Chapter Five
Five
Whoa! Busy morning.
Nick closed his eyes in a slow blink before answering the text. Nothing like running a business while being constantly supervised. It’s the chocolate chips I put in the banana bread. Makes the people come running!
There was a long pause before Elmer replied. Heathen.
Hey, I’m just giving the people what they want.
What the people want is for you to stop fucking with the banana bread.
How many times could Nick roll his eyes in one morning?
Elmer was able to read into his silence, even via text. I’m not trying to be a dick , he responded, even though he was totally being a dick. My recipe notebook is still in the back somewhere. There’s a lemon pound cake I used to do that I bet would go over great. Maybe try that.
Sure . Nick left the reply vague. He knew what notebook Elmer meant; a battered green spiral-bound notebook—he’d found it the first month he’d taken over the café. Most of the recipes taped onto its pages had clearly been clipped from magazines and the backs of boxes. No culinary secrets there. Nick had flipped through it just in case, but the only thing of note was a photo of Elmer and his wife, Dolores, stuck between the pages in the back. It had been taken in front of the café sometime in the 1970s, judging by the cars parked on the street and the quality of the color of the photo. Funny how the place hadn’t changed much since then. He had carefully put the photo back before leaving the notebook on the upper shelf where he’d found it.
Nick glanced down at his phone, but Elmer had clearly finished giving advice. For now, anyway. He stowed his phone away and got back to cleaning up after the morning rush. It had been a relatively busy morning, especially for this time of year. It was too early for the summer season, but this was a Friday in Florida. There were always tourists, and some three-day weekenders had started to trickle in. The pastry cabinet was almost empty.
The bell over the door chimed, and Nick gritted his teeth. He loved tourists, but he hated tourists. Especially when he’d just finished wiping everything down and it was almost time to set up for lunch. But tourists paid the bills, so he plastered a smile onto his face as best he could. It probably looked more like a wince, but what the hell. Then he looked up and, like his wildest hopes had conjured her, there she was. Messy bun and T-shirt, bag over her shoulder. “Oh. It’s you.”
“Thanks a lot. It’s that stellar customer service that keeps me coming back.” But she frowned as she looked around the café. Nick followed her gaze, then he frowned too. Coming out from behind the counter, he stalked to the back table. The one near the outlet. The one that was currently occupied. Theo had been there for almost an hour, nursing that same cup of coffee and reading.
“Don’t you have a bookstore to run?”
Theo turned a page, unconcerned, as he shook his head. “I open at noon on Fridays.”
“It’s close enough to noon. And that’s her table.” Nick snatched the mostly empty coffee mug. “Let me warm this up for you. In a to-go cup.” Behind him, he heard the thud of Theo snapping his book closed before he followed Nick to the counter.
“What the hell?”
“Don’t want you to be late.” Nick filled a to-go cup with fresh coffee and pushed it across the counter.
Theo took the coffee with a quizzical expression. “Thanks?”
“Just looking out for you, man.” He waved off Theo’s card. “On me. Don’t worry about it.” It was the least he could do for kicking the guy out.
Cassie stayed frozen by the door, watching as Theo left, then turned her head to watch Nick clear away Theo’s used plate and give the table a quick wipe down.
“What was that you were saying about customer service?” That came out a little more gruff than he’d intended, and Cassie jumped as though startled.
“I said it was stellar.” She moved quickly to her table. “Keeps me coming back.”
“Ah, bullshit,” he said through the smile blooming across his face. “It’s the Wi-Fi and I know it.”
“And your outlet, of course.” She lifted the power cord in illustration before plugging it into said outlet. “Laptop’s dead again.”
“Hazelnut latte, right?” He moved toward the espresso machine. “What did Buster have to say?”
“You read my mind. Iced, please.” She followed him, leaning her elbows on the counter, and Nick tried not to notice her watching him make her drink. “Buster said everything was fine, and the laptop worked when he plugged it in. But I took it to the back porch yesterday since it was so nice outside. And this morning it was dead. Again.” She examined the remaining baked goods in the pastry case. “Any cinnamon today?”
