Bake Off

by S. Y. Robins

  “Harry apparently skipped town.” Her mother frowned. “Looks like we’re back around to him as a suspect.”

  “Mom, I’m telling you—”

  “And I’d like to believe you, sweetheart, but when someone is a murder suspect and they disappear…”

  “Who knows how long he’s been gone?” Eliza argued. “He might not even know that Emma’s hurt.”

  “Well, we’ll keep thinking about it, but right now we need to leave for the Thornson’s housewarming.” Her mother shooed her off the couch. “Suzanna, I assumed you’d stay here.”

  “Definitely.” Especially after the day’s events at Emma’s house, Suzanna had no interest in going out. “Go, and I’ll hold down the fort.”

  “Don’t answer any calls,” Eliza advised. “It might be the press again.”

  “I won’t,” Suzanna promised. “Have a good time. Tell the Thornsons I say hi…unless they think I did it, that is.”

  “If they thought you’d done it, we wouldn’t be visiting them.” Her mother kissed her on the cheek. “Remember to get some sleep, dear.”

  “Thanks.”

  Suzanna watched them stroll off down the driveway, then went to the kitchen. She had already decided to bake all evening. The day’s events still troubled her, and she knew just the thing to soothe her troubled mind: making up a new recipe. She pulled every cupboard open and stared at the contents. Her parents didn’t have whole shelves of different sorts of sugar or flavored syrups, but that was what made it a challenge. And Suzanna loved challenges. Finally she pulled down tea leaves and white chocolate chips. Earl grey scones with white chocolate chips sounded like just the thing.

  As she sifted flour and measured out buttermilk, she let her mind drift. If she could have anything in the world, it would be to have someone knock on the door right now—the police, telling her that everything was okay and she was no longer a suspect. They’d have found the person who framed her, and they’d offer to speak to the potential investors in Savannah and tell them that Suzanna was absolutely innocent of any crime. One of the policemen might say how much he loved The Cake, and another would say her chocolate chip shortbread was even better.

  And then she’d have the tea shop. Suzanna felt her lips curve in a smile, holding the mixing bowl in one arm and humming as she wandered around the kitchen. The oven was heating, the kitchen redolent with the smells of spices and sugar, and she would someday be moving not around a tiny bungalow kitchen, but around a big, gleaming, white-tiled industrial kitchen with gleaming stainless steel counters. Outside some swinging doors, servers would emerge into a homey, gorgeous room filled with summer sunshine and well-worn kitchen tables, setting scones and mugs of tea down by students and dating couples.

  A sound outside jarred Suzanna from her reverie, and the mixing bowl slipped from her hands to shatter on the floor. Gasping, she whirled to look out at the darkening yard. No one was there—there was no movement beyond the blowing leaves and the shadows of the windswept trees. But the back of her neck prickled, and it took her several long moments of deep breathing to calm herself. Heart still pounding, she knelt to pick up the shards of the bowl and sweep the flour and spices into a dustpan.

  When it was all cleaned up, Suzanna took a deep breath and ran her hands through her hair. She’d get these scones in the oven and then go take a bath. That would calm her down. She’d been focusing on the murder too much, allowing what had happened to Joel and Emma to make her jump at shadows and fear even the normal noises of a house. She was perfectly safe. She measured out more flour and sugar, shaking her head.

  All of a sudden, she stopped, cup of flour poised over the sifter, Eliza’s voice echoing in her ears.

  He might not even know Emma’s been hurt.

  And no one knew if Emma was going to survive. Eyes widening, Suzanna put down the cup of flour. Her heart was beginning to beat fast again, but this time it was out of empathy and not fear. What if Eliza was hurt, terribly hurt, and Suzanna didn’t know? What if no one knew even if Eliza would pull through, and no one had called Suzanna to let her know so that she could say goodbye? What if she found out, later, that her sister had been lying alone in a hospital? The thought was too much to bear. She had to make sure that Harry knew.

  She stopped, sighing. She was absolutely the last person who should be calling Harry about this. The police had even warned her about it. Heck, her lawyer had warned her. And surely someone from the hospital would have called Harry.

