The ghosts on the pumpkin tarts are starting to droop in the steam of my own breath. I pipe a smile on the last one, flick a glance at the clock—11:48 p.m.—and try not to think about the crowd still roaring through Main Street. The bakery smells like nutmeg, cinnamon, and sugar so thick I could live on the air alone. Somewhere outside, someone screams with laughter. Birch Hollow only throws itself at the moon this way once a year, and I want to watch from the window.
Instead, thunder rattles the back door. Three hard knocks. My piping bag crumples in my fist. I wipe my hands on my apron and peer through the peephole. It’s Cal Mercer, all broad shoulders and rumpled flannel, sweat darkening the hair at his temple. His flannel is buttoned wrong, mouth a tight grimace, but his eyes—his eyes are fixed on my register, right where my aunt’s brass key glints under the lamplight.
He doesn’t bother with pleasantries. "Your aunt used to lock me in," Cal grinds out, voice raw as gravel. "Tonight you do it. Don’t open that door for anyone. Including me."
I want to ask where his usual cool indifference went, want to joke that he could at least bring me a coffee for all this drama, but then his eyes ripple with an uncanny gold, just for a second. My heart bangs out a new rhythm. I grab the brass key, hand trembling, and gesture him past the racks and the leftover loaves. He walks stiffly—there’s something hunted in the set of his shoulders, as if he’s holding himself together by stubbornness and frayed will.
The old vault door gapes behind the bread shelves. I haul it open, hear the singing of iron hinges echo off the tile. Cal steps past me—he doesn’t look back. I shut the door, the inch-thick steel grinding into its frame, and slip the key into the lock. My palm slides with sweat, but I turn it anyway.
It sticks.
I try again, biting my lip. Something’s wedged inside—a crumple of paper? A sliver of metal? My stomach plummets. There’s no time to dig for it, not with the moon so high and the crowd so close. The bakery’s bright windows make me feel exposed, like I’m on a stage.
I’m still bent over the lock when headlights sweep the front display. A cruiser, blue and white, idles in the crosswalk. Main Street’s crowd parts in a wave of confusion and curiosity as the sheriff’s car comes to a stop. A car door slams, and a voice rings out over the quieting laughter and music:
"Sheriff’s office! Open up. We’re looking for Cal Mercer."
I freeze, key in hand, caught between the vault and the glowing window, with Cal locked—or not locked—inside and the whole town about to watch what I do next.