My Fiance and Junior Sister Stole My Incense Recipe; I Ruined Them

My fianc and my youngest junior sister were carrying on behind my back, treating the Soothing Incense recipe my family had passed down for seven generations as if it were already theirs.

In front of me they played the devoted couple and the sweet little disciple, while behind me they stole ingredients, swapped out exhibit pieces, and had already worked out how to throw me out on the street the moment we signed the marriage papers.

Standing before the hidden compartment in the study, I held the voice recorder and listened to every filthy calculation, and a thin, mocking smile curved my lips.

This swindle carried out in the name of love was due for its final act.

An autumn afternoon, in the back courtyard of the Henson Atelier.

I was crouched by the bamboo rack sorting incense wafers when Barnaby Harding arrived carrying a box of candied fruit.

He set the box on the stone table, lifted the lid, and smiled at me, all warmth. "There's an old-name shop down at the corner. Stood in line half an hour to get these."

I wiped my hands, ate one, and asked, "Don't you have to be at the office today, watching over the new-drug filing? Didn't R&D say last week they were slammed around the clock?"

He gave me a crinkle-eyed smile. "No matter how busy things get, I still have to spend time with my fiance."

"By the way, Lucille Henson, once we sign the papers, what do you say we register the Soothing Incense recipe as a company patent?"

"I'll run it through the pharmaceutical mass-production channels and take our family craft nationwide. That beats being stuck in this little courtyard making wafers by hand, and it would honor what our ancestors handed down."

My brow drew together. The Soothing Incense was the root of the Henson Atelier, passed down seven generations. The family rule was plainly written: the recipe was never to leave the family, let alone be turned out by the ton in a factory.

I was just about to refuse when I heard quick footsteps rushing in from beyond the courtyard.

"Lucille, Lucille, I'm so sorry!"

Penelope Pruitt ran up with her eyes red, wearing the most pitiful look. "I went into your study just now to get rice paper for printing the incense catalog, and when I was moving the stool I knocked over the camphorwood box with your recipe in it. All the pages spilled out onto the floor..."

"I've already picked everything up, but a few of them got their corners creased. Yell at me, please. How could I be so clumsy?"

Something dropped in my chest.

The camphorwood box sat on the very top shelf, right next to the warning sign I'd put there on purpose. What business did she have touching it at all?

Before I could say a word, Barnaby reached over and ruffled Penelope's hair fondly, then turned to me with a smile. "That's my fault. I sent her to get a partnership document out of my briefcase, and she was in such a rush she got careless."

"It's nothing. A couple of creased corners, that's all. You can still read the writing."

"Once we're married, I'll rent a private safe-deposit box at the bank just for it. We'll lock the recipe in there, no one can touch it but you, and I'll hand you every key to keep. How's that?"

His gaze was open and sincere, and the discomfort that had just risen in me suddenly felt petty.

I sighed and looked at Penelope, whose eyes were still red. "It's fine. Just be careful next time. Don't go poking at the things on the top shelf. If something falls and hits you, that's no good either."

Penelope's tears turned to a smile at once. "Thank you, Lucille. I'll be careful, I promise!"

Toward evening, as I was gathering in the incense, old Hal Finch came in with a basket of prepared ingredients on his shoulder. He glanced at Penelope's departing back, then looked at me, opening his mouth as if to speak and then holding back.

"Hal, if you've got something to say, just say it. No need to stand on ceremony with me."

I tucked the incense wafers carefully into the paulownia-wood box.

Hal set the basket down and lowered his voice. "Miss, a recipe passed down in a family is the root your ancestors left you. You have to hold it tight in your own hands."

"An outsider is an outsider in the end. Even with a bit of a family tie, their heart isn't one with yours."

I smiled and pressed the lid of the wooden box shut, locking it. "Hal, Barnaby is my fianc. We'll be one family soon."

"Penny was the last disciple my mother took in before she passed. She's half a sister to me. Neither of them is an outsider."

Hal opened his mouth, then in the end only sighed, shook his head, and carried the empty basket away.

I stood in the dusk, looking at the incense box in my hands, and for reasons I couldn't name, a thread of unease slipped through me.

Three days later.

I was taking inventory of the storeroom, and when I opened the rosewood chest at the very back, my heart lurched.

Inside it I kept three ounces of premium aged agarwood, old stock my grandfather had left behind. Even when I blended top-grade Soothing Incense, I only dared shave off a little powder at a time.

Now a full half of it was gone, and even the silk lining underneath had been rummaged into a mess.

This grade of agarwood was worth its weight in gold, and only two people had a key to the storeroom: me and Penelope. She was my mother's disciple, and she usually handled the odd jobs in the storeroom for me, so she came and went freely.

When I carried the half-empty box over to find her, she was sitting in the front room polishing incense tools, humming to herself.

"Penny, the agarwood in the storeroom. Did you touch it?"

I set the box on the table, my voice level.

The polishing cloth slipped from her hand to the floor, and her face went white in an instant.

"Mentor, these past few days I saw how Barnaby couldn't sleep. He came home every night rubbing his temples, and it was so hard to watch. I thought agarwood works best for helping people rest, so I took some on my own to blend him some stick incense"

By the end of it she'd burst into tears, sobbing, "Mentor, I'm sorry. I know that was precious old stock. I was thoughtless, I overstepped."

"Scold me, then. Punish me however you want. I just couldn't stand seeing Barnaby so worn out"

At that moment Barnaby came in and gently comforted her. "What are you crying for? It's nothing."

Then he turned to me, guilt in his voice. "Lucille, honestly, this isn't Penny's fault. I mentioned to her a few days ago that I hadn't been sleeping well, and that's the only reason she thought to blend some incense for me."

"It's my fault for not stopping her. I didn't think it through."

He pulled a bank card from his wallet and set it in front of me. "There's two hundred thousand on here. Consider it payment for the materials."

"If it's not enough, just tell me. I'll cover whatever it costs."

"I'm the one who was wrong. I should have talked to you first. I upset you."

Watching him look so full of self-reproach, I started to feel my earlier questioning had been unkind.

It was only a bit of raw material. He was my fiance; using it wasn't out of line. Was there really any need to make such a big thing of it?

"Forget it. What's used is used. There's nothing to pay back."

I pushed the card back to him and said, half-reproachful, "Why didn't you just tell me you couldn't sleep?"

"I could have blended you some Soothing Incense. Wouldn't that work better than plain agarwood? You went and wasted good material for nothing."

Barnaby gave a helpless smile. "I just didn't want you to worry!"

"Besides, you already wear yourself out every day running the atelier and teaching your students. How could I bring myself to trouble you to blend incense for me on top of all that?"

And with that the matter was smoothed over. But the little doubt in me hadn't fully cleared.

Two more days passed. He was showering at my place, his phone left on the coffee table in the living room, and the screen suddenly lit up.

I glanced at it without meaning to. It was a text confirming a hotel booking, and the recipient's name was Penelope.

The hotel was the most luxurious one downtown, the Four Seasons, and the room booked was a couples suite.

I gripped the phone, fury rising straight to the top of my head.

He came out of the bathroom, saw me holding his phone, and asked with an unnatural smile, "What's wrong? Who texted you, that you look so grim?"

"See for yourself," I said coldly.

Barnaby lowered his head and skimmed the screen, then pulled me into his arms and said, a little helpless, "Silly girl, what are you imagining?"

"That FDA review expert coming next week is the key person for our new drug approval. I asked Penny to help host him, and the booking's under her name so she can coordinate the arrangements whenever she needs to."

"Look, here's the coordination letter."

He opened a file on his phone as he spoke. It really was an official letter about the review, and Penelope's name was there on the list of contacts.

"You, hm. Getting cold feet now that we're about to register the marriage?"

"Once this busy stretch is over, we'll go shoot the wedding photos. That seaside location you love, I've already booked it all."

Leaning against his chest, the emotions that had just churned up slowly settled.

He was so good to me. Young, accomplished, gentle, attentive. Why would he ever lie to me?

It had to be that I'd been too busy lately, too on edge, reading too much into things.

That night I lay in bed, turning over and over, and didn't fall asleep until well past midnight.

My dreams were full of Penelope's red-eyed, wronged little face and Barnaby's gentle smile, the two of them layered over each other, tangled into something that left me uneasy.

The city's heritage-craft incense showcase was set for the weekend. Our Henson Atelier's Soothing Incense was the finale exhibit, and the make-or-break piece in our push for a place on the state heritage-craft registry.

I'd started preparing the sample a full two weeks early, blending three versions with my own hands, adjusting the proportions again and again until I settled on the one I was proudest of. I sealed it in a glazed-glass incense box and locked it in the display case.

The morning the show opened, I'd barely reached the exhibition hall when I heard the commotion inside.

Director Chavez, who was overseeing the review, stood in front of our booth, his face dark. A crowd of exhibitors and reporters had gathered around him.

"Lucille Henson, this is what your Henson Atelier submits for judging?"

He pointed at the open glazed-glass box, his tone thick with disappointment and anger. "This is the Soothing Incense you've passed down for seven generations?"

"How is this any different from the cheap cedar incense you buy for ten dollars on the street?"

"Is this how you treat a heritage-craft review?"

My heart lurched, and I hurried over.

What sat in the box was nothing like the Soothing Incense I'd prepared. It was the most ordinary industrial cedar incense, sharp and biting, without even the most basic layering of scent. One look and you could tell it was cheap.

"What I placed in here yesterday with my own hands was the Soothing Incense sample," I said quickly. "I sealed the glazed-glass box myself!"

Penelope was crying with rage. "Lucille, someone's clearly doing this to us on purpose!"

"It has to be another atelier, jealous of how well-known the Henson Atelier is, afraid we'd make the registry, so they swapped the sample!"

"This is outrageous. How could anyone stoop to something so vile!"

The onlookers buzzed with talk, the judges murmuring to one another, their eyes full of doubt and disdain.

"Quiet, all of you. What is this noise!"

Barnaby pushed his way through, his face grim, and swept me behind him with one arm. "Director Chavez, esteemed judges, we will get to the bottom of this and give the organizing committee an answer."

"Whoever dared to maliciously swap our exhibit at a heritage-craft show is looking at commercial defamation, and I will not let it slide."

He pulled out his phone and, in front of everyone, called a lawyer, his voice hard. "Hello, Lawyer Dickerson. Someone here at the showcase has maliciously swapped the sample we submitted for judging and damaged our reputation. Bring your people over right now."

"Pull the hall's security footage, take the legal route. If it warrants a lawsuit, we sue. If it warrants damages, we collect."

By the time he hung up, the muttering around us had quieted considerably.

Barnaby turned, reached out to wipe the cold sweat from my temple, and murmured, "Don't be afraid. I'm here."

"This is a competitor's dirty work. I'll make them pay. I won't let you or the Henson Atelier suffer this kind of injustice."

Before, I'd have been reassured in an instant.

But this time my eyes had dropped to the cuff of his suit trousers.

There was a smudge of red clay along the hem.

That was the clay we used for processing herbs in the Henson Atelier's back courtyard, the clay I'd hauled back from Red Clay Ridge myself, breathable and perfect for slow-curing the ingredients.

In the whole city, that clay existed only in our back courtyard.

An outsider had no way of getting it on their clothes.

An ugly suspicion rose in me all at once.

The show broke up on bad terms. The organizing committee gave us three days to find out what had happened and to hold a special review over again.

Back at the atelier, Penelope wouldn't stop cursing that "shameless rival," more worked up than I was.

Barnaby took a call, said there was an urgent meeting at the company, and rushed off, telling me over and over before he left not to get angry, that it wasn't worth ruining my health over.

That evening I sat out in the courtyard to cool off, and Penelope came over with a bowl of iced lemonade and set it on the stone table in front of me.

"Lucille, stop being angry. It's not worth ruining your health over."

"Once we find out who did it, we'll make sure he pays until he's got nothing left."

I kept my voice casual. "Penny, the day before the show, where did you go?"

"I went looking for you to check the sample list, and I couldn't find you all afternoon."

She answered easily. "I went to the paper market to buy wrapping paper for the incense catalogs. I hit several markets, wore my feet raw. Why, Lucille, did you need me for something?"

I answered calmly. "It's nothing. Just asking."

I remembered perfectly well that the day before the show, the paper market had shut down completely for a citywide fire inspection. The doors hadn't even opened.

She was lying.

These two, the people I trusted most, the people closest to me, how much had they been hiding, how many things done behind my back that couldn't stand the light?

I said nothing. If anything, I was gentler than usual. I even brought up our plans after we got the marriage license, playing the part of a woman who trusted him completely.

The next morning at breakfast, in front of both Barnaby and Penelope, I let it slip on purpose: "The ancestral original of the Soothing Incense recipe is in the hidden compartment in the study. It's not really safe there."

"Once the showcase business is settled, I'll rent a safe deposit box at the bank and store it away, so I'm not fretting over it every single day."

"Tonight I'm going to Hal's place to talk through re-doing the evaluation. I'll probably be back very late. You two watch the house. Don't wait up for me."

Barnaby smiled. "Sure. Be careful on the way. Call me anytime if anything comes up."

Penelope nodded along, the picture of sweetness. "Don't worry, Lucille. I've got the house. I'll lock every door and window."

I looked at their flawless expressions and laughed to myself, cold inside.

Such a good performance. It'd be a real waste if they didn't go into acting.

After dark, I pretended to head out with my bag, circled around the mouth of the alley, then slipped quietly back in through the small door at the rear courtyard and hid in the nook beside the study.

The nook had a carved lattice window, just enough to see everything in the study clearly without being spotted.

The courtyard was silent, nothing but the chirp of insects.

I waited about half an hour before I finally heard soft, careful footsteps.

The door eased open, and two figures came in, one behind the other.

Barnaby and Penelope, just as I'd thought.

"Quick, where's the compartment? Did she really put the original in there?"

Penelope kept her voice low, but she couldn't hide the excitement in it.

"That head of hers, everything she's thinking is written all over her face. A few words and it came right out of her."

Barnaby's voice had none of its usual warmth now, just a trace of contempt and satisfaction. "It's behind the bookshelf, the third brick. Press it and it opens. I saw her open it once before."

I'd only shown him once, back when we'd just started dating, mentioning an old family rule in passing. I never imagined he'd kept it in his memory all this time, holding onto a thought like this.

A soft click, and the compartment opened.

Penelope let out a low cry of delight. "Found it, it's really here, this is the silk manuscript!"

"Careful, don't damage it. This is the money tree."

Barnaby's voice went eager. "Once we have the recipe, we file for the patent first. And once we get the marriage license next week, this atelier becomes joint marital property."

"Then we transfer it into the company's name, all above board. No one can say a word."

Penelope's tone carried a spiteful glee. "After you've got the license, how do you plan to get rid of her? You can't just let her keep the lady-of-the-house spot forever."

Barnaby's whole face turned cold. "How else? Come up with some reason. Say she's paranoid, that she's moving assets during the marriage. Take it to court and leave her with nothing."

"A woman clinging to a run-down atelier. Strip away the Henson Atelier name and she's nothing, she can barely feed herself."

Penelope laughed, her voice thick with jealousy she couldn't hold back. "You have no idea. I've been jealous of her since we were kids."

"Why was she born the young mistress of the Henson Atelier? Why does she get all of it, the ancestral craft, the rare medicinal ingredients, more money than she could ever spend?"

"How am I any less than her? Why do I have to live under someone else's roof, reading her moods to get by?"

Barnaby's face went tender. "Of course you're better than her."

"Once this is done, you're the lady of the Henson Atelier. The money from mass-producing the Soothing Incense, we split it down the middle."

"By then, what won't you be able to have? Designer bags, a big house, take your pick."

Penelope said, all sweet reproach, "Then you'd better keep your word."

"To help you, I stole ingredients, swapped the exhibit, and played the good little disciple in front of her every single day. I'm exhausted."

Barnaby smiled, eyes crinkling. "You've worked hard, baby."

"Once we have the recipe, we won't have to watch her moods anymore."

"If it weren't for this recipe worth billions, I'd have laid it all out to her long ago. You really think I like that untouchable, holier-than-thou act of hers? Bores me to death."

The two of them stood in front of the compartment, trading lines back and forth, laying out every scheme, every plot.

From three years ago, when Barnaby staged a chance meeting to get close to me, to Penelope seeking him out to conspire, from stealing rare ingredients and pocketing the money, to swapping the sample at the showcase to ruin my name. Every single thing was a heavy blow.

My body trembled faintly, not from grief, but from disgust.

Three years of feeling. A bond from growing up together since childhood. And from beginning to end, it had all been a carefully planned con.

I'd treated them like a fool, giving them everything in my heart, while they'd had me figured out cold the whole time.

Just as they took the recipe and turned, satisfied, to leave, I pushed open the door of the nook and walked out.

"What are you two talking about? Sounds lively in here."

They whipped around, and the instant they saw me, their faces went bloodless, like they'd seen a ghost.

The silk recipe dropped from Penelope's hands to the floor. She stared at me, eyes wide and round, lips trembling. "Lucille? Weren't you going to Hal's? How are you here?"

Barnaby was frozen too, forcing a dry little laugh onto his face. "Lucille, why are you back? We came to find an old text, looking up some material on incense recipes."

I laughed coldly. "You need my hidden compartment to look up material? Do you think I'm an idiot?"