Chapter 6
Chapter 6
MY ALARM CLOCK DRAGGED me out of sleep the following morning with a start, my heart beating hard against my ribcage. I’d been in the middle of a dream in which Portia, dressed as the Wicked Witch of the West—no points for originality there—was cackling at me as I sat on a child’s seat, my bedroom walls crumbling around me while a guinea pig wearing a baseball cap munched on a stick of celery. Seriously, I couldn’t make this stuff up.
I glanced at the digital clock on my nightstand. It was early, way too early. I rolled over and buried my head in my pillow. Although I’m a morning person, I’d got into the habit of hitting the snooze button one too many times, delaying the inevitable need to drag myself into the office.
I wasn’t always like that. I used to leap out of bed, often before my alarm, ready to face the day and the joys it may bring. But that was when I was younger, my job was fresh, and though never exactly exciting, it was at least interesting. And I felt sure it would take me places; it was a stepping stone on my way to the big rock of my career. I don’t know where I got the idea from, but I always felt I was destined for big things, and I carried that belief inside while I analyzed marketing campaign results and suffered through Portia’s moods.
And now? Now, I didn’t even have a job to lie in bed avoiding.
I rolled over onto my back and let out a sigh. I needed to get up. I knew I was unlikely to fall back to sleep again—the bad dream had put an end to that—and I also knew I had made a commitment to Bailey to get to the café bright and early this morning to help with the baking. I had no intention of letting her down, even if the reality of my resignation yesterday was sitting heavily in the pit of my stomach.
I got myself out of my bed and had a shower to wake up. Wiping the steam from the bathroom mirror, I looked at my tired and puffy face.
You’ve really gone and done it this time, Paige.
Doing my best to ignore the pang of guilt at lying, I left a note for Dad on the kitchen counter by the kettle, making up a story about having to get into the office early to work on a deadline, and drove through the quiet streets to the Cozy Cottage Café.
Bailey was there to greet me with her ready smile and a cup of coffee, which I accepted gratefully.
“Right, where do we start?” I asked.
“We’ve got the breakfast crowd to deal with first, so if you can get the ciabattas in the oven, I’ll prep the coffee machine. Then, we’ll need to bake some cakes and muffins and get the soup of the day underway.”
I grinned at her. “Now you’re talking. That must mean I get to see those cake recipes you’ve kept a trade secret all this time.”
Bailey chuckled as she handed me an apron, tying her own behind her back. “I guess today is your lucky day. What do you want to listen to? I usually start off with something cruisy like Adele first up, then move onto something more upbeat once I’m fully awake.”
“Adele sounds great to me.”
The time flew by as we worked side by side in the kitchen, whipping up all those delicious baked goods, stuffing croissants, filling paninis. We sang along to the music and chatted about the café and life in general. When Bailey said it was seven and time to open up, I was genuinely surprised—it felt like I’d only been here for ten minutes, not two hours.
As Bailey unbolted the front doors and set the “open” sign out on the street, there was a knock on the back door to the kitchen. I wiped my hands on a tea towel and opened it up.
“Good morning. You’re new.” A man, probably a few years older than me, was smiling over a large box he was holding in his hands. He was tall, at least six foot one or two, with messy brown hair and an open face. Some might say he was good-looking, but he definitely wasn’t my type.
Which was a good thing, now that I had decided to become a celibate spinster with cats and a rose-munching goat.
I smiled at him. “Yes, I’m Paige. I’m helping Bailey out for the week. Are you delivering something?” It seemed like a fair enough question to ask.
“No, I just like to carry a box around with me wherever I go.” His eyes sparkled from behind his glasses.
“Very funny.” I stood back to let Box Guy walk through the door, which he did, heading straight over to the storage area, clearly familiar with the layout of the place. He placed the box on the counter and turned around. My eyes immediately dropped to his T-shirt, which had “Words cannot espresso what you bean to me” emblazoned across his chest, accompanied by a picture of a smiling coffee cup.
I tittered. It was a cute T-shirt, one I might quite like to wear myself, despite the fact it was a little on the nerdy side.
Box Guy raised his eyebrows in question at me. “Something funny?”
“Just your T-shirt. I like it.”
“I’m glad you approve.” He pulled a folded piece of paper out of the back pocket of his jeans, took a pencil from behind his ear, and handed them to me.
He must have noticed me looking at them uncertainly. “You need to sign here.” He pointed to a box at the bottom of the page. I glanced at the header. It read Ned’s , presumably the name of the coffee roaster he worked for, although why anyone would call their business “Ned’s” was beyond me. It hardly brought hot, aromatic coffee to mind.
“Okay. I’d better get Bailey. I’m not exactly authorized to sign this.”
“Oh, hey, Josh. I didn’t hear you come in,” Bailey said as she entered the kitchen. “You’ve met Paige?”
He nodded, smiling at me as he took the paper and pencil from me and handed them to Bailey. “Your usual order, but I’ve thrown in a sample of a new blend we’re doing. It’s called ‘Midnight,’ and I think your espresso drinkers will love it.”
