Page 7 of Coffee Shop Girl
Signs of a messy life littered the room. Before Dad died eight months ago, it would have been immaculate. Dad always did military corners on his bed as soon as he woke up. Now necklaces, dirty clothes, and old magazines cluttered the space.
The one-room bedroom held what was left of my life. My brighter, happier, less lonely existence had been lost in the months since Dad’s untimely heart attack.
To distract myself from my depressing thoughts, I looked outside. My heart did a double take. Was that. . .?
Yes. Yes, it was.
The Viking had just stepped out of the grocery store and was scanning from left to right. He wore a black T-shirt and work khakis now.
Grateful for the anonymity of my upstairs window, I watched him cross the parking lot in the dusk. He was late twenties, possibly early thirties. Deep lines on his forehead meant he was a thinker, but he’d been easygoing despite my total mess this morning.
I spent so long studying him, lost in my thoughts, that I didn’t realize he was staring right back at me. With a gasp, I jerked back and shoved the curtain closed. My heart slammed in my chest.
When I peeked out again, he’d disappeared.
Acting as if I didn’t see the stack of bills on my desk that had arrived that afternoon, I pushed past the mess, tumbled onto the bed with my hair still wet, and fell into a restless sleep.
* * *
The wooden doorto the Frolicking Moose Coffee Shop groaned open the next morning. With a quick kick, I propped it open to let cool morning air circulate inside. The OPEN sign flickered to life when I hit the switch behind the counter.
Still half-awake, I shuffled across the wooden floor that desperately needed a refinish and over to the drive-through window. A slight breeze whipped past me. The machines hummed a mellow greeting when I turned them on. After a thorough rinse that left espresso grounds bound into my skin, I’d been able to save the espresso machine from yet another espresso-doctor visit. Not to mention the two-hundred-dollar bill that would have choked off my food supply for the next four months.
My laptop sat on a nearby table, but I ignored it. No, there wouldn’t be an email offer waiting for me. Namely, a scholarship to the online real-estate program I had been hoping to interview for yesterday. Getting my license would help me recover what dropping out of college had done to my life.
Really, what had I been thinking? With the Frolicking Moose this hot of a mess, I wasn’t bound to recover from anything soon. And I wouldn’t give this place up.
I yawned, heading for the bathroom and ignoring the voice of panic that constantly rang in my ears. Dishwasher to run. Inventory to tally. Cups to stock. I really should have prepped last night, but I’d been too tired.
Halfway to the bathroom, a littlescritchnear the back door caught my attention. I paused, turned an ear toward it, and waited. A shuffling sound followed.
Was that ... a whisper?
Quiet voices, if they were voices at all, came through the door. I reached into my office, grabbing a baseball bat I kept propped against the wall, and slipped toward the back. It was 4:45 a.m. Fifteen minutes before the rush of people commuting an hour to Jackson City. No one should be outside.
I threw open the door.
Two pairs of human eyes stared at me, startled.
I jumped back, screamed, and lifted the bat. Two girls were huddled on the rickety porch, peering up at me in wide-eyed shock. I’d startled them, too. One of them grabbed the other, shoving her away to safety.
“Don’t hurt us!”
Eternities seemed to pass as the voice registered in my brain, then traveled to my heart and almost stopped it. It happened the very moment I recognized the two faces. Those eyes.
Those emerald eyes.
I sucked in a sharp breath, the bat clattering to the ground behind me.
“Lizbeth?” I whispered. “Ellie?”
“Please,” Lizbeth whispered, her coppery hair limp around a pale, thin face. “Please let us inside.”
She was sixteen but looked closer to twelve right then. Her hair hadn’t been washed in what looked like weeks, and smudges gave her sallow skin a dirty tinge. Her shoulders trembled as she stood in front of her little sister—no,ourlittle sister—Ellie.
Ellie, with her raven-black hair, verdant eyes, and wiry frame, looked so much like me despite being only my half-sister. She would be eleven now, although she acted more like an adult.
In a daze, I stumbled back.
