Page 8 of The Cinnamon Spice Inn (Maple Falls #1)

“What now?” He turned. “Ope! That would be breakfast.” Her dad looked to the left, then the right, for something to help.

Madison quickly raced to unplug the toaster and then covered it with hand towels to smother the flames. She searched the cupboards for a box of baking soda just in case the towels weren’t enough but came up empty. In fact, most of the cupboards were empty.

He looked up at her with surprise, holding what looked to have once been an egg between his fingers. “Sorry about that. It’s just… are hard-boiled eggs supposed to be powdery?” he asked, genuine curiosity in his voice.

She momentarily froze. “What? No! What is happening here? Where is Maurice?”

For years, the inn had had a brilliant French chef, Maurice, who was one of the biggest reasons Madison fell in love with food in the first place.

Maurice and her mom had baked treats for the inn from old family recipes, the pair of them filling the kitchen with laughter and the most delicious of scents.

“In Bordeaux, I suspect. Or was it Lourdes? I can’t remember where he was retiring to.” Her dad scratched his chin.

Madison’s stomach dropped in shock. “Maurice is retired? Since when?” Madison had assumed he had simply gone home for the evening when she’d arrived last night.

“Oh, I don’t know… the past four, maybe five months? But don’t you worry, I’ve been managing the kitchen.” Madison’s dad waved his hand in front of him. “Nothing fancy. I put a stack of plates out and let guests serve themselves.”

“Stack of plates,” Madison mumbled.

She couldn’t imagine the inn without Maurice. Most chefs would’ve kicked an overly curious eight-year-old out of their kitchen, but not Maurice. No, he’d pulled up a milk crate, handed her a spoon, and put her to work.

“A good chef knows how things should taste,” he’d say, plopping a dollop of sauce onto the back of her hand. “Not guess—know.”

Maurice had taught her how to tell if peaches were ripe just by their scent. How to pick the best bread by the feel of the crust. How to whisk eggs until they turned the perfect shade of pale yellow.

He also had zero patience for laziness.

“Why are you chopping like a sad little bird? Use confidence, Madison!”

“No, no, no—your béchamel is too fast. Slow down!”

Madison had worshipped him. The first time he’d let her carry a plate out to a guest, she’d felt like she’d won an Olympic gold medal.

Now, she was standing in the same kitchen, staring at what could only be described as a culinary crime scene. And here she’d been hoping for Maurice’s butter pecan French toast.

Madison’s gaze swept over the disaster in front of her. In addition to burnt toast, her dad had managed to serve up something that once used to be eggs, along with undercooked bacon and overripe fruit with a side of watery yogurt.

Her dad, completely oblivious, smiled at her proudly. “Sometimes I add donuts from the Stop ’n’ Go.”

“The gas station?” Madison asked incredulously.

“Guests seem to really like them,” he said with a shrug.

It was worse than Madison could’ve imagined. Maurice was probably somewhere in Bordeaux, sipping a fine Chablis, blissfully unaware of the culinary crimes being committed in his absence.

If he saw this, he would weep.

“Course, I know it’s not forever…” George said, correctly reading his daughter’s expression.

“I just didn’t know how to find someone to fill Maurice’s shoes.

I put out an ad in the paper, but the only person who interviewed was an out-of-towner who didn’t like animals.

Aspen was put off his food for a day when I told him.

Can you imagine!” George shook his head.

No, Madison couldn’t. George loved animals and had an addiction to rescuing them.

Cocoa was only one of the inn’s latest pets.

Honey and Biscuit, a pair of miniature Highland cows, were a destination in their own right, given to Gram on her seventieth birthday.

They also had two goats— They can’t live all by themselves!

They’d be lonely! —and Aspen, her father’s white pony, rescued from a circus.

The animals were some of the many additions her parents had made to the historical inn over the years. Now, the inn had no chef, no money, it was falling apart, and yet her dad couldn’t seem to stop rescuing animals. Heaven help her.

“I’ve got to go,” Madison said, her thoughts snapping back to the present. Her habitual fight-or-flight response had kicked in hardcore, and she needed space. Needed to think. Or not think. Everything was all too much.

She just needed to go.

Madison turned on her socked heel and made for the exit.

“Wait! You’re not going to stay for breakfast?” he called after her.

“Sorry, Dad, not hungry!” she replied without looking back.

“I can get some donuts if you’d like?” he added, but Madison was running away.

She tugged her boots on and wrapped a knit scarf around her neck before quickly stepping outside. She didn’t think; she just escaped.

She had avoided Maple Falls ever since her mom’s funeral a few years ago. It had been too painful, too full of memories.

But even before then, Madison had mostly stayed away since leaving home in her early twenties. Sure, she’d visit her family over the holidays. But every time, she’d keep herself hidden away at the inn, away from the town she’d once loved so much. The guilt had been too much.

It wasn’t just the way she had left for the internship, when she and Zach were still together, and how they’d started to talk less and less often as work and city life consumed her.

No, it was what came after. When she’d come home on the anniversary of when they first started dating, to surprise him.

She wanted to tell him about how amazing New York was, how a whole new world had opened up to her, and maybe, just maybe, persuade him to move there with her.

This wasn’t the type of conversation to have over the phone.

Oh no. This was a big, life-altering conversation, and she’d wanted to have it in person.

In her mind, she pictured them celebrating their anniversary before asking him the question that could change everything.

But instead, she’d found him at the bar, playing pool and laughing with another woman, the girl leaning too close, smiling in a way that made Madison’s stomach twist. She’d turned around and walked out before he even saw her, her heart splintering in a way she hadn’t let herself think about since.

A few days later, Madison had called him, saying she could feel something was off between them and asking if there was anything he wanted to tell her. He hadn’t said anything. Only silence, an awkward pause.

So, Madison did what she had to do. She told him she was going to stay in New York for her career and that maybe it was better if they broke up since the long-distance thing clearly wasn’t working.

Zach didn’t argue. That fact still hurt all these years later.

Deep down, she had hoped he would stop her, admit what was going on with that other girl, say he still wanted them, that he would try. But he hadn’t fought for them at all. He had just let her go.

After that, it hadn’t taken long for her to lose touch with all her friends. They were all so connected to Zach, from his sister, Emily, to his best friend, Liam, and it just felt like there was no space for her anymore.

All the same, their friendships had been real, deep, and important, and she had pushed them away. Now, she wasn’t sure if she’d be welcomed back.

She could still turn around. Run back to the inn, to coffee, to comfort.

But standing on the porch, the leaves whipping around her feet, it was like a cool breeze was stirring in her heart too. Whispering that it was time to come home. Madison stepped off the porch.

Maybe she’d walk down to the lake first. Let the cold air clear her head.

Or maybe she’d just wander. See how the town had changed. See what was new.

Maybe—just maybe—she’d run straight into the person she was trying so desperately to forget.