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    Sera laid her burning cheek against the cold porcelain of the tub, awash with shame.
    â€œSo is it Awful Austin?” Pauline prompted.
    â€œWell… it is kind of about Blake, but…” Sera didn’t know quite how to describe the nuclear meltdown that had just incinerated her life.
    Pauline harrumphed. “Spill it, kid.”
    Where do I start? The booze was way out of control. Her career had just died a violent death. And she was so alone. Sera opened her mouth to try to explain, to justify, to deflect. What came out instead was a simple admission, born of grace.
    â€œI think… I think I need help.”
    Pauline didn't chide her, question her, or tell her she was being dramatic. Instead, she said the six simple words Serafina most needed to hear.
    â€œHelp’s coming, baby. Just hang on.”

Chapter Three
    Santa Fe, New Mexico
Right about now
    D ry and crumbly.”
    Serafina delivered the verdict dolefully into the cell phone cradled between her shoulder and cheek as she let the rest of the batch of red velvet cupcakes tumble like little boulders from the pan into the waiting trash bin in her aunt’s capacious kitchen. She’d frosted only one; now she had enough cream cheese icing left over to… well, try again, she supposed. Once she figured out exactly what had made one of her most tried-and-true recipes fall flat.
    â€œAw, hon.” Margaret’s sympathy came through two thousand miles a little tinny, but just as warm and honest as ever. “I’m sure they’re not all that bad. I mean, c’mon: When was the last time you made a dessert that wasn’t mind-bogglingly delicious?”
    In Sera’s opinion, there was delicious, and there was delicious. She’d been born with olfactory bulbs that could sniff out the faintest subtleties of anything edible. (In her wine-drinking days, she’d amused people at parties by allowing herself to be blindfolded, then identifying—by smell alone—the origin of any vintage placed before her. That was, until she’d passed out after guzzling too many of her test subjects.) And if anything, her taste buds were even more discerning. When it came to chocolate, for instance, she could instantly parse the difference between a single-source Peruvian and an Ecuadorian free-trade blend, then tell you the precise percentage of cocoa in each. Texture and flavor captivated her the way a dicey derivatives market enthralls an investment banker, and she’d known from early childhood that she was destined to work with food.
    Determined not to rely solely on her innate gifts, Sera had trailed some of the best pastry chefs in New York while still in cooking school, even taking a semester in France to apprentice herself under one of the most legendary chefs in Paris. She’d worked hard to hone her baking skills, studying the alchemy that turned simple yeast, flour, salt, and water into heavenly bread. She could have written a dissertation on the effects of gluten on those lovely bubbles that characterized the crumb of her tender, crusty loaves. But it was in her confectionery creations that Sera’s perfectionism truly came to the fore. She’d spent hour upon hour training herself to pipe precise lines with a pastry bag, until she could have written a perfect “Happy Birthday” on any cake with her arms behind her back. In fact, Sera was so adept at shaping lifelike sugar sculptures that the couples who’d ordered her wedding cakes had often refused to believe they could actually eat the flowers that adorned them.
    Of course, all that was before booze and Blake Austin had done a double whammy on her. But she’d promised herself she wouldn't dwell on the bad old days. Instead, she focused on her sponsor's encouragement.
    â€œThanks, Maggie, but they really are pretty inedible. Don’t worry, I’m not getting down on myself.” Sera wouldn’t dare, after all