Page 21 of Coffee Shop Girl
“Mmm. Double shot today, please. I’m packed with hair appointments. Luckily, Devin’s at home helping his father with a new truck job. Good Lord loves us.”
Thankfully, Maverick faded into the office again. A long breath whooshed out of me when he shut the door. Millie silently tracked him until he disappeared, then turned to me with a squeal.
“Who isthat?”
“Trouble,” I muttered.
“Then trouble is gorgeous. Wait, why is he in your office?”
“He’s renting it as a workspace.”
Her nose scrunched. “That tiny thing?”
“That tiny thing.”
She studied me with a shrewd gaze. “Uh-huh,” she murmured. “And sparks are flying?”
“Millie, no! Geez. What are you ... no. Nothing like that.”
“Right. You haven’t noticed that he’s 1,000% male and the size of a fridge? Don’t tell me you don’t want to feel those arms around you, or haven’t thought about it. That’s a lie!” She pointed to me as soon as I opened my mouth. Her voice took on a wispy edge. “It would be like cuddling a Viking.”
“Or a large piece of inflexible wood that thinks highly of itself.”
She smirked.
I set her steaming cup in front of her with a dangerous glare. “This is not something I’m going to talk about. He’s a paying customer of Dad’s coffee shop, and that’s it. I treat him with courtesy and respect, just like anyone else.”
Which is why I haven’t punched him.
“It’s your store now,” she said softly, a sad smile on her face as she took the cup. “It’s not your dad’s anymore.”
“How’s the family?” I asked, hearing the edge in my own voice.
“Fine.” She sighed. “Mac’s already butchered the cows we had on track for the summer, so he’s picking up car work again. If we’re not borrowing money from Peter to pay Paul, I don’t know what we’re doing.” She glanced at her watch with a little cry. “Gotta go! Thanks, girl. You’re a lifesaver.”
After she left, Maverick’s steady voice came from the office, a blur in the background. Probably in another meeting. I leaned against the counter with a long breath. Thinking was easier when I didn’t have toseehim.
Life was never supposed to be fair,Dad muttered in my head.
I made a mental note to riffle through the messy binder he’d left behind. Maybe there was an operations manual. The uneasy truth that maybeMaverick was right made me restless.
My eyes roved the shop, lingering on the old fishing knickknacks decorating the far wall. Pictures of bass and trout and carp. Dad fishing in Alaska. Stupid signs likeI fish ... therefore I am ... not here!
Homey. Cozy. Definitely Dad.
This didn’t look like it was teetering on the edge of disaster.
Right?
The Frolicking Moose had been Dad’s big retirement and dream.A coffee shop and a bed-and-breakfast on the reservoir of a small mountain town, Bee,he’d always said to me, sipping artisan coffee and looking out over the lake.It’s the life.
He’d thrown everything into it after retiring from the military. Blueprints for the bed-and-breakfast expansion lay forgotten in the storage room, collecting dust. At the time, I thought him indomitable. Everything would happen because Dadmadethings happen.
Only now was I starting to see the truth.
He had been disorganized, at best. Drowning, at worst. He’d invested in things he didn’t really need, like an awning, when the ice maker had been sputtering to death. I’d been forced to buy a run-down espresso machine that was unreliable on its best day.
Dad’s booming laugh had hidden the truth. Everything had seemed fine. I’d called him the day before the heart attack. The last time I’d spoken to him in person, he’d left me with the biggest bear hug I’d ever felt. All my concerns about finishing college and settling into my real estate dream had felt much smaller. Iwishedthat was all I was dealing with now.