  But they might not have. Joel would probably be Emma’s emergency contact still, and what if Harry just wasn’t told what had happened? This was beyond the right or wrong of whether Suzanna should call Harry—it was the right or wrong of whether his sister was lying alone in the hospital, or with her brother at her side. Eliza had been absolutely sure that Harry had nothing to do with Emma’s assault. Someone needed to tell him.

  This was a bad idea. A very, very bad idea. But Suzanna felt herself moving out into the living room to look for her sister’s phone. It was there, sitting innocently on the coffee table. Picking it up, she gave a look at her parents’ cat, Mumu.

  “D’you think I should?” she asked quietly.

  Mumu only yawned.

  “You’re not helping.” Suzanna unlocked the phone and paused, trying to stop herself. It was useless. She opened up Eliza’s contacts and scrolled, and there it was: Harry’s name and phone number.

  She absolutely, positively shouldn’t do this. Suzanna locked the phone again, put it down on the coffee table, and marched resolutely back into the kitchen, picking up the cup measure again. Of course Harry knew his sister was hurt. He’d be coming back right now. There were systems in place to make sure that he knew.

  But what if there weren’t? Groaning, Suzanna put the cup measure down for what felt like the seventeenth time and went back out to the table. She sighed, staring down at the phone, and tried to weigh the pros and cons. Finally, she picked it up and dialed, her heart beginning to race.

  “Eliza?” Harry’s voice was panicked, and Suzanna jumped as well; she realized she hadn’t expected him to pick up.

  “It’s Suzanna, actually.”

  There was a long pause, and when Harry spoke again, his voice was half terrified, half furious.

  “Did Joel tell you to call?”

  Suzanna paused, blinking. How long had Harry been out of town?

  “Harry…I called because Emma’s been hurt. She was beaten up, and I wanted to make sure you knew.”

  “That bastard.” His voice was ugly now. “Where is he?”

  “Harry, Joel is…well, he’s dead. He’s been dead for weeks.”

  There was another pause, and she heard Harry sigh. At last he said quietly,

  “No. No, he’s not.”

  5

  “But he is dead,” Suzanna said stupidly. She could not think of anything else. There was a ringing in her ears and the bottom of her stomach seemed to have dropped out, but all she could think, over and over, was that of course Joel was dead, someone had seen her push him into the river…

  But had they? Who called in the tip? And had they actually seen anyone push Joel in, or had they made every bit of it up? Suzanna herself had wondered if she was being framed. They’d thought and thought and turned this over from every angle, but none of them had thought to wonder if Joel was actually dead.

  “They never found a body, right?” Harry asked her, as if knowing exactly where her mind had gone.

  “Okay, but when someone goes missing…”

  “When someone goes missing and everyone knows he had someone who hated him and everyone knows he just screwed them over and everyone knows someone called in a tip that they saw you push him into the river and they’re too scared to say who they are for fear of retribution…” Harry paused. “It was all a setup, Suzanna.”

  This was ridiculous.

  “So you’re telling me,” Suzanna said carefully, “that Joel Smith hated me so much that he faked his own death to
get me accused of murder? That doesn’t make any sense. If he was going to do that, he’d have to know he’d need to confess at some point, and that’s got to be a criminal offense.”

  “Don’t you see?” Harry asked. He sighed. “No, I suppose you wouldn’t. You were only ever peripheral. I think he’d say he knew you’d be cleared eventually. There was no actual evidence, right? No body, and your lawyer would point out that if you were guilty, you’d never have admitted to being at the river that day, and…”

  “But he would have ruined everything in the meantime!” Suzanna felt her fingers shaking where she gripped the phone.

  “He doesn’t care about that—or if he does, he’d just find it funny.” Harry’s voice was ugly. “Joel liked hurting people. It’s just like him to frame someone, not even caring that the whole rest of their life, people would wonder.”

  “But Harry…” Suzanna shook her head. “No. I can’t—no. There’s no body, but how can you possibly know any of this?”

  There was a long silence.

  “Emma told me,” Harry said finally.

  “Emma was in on it?”

