Page 69 of The Third Baseman

“You got it, I’ll be right back.”

The coffee shop was much busier than it looked from the outside. Much, much busier, and pretty loud. I joined the line behind a couple of guys wearing Lions caps, pulled out my cell and brought up Jupiter’s contact details.

My fingers hovered over the letters. I needed to say thank you.

Thank you seemed too basic for the immovable object now sitting in my living room; for the trouble he’d gone to. And thank you wasn’t right. I had a lot of feelings about Jupiter Reeves swirling around my brain, but I wasn’t sure if thankfulness was one of them.

I hadn’t figured it out before my name was called, so I slipped my cell back into my pocket, put my order through, and stood aside to wait with everyone else.

“Marnie,” the barista called my name, quicker than I’d expected. “Marnie.”

“Me!” I pushed through the rest of the customers waiting for their drinks and grabbed the two cups, then made my way back to where Beulah was standing under a row of blossom trees. “Come on, let’s go.”

She dodged a guy not looking where he was going. “It’s so busy!”

I glanced around; fifty percent of the people were wearing some form of Lions logo.

“The game today,” I gulped my coffee, gagging at the bitterness. “Ugh, this is disgusting.”

I looked at the cup. Unless my name had changed to Barney in the last fifteen minutes, this was not mine.

“What’s wrong?”

“I got someone else’s coffee,” I grumbled. I really wanted coffee, but this was undrinkable. However, that would require me going back through that crowd. But… coffee… “Do you mind waiting? I’ll see if they have mine. I can catch you up if you want to start walking.”

“No, we’re good for time,” Beulah replied, and then her smile turned flat while her eyes moved to over my left shoulder.

I spun around to find a preppy-ish looking college guy holding a large coffee cup. “Marnie?”

“Yes?”

He thrust the cup at me and pointed to the one I was holding. “I think we got each other’s.”

My eyes widened with relief at the trip I’d been saved, “Oh! Thank you! I really didn’t want to go back in there.”

“Yeah, me either,” he grinned. “Here you go.”

I took it from him and sipped. Much better. “Ah, awesome. Enjoy your day.” I smiled at the guy, expecting him to walk off as I turned to Beulah, gesturing with my head for her to lead the way.

Coffee guy didn’t move. Instead, deep dimples formed as he grinned. “Your coffee order is disgusting by the way.”

I scoffed; eyes widening at Beulah, then at coffee guy. “No, you’re mistaken.Yourcoffee is disgusting. I nearly spat it out.”

“You’re wrong.”

I wasn’t about to stand and argue with this guy, no matter how cute he thought he was being, especially as I was becoming aware of Beulah’s head switching between the two of us like this was playing out on Center Court at Flushing Meadows, wearing a wide smile of her own that I didn’t understand, but it looked like trouble.

“Okay, well, enjoy your coffee.” I pulled a laughing Beulah away in an attempt to shut this down.

“Oh, I will, Marnie,” he grinned. “See you around.”

The way he said my name… all arrogant and self-assured, but not in the way it tripped off Jupiter’s tongue, because when Jupiter said my name, it felt like there was no one else around.

Beulah nudged me and lowered her voice. “That guy was flirting with you.”

“What?” I blew out. “No, he wasn’t.”

She pulled her sunglasses down her nose. “Um, yeah, he was definitely flirting with you.”

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