Chapter 2 - Three Seconds from Disaster
The bottom tier slid less than an inch.
That was enough.
Camila lunged forward and locked both hands around the hidden support frame under the tablecloth.
"Nolan, kill the music!"
The mariachi trumpets stopped mid-note.
A waiter gasped as the sugar arch trembled.
Victoria jumped backward. "What is happening?"
"Don't bump the table!" Camila snapped.
For the first time all evening, Victoria obeyed.
Camila dropped to one knee. Beneath the linen, the cake stand's central brace had been loosened. She could see the empty hole where a steel locking pin should have been.
"Nolan. Prep room. Red toolbox. Bring it."
He ran.
Victoria stood rigid, phone still in her hand. "Did you do this?"
Camila looked up. "You watched me walk over here thirty seconds ago."
"That doesn't answer me."
"It answers anyone who wants the truth."
Two hotel security guards approached. Behind them came Bianca Vale, the event planner, floating into the ballroom in a cream pantsuit with a headset tucked behind one ear.
Bianca's eyes went from Camila to the cake.
For half a second, something flashed across her face.
Not surprise.
Annoyance.
Then it vanished.
"What happened?" Bianca demanded.
Victoria pointed. "I caught her messing with the cake."
Bianca looked down at Camila. "I knew bringing outside bakery staff into my event was a mistake."
Camila's grip tightened around the frame.
"Funny," she said. "I was thinking the same thing about the event planner."
Bianca's eyes narrowed.
Nolan returned with the toolbox. Camila pulled out a temporary steel pin, slid it through the brace, tightened the collar, then checked the level twice.
The cake settled.
Nobody spoke until Camila stood.
She lifted the missing-pin housing from beneath the linen and showed it to the guards.
"This didn't vibrate loose," she said. "It was removed."
One guard frowned. "How can you tell?"
"Because the safety clip is gone too. You have to squeeze both tabs and pull straight out. Someone knew what they were doing."
Bianca crossed her arms. "Or someone wants us to think that."
Camila turned toward her.
There it was again.
The little push.
The suggestion.
Bianca never accused directly. She planted a thought and let everyone else water it.
Victoria took the bait immediately. "Search her bag."
"No," Nolan said.
Everyone looked at him.
Nolan swallowed. "We need to handle this professionally."
Victoria's face hardened. "This is my family's event."
"And this is my hotel." A deeper voice came from the ballroom entrance.
Mr. Rafael Salazar stood between the open doors.
At seventy-two, he still carried himself like the construction foreman he had once been - broad shoulders, silver hair, steady eyes that missed very little. Tonight's celebration was for his wife, Elena, who was turning seventy.
Beside him stood Elena in a deep red dress, one hand looped through his arm.
She looked from the security guards to Camila to the trembling sugar flowers.
"What happened?" Elena asked.
Victoria rushed forward. "Grandma, this server was touching your cake and - "
"Elena," Camila said softly.
Victoria stopped cold.
So did Bianca.
Camila had not called her Mrs. Salazar.
She had used her first name.
Elena stared at Camila for one long second.
Then her face lit with recognition.
"My God," she whispered. "You came."
Victoria's mouth fell open.
But before Elena could say another word, a scream came from the prep hallway.
A hotel employee stumbled into the ballroom holding a white bakery box.
Red frosting dripped from the bottom like blood.
"Ms. Reyes," he said, breathless. "You need to see what somebody did to the backup cake."
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