Not only was my husband the lead heart surgeon at Boston General, but I have financial stability in my own right from my career, and it might be time to splurge a little on me for once.
“I’d still like a job. Just something to keep me busy, and in the middle of people. I don’t think I’ll be good company with myself.” It’s not that I can’t be alone; it’s that I don’t want to be alone. I’ll spend too much time self-evaluating, wondering where I went wrong in my marriage and career. Admittedly, I have negative self-esteem issues from my parents who laid the groundwork, so I don’t need the self-demoralization.
As I look around the room, I notice a sign in the front window. Help Wanted. Like the phone call I received from Rita on the day I lost both my husband and my job, I feel like this is another message from the universe.
“I could work here,” I say, glancing back at Rita.
“What do you know about making coffee?”
“Nothing, but how hard can it be?”
More than a month later, I still don’t quite have the hang of it, but the owners Zara Rossi and Audrey Shipley are more than patient with me. The café is busy, and another warm body actually helps out. I don’t mind the menial work of wiping off tables and straightening chairs, restocking the pastry case or even washing out coffee pots. It gives me a chance to talk to people, and I love a good gossip story.
The other thing about me is I’m timely. I have nothing else going on in life, so why not take any shift offered, even the ungodly early ones. My divorce is proceeding as we aren’t contesting anything. I don’t want the apartment especially after my delinquent doctor husband moved his little pregnant med student into our home, and Shelton isn’t disputing that he pay me my share of the property. It feels like dirty money to me, but I just want to be done with him. Happy ex-wife equals happy life. I should write that on the chalkboard beams.
I am happy, mostly. I spend time with Rita. I explore Vermont, and steer clear of where I think Bull Eaton might be. No more The Gin Mill. No Dunham where I’ve learned his family owns a dairy farm. Dunham is a small community, and I vaguely recall the name from a story I reported on a while back. Something about cows, as a matter of fact, but I can’t remember the headline. As if my thoughts conjure the only dairyman I know, Bull enters the café.
With a woman.
Blinking to clear my vision, making certain it’s really him, I drop behind the peach couch, falling to my hands and knees. Crawling to the edge of the furniture, I watch Bull place his hand on the small of the woman’s back—a possessive move if I’ve ever seen one. He strokes up her spine, and I feel a little sick watching him touch her so intimately. Actually, I’ve been feeling a little sick a lot lately, and I chalk up the current nausea to the upheaval in my life.
The woman orders and then turns to Bull, offering him a sweet gaze as though she’s totally smitten with him. She also looks about fifteen years younger than him. The strange part is, he doesn’t seem to notice her looking up at him with hearts in her eyes. He just keeps his eyes forward and places his order.
Please let it be a to-go order. I send up my silent prayer to the cosmos but have no such luck in it being honored when the two pick up plates with muffins on them and cross the café to the couch I’m hiding behind.
Frick. Frick. Frick.
I need to get out from behind this couch, but I’m trapped. I’m working with Audrey and Roderick today. Audrey has the patience of a saint with me and that Astra coffee machine that looks like something from outer space. It makes three cups of coffee at once, but I’ve only mastered black and pointing at the cream and sugar counter.
“Well, this is exciting. I’ve never been on a breakfast date.”
I’ve never been on a breakfast date. My lips silently move to mimic her. Her voice is too high, and she sounds like Vermont Barbie. Only, I know that’s not fair of me. I’m jealous, and I admit it one hundred percent. I haven’t been with another man since Bull and don’t have immediate intentions to do so, but most of all, I’ve missed him—the strength of his body, the tenderness of his touch, and the incredible orgasms. On top of that, Bull was sweet. We laughed about silly stuff, never mentioning anything about our pasts or our futures.
Only tonight, he said. Us and this bed are all we need in our heads.
Only one night, and my chest aches when I think of him. It’s silly to consider, but the attraction to him was so strong. The way we moved. The way we connected. It was so different from Shelton, but then I chalk up the sensation to being with someone other than my husband after so many years.
I tip my head to the back of the couch and then lean forward, hoping they didn’t feel the jostle.
“So how do you know Dillard Barnes?” Bull asks as if picking up an unfinished conversation.
“We’re old friends,” she casually states, and I’m shaking my head at the sound of things. Old friend, my ass. His friend didn’t keep her, or she didn’t keep him, and now Bull will be second-string. My lips purse, admonishing myself because I used Bull as a rebound, too. Although it didn’t feel like a rebound. He felt like the start of something new. He felt like my fresh start. My shoulders sag, though, as I recall waking alone that morning.
“What should we do today?” Her voice is like nails on the chalkboard-painted beams around us. Why do older men always go for younger women? I don’t want to hear about their plans or what Bull will do to her later, especially if it involves maple syrup or a hotel desk. My eyes close at the memory.
“Well, we’re just doing this right here,” he states, and I almost laugh. Bull isn’t simple, but he’s a simple man. He’s living in the moment, and I’m hoping this means he hasn’t thought past this coffee date.
“A dark roast and a caramel macchiato with exactly five drizzles of caramel, fifteen pumps of vanilla syrup, whipped cream, and an extra shot.”
What the . . .?
Thank God, I did not take that order. I don’t even know what that is. There’s a pause of silence, and I’m wondering what’s happening when Bull says, “You have a little something . . .”
I just want to die a slow death as I imagine him swiping at the corner of her lip or wiping off her nose, and that sweet, tender touch will be all the spark Vermont Barbie needs to want to pounce on this man behind me. Bull has these deep blue eyes and that silver-speckled scruff, plus his hair is artfully streaked with gray. He’s all-around sexy, and he doesn’t even know it. Then his touch. The soft strokes down my body and the delicate dips of his fingers, I just can’t—
“Have either of you seen Scarlett?” Audrey asks.
Frick.
“Scarlett?” Bull chokes from his seat on the couch.
“Yeah, Scarlett. She’s our newest barista, and I swear she was out here.”
“I didn’t see anyone,” Vermont Barbie states. “But then again, I’ve only been looking at Bull.”
Okay, that’s enough.
“Found it,” I say, popping up from behind the couch and holding my fingers pinched together like I’ve just found gold in them there wood floorboards.
“Scarlett?” Audrey blinks at me with those expressive eyes of hers. She’s a petite blonde with a lot of power behind her personality. I slowly stand but find myself dizzy as I do and grip the back of the couch for support.