Hilary Fields - Bliss

“I’m gonna let you two duke it out,” she said, backing away slowly into an aisle that advertised teas for every complaint from “feminine distress” to “involuntary astral projection.” Good thing I followed Aunt Paulie out here in the rental car, or I’d be marooned at the organic O.K. Corral. “I’ll be late for the auction if I don’t get a move-on, so I’ll just be going, and catch up with you back home later, okay?”

Pauline spared a nod, but didn’t look away from her standoff with her beloved.

“Hortencia, it was, er, nice to meet you. I’m, ah, very glad to hear you’re alive, and, um…” Sera stuttered to a halt, stymied for a socially correct exit.

“Thank you, dear,” said Hortencia. Her gaze remained locked with Pauline’s. “I’ll see you again soon. Tonight, in fact, since I’ll be attending the Back Room Babes’ get-together as usual.”

“You wouldn’t dare!” cried Pauline. She looked ready to swipe the contents of the dairy case clean to the floor. “The BRBs are my club, and I say who the members are. And you… you lying, man-loving hussy, are officially disinvited!”

“You just try and stop me from showing up, you hypocritical old harpy,” Hortencia flashed back at her.

She had more to say—a lot more. But Sera had already fled to the safety of a row of esoteric canned goods, and was making a beeline for the door as the argument raged behind her.

Was I the only one Pauline lied to about this? I must have been—she’d never have gotten away with such a whopper in a town this small. Now Aruni’s nonchalance at the diner made so much more sense. So did Pauline’s hinky behavior this past week.

Well, hell.

Sera had a great deal to think about. The very reason she’d come out here—to comfort her grieving aunt—had just been called into question. But there was no going back now. Santa Fe, it seemed, still had a few surprises to lob her way. She’d known it was a magical place, but a full-on resurrection?

Nice one, she complimented her new home as she stepped out into the sunlight and headed for her car. I truly did not see that coming.

Apparently I’m destined to live in the land of grumpy people today, Sera thought as she tiptoed around the edges of the pie whisperer’s going-out-of-business-sale. So much for “enchantment,” I guess.

Still stunned at seeing Hortencia rise from the dead, she’d found her way to the little hole-in-the-wall bake shop run by Malcolm McLeod with some difficulty. (Santa Fe, she’d discovered, justly deserved its reputation as a town laid out by a drunken monk riding backward on a mule.) Tucked away at the edge of what had once been a dusty office park on Cerrillos Road, but now hosted an ersatz Chinese restaurant and a dog-grooming parlor as well as the bakery, his place was unimposing from the outside, barely deigning to advertise beyond a small sign that read “Best Pies.” The windows were unwashed, as though to shield the interior from customers’ too-curious gazes, and the token awning was faded and fraying. Inside, there was little charm, just a display case that doubled as a take-out counter and a cash register up front, no seats for waiting customers or even pictures on the walls. In the back, where the sale was about to start, the environment was all stainless steel business. The atmosphere, however, was borderline toxic.

The man of the hour was following what few customers had come to his auction about with a gimlet glare, clenching his fists with barely suppressed ire every time someone so much as peeked their snoot in a pantry or hefted a pie pan to check for dings or scratches. The guy looked positively murderous.

But it was worth enduring a little sourness. McLeod had some seriously state-of-the-art ovens. Ah, Blodgett, Sera thought. You may not look flashy, but you’ve sure got it where it counts. And Mr. McLeod had a lot of what counted—at least to Sera. His chest freezers and reach-ins were immaculate—and exactly what she needed. His convection ovens and industrial range showed the patina of use, but also the cleanliness of the well-maintained machines they were—not to mention, they were truly top of the line. His mixers were displayed next to every conceivable desirable attachment, and some Sera had rarely seen outside of a KitchenAid catalog. No dough roller, she noted. Too proud, probably, and she didn’t blame him for distrusting the damn things—horror stories abounded about crush injuries and maimed cooks. Plus, they took the precision, the intuition out of baking. (Still, she’d make an exception for a nice fondant sheeter, if she ever did wedding cakes again. Back when she’d had her custom cake orders piling up by the dozen, having one of those babies had really saved her bacon.)

He had bun racks, worktables, baker’s scales, dough proofers, and more—all in tip-top condition and clean to the point of making one’s teeth ache. And his bakery cases—both dry display and refrigerated models—looked like they’d just rolled off the factory floor. New, they’d have run her upwards of $6,000 a pop. Used, Malcolm would be damn lucky to take in half that. Problem was, he didn’t look any too eager to part with a single piece, despite the starting bid stickers on most of the bakery’s fixtures, and the eviction notice glued to his front door. Indeed, the small, Santa-bellied Scotsman seemed set to slap the questing fingers of the first person who dared open an oven door for closer inspection.

Boom!

Some fool with a death wish had just sent an unwary elbow across a counter, knocking a rolling pin to the floor. Apparently, this was the ice cream on Malcolm’s pie à la mode.

“Out, out, out, OUUUUUUUT!”

Except it sounded more like “Oot, oot, oot, ooooooot!”

Serafina smothered a giggle. And while the red-faced Scotsman chased the half-dozen or so other prospective buyers out of his joint, flapping his stained apron and shaking his fist, she stayed where she stood, leaning hipshot against one of his chest freezers. Swallowing chuckles, she observed the man she’d just decided was going to come work for her.

With his waist-length, white wavy hair and long handlebar mustache, he could have been Arlo Guthrie’s twin. However, Serafina very much doubted Arlo would’ve chosen to sport Army surplus combat fatigues beneath a kitchen apron that looked like it had seen action in Da Nang. Nor would Arlo have condoned Malcolm’s Rambo-style bandanna, she suspected, though the paunch was probably just okay, maaan.

Malcolm spotted Serafina.

“What’re ye still doing here? Didn’t ye hear me say ‘out’?” He took a menacing step toward Sera. But Serafina Wilde was a veteran of Blake Austin’s kitchens—not to mention his bed—and she wasn’t afraid.

“It’s not going to be much of an auction with only one bidder,” she pointed out. She crossed her legs at the ankle and leaned more comfortably against the freezer.

“ One bidder? I’ll have none of ye! I’ll rot in debtor’s prison before I’ll sell my beautiful ovens to a flock of philistines like ye. Now get gone, ye sodding vulture, before I call the cops.” He swooped down with surprising grace for such a stout man and swept up the toppled rolling pin, examining it for damage.

Sera found the notion of debtor’s prison quaint. Compared to the modern hells of bankruptcy court and predatory debt collectors, such a place might be preferable.

“Hard to part with it all, huh?”

McLeod looked up from the rolling pin, suspicion beetling his caterpillar brows. “What would ye know about it?”

“I lost everything that mattered to me not too long ago. I thought I’d never cook again, and it nearly killed me.”