Hand over the bakery keys, Grandma, you’re too old to run a business and

I set down my rolling pin and wiped my hands on my apron. ‘Tyler, sweetheart,’ I said gently, ‘why don’t you come into the back office. Let’s talk like adults.’ He smirked at the customers like he’d already won and followed me past the ovens. I opened the old oak desk drawer and pulled out a navy-blue folder. ‘Before you sign anything,’ I said, ‘you should know a few things.’ I slid the first page across. It was the deed. Not to the bakery. To the entire building, the two apartments above it, and the parking lot behind. ‘Your grandfather bought this block in 1979 for eleven thousand dollars. It’s appraised at four point two million now.’ Tyler’s smirk cracked. I slid the second page. A letter from Sterling & Croft Patisserie Group. ‘They’ve been licensing my sourdough starter for six years. That’s the royalty statement. Last year alone: three hundred and eighty thousand.’ His mouth opened. Nothing came out. I slid the third page. My will. ‘Everything was going to be split between you, your sister Megan, and the Maple Street Children’s Hospital. Equal thirds.’ I picked up a pen, drew a clean line through his name, and initialed it. ‘Megan drove me to chemo every Tuesday for nine months while you were posting yacht photos in Miami. She never once asked what I owned.’ I closed the folder. ‘You came in here today and told a room full of my customers I was an embarrassment. Those customers are my family, Tyler. You are a stranger who shares my last name.’ I walked him to the front door past the silent line. Mrs. Patterson, eighty-one, held the door open for him with a sweet smile. ‘Visionary entrepreneur,’ she said. ‘Bless your heart.’ Tyler’s BMW pulled away. I went back behind the counter, tied my apron tighter, and called out, ‘Who’s next, my loves?’ The line clapped. The croissants came out golden that afternoon. Best batch I’ve made in years.