Run: 2026-04-25-01KQ2DJ9E5PZK0FRBDHK4WXBB8

The warm, yeasty air of Rise & Shine Bakery wrapped around me like floured arms. Outside the picture window, Maple Street glittered with a fresh dusting of snow. Inside, the display case glowed, a jewel box of glossy fruit tarts and pillowy cinnamon rolls. “You’ve been staring at that same scone for five minutes. Did it confess to the crime?” “It’s a cranberry-orange scone, not a witness. I’m just… thinking. The texture is all wrong for a proper bludgeon. Too crumbly. No structural integrity.” “Only you would analyze the murder weapon potential of a baked good. The police are saying it was the brass candlestick, same one from the library window. Case closed.” “Is it? Then why was there a dusting of flour on the rug near the body? Not just any flour. A fine-milled pastry flour. The kind Millie uses for her scones.” “Millie wouldn’t hurt a fly and you know it. She was here, glazing windows at five in the morning.” “With an apron full of this exact flour, which, I might add, is completely inconsistent with the crime scene’s candlestick narrative. The angle of the wound was all wrong for a swing. It was a thrust. Almost certainly a secondary object, something heavy but with a smaller, concentrated impact point. Like a frozen stick of butter. Or a rolling pin.” “You’re telling me a frozen stick of butter is the real murder weapon?” “I’m telling you that candlestick was a plant. And whoever put it there doesn't know a crumb coat from a crumb trail.”