too fast to keep up with.

  “I love you, Livi,” he said, breathing hard. “Let me try again. Let me prove myself. Please.”

  She couldn’t think within the confines of his arms, her lips still recouping from the pressure of his. Olivia turned her face away for clarity.

  Blake was standing outside the windows, his gaze boring into hers.

  40

  Blake went hot. Whatever dandy was driving the red Jaguar was kissing his girl. And Olivia was allowing it. The sky broke loose, and cold rain pelted Blake’s hat, his shoulders, and pooled at his feet. Yet all he could do was stand outside the bakery and watch this nightmare play out. A plot he’d lived once before.

  Olivia’s gaze met his through the glass. Her face paled to a ghostly white. Yep, caught. He hadn’t for one second suspected her to be the playing type. She was too honest. Too fragile. Too broken.

  Or he was an idiot.

  Olivia yanked free from the man’s embrace and flung open the door. She met Blake in the rain. “I’m glad you’re here.”

  Interesting. Not the first sentence he would’ve expected to come from her lying mouth. Then again, she sounded genuinely relieved to see him.

  “Did he hurt you?” Blake pointed to the jerk dressed like he’d just come from a board meeting.

  She turned to look back inside the open front door. “No.”

  Then Blake’s eyes weren’t tricking him after all. Only his heart. “Who is he?”

  The man leaned against the door frame, staying under the protection of the awning. He tucked his hands in his pockets, crossed his ankles, and looked at Blake as if he were a roach. “Her fiancé.”

  Blake’s gut churned. “Your what?”

  The last word came out in a growl.

  “It’s not like that.” Olivia started toward him but stopped when he backed away.

  “What’s it like, then?”

  Rain plastered her hair to her cheeks. Soaked into her thin shirt. She shivered. “We were engaged. We broke up before I moved here.”

  Now the nameless man—a stylish, manicured city guy perfect for a city girl—walked up behind her and placed his hand on her shoulder. Marking his territory. “We put the wedding on hold. Took some time to regroup. We never broke up.”

  Olivia jerked away from the man’s hold. A cloud of breath formed in front of her lips. “You asked for time, and then I didn’t hear one word from you for a year. That’s a breakup in my book.”

  Engaged? The truth curled around Blake’s heart and squeezed. Of course there’d been other men. He’d known that. But he’d been living in the moment, figured there was plenty of time to explore her past. Her current healing was more important than rehashing old events. However, he’d never expected she belonged to another man. Not one so recently anyway.

  “Yeah, well, it wasn’t.” The guys white dress shirt was now clinging to his torso. “You agreed to give me that time. What am I supposed to think?”

  “I heard nothing from you, Justin. Nothing. You never once in all that time asked how I was doing, or inquired if I’d settled in nicely here. No communication whatsoever.”

  “I’ve been texting and calling for the last three months!” The man threw his palms out.

  Another blow to Blake’s world. “Is that true?”

  Her wilting body told him the answer.

  Three months ago would mark the blueberry festival, Mrs. Hudson’s stroke, their first kiss. The moment she and Blake started a relationship. How coincidental.

  “You never thought to mention him to me?” Blake pointed to the guy then let his hand fall against his cold, wet leg.

  “It was over for me.” Her voice broke. “I didn’t think rehashing it was as important as building on us.”

  As if just noticing the rain, Justin looked at the sky, then smoothed his tie and went back into the bakery, shaking his head.

  Blake almost felt sorry for him. He knew exactly what it was like to have the woman he’d planned to marry stolen by another man without warning.

  Anger seared Blake’s vision. “With my past, it was important.”

  Olivia moved toward him, placing her hand over his heart. “I’m not like Madison.”

  Blake wrapped his fingers around her cold wrist and removed her hand. “Yes, you are.” Blake turned for his truck. Dampness from his boots seeped into his socks with every step. So much for a romantic dinner in Machias, where he’d planned to audibly confess how deeply he’d fallen in love with her. So much for planning a future with a woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. Again.

  ~*~

  The light bulb buzzed overhead. Grandma’s closet had always made a great hiding spot when Olivia was a child. Tonight was no different. Blouses, slacks, and sweaters surrounded her from all sides. Shoe boxes and file storage containers filled the long shelf above the clothes. She inhaled the scent of Grandma, an old-fashioned floral scent that reminded her of a bygone Hollywood era.

  She could stay in here for weeks. Hide from the world as she used to when she was in elementary school, and they’d visit during the summer. Not wanting to go home, she’d hide amongst the clothes, hoping they’d miss their plane, which infuriated her father. She’d loved her Indiana home, but something about this place had called to her even then.

  Tonight, she wanted to enclose herself in the tiny space, escape from the pain of her parents’ choices, her grandma’s illness, and the loss of another good man.