He shook his head. “Chocolate chip.” He raised his eyes in a question and she nodded. They were already at nonverbal communication. That had to be a good sign, right? Nick pushed that thought down and forced himself back on topic. “That’s weird about your outlet.”
“It really is. I’m trying to tell myself it’s a charming quirk of owning an old house, but when it keeps me from getting work done it’s not so charming.” The look in her eyes was practically lascivious as he plated the banana bread and handed it to her. She broke off a corner, popping it in her mouth. “Oh, damn. I renounce cinnamon.”
“You can like both, you know.” He set the coffee down in front of her. “I take it you’re staying for a bit?”
She nodded, taking a long pull off her iced latte. The resulting moan made things within him tighten. Things that were inappropriate for a work setting at ten thirty-five in the morning. “I’ve got a project due by the end of the day. I promise I’ll stay out of your way.”
“Okay…” He tried to sound doubtful, but let’s be real. If she kept moaning at him like that, he’d let her do anything she wanted. “Lunch starts in about an hour. It might get a little crowded.”
“If it does, I’ll give up my table.” She held up her hand, prepared to swear on a stack of Bibles.
“Or you could just…you know…get some lunch. Branch out from banana bread a little.”
“I dunno.” She broke off another corner of said banana bread. “What’s your lunch menu like?”
“It’s all right there.” He gestured to the chalkboard above his head, hanging on the back wall.
“So extensive.” She leaned on the counter, studying it, and Nick caught himself starting to lean toward her in response. “Pretty sandwich forward, I see.”
It didn’t sound like a criticism, but Nick wanted to apologize anyway. “I’m not much of a cook,” he admitted, “but Ramon makes a mean chicken salad.”
“Don’t sell yourself short. Your baking is phenomenal.” She lifted the banana bread plate in illustration as she headed back to her table. “You won’t know I’m here, honest.”
Yeah, good luck with that. His phone buzzed in his pocket, because of course it did. Elmer had been quiet for far too long. Hey, that cute girl is back! You should ask her out.
Nick’s heart was clearly on Elmer’s side, leaping at the thought, but he shut that shit down quick. Not gonna happen.
Why the hell not? You like tourists. You like to DO tourists.
Nick choked, turning it into a cough when Cassie looked his way. Elmer wasn’t wrong, but damn. He didn’t have to put it like that.
He needed to correct Elmer about one thing, though. Not a tourist. She lives here. Not gonna go there . Even though he wanted to go there. Very much.
Oh come ON. Live a little, will you? For my sake.
Funny. It was tempting. More than tempting: it made things inside of him light up that had been dormant for some time. But it made him nervous too, like he was about to skydive without a parachute.
Over at Cassie’s table, she was frowning at her laptop, and the iced latte at her elbow was almost gone. Well, that was a problem he could fix. It didn’t take long for him to make another one, and her frown cleared almost instantly when he approached. “You’re a lifesaver,” she said as he set down the drink and picked up her empty glass.
“No problem,” he said. He nodded toward the laptop. “Everything okay there?”
“Oh. Yeah. Just…” Her sigh said the exact opposite. “Three deadlines got moved up without anyone telling me. Everything’s due on Monday now, when I was supposed to have another week.” She made a disgusted noise and reached for her fresh iced latte. “I was going to unpack some more this weekend, but I guess that’s off the table.” She took a long pull of her drink, as though mainlining caffeine would help her get through her work stress.
Nick knew when he was dismissed. “I’ll let you get back to it, then. Didn’t mean to distract you.” He didn’t know what he was thinking; she wasn’t into him. She was here for the caffeine and the Wi-Fi. Not for him.
But her eyes flicked up to his, and her abashed expression made him think that maybe he was wrong. “Please. You’re not distracting at all.” She closed her laptop with a definitive snap. “Or if you are, I’m not complaining.”
“Ah.” Well. If that wasn’t an invitation…It only took a second for Nick to set her empty glass on the counter before returning to her table and dropping into the opposite chair. And then he remembered: he was the worst at small talk. He gestured toward her laptop on the table between them. “So…uh. What is it that you do, anyway?” Perfect. Great job. She’s annoyed at her work, so the first thing you should do is ask her about it.
