Chapter 1
Penny
Ilove the smell of coffee in the morning. It’s my life. Literally. I can always count on the sweet aroma to wake me up when Beach Brew Coffee House opens at the crack of dawn.
It’s a pain in the ass.
I take a peek into Autumn’s room to find her still asleep with her face smooshed into her pillow.
I smile to myself and head to the bathroom before I move to my closet and find a baby blue chunky sweater to layer over a Beach Brew t-shirt.
I pull on my boyfriend jeans and my signature feather earrings and call it good.
Luckily, my long blonde hair doesn’t need too much work since I curled it two days ago.
It still resembles something publicly appropriate, so I call it a win.
The last few weeks have been a whirlwind, to say the least. Jordan, my best friend, was kidnapped.
It was a huge mess that also involved her father and boyfriend, who, unbeknownst to me, is an undercover cop.
And although everyone is okay, I know she’s ready for some semblance of a normal life now that the whole ordeal is over.
So, I’ve been knee-deep in interviews to replace said best friend at the coffee shop because she needs to focus on building her photography business and not working a job she should have quit a long time ago.
I’ve been lucky enough to find two hires who seem promising. One of them starts her training today, and I’m excited to show her the ropes.
“Morning, mommy.”
I turn to see my four-year-old rub the sleep out of her eyes. I hold back a laugh because her dark hair is reminiscent of a rat's nest in the back. It’s so ridiculous, it’s cute.
“Morning, baby girl. You sleep okay?”
“Yup. I’m hungry.”
I chuckle because the statement doesn’t surprise me. It’s the same… every morning.
“Well, lucky for you, I made you some cheesy scrambled eggs and toast.”
We spend the rest of the morning eating and getting ready for the day.
Autumn has preschool at eight, and as soon as I’m done making her lunch, we put our shoes on and head out.
The stairs to our apartment lead down to the sidewalk and sit right between Beach Brew and the empty retail space next door.
Well, it’s not empty anymore.
A few weeks back, the for-sale sign in the window disappeared, and the rumor mill started whirling at the prospect of what the space was going to be.
No one really knows, but I’m hoping it’s a cute little boutique.
The girls who own the one down the road aren’t very nice.
And as much as I would love to support their small business, I can’t seem to step in there without them gossiping behind my back about my single-mother status.
You’d think people would be more accepting these days, but I guess being a single mom who has raised her daughter alone since day one isn’t, quote on quote, “right”, according to some people.
That’s the only downside of living in a small town.
I try not to let it get to me, so I keep my head up and take it with a grain of salt.
As far as you and I are concerned, though, they can kiss my ass.
The window to the space has been covered from the inside, but this morning, a piece of the brown paper is sagging in a spot. I’ve heard people coming and going from the back entrance, but have yet to see who owns the space. I guess we’re like ships passing in the night.
“Hold up, Autumn.”
We stop, and I peek through the opening.
Huh.
It’s dark inside, but I can see a reception desk off to one side, a nice-looking sitting area, and six adjustable chairs with stations that line the walls.
A tattoo shop. That’s what it looks like anyway.
Not what I expected, but also not out of the realm of possibilities. We don’t have a tattoo shop here in Daybreak, and the locals all travel to neighboring cities to get their tattoo work done.
“What is it, mommy?”
I look down at Autumn, who is craning her neck to see what’s inside. “It’s a tattoo shop, baby girl.”
“What’s a tattoo shop?”
“You know the artwork some people have on their bodies? They have to get it done at a shop by artists who specialize in drawing on skin.”
“Oh.”
I smile down at her because I can see the wheels turning in her head. My daughter is smart, and I have a feeling she’s going to have more questions about this tattoo shop later.
We continue down the sidewalk, and I drop Autumn off at her preschool, which is just a few blocks from our apartment and the coffee shop. Once I kiss her goodbye, I make my way back the way I came from so I can head into work.
A little over six months ago, my parents stepped away from the business and made me the acting manager of the coffee shop.
Which means more paperwork and phone calls, plus a slew of other responsibilities.
That includes hiring new people. Usually, the turnover rate for employees at a coffee shop is pretty high, since most people are just looking for a part-time gig until something better comes along, but we’ve managed to hold onto this crew for over a year now, and the shop is doing great because of it.
It’s going to be interesting adding new employees to the mix, but it has to happen.
I just hope my gut was right when I hired the two new girls.
The bell above the door rings as I step into the shop, and my immediate goal is to make myself a coffee for my first hit of caffeine of the day.
“Hey, Pen!” Jordan calls out over the noise of the running espresso machine.
“Morning. Everything good?”
“You know it.” Her smile is wide, and there’s an air about her that’s lighter. I have no doubt it has everything to do with her boyfriend and her newfound freedom from all the stuff she was going through.
The door chimes not a moment later, and the first of the new employees walks through the door.
“Hi, Wren!” I call out.
“Hey. It’s so busy in here.” Her eyes are wide, but I have no doubt she’ll do fine in this environment. One of her previous jobs was working at one of the big chain coffee shops, which bodes well for me because I don’t have to train her from the ground up.
“Let’s get your stuff put in the office and I’ll introduce you to the quitter.”
“I heard that,” Jordan chimes from behind me and I wave her off, winking at Wren.
Wren knows why Jordan is leaving and also why I hired two people instead of just one.
We’ve been extra busy this year and I want to be able to take a step back from helping out behind the counter and really dig into the business and marketing side of the coffee shop.
It’s what I originally went to school for. Not that I finished, but still.
My parents opened the shop a year before I went to college.
I would help out on the weekends and fell in love with making coffee.
When it was finally time for me to leave the nest, I planned to major in business and minor in marketing so I could come back and help my parents with the business.
Neither of them had any previous dealings with running a business, so I put it on myself to help them out.
I made it through a year of college before those plans got derailed.
Not that I’m complaining, but it would have been nice to finish what I started.
Wren chuckles at the banter between me and Jordan, and I make introductions.
She’s going to fit in just fine here. She’s twenty-three years old and has been working since she was sixteen, according to her resume.
She has long, slightly wavy, chocolate-brown hair down to her waist, and her whiskey-colored almond eyes are framed by a spattering of freckles that cross the bridge of her nose and trail over her cheeks.
Between her quiet demeanor and shy, soft smile, I have a feeling she’s clueless as to how pretty she is.
“You’ll get to meet Kyle soon. He only does a few hours in the morning before he goes to school, but since break is coming up, you’ll see him a lot more.”
“Cool.” She nods and looks around.
I can tell she’s a little nervous, but I pull her behind the counter to show her where everything is, and before I know it, she’s making drinks like she owns the place.
“Did she memorize the drink list?” Jordan questions a few hours later while Wren is in the bathroom.
“It seems like it. I gave her the recipe list last week, and she must have studied. I didn’t expect her to memorize it this quickly, though.”
“She’s a quick learner. She told someone their total, including tax, without looking at the computer. Did she tell you why she’s working at a coffee shop and not going to school?”
I might have let it slip to Jordan that Wren’s resume said she had only completed high school. Zero college. It seems weird, considering how smart she is.
“Nope. She just said she needed a full-time job and was a reliable employee.”
“Well, you’ll be in good hands when I leave. She’s a workhorse.”
Wren returns from the bathroom, and I finish showing her the ropes before sending her home.
Jordan leaves an hour after her, and it’s me in the empty shop alone.
I finally have a chance to look at my phone, and I have two unopened messages. The first one is from my mom, telling me that she and my dad picked Autumn up from preschool and are having fun at their house.
The second message has my heart skipping a beat, and I open it with a giddy smile on my face.
Dec: Dark green or dark blue?
Sent thirty minutes ago.
Me: Um… dark green. Why?
Dec: I’m painting and want an accent color on the walls.
Me: Green is my favorite color, so that’s what I would pick. An accent color? Sounds very distinguished.
Dec: Green it is then. I have to keep up with the times. Having an accent color makes a room homey and warm. At least according to HGTV. How’s your day?
Me: Good. Uneventful. Yours?
Dec: Just grinding away.
We chat for a few minutes before he has to go, and I sigh to the empty coffee shop once the conversation ends.
It’s been a few months since Dec and I started talking, and to say it’s been fun is an understatement.
We ask about each other's days and throw jabs and funny memes at each other, keeping the conversation light. And we joke about what the other person looks like more often than not. There’s an easiness between us that keeps me coming back for more.
Meaning every single day. Our relationship is purely platonic but the fact that he’s funny and has a killer body makes me want to see a picture of his face.
I have a gut feeling he would blow every image I’ve conjured up of him in my mind out of the water.
The only thing is that we have an unwritten rule: that we don’t speak about our jobs or personal lives.
He has no idea where I work or that I have a daughter, and I don’t know anything about his life outside of his likes and dislikes.
For all I know, he’s a serial killer or a circus clown.
And it’s probably better that I believe that because I’m woman enough to say I have a crush on him at this point.
I should probably start swiping right on a few people through the app and get myself back out there in the dating pool, so I don’t fall further for a man whose face I haven’t seen yet.
I slowly start shutting everything down, put the closed sign in the window, and spend the next hour going over the numbers for the day and doing inventory. Eventually, I lock up and head out the back of the shop to jump in my silver sedan so I can pick up Autumn at my parents.
The new occupant of the shop next to ours has early two thousand emo music playing that I can hear through the back door, and I’m tempted to knock and introduce myself.
I talk myself out of it at the last second, too much of a scaredy cat to introduce myself to the owner of a tattoo shop. I may be outgoing, but even I get intimidated by certain people. Instead, I head straight towards my parents’ place in Carlsbad.
I’ll meet the owner eventually. It’s only a matter of time.