  Blake refused to take her calls, return her texts, or answer his door. Apparently, he’d said everything he needed to say when he’d accused her of being just like Madison. The vicious spark in his eyes, the poison in his voice, had been directed at her heart.

  It hit the target.

  Rita Hartford was right. Until Blake could forgive his brother, give the bitterness to God, Blake couldn’t have a healthy relationship with anyone.

  So Olivia prayed. Prayed that Blake would give it over, prayed that Blake would understand he
r reason for not mentioning Justin, and prayed that whether it was God’s will for them to be together or not, their relationship with the Lord wouldn’t falter. And, yes, she continued to pray for Blake’s future wife just as she’d promised. Even though that woman apparently wasn’t her.

  Today marked another untraditional Thanksgiving spent alone in a room full of strangers. She’d spent the day with Grandma, who no longer remembered Olivia, and after a mini-stroke shortly after moving to the nursing home, could no longer communicate.

  Continually wiping the white, pasty gravy from Grandma’s chin at dinner, Olivia had discussed the bakery, all the happenings around town, and how much Sydney missed her. It wasn’t how Olivia would’ve preferred to spend the holiday, but she was thankful to still have her Grandma.

  Which was why she was cocooning herself away now, to gather more items to keep Grandma comfortable and retrieve some paperwork the nursing home director had asked for. Anything to keep her mind off Blake and the emotional sendoff she’d given Justin after three days of him attempting to change her mind. They’d separated peacefully, and she wished him all the best.

  Olivia started on the left side of the closet and rummaged her way right, pulling down and opening boxes, intrigued by the things Grandma had chosen to keep over the years—birthday cards, Polaroid photos of her and Grandpa in the seventies, shells, half-sewn cross-stitch designs, magazine recipes, and newspaper clippings. She lifted the items off the closet floor and piled them on the bed while she scanned the clothes rack and shelves.

  After collecting a few pairs of fleece-lined pants, a couple of long-sleeved shirts, and an extra quilt, Olivia worked her way through the shoeboxes in hopes of finding house slippers or a comfortable pair of loafers.

  She opened an old hat box to find it bursting with photos and newspaper clippings. Most were articles written about the bakery and obituaries of people Grandma had known.

  Beneath the mementos rested a leather-bound journal. Olivia flipped through the pages, stopping when a glossy black-and-white photo slipped from the pages. Her grandpa, mid-thirties she’d guess, was holding a fishing pole in front of a glass lake with looming mountains in the distance. The photo had faded with age, but the handsome planes of Grandpa’s face were evident. Dressed in tailored pants and a white shirt, he grinned at the camera.

  The profiles of two small boys were in the bottom left-hand corner. Olivia turned the photograph over, but it gave no indication as to the year or who the boys were. The clothing appeared to be late 1950s.

  Similar pictures were tucked inside. A few included Grandma and two boys around the ages of two and four. The same ones in the photograph, judging by their striped shirts. Olivia recognized the older boy as her father, the stubborn set of his chin unchanging.

  A brittle newspaper clipping wedged a few pages over had Olivia’s pulse racing.

  Tragedy on Moosehead Lake, dated July 1957.

  Olivia absorbed every word of the article, filling in blanks where the ink had smudged. The local sheriff was quoted giving his condolences to the Hudson family for their loss. It went on to give details regarding the date and time of death of the toddler belonging to Clifford and Elizabeth Hudson of Kennebeck—Jacob Hudson.

  Olivia went cold with shock. Her grandparents had lost a child? She’d had an uncle? How unimaginable to hold a child in your arms, nurture him, and raise him, only for that child to be taken from you.

  After all these years, that same loss still stood sentinel inside Grandma despite her declining brain activity. Olivia couldn’t recall how many times her grandma had mentioned Jacob. That grief had become part of Grandma’s DNA. Out of all the things her sweet grandma had forgotten, why did this tragedy have to haunt her?

  Olivia settled cross-legged on the floor, setting the photos aside. Her family history had remained silent long enough. If this journal was anything like the one Grandpa had made, Olivia would get answers.

  She opened the front cover to her grandma’s perfect scroll.

  1962

  Cliff suggested I pour my heart into these pages. He thinks it will cure my grief. I promised to try.

  Grandma recalled a few vague memories and mentioned her irrational anger at Olivia’s dad over the situation, but nothing that really connected any dots for Olivia. The pages were mostly filled with doodles and drawings.

  Halfway through the journal, two silver photo triangles meant to hold in a picture, rested empty in the middle of the page above a caption.

  Some mountains cannot be moved.

  Olivia fingered through the pictures and stopped at the one of her grandpa with the fishing pole. She slipped it into the photo triangles. Perfect fit.

  Bile burned in Olivia’s throat. How had she gone twenty-nine years unaware of such a tragedy?

  How had her grandparents handled the aftermath? What steps had they taken to move forward with their lives? How had Olivia’s father been affected?

  Counseling held such a stigma back then. Things that happened in a person’s childhood could alter how they looked at the world later in life.

  Was this the case with her father? Were there other secrets Olivia didn’t know?

  Olivia closed the book and curled her arms around her legs. She leaned against the closet wall, shrouded by her grandma’s clothes, took a step back in her mind and took a therapist approach to her life.

  People made choices. Those choices affected others. Some for good, some for bad. Olivia saw it every day in her practice, and patients spent large amounts of money for help overcoming the effect of choices.

  Now, Olivia had a choice. She could take her father’s adultery, Justin’s betrayal, and Blake’s abandonment and slip back into a depression that sucked joy from her life, or she could give it all to God. Let Him fight for her.

  She chose to live.

  41

  “It isn’t until we learn to forgive that we can be truly free.” The words scrawled on a sticky note in Olivia’s handwriting he’d found attached to his door refused to stop their taunting.

  The last stroke of blue faded into the black night as Blake put away his maul in the tool shed. Hardly night. It was only five-thirty. Time to begin the long, grueling motions of pretending he wasn’t lonely, that his heart wasn’t devastatingly broken.

  Nights were the hardest. Especially tonight, knowing she’d been here. She should be sitting with him now by the fire, curled up in his arms. They should be laughing together, cooking food and eating ‘til they popped. Kissing.

  Instead, after he carried in this load of firewood, he’d mark off his thirty-fourth day without her and wonder, once again, how he’d made it through another day.

  He loaded wood chunks in his left arm and maneuvered through the door. He added two logs to the already blazing fire. The wood, covered with a dusting of snow, hissed when it met the flames. Blake added the remaining logs to the rack in the corner and then stirred the fire with a poker, sending orange sparks up the chimney.

  He plopped down in front of the radiating heat, coat, boots, and all. Blake hadn’t needed to split any more firewood. He already had enough to last him two winters. But it gave him something to do while he waited for the new upstairs flooring to arrive. If it didn’t come soon, he’d have every tree on his property scalped, cut, and stacked.

  Scooby moaned from his bed by the couch. The dog lay on his side, twitching and jerking in a deep state of REM.

  Blake wished he could sleep that well. Most nights, he stared at his dark ceiling, a breath away from giving in and calling Olivia.

  What good would that do? She’d been engaged to another man the entire time they’d been dating. There were no words of reconciliation, no words to stitch up the wound.

  Sure, the guy was a loser for putting things on hold and not contacting her for months. Still, she could’ve told Blake. At least mentioned she’d been engaged. Especially, knowing how delicate the situation was with his brother. But she’d chosen to keep that secret to herself.
r />   Blake stood and hung his coat on the rack, pulled off his boots, and went to the kitchen. He eyed the contents of his fridge. Sliced turkey, sliced ham, and an almost empty carton of yogurt. He grabbed a soda and closed the door, deciding to go hungry. He really should get some groceries in the house. Empty cabinets during a Maine winter was just plain stupid.

  Blake opened the soda’s tab and took a sip on his way back to the living room. His nightly routine—pace the floor between TV and fridge, pretending he wasn’t a fool who’d been fooled twice.

  This house was just a house again. Not the home it had morphed into when Livi had been part of his life.

  He stared at the couch, untouched for thirty-four days. Blake missed her. So much it hurt to breathe sometimes. And the proposal he’d been considering for Christmas was now nothing more than a pipe dream.

  ~*~

  “Merry Christmas, everyone. See you next year!” Olivia pumped more enthusiasm into her words than she felt. She handed each of her employees a red envelope with their names written in cursive on the front. Bakery profits had doubled since her arrival, and she couldn’t have done it without these ladies. Even grumpy Darlene.

  As soon as the last chore was done, Olivia shooed them out the door to enjoy time off with their families. Tomorrow was Christmas Eve, and the bakery would remain closed until after the New Year. Eight days off. How would she ever survive without distraction?

  She’d considered flying home and spending the holiday with her mother, but the nursing home had called, concerned with how much Grandma had been sleeping and the CBC count of her latest blood test. Olivia had decided it was best to stay.

  Once she was entirely alone in the bakery, she glanced around the sparkling kitchen, and sighed. The kitchen was still warm, and when she donned her apron in this room, her life made sense.

  Stepping out the back door would throw it off kilter again.

  Olivia collected her purse and keys and took her time bundling herself against the elements. When one last walk-through proved the doors were all locked, the ovens off, and that nothing had been overlooked, she decided she’d stalled long enough and braved the cold.