“Oh.” She looked at her laptop as though she’d never seen it before. “I’m a copywriter. I work on ad campaigns for different brands. Sometimes it’s fun. Sometimes it’s a giant clusterfuck.” She rolled her eyes with what looked like forced cheer. “You ever have a boss practically hanging over your shoulder, micromanaging everything you do?”
Nick thought about the phone in his back pocket, and Elmer’s weird obsession with what Nick put in the pastry case. “Yeah. I know a little something about that.”
“It’s all so stupid.” She huffed out a sigh as she traced a line of condensation down her glass with a fingertip, and something about the movement made Nick catch his breath. “We spent, what, a year or so locked down, working from home? You’d think they would have gotten used to us working independently. But now that almost everyone’s back in the office, it’s like I have to fight twice as hard to prove I can keep up.”
“What brought you all the way out here, then?” Seemed like she was asking for trouble, moving so far away from work. But again, what the hell did he know?
“Lots of things.” She looked thoughtful. “Mostly that the house I was renting went on the market. It made me wonder what it would take to buy a place of my own. But everything in Orlando’s crazy expensive, of course. So I kept looking farther and farther out until…”
“Until you were at the coast?” He snorted. “That’s pretty far out.”
“Yeah, no kidding.” Her lips quirked up. “Y’all don’t even have a Publix way out here.”
She had a point, but Nick wasn’t going to admit it. He liked being way out here , in a town too small for a stoplight, not to mention a chain grocery store. “We get by.”
“But how do you live without Publix subs?” Cassie shook her head with mock regret. “I really didn’t think this through.”
“Okay, I admit it’s been a long time since I’ve had a Publix sub—”
“Are you serious?” Cassie’s eyes flew wide open. “How can you call yourself a Floridian? There is nothing better in this world than a chicken tender Pub Sub. Toss the tenders in buffalo sauce, add some lettuce, peppers, tomato, and onion, a little squeeze of ranch dressing on top. Maybe grab a side of potato salad…the yellow kind that has the egg in it…” She was practically in a trance, drooling at the memory, and damn. What would he have to do to get her to look at him like that? Because he wasn’t above doing some questionable things with buffalo sauce…
He cleared his throat and tried to get back on topic. “It’s not all bad. Sure, we don’t have chicken tender subs, but Poltergeist Pizza, around the corner, delivers till ten most nights, and—”
“Most nights?” Her eyebrows shot up, but amusement danced in her eyes.
“Yep. Most nights, unless the delivery guy doesn’t feel like working late. Or his scooter’s busted. Sometimes they’ll close up early if it’s not busy.” He trailed off as he realized that maybe Cassie had a point. Small-town life was definitely its own thing. He just needed to show her the good parts of it. “If it’s chicken you want, though, you should check out The Haunt.”
“The what?”
“The Haunt.” Nick nodded toward the door. “Down on that corner. Technically it’s an oyster bar, but it’s the place that’s open late year-round. You live close; you probably hear them at night.”
“Ohhhh. The place that looks like it wants to be a biker bar, but just without the bikes?” She made a nod of understanding. “I’ve been meaning to go sometime.”
“That’s the one. Doesn’t look like much. I think they do that on purpose to keep the tourist traffic down. But they do a fried chicken on Tuesdays that will change your life.”
She smiled, and it was like the sun coming out. He wanted to bend toward that smile like a sunflower. It was that smile that made him bold. Made him want to take Elmer’s advice after all. What the hell.
He leaned forward, elbows resting casually on the table. “You know, if you’re not doing anything next week, maybe on Tuesday we could—”
The chime of the bell over the door drowned out the end of his sentence, and he wanted to scream. Cassie raised her eyebrows, her eyes alight, and he could almost see the answer to his unasked question sparking in their depths. But duty called, and he stood, managing to conceal his groan of frustration. “Hold that thought.”
“Holding.” She opened her laptop, but there was a trace of that smile in her voice as he went to the counter. “Hey, Sophie,” he said easily. From the corner of his eye, he could see Cassie’s head jerk up in reaction. “You need a coffee?”