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Rosine felt the question in the quiet. “May I?”
A small incline.
She broke a tarte cleanly and tasted. Butter yielded first, lemon bright at the back of her mouth—then the wrongness: a faint scrape against her teeth, more touch than sound. Grit. She turned, used the corner of her handkerchief, spat with as much dignity as a woman can when her work has been salted with dirt. Acid rose up her throat.
“Sand in the sugar,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said evenly. “I suspected sabotage. I did not expect pettiness.”
“From the new lot at dawn,” Rosine answered, folding the linen over the gritty flecks as if to cage them. “Adulterated.”
Silence gathered. Rain laced the glass like wire.
“We can’t shut the Den, the raid is underway with Sander holding down the fort. If we don’t feed the men and stretch the evening, they will start searching the entire building,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said at last. “Cancel the pastry exhibition.”
“No.” Rosine’s own voice steadied her. “We said we would stand in the light. If they cut our sugar, we answer them where anyone may see.”
“What do you propose?”
“A changed menu, with your permission,” Rosine said unsure whether she could curtsy to soften her directness.
A pause, keen as a blade being weighed. “Convince me.”
“Sugar melts. Sand does not at our oven temperatures,” Rosine said, patient as a recipe.
“We take one pan to hard crack. Hold it high, tip it slow. The grit will settle where all can see; the clean stream becomes caramel—threads for display, glaze for the buns. We send the sacks from this lot to the street in daylight and mark them. We don’t hide thieves. We light them.”
Under the veil, something like approval moved. “Very well. I’ll provide eyes to witness. And, Rosine—he is downstairs.”
Her breath snagged. “Sander?”
“Playing for his life,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said without embroidery. “For your future. For my business. Blind against twenty of the best players in London.” The veil dipped a fraction closer. “If he wins, we keep the floor. If he loses, he sails at dawn.” And all the Jews working at the Lyon’s Den would have to leave. That’s why I need my bakery, my independence.
She drew out a folded packet from the drawer and laid it on the blotter. Two tickets. Rosine stared until the ink swam.
“Will you go to Boston with him?” Mrs. Dove-Lyon asked. No pressure, only steeled resolve.
Rosine’s fingers found the cool weight at her throat—the little pawn. Home is not a ship. She lifted her chin. “No. I want the bakery. With or without your standing order.” Her pulse hammered; she didn’t look away. “I want here.” Except that she wanted Sander more and couldn’t believe herself. What would London or a bakery be without Sander by her side?
Argh!
“Very well.” The older woman folded her gloved hands. “Then your future is in your hands. I can help with the match. Not the life you craft out of it.”
Rosine set the gritty linen beside the tickets and felt the choice take its shape inside her ribcage—painful, clean. “Then I’ll craft it,” she said. “Tonight.”
“Good girl.” Mrs. Dove-Lyon rose; decision snapped tidy as a thread. “I’ll draw the gentlemen to the gallery. You draw the truth from that pan. If scandal sheets are listening, let them learn the taste of evidence.”
Rosine reached the latch and paused. The rain had softened to a hush; beyond the door, the house had that particular stillness—the kind that comes right before a crowd remembers to hold its breath.
She set her palm flat on the plate’s cover. This has to work. If Nagy got the upper hand, the lease would falter, the Lyon’s Den would wither, and a ship’s bell would steal the man she had just begun to claim.
“Go,” Mrs. Dove-Lyon said. “And Rosine—do not burn the caramel. Men forgive many things. They never forgive a ruined show.”
Rosine almost smiled. “I won’t.”
She stepped into the corridor. Somewhere below, a single, precise click rang out—chess, not thunder. The first move. She lifted the tray to her shoulder and started for the heat, the question beating time with her steps:
Would the pan run clean—and would he?
Chapter Fourteen
