Page 10 of Bear and Order

"Can you confirm that officially?" I ask.

"Without hesitation," she replies, and a slow breath leaves my lungs. The health warning is fake, which means every customer who received one was lied to, every person who believed it was manipulated, and every rumor that followed was built on a forgery. The secretary watches me closely.

"Is there a problem with the business involved?"

"No," I say immediately, because there wasn't — I inspected Sweetbell Bakery myself and reviewed every record and every permit and every safety procedure, and the bakery was clean. The warning wasn't.

"You look concerned," the secretary observes.

"I'm interested," I reply, folding the paper and slipping it into my coat, because concern is emotional and interest is professional, and that distinction matters. I tell her I want more information before she reports anything, and she nods and says fair enough, and I leave town hall carrying more questions than answers. The forged warning joins everything else — the complaints, the missing inventory, the canceled contract — and each issue points toward the same place.

The bell above the bakery door rings as I step inside, and the scent of vanilla greets me along with something else — a heaviness in the room that I identify before I've even located the source. Juniper sits at one of the tables near the window with a blonde woman beside her, one arm around Juniper's shoulders. Juniper notices me first and her eyes widen slightly before she straightens.

"Brock," she says, and my name sounds different coming from her — softer, less argumentative than usual, and I find I don't like the reason for it.

The blonde woman follows her gaze and curiosity flashes across her face before Juniper introduces us. "This is Marissa Holloway," she says, and Marissa rises and offers her hand warmly.

"I've heard about you," Marissa tells me with a bright smile.

"No, you haven't," Juniper says immediately, dropping her head into her hands.

Marissa gestures toward an empty chair, “Join us,”

I pull it out and sit, keeping the forged warning tucked inside my coat for now.

Juniper looks tired and it clearly has no connection with sleep — the usual spark I associate with her noticeably dimmer, dark circles shadowing her eyes. Marissa squeezes her shoulder gently. "You need to stop carrying everything yourself."

"I'd love to," Juniper replies with a humorless laugh.

"Then let people help," Marissa urges.

Juniper stares at the table. "That's all I've been doing," she says quietly.

"I lost the contract. The mixer broke. The inventory disappeared." She laughs weakly. "Everything keeps falling apart, and I'm getting tired."

The words strike harder than expected, because she isn't talking about work — she's talking about fighting, about the sustained effort of pushing back against rumors and complaints and suspicion and every problem thrown at her from a direction she can't identify. Something tightens unexpectedly in my chest.

Marissa wraps both arms around her. "You'll be okay. You always find a way through."

"I'm not sure I have one left," Juniper admits, and a tear slips free before she can stop it. She wipes it away immediately and another follows, and the sight creates a hollow ache beneath my ribs that I have no reasonable explanation for. I barely know this woman. I certainly shouldn't care this much. And yet watching her cry feels wrong and this goes beyond professional concern.

I watch Marissa comfort her — the warm tone, the concerned expression, the supportive body language — and something instinctive stirs in me that I can't immediately name. Then my gaze drops and I notice it. Marissa's free hand, the one Juniper can't see from where she's sitting, is curled into a fist so tight the knuckles have gone white. Not nervous, not tense — furious. She continues speaking softly and stroking Juniper's hair and smiling, and the fist doesn't loosen once.

The contradiction sends a warning through me that is primal and immediate and impossible to reason away. My bear stirs with increasing urgency, and before I can hold it in, a growl rumbles from my chest — low and unmistakable — and conversation stops entirely. Juniper's head jerks upward and Marissa freezes and several customers glance toward our table.

"Brock?" Juniper says, staring at me.

I clear my throat, genuinely baffled by my own reaction. "I should go," I say, rising from the chair, and Juniper tells me I don't have to leave and I tell her I do. I look at her directly before I turn to leave. "I'll come back."

"Why?" she asks, and the question is reasonable enough that I owe her an honest answer even if it isn't a complete one.

"Because I think there's more happening here than either of us knows," I tell her.She watches me carefully and then nods, and I leave before Marissa can ask anything at all.

The pay phone near the edge of town takes coins, and I feed them in and dial town hall.

“Town Hall, how can I help you?” The secretary answers.

“This is the Inspector from earlier today,” I identify myself.