  “Yeah,” he admitted. “But listen, it wasn’t her idea.”

  “She still—”

  “You don’t understand.” Harry’s voice was rising, and Suzanna remembered her sister’s statement that Emma had always taken care of Harry. Of course he’d defend her now. “Emma’s nice, she was always too nice for him, and when he told her he wanted to start over somewhere with the insurance payout, she argued…but you don’t know how Joel could be. He terrified her, and at the same time it was like he was an angel. She talked about how nice he was even when she was telling me about terrible things he’d do to her. He wanted her to leave, just leave, and she took some of the money from the insurance and called to say she was leaving it for me.”

  “Oh, my God.” The money Emma had been taking out of the bank every day. It had been for Harry. Still… “So if it wasn’t you who assaulted her.”

  “Me?” Harry’s voice rose.

  “We thought—listen, no one thought so for long, even the gossip network had nothing on you except the money trouble—”

  “And he would have known that, too.” Harry sounded furious. “But why didn’t Emma tell them the truth.”

  There was a stricken pause while Suzanna tried to figure out what to say. She could remember Emma’s blood on the kitchen floor, and she pressed her lips together. A moment later, an indrawn breath from Harry told her he’d guessed.

  “How bad is she hurt?” His voice trembled.

  “Pretty badly.” Suzanna sank her face into her hands.

  “Oh, my God. I have to get to the hospital.”

  “They say she’s stable,” Suzanna assured him. The paramedics had been hopeful as they loaded Emma into the ambulance.

  “It’s not that!” There was the squeal of car tires from the phone and the distant sound of a motor revving. Harry must have been driving. “It must have been him who hurt her, and if he figures out she’s still alive…”

  “Oh, no.” Suzanna tried to remember where she’d put her keys. Her sister’s car was still in the driveway. She could get to the hospital quickly. “How far away are you?”

  “Not far. Listen, you call the police.”

  “All right.” Suzanna ran into the living room…

  And collided with a man’s chest. The phone slipped out of her hand to the floor, Harry’s voice echoing out of it, and Joel Smith kicked it aside contemptuously. His smile was satisfied, and his eyes were cold enough to make the breath freeze in Suzanna’s chest.

  “Hello, Suzanna.”

  She couldn’t look at the phone. Suzanna backed up hastily, trying to think of something to say that would tip Joel off…but not to the fact that his wife was lying defenseless in a hospital bed.

  “I thought you were dead,” she said, as loudly as she could.

  Joel knew something was going on, but thankfully, not what it was. He looked up at the ceiling, as if scanning the rest of the house, and then smirked.

  “Weren’t you paying attention? Your family left, Suzanna. You’re all alone here.”

  “Oh, my God.” The words slipped out involuntarily, and Suzanna felt tears come to her eyes when Joel smiled again. “Oh, my God. Why are you here, Joel? What do you want?”

  A gun appeared in one hand.

  “I want you,” Joel said quietly, “to shut up and stop asking questions.”

  Suzanna shut up, clamping her lips together. To her surprise, Joel rolled his eyes.

  “Not now. In general. Shut up, don’t ask questions, and just let the police suspect you.”

  “That’s a terrible plan,” Suzanna said, before she could stop herself. When Joel’s grip tightened on the gun, she threw her hands up, pleading. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean…”

  “You keep looking for other answers,” Joel said, his voice ugly. “Well, don’t. Let them figure out it wasn’t you. But don’t try to speed it up.”

  Or what? She didn’t ask it, but Joel saw the question in her eyes.

  Please, God, let Harry have heard her. She could only hope he had called the cops. She needed to stall as long as she could.

  “But what if they don’t clear me?” She made her voice as plaintive as she could. She needed to walk a fine line here, and she knew it. The urge to curl up on the floor and promise to do anything he said, anything to make him lower the gun, was almost overwhelming. She gritted her teeth. She needed to stay upright, keep him here—or he’d disappear, and any proof that she was innocent would be gone.

  The police would never believe her—hell, she barely believed herself.

  “Then they don’t,” Joel said, his voice ugly. “It’ll be manslaughter. You won’t be in jail for long.”

