Page 1 of The Barista's Beloved

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“To the last two standing!” Maeve Brennan was drunk. She must be, or she wouldn’t have toasted her single-hood quite so exuberantly. Max Vergaras clinked glasses with her over the bar, but she didn’t miss the wince that crossed his handsome face. She leveled a finger at him. Tried to, anyway. It wove and bobbed until it landed just to the left of his nose, poking into his cheek. “You’re not any happier about it than I am.”

He gently grasped her finger and removed it from his face. “Not particularly, no.”

“Well, what are you doing about it?” Maeve attempted her best intimidating face. She’d grown up with three older brothers who she’d had to hold her own against, so she thought she was doing a pretty good job of it, but Max didn’t seem very intimidated.

He shrugged. “It’s hard for chefs to date since we have such weird schedules.”

Maeve snorted. “So do bakers. And Sean and Jess just got married.” Her voice trailed away on the last word. Jessica Casillas-Moore was Maeve’s best friend in River Hill, her new hometown. Maeve had moved here with her brother to open up a distillery, far away from their family and the grand whiskey traditions that had ruled them for generations. She’d met Jess when the beauty blogger had started dating a friend of Iain’s, and the two had hit it off immediately.

Two days ago, Jess had come back from a surprise trip to Costa Rica with an even bigger surprise: she and Sean had eloped! Which was why Maeve was huddled here at the bar at Frankie’s, Max’s award-winning restaurant. Ostensibly, she’d come to discuss the joint gift they were planning for the newlyweds. In reality, she’d come to drink.

“Letsh … let’s make a pact,” she said. “If neither of us is married by the time we’re thirty—”

“I’m thirty-five,” he said dryly.

“Ugh.” She shook her head slowly. “I always forget how old you are.”

He rolled his eyes. “Thanks a lot, spring chicken. You should probably dry out.” He poured her a glass of water and walked away to go help his staff prepare for the dinner rush.

It was good advice from a wise elder. She didn’t take it, though.

Which was why, the next morning, she limped into The Hollow Bean, River Hill’s best coffee shop, and ordered her coffee without even looking up over the rim of her oversized sunglasses. The sound of her own voice made her head hurt. Listening to other people was even worse. But nobody had started up a coffee delivery service here yet. She was on her own, and she had a lot to do at work today.

“Here you go.” The voice sounded like sunshine. It was the first thing that hadn’t set her head to pounding all morning. This time she did look up, and beheld the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. Warm brown eyes circled by thick lashes over an elegant nose that led to a square jaw dusted by a bit of stubble that somehow looked soft. It was like Captain America had personally showed up to make her drink—especially when her eyes darted downward to his chest and her gaze followed his arm as it reached out toward her. He was holding her coffee, the second most beautiful thing in her field of vision.

“Thanks,” she managed to get out. Her voice barely made it beyond a rough whisper.

“Rough night, huh?” He smiled, and she was almost certain a breeze ruffled his perfect golden-brown hair. She resisted the urge to look behind her for an assistant with a fan. She wasn’t on a reality show. That she knew of, anyway.

“You have no idea,” she mumbled.

“Well, enjoy.” He turned back to serve other customers, and she spared a moment to watch him walk away. His back was even better than his front, the little coffee shop apron strings cinching around his waist and letting his ass take center stage. It was mesmerizing. But she didn’t have time to be mesmerized.

She shuffled back toward the edge of the crowded shop, out of the way, and took her first sip, ready to savor the caffeine-tinged goodness.

It. Was. Awful.

She grabbed for a napkin and wiped her face, sure the vile brew was dribbling down her chin. Raising the cup to eye level, she stared in horror at what had once been her most reliable companion. The cup looked the same—cream cardboard, tan liner, both emblazoned with The Hollow Bean’s logo. But what lurked within ...

Maeve sniffed the opening in the lid and recoiled. Whatever this was, it couldn’t be called coffee.

She glanced up at the counter and bit her lip. There were three baristas working today—the morning rush was always busy. She hated conflict, but she needed coffee.

She watched the line move for a moment. The Hollow Bean was tucked into a tiny building in River Hill’s town square in a space clearly not intended to house a coffee shop. Max had said he thought it might once have been an insurance sales office. Now, the baristas were tucked behind a slim counter, sailing around each other in a complicated coffee-making dance that was almost elegant. On the other side of the long swath of burnished marble, things were a lot less pretty. The line curved and bent its way through the space, surrounding the few tiny tables in the front area near the large glass windows. Only the bravest customers actually tried to sit down here, and Maeve wasn’t one of them.

Now she carefully edged her way through the crowd to the corner of the counter, out of the way of the people shouting out their orders. The man handing over his credit card at the front of the line shot her a dirty look. She held up her cup in silent self-defense and he rolled his eyes.

It was almost enough to make her back up and leave. She’d had enough conflict in her life—anyone who’d grown up with Cathal Brennan as a father had far more experience with it than they wanted. But where her brothers had grown up into blustery versions of their father—Iain, for the most part, was the exception, though even he could bristle with the best of them—Maeve had decided to just...be nice. She’d discovered a long time ago that people were far more inclined to do what you wanted when you smiled at them than they were when you yelled, and she’d made such a habit of being sweet and accommodating that it had become ingrained. When she’d mustered the courage to tell her family that she and Iain were moving to California, she’d thrown up both before and after the conversation.

But a whiff of the toxic brew in her cup was stronger than the faint nausea the idea of complaining roused in her. She couldn’t live without coffee, and she was already too late for work to go anywhere else. She caught the eye of one of the other baristas as he stepped nearby to pour beans into the grinder.

“Excuse me.” She raised her cup and put on her best apologetic face. “I’m really sorry, but could I possibly get a fresh one of these?”

He reached out an arm and snagged it with one hand while pushing buttons on the bulky metal machine with the other. He raised it to his nose and sniffed, then sighed. “Ben make this?”

“Uh, the new guy?” She recognized the other two baristas as regulars, but she’d never seen the one who’d made her coffee before. “Yeah.”

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