For a full minute, Talia did not move.
She knelt on the sharp, damp cobblestones, the sound of the vanished Rolls-Royce fading in her ears, the text from Chef Arnaud burning in her mind.
Unacceptable. Do not bother.
The phone was still clutched in her hand. Her knuckles were white.
A gust of cold wind swirled down the narrow mews. It lifted the lightest particles of her ruined spices, creating a small, fragrant ghost of what she had lost. The air smelled of paprika, cumin, and cardamom... and of her. It smelled like failure.
A single, hot, angry tear slipped down her cheek, carving a clean path through the turmeric dust that had settled there.
She swiped it away. Crying was a luxury. Crying wouldn't pay the lease.
"No," she whispered, her voice low and ragged. "No. I... I can fix this."
Feeling stiff and robotic, her limbs heavy with dread, Talia began to salvage what she could. Her hands, already stained a deep red, reached for the unbroken jars.
Three jars of star anise. A half-kilo bag of smoked paprika, miraculously sealed. A small jar of Grains of Paradise.
It was useless.
The expensive ones—the ones that mattered—were a total loss. The delicate saffron, which she'd weighed painstakingly, was gone, trampled into the mud. The custom ras el hanout, her father's 20-ingredient blend, was a gritty paste on the pavement, already mingling with the city's grime.
A hysterical laugh bubbled in her throat. She had just been ruined by a man who probably spent more on his car's floor mats than she made in a month. A ghost in a black car.
She couldn't just leave this mess. It was too symbolic. It was her father's legacy, scattered in the dirt. Using a dustpan and brush she kept for accidental spills, she swept the fragrant, tragic rainbow of her spices into a gutter. It felt like burying a small animal.
Her hands were shaking so violently she could barely unlock her phone again.
She had to call. Arnaud's text was a dismissal, but he was a chef. He was volatile. Maybe, if she begged...
She scrolled to the contact, "Chef Arnaud (Élan)," her thumb hovering. She pressed "call" and held her breath.
It didn't even ring. It went straight to a deputy.
"Purchasing, Élan," a crisp, bored voice answered.
"Hi, this is Talia Solomon," she began, her voice sounding thin and reedy. "From Solomon's Spices. I'm... I'm sorry. I'm running late with your 2 PM order. I've had an accident—"
"Solomon's Spices?" the man interrupted. He didn't sound angry. He sounded indifferent. There was a clicking of keys. "Ah, yes. You can disregard that order."
Talia's stomach dropped. "Disregard? No, please, I can replace it. It might take me until tomorrow morning. I'll have to re-grind the ras el hanout, but the saffron—"
"That won't be necessary," his voice cut her off, final like a slamming door. "We've been instructed to inform you that The Asher Group is terminating your supplier contract, effective immediately. A new shipment is already on its way from our central distribution."
Talia's brain struggled to process the words. "Terminating? But... it was an accident. I'm ten minutes late. I can fix this. Please, let me speak to Chef Arnaud—"
"Chef Arnaud is no longer handling this. This decision comes from the Group."
"The... the Group? What group?" Talia stammered.
"The Asher Group," the man said, as if explaining something to a child. "We own Élan. A confirmation email of your termination is already on its way. Have a good day."
The line clicked.
Talia stared at her phone, at the "Call Ended" screen.
The Asher Group. That was the phantom corporation that owned the restaurant. The one she'd only ever seen on letterhead.
They hadn't just fired her. They had replaced her in ten minutes. She wasn't a partner. She was a line item that had been deleted.
The walk back to the shop was a blur. She didn't have the fare for the Tube, not without the check from Élan she'd been counting on. She walked the forty blocks from Mayfair to their small, beloved storefront in Marylebone, her basket digging into her shoulder, the ghost-scent of her failure clinging to her clothes like a shroud.
With every step, the numbers clicked through her head.
The Élan contract was forty percent of their monthly revenue. It covered the mortgage on her mother's flat above the shop. It paid for Maya's tuition for her design course.
She had been holding it all together by a single, fragile thread. The man in the Rolls-Royce had just taken a pair of shears to it.
When she reached the shop, the warm scent of cardamom and roasting cinnamon that usually felt like a hug now felt suffocating. The brass bell above the door chimed, a cheerful but false sound.
"Solomon's Spices" was her father's dream. A tiny, vibrant jewel box filled with jars of every color, the dark wooden shelves a testament to his passion.
Her mother, Sarah, was at the counter, her dark, curly hair flecked with silver. She was laughing at something Maya was showing her on a tablet. Maya, her 24-year-old sister, the artist and the light of the family, looked up first.
"Tali! Finally!" Maya grinned, pushing a strand of bright pink hair from her eyes. "Mom made that honey cake. We were just—"
Maya's smile faltered. She sniffed the air. "Tali, what... what's that smell? Did you drop something? You smell like... the street."
Sarah turned, and her smile didn't just fade; it vanished. A mother's intuition, sharp and immediate. She didn't look at the basket. She didn't look at Talia's stained hands. She looked at Talia's eyes.
"Talia? Matok? What happened?" Sarah asked, her voice quiet, already moving from behind the counter.
Talia stood by the door, the bell chiming one last, hollow time as it settled. She looked at her mother's worried face and her sister's confusion. She looked at the shop her father had built, this beautiful, fragrant, impossible burden.
She tried to be the strong one. She tried to say, "It's fine. I'll fix it."
But the words wouldn't come.
She let the heavy, now-lopsided basket slide from her shoulder. It hit the wooden floor with a defeated thud.
"I lost it," Talia whispered, the words tearing at her throat. "The spices... the delivery. It's all gone."
"Oh, Matok," Sarah said, rushing forward, her hands fluttering. "It's just spices. We can replace—"
"No," Talia said, finally meeting her mother's eyes. The hot, angry tears she had refused to cry in the mews spilled over. "You don't understand. I lost the contract. Élan... they fired us."