  “But everything I’ve worked for—”

  “Oh, shut up about that!” The gun shook in his hands. “Always with the work, with that innocent little face, all determined, impressing everyone. You’re pathetic. You’re nothing more than one of the drones, doing things the stupid way, but everyone always loved you for it, even my fucking parents. ‘Why can’t you be more like Suzanna? If you want to open a bakery, why don’t you ask Suzanna for help? Suzanna knows what hard work is.’” His face twisted. “You make me sick.”

  “What?” It wasn’t an act this time. She was so thrown by this that she almost forgot the gun for a moment.

  “You’re stupid,” he said, his voice ugly. “Just a stupid woman, doing everything the stupid way.”

  “I don’t understand—”

  “Of course you don’t understand!” He was yelling now. “You never did. I was the one who saw how to make a business profitable, who to hire, who to pay, who not to pay. You would never have made those idiots in Savannah as much money as I could make them. You would have hired professionals for everything, talked about fair pay, gotten up at 4AM to bake every day like a chump. I could have made them money hand over fist. And you know what?”

  Suzanna shook her head, genuinely lost.

  “They liked you better.” Bitterness dripped from his words. “So sweet. So hardworking. Such a beautiful story, they told me. That cake. Anyone could make that cake with a recipe! What makes you special, other than the fact that you work harder than you need to?”

  Suzanna swallowed and looked down. She was supposed to say he was right, but she didn’t understand…and part of her just wanted to yell at him not to be so stupid and selfish.

  “Joel.”

  “What?”

  “Look, you’ve made your point.”

  “And that is?”

  “To let you go.”

  “Damn straight. Because if you tell anyone, Suzanna, I will find you. I’ll find your sister. And she’ll pay.”

  Her blood ran cold. He wasn’t lying, she knew it. But before she could even react to the fear, fury came in a flood. Suzanna felt her hand shoot out, and the next moment a canister of flour knocked Joel back. The gun went o
ff, the shot echoing through the room as it pierced the back wall, and Suzanna ducked sideways, her ears ringing. When someone pushed her to the floor, she tried to kick, to push her attacker away.

  Only it wasn’t an attacker. It was the police, swarming through the backdoor, running for Joel, and as Suzanna curled under the dining room table, still unable to hear anything but the faintest noise from their shouting, she watched Joel being hauled away. Someone helped her out, a man with kind black eyes, and he kept mouthing something at her.

  “What?” She was practically yelling, and the police officer smiled.

  “I said,” he yelled back, “it’s all over. Joel Smith is alive. We’re dropping the charges.”

  6

  “I’m so nervous.” Suzanna felt her stomach twisting, and she closed her eyes.

  “Don’t close your eyes and walk!” Eliza stopped her with a hand on her arm. “And don’t play with your hair, it looks perfect.”

  “And you’re sure this outfit will do the trick?”

  “Yes, you look wonderful.”

  Suzanna looked down at the dress. Eliza had decked her out in an outfit that called the fifties to mind, a brightly patterned dress and cute heels, at once modest and charming, with a pearl bracelet—“nothing gaudy, you’re a nice Southern girl, after all”—and her hair down. The lines of the dress were sharp, to play up the idea that Suzanna could really run a business, but the colors were soft enough to remind the investors that Suzanna was a baker first, someone who’d win everyone over with sweetness and…

  Well, and hard work. The very thing that had so infuriated Joel. Suzanna shook her head at the memory. Her parents hadn’t even believed her when she first told them what happened, but over time, everyone in town had started to remember the little things: how Joel was always charming his way out of homework assignments, or talking his way from a B to an A. How the pranks he played on Suzanna hadn’t been so nice, after all.

  And it was pretty hard for anyone to argue that it was okay to frame someone for a murder that hadn’t happened at all. When Emma woke up and gave her statement to the police that it was Joel who’d nearly killed her, it was the final nail in the coffin. Suzanna’s lawyer told her confidently that Joel would be going away for a very, very long time. And, as Suzanna had dreamed, the police were only too happy to call the investors and let them know the whole story. Small town or not, everyone loved a good scandal—and the investors had been charmed.