Loverboy

by Bowen, Sarina

  “Aw, shucks,” he says. “You have a nice day, now.” He waves as she walks away, then eventually turns to where I’m standing here, fuming. “Chill, Posy. So they gave you a price break, maybe. It’s nothing to get upset about. This is exactly why I don’t drink caffeine. It makes people ragey. Is it time for my lunch break yet?” He pats his impeccable abs. “A growing boy needs to eat.”

  “No,” I say, agitated. “I need another thirty minutes before I can cover for you.”

  “All right. Don’t be a stranger.” He gives me a maddeningly sexy smile.

  I spin around and storm back into the kitchen, my body pinging with hormones and confusion. Who are Gunnar’s friends, anyway, that they could practically give me a new window? “Who does that?” I ask my empty kitchen, because Ginny is outside on her phone, and Jerry has snuck off to read comics.

  The only answer I get is the ding of the oven timer. So I get back to work.

  16

  Gunnar

  You do a woman a favor, and she only gets agitated. Ah well. I tried.

  There’s a short break between customers, so I wipe down the counter, hoping Posy won’t make too big a deal over the low bill we sent her.

  The night of the break-in, we basically turned this place into a security fortress. Cameras capture everything in high resolution from every angle, 24/7. It’s awfully invasive. But I need to know if The Plumber is connected to Posy’s business or family. And I need to know soon.

  I don’t feel great about it, though, because it isn’t even working. We still don’t have a suspect. There must be something I’m missing. “Hey, Teagan,” I try during a rare lull behind the counter. “How’d you get into making donuts, anyway?”

  She looks up from the phone that’s always glued to her hand. “Everybody likes donuts. It’s a recession-proof business.”

  “Sure. But not everyone makes them.”

  She stashes the phone. “Well, it’s kind of a personal story. My family went to Hawaii when I was seven. It was the only really big trip I can remember us taking together.”

  Bingo. You should always ask a small question first. If I’d asked Teagan about her family, it would have sounded suspicious. But asking about donuts got her talking anyway.

  “We got these Portuguese donuts at a shop on Oahu, and they were still warm. We ate them on the beach, and I rinsed my fingers in the ocean. It was the best thing I’d ever eaten, and twenty years later it still seems magical.”

  “That’s a nice story,” I say. “And you haven’t been back there?”

  She shakes her head. “I always wanted to go. But my parents were killed in an accident a few years later. I went to culinary school, and I worked for some fancy restaurants. But I didn’t like those jobs. Famous chefs are all assholes. So now I work for myself. I make the donuts for a few customers, and I work here for extra cash. I’ll never be rich, but it’s a good life.”

  “Sure is,” I agree mildly. The bell on the door jingles, and another customer walks in. To my surprise, it’s Saroya. She's wearing a sequined sweater, bright red lipstick, and a somewhat sheepish expression.

  Interesting.

  “Hello there, Gunnar,” she says, blinking rapidly. “I was hoping you might have a decaf sugar-free nonfat peppermint iced latte with my name on it.”

  I paste on a smile. “Of course, madame.” I'm as friendly as possible, although it is just a little weird that last time we saw each other, I called her boyfriend an asshole, and then she said that I was “obviously deranged.” Honestly, I didn't expect to see her set foot in this place again. And I was perfectly okay with that.

  On the other hand, I'm told that I am a truly great barista and pregnant women are well known for their cravings. “Would you like that for here or to go?”

  “For here, please.”

  I grab a glass from the clean stack and get busy making her disgusting drink. People are weird. Her especially. While I'm making the coffee, I take surreptitious glances at her. Saroya is very busy examining the cafe and eyeballing the clientele. She’s studying the pie shop like there will be a quiz later.

  I can't help but wonder why she’s so obsessed with this place. I guess it’s possible to become fixated on your boyfriend’s ex, especially if they were together for a long time. That's the only reason I can think of why a woman might spend a lot of time in her partner's ex-wife's cafe. Maybe she’s jealous of Posy for some reason. Maybe there's tension at home. Maybe Saroya has some reason to think that Spalding isn't over Posy.

  And maybe he isn’t, because Posy is amazing.

  “That will be four-fifty, please. Anything to go with it?”

  Saroya turns toward the counter again, taking in the pies on offer, examining them with that slightly judgmental squint that’s weirdly familiar. “No thank you.” She passes me a five-dollar bill.

  I can’t figure out who she reminds me of, and it’s going to bug me. “You know,” I say as I'm making change, “the first time I made you a latte, I thought you looked really familiar to me. Have we met before?” I pass her two quarters.

  Her eyes narrow immediately. “No, of course not. I’d never seen you before in my life.” Then she picks up the cup of coffee and walks quickly away from me, without even putting that change in the tip jar. And without the usual amount of flirting. So that's weird. She takes a seat across the room, her back to me.

  Posy emerges from the kitchen. “Hey, Gunnar, you can take that break now. I’m all set.” Her eyes dip, as if she’s embarrassed for snapping at me.

  “Yeah, thanks,” I say slowly. “Heads up, though, about table number four.”

  Posy’s eyes dart over to where Saroya is seated, sipping her drink and flipping through a magazine. “Oh. Seriously? Thanks for the warning.”

  “You want me to stick around?”

  She shakes her head. “Nah. Go on. I can handle her.”

  I go back into the kitchen and help myself to a sausage hand pie that's cooling on the rack. I grab my laptop, too, and go outside to sit on the back step. I eat the pie one-handed while I do a little Google searching. Saroya’s social media is locked down, including the lists of her friends. But then I find an old Twitter account called @RealtorSaroya. She hasn’t touched it in years.

  But your past always catches up to you, doesn’t it? As I skim past a list of old apartment listings, I find that in 2016, Saroya retweeted a bunch of things about the Rockaways Cheerleading bake sale. That rabbit hole leads me to a high school in the farthest reaches of Brooklyn, and its cheer team.

  Apparently cheerleaders take a lot of photographs, because there are a million. She’s only identified as Saroya D. But that’s enough. I find photos of her in a million poses.

  Yet it’s a plain old selfie that finally gives me the information I need. Saroya D. is pictured holding a trophy and standing beside a woman who could only be her mother. Their eyes are different, but their smiles are a perfect match. They have the same nose, and the same dark, gleaming hair.

  But what’s more—I’ve met Saroya’s mother. The moment I see her face, a name pops into my mind. Anna. It only takes me a moment longer to recall where I met Anna. At Paxton’s Bistro. She worked as a hostess during my first year there, when I was just the errand boy who took leaking bags of garbage out back and tossed them into the dumpster.

  I never had a real conversation with Anna the hostess. She was always up in the front of house and I was always in back. But I remember that she was fearsome, and the servers were all a little afraid of her.

  And Saroya is her daughter? That’s another link to Posy. A huge coincidence. Unless it’s not a coincidence at all …

  I stare at the old picture until my eyes are practically cross. As if sheer willpower could make the women in the photo animate and tell me exactly what I need to know.

  “Gunnar?”

  I whirl around at the sound of Posy’s voice, slamming the laptop shut in a hurry. “Yes?”

  “Are you ever coming back from break?
Or are you too busy looking at photos of cheerleaders to make coffee again?”

  Shit. “Just reading something about a charity bake sale that my friend sent to me.” I stand up and dust crumbs off my apron. “Sorry to dilly dally.”

  Posy gives me another dubious look. “No problem,” she says stiffly, before turning to go back inside.

  Shit shit shit. I don’t think she had a good enough look at my laptop to pick out Saroya and her mom. There were at least five photos on the screen. “Everything okay?” I ask as I follow her through the kitchen and into the cafe. “Except for my tardiness, of course.”

  She stops behind the counter, which thankfully has no line in front of it. She crosses her arms, one hip cocked against the bar. “I’m fine,” she says, her eyes flashing.

  There isn’t a lot of extra space back here, but lately it feels even smaller. She smells like lemon zest and vanilla extract. I never realized that baking scents were an aphrodisiac, but there you have it. And I’d like to get even closer to her. And naked, too.

  But I will resist. The case I’m working keeps getting more complicated instead of less, so I can’t go there. “Did she say anything?” I ask, dragging my foggy brain back to the problem at hand.

  “Who?” Posy whispers, her eyes a little glazed and her cheeks a little flushed. I’m not the only one who feels it.

  “Your nemesis at table four,” I say softly, jerking my chin toward the chair where Saroya had sat less than an hour ago.

  “Oh. No,” Posy says quickly. “She left without a word to me.”

  “Well that’s good, I guess.” I pick up a rag and wipe the bar, even though it’s already clean. “Just curious. How did she and your pencil dick of an ex meet, anyway?”

  Posy snorts before clamping a hand over her mouth. “She’s a wellness coach.”

  “You mentioned that, I think. