Page 1 of Sycamore Circle

CHAPTER 1

They’d been standing in line for five minutes and likely had another ten minutes to go before they could get out of there. Considering he hadn’t wanted to go to Sacred Grounds in the first place, Bo was irritated. After a three-year stint in Madisonville, he didn’t like to spend his time standing in line for much.

Waiting this long for a cup of overpriced coffee just seemed wrong.

“I can’t believe you come here all the time, Mason,” he muttered.

Mason shrugged. “This coffee is worth the wait. You’re going to love it. I promise.”

“Doubt it.”

As usual, his longtime buddy paid him no mind. “Whatever. Look at your phone or something and chill.”

Mason went back to doing exactly that, but Bo was in no hurry to pull his phone out of his back pocket. If he did, he knew he’d see another four emails and twice as many texts from the guys who reported to him. He liked his job, but sometimes he needed a break.

Instead, he listened to the woman at the head of the line order some kind of complicated latte with almond milk and gritted his teeth. Why did everybody try to make simple things so difficult? Coffee was coffee. There was no need to add whatever kind of “milk” came out of an almond to it.

Mason sure had fancy tastes in his beverage choices, considering he’d come out of prison not too long ago.

At last, the almond milk gal had her drink and scone. They stepped forward in the line. Bo started to smile—until he heard the teenage girl at the front of the line announce she was ordering four drinks to go.

“Lord have mercy,” he murmured. He meant it too. He absolutely was going to need some divine help in order to not pull Mason out of Sacred Grounds and drive to the nearest convenience store. There, he could get sixteen ounces of Maxwell House for two bucks, and even pick up a Slim Jim or two.

Mason looked up from his phone. “I’m telling you, it’s worth it. Settle down.” Lowering his voice, he added, “and try, for once, to look a little less like you’re itching to wring somebody’s neck. You’re gonna make everyone around us nervous.”

Realizing Mason probably had a point, Bo pulled his attitude down a notch. He wasn’t a small man, and his sleeve of tattoos didn’t always generate warm and cozy feelings either.

He knew that too. Shoot, it seemed like he spent half his life telling the men he was in charge of—fresh-out-of-prison guys in need of a hand—to remember that the regular population was real different than the one they’d been accustomed to in Madisonville.

It was obviously time to concentrate on something else. He looked around hoping to find something to capture his attention.

The coffee shop was a converted church in the middle of the square in their tiny downtown. Whoever had done the remodeling had kept the basic structure but had removed anything that might have religious connotations. He never would tell Mason this, but he remembered when the owners had bought the old place. They’d donated the sixty-year-old stained glass to a local church and replaced it with stained glass featuring a sun, a cup of coffee, and the shop’s name.

Mason was obviously not the only fan of the café either. There were eight tables and six of them were filled. At least a dozen people stood in line, and three people worked behind the counter.

When they moved forward again, he heard the prettiest voice he ever heard. It was smooth, melodic, and kind. So kind.

Something inside of him stilled.

“Good job, Anthony,” the woman said in a gentle way. It wasn’t condescending or the slightest bit flirtatious. It was just plain nice. Nice in a way that clean laundry or breathing fresh air in the early morning was.

Her perfect, oh-so-nice voice caught his attention like nobody’s business.

So much so, Samuel Beauman—called Bo by everyone who wanted to live—couldn’t stop himself from turning his head to see who that voice belonged to.

It didn’t take long to find her... and then, there she was, at a table next to the window across from a large middle-aged man. She was a pretty thing. So pretty, he almost wished he hadn’t looked.

The man she was with—Anthony, Bo supposed—looked embarrassed and mumbled something under his breath.

She laughed. “Nope, I’m not going to let you go there. I’m proud of you.”

The words, combined with the sound of her voice, so clear and melodic, rang out over the piped music playing on the speakers overhead. When the Anthony guy smiled at her, she laughed. Drawing him in even further.

It was almost a shame when it was his turn at the counter.

“What will you have?”

“Large coffee. Black.”

---