Bailey scrawled her signature on the paper and handed it back to Josh. “Thanks. I’ll give it a try and let you know.”
“No worries.” He walked past me toward the door, and I caught a whiff of his aroma: a mixture of freshly roasted coffee and a cologne I recognized but couldn’t name. “Nice to meet you, New Girl. See you next time.”
“Sure. See you.”
“Right,” Bailey said with a clap of her hands. “My first regulars turn up about now, so can you give the kitchen a bit of a cleanup while I man the counter?”
I scanned the counters. There were enough dishes to keep me tucked away in here for a good hour, maybe more. I smelled the baking cakes and thought of what I would be doing right now if I hadn’t walked out of my job yesterday. I’d be lying in my bed, procrastinating about getting up, hitting the snooze button for probably the third or fourth time, dreading having to haul myself out of bed to go to work. Washing a stack of dishes for Bailey was a dream by comparison. I grinned at her. “I’m on it.”
The morning whizzed by in a blur of customers, food prep, and dishes. Although my feet were sore from the get-go, thanks to yesterday’s ill-advised Mary Jane heels, I pushed through the discomfort, loving every moment of working in the café. Thankfully, after the breakfast crowd and morning coffee brigade were gone but for a few hangers on, we got some quiet time to put our feet up at one of the tables for a few minutes—and enjoy a cup of coffee and a slice of Bailey’s delicious cake.
“This tastes even better than usual because I’m so darned hungry!” I exclaimed after I’d cleaned my plate of an extra-large slice of carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.
“You definitely get to work up an appetite in this job, that’s for sure. Not that it ever helps me work off these extra pounds.” Bailey leaned back in her chair and patted her thighs. “In fact, sometimes I figure I won’t even bother with eating the cake, I’ll just slap it right on there.”
I looked at her across the table and frowned. “You’re beautiful, Bailey. You don’t need to lose any weight.”
She blushed. “Maybe. Hey, I’ve got some paperwork to get through, and then we need to talk about finding you your Last First Date.”
“Ah, no, we don’t,” I said, shaking my head. Had she forgotten my decision? It was infinitely better to die an old-maid-slash-reclaimed-virgin than go through that heartache again.
“Yeah, we do. Marissa and I had a meeting and we’ve decided—”
“You had a meeting ?” I asked, incredulous, my eyes wide.
“We’re going to do this properly, Paige.”
I bit the inside of my lip. “Look, I told you at the beach. I don’t want to find a man. I’m over the whole Last First Date thing.”
Bailey looked at me, a smile on her face. “Is that so?”
“Yes!” Why was she persisting with this? My mind was made up; I had given up on love.
“Hold that thought,” Bailey said as she jumped out of her chair.
I’d been too lost in exasperation to notice there were a couple of customers standing at the counter, perusing the cabinet food. I stood up, collected our plates and coffee cups—with two hands and not Bailey’s skillful one yet—and headed to the kitchen.
Once behind the counter, I looked across at the customers to give them a welcoming Cozy Cottage Café smile. My eyes met a man’s at the counter, and I swear the breath was sucked right out of me.
Oh.
My.
This guy was beautiful . Tall, broad, his olive skin set off by his crisp, white, open-necked shirt, cropped black hair, and an I’m-sent-down-by-the-Greek-gods face. Angels sang, harps were strummed, and everything around me fell into nothingness as I stared into his dark eyes. He smiled back at me, holding my gaze for a beat, two. I could hear my heart thudding in my ears, and I had to stifle a nervous, girly giggle.
Too late, I felt the crockery in my hands begin to wobble. I took a step, tried to right them, but both my hands were full. The dishes came crashing to the floor, smashing into one hundred pieces, the dregs of our coffee splattering against my legs and the floor.
Uh-oh!
I quickly squatted down and began collecting up the shattered crockery, my face burning. This was mortifying!
“Paige! What happened?” Bailey looked at me down on the ground, startled.
“Sorry. I . . . I don’t know.” Which was, of course, not entirely true. I knew exactly what had happened. I’d been too busy staring at Adonis Guy and not concentrating on carrying the dishes to the sink. I shook my head, angry with myself.
I’d let womankind down miserably; my lack of multitasking ability was clearly equal to a man’s.
A dark head poked over the edge of the counter. “Are you all right down there?”
I stopped what I was doing and looked up into those mesmerizing eyes once more. My mouth went dry. “I . . . yes, thank you.” I stood bolt upright as the heat in my cheeks intensified.
Adonis Guy pushed himself up off the counter and shot me a gorgeous grin. “What did those dishes ever do to you?” He turned to his friend. “Is this the reason you like this place? The hot waitresses throwing dishes around?”
Adonis Guy just called me hot ?
Bailey laughed. “Usually we just try to dazzle you through our excellent coffee and food. So that was two lattes. Anything to eat?”
Adonis Guy looked back at me. I hadn’t moved an inch. “What do you recommend?”
“Oh, ah, me?” My blush deepened. “The, ah, carrot cake with the cream cheese frosting is out-of-this-world good.”
“That sounds delicious. Sold.” He turned to Bailey. “I’ll have a slice of that, thanks.” Adonis Guy returned his gaze to me.
His much less godlike friend shook his head good-naturedly, watching Adonis Guy quite obviously flirting with me. “I’ll grab one of those spinach and feta muffins.”
Bailey rang up their order. “I’ll get this, Marcus. I owe you one,” Non-Adonis Guy said.
I squatted down to collect the remaining broken dishes in my hands. Try as I might, I couldn’t get my heart rate to return to normal, and you could have roasted s’mores on my cheeks, they were so hot.
Marcus . His name was Marcus.
“Thank you. We’ll bring those over for you,” I heard Bailey say from my position on the floor.
I peeked over the top of the counter. Marcus and his friend had walked over to the window and were now sitting down at Marissa’s, Cassie’s, and my usual table. Of all the tables in the café, he chose my favorite. Was it a sign?
No, it’s not . I’d given up on love. I needed to remember that, difficult as it may have been in the presence of such manly perfection.
While Bailey expertly worked the coffee machine, I put the fragments of the dishes onto some newspaper, wrapped them up, and placed them in the trash. Once I’d swept up the shards, I washed my hands and paused, deep in thought. I may have given up on love, but I was still a woman. And women liked to look good, right?
I pulled my lipstick out of my bag and slipped the lid off. I held it up to my lips, peering in my small compact mirror, and stopped dead. What am I doing? One hot guy shows an interest in me and I’m throwing that all away? Talk about being flakier than one of Bailey’s cheese filo puffs.
I snapped my compact shut and wound my lipstick down, unapplied, returning it to my makeup bag. I couldn’t let the first cute guy I saw dissuade me from my new path. I’d made up my mind; I was a man-free zone.
My jaw clenched, I returned to the counter. “I’m really sorry about that, Bailey. I don’t know how it happened. You can dock my pay.”
The steamer on the coffee machine made a loud screech as she fluffed the milk for the coffee in a jug. “Don’t worry about it, Paige. Accidents happen. Just don’t let it happen too often, okay?”
“Of course.” I pulled out a couple of plates and put a slice of the cake and a muffin on each. I glanced over at Marcus. He and his friend appeared to be deep in conversation.
Bailey nodded at the plates. “Can you please take those over? I’ll bring the coffees when they’re done.”
Part of me wanted to leap at the opportunity of talking with Marcus again. Another part of me wanted to squirm out of it, come up with some sort of an excuse to avoid the temptation. I told myself I needed to be strong. It was inevitable I was going to meet cute men. I simply needed to learn to deal with them. My inevitable spinsterhood demanded it.
After all, my track record with men had been a miserable failure.
I smoothed my shoulder-length hair behind my ears, took a deep breath, and walked out from behind the counter over to the men’s table. “Here you go, gentlemen,” I said brightly as I placed their respective treats in front of them on the table.
“All recovered from your plate smashing ordeal?” Marcus asked with a cheeky half smile on his face, looking up at me from his seat.
“Oh, yes. It’s all fine, thank you.” I tucked my hair behind my ears. “Right. I’ll leave you to it.” I turned on my heel without a second glance and walked on wobbly legs back to the counter.
Done. Easy. Well, okay, not easy exactly, but done all the same.
As Bailey took advantage of the lull and got on with some paperwork, she left me to clean up the counter and wipe down tables before my shift ended. There was only Marcus and his friend in the café, and I was thankful they were so deep in conversation they ignored me, so I had free range to make the place spick and span, ready for us to do it all again tomorrow.
I was putting some things under the counter when someone cleared their throat next to me. I bobbed up, ready to serve like the good Cozy Cottage waitress of almost two days I was. My tummy did a flip when I saw who it was.
“Just checking you’re not abusing any more defenseless crockery down there,” Marcus said with a fake brow furrow.
My blush returned faster than you could say hot-guy-flirting-with-me. I let out a laugh. “No, no.”
“That’s good to hear. I’m from the Society for the Protection of Dishes, and we take these matters very seriously, you know.” His face broke into a grin.
Wow, this guy looked like Channing Tatum when he smiled. This was so not a good thing right now.
I let out a light laugh, putting my hand on my heart. “I swear to give the dishes the respect they deserve in future.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet.
“Oh, I think you already paid,” I said.
By way of response, he offered me his business card. Dumbly, I took it in my hand, looking down at the words. Marcus Hahn , Attorney-at-Law.
“I would urge you to get in touch if you have any dishes-related concerns.”
“Oh, I . . . thank you . . . Marcus.” I blushed as I said his name.
He flashed me his Channing Tatum grin once more and I swear my legs ceased to function for a moment there. I watched as he sauntered out of the café, turning to shoot me one last smile before he disappeared out onto the street.
Resisting this guy was going to be trickier than I thought.