Chapter 10 - The Map in the Crust
Claire returned to the bakery after midnight. The fire had damaged the storage room, but the ovens still worked. She mixed pie dough while Roman sat at the counter, sleeves rolled to his forearms, reading copied ledger pages.
“You are terrible at rolling crust,” Claire said.
Roman looked at the uneven circle before him. “It is functional.”
“So is a parking ticket.”
“Do you insult everyone who helps you?”
“Only people who need improving.”
The ordinary rhythm steadied them. Claire measured flour, Roman read dates aloud, and the code slowly emerged. The orange-zest recipes pointed to locations that formed a route through Pittsburgh: a closed mill in Homestead, a storage unit near the Strip District, and finally a small house in Dormont.
“That house belonged to Mara,” Roman said.
“You never searched it?”
“Victor handled the estate.”
Claire stopped. “You trusted him.”
“He was my brother.”
“That is not the same as trustworthy.”
Roman looked down at the dough. “I wanted it to be.”
Claire softened. “Wanting a person to be good does not make you foolish.”
“It can make you dangerous.”
She leaned against the worktable. “My mother wanted my father to be a man who left. It was easier than believing he was hunted. We all choose the story we can survive.”
Roman studied her. “What story did you choose?”
“That I could survive without anyone.”
“And now?”
Claire met his gaze. “Now I am considering whether survival is the same as living.”
The tension between them changed. Roman stood slowly, giving her time to move away. She did not.
“Claire,” he said, “I want to kiss you.”
Her breath caught. “You are asking?”
“I promised I would.”
“You also promised no public claims.”
“This is private.”
“And if I say no?”
“I will finish ruining the pie crust.”
She smiled despite herself. “That would be a tragedy.”
“So?”
Claire stepped closer. “Yes.”
His kiss was careful, almost tentative, as if he understood that strength did not excuse taking. Claire touched his coat, then his shoulder. He waited until she pulled him closer before deepening the kiss.
When they separated, his forehead rested against hers.
“That was not protection,” he murmured.
“No.”
“It was not a strategy.”
“Definitely not.”
“I may need a moment to adjust.”
“You have had years to adjust to being insufferable.”
His quiet laugh warmed her more than the ovens.
The moment ended when Claire noticed flour on Roman’s cuff. Beneath it was a faint green stain.
“Where did you get that?”
Roman examined the mark. “From the warehouse.”
Claire compared it with the green paint on the map. “It came from the floorboard.”
She scraped the stain onto a sheet of paper and added vinegar. The color shifted, revealing a hidden symbol: a small crown split down the middle.
“This is not Victor’s mark,” Roman said. “It belonged to Dominic.”
“Then the person using the red ribbon is connected to your father.”
The back door creaked.
Claire reached for a rolling pin. Roman moved in front of her, then stopped himself and stepped aside.
Susan entered alone, soaked from the rain. “The house in Dormont has been searched.”
“By Victor?” Roman asked.
“No. By someone who wanted us to think it was Victor.”
She placed a photograph on the table. It showed the burned remains of a room, with a single message painted on the wall.
THE HEIR IS NOT THE KING.
Roman stared at it.
Claire recognized the handwriting from Daniel’s recipe notebook.
“My father wrote that,” she said.
Susan shook her head. “No. Mara did.”
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The next morning, a federal investigator named Elena Ward arrived at the bakery with a warrant.
She looked at Claire and said, “You are under suspicion of helping Roman Duke conceal criminal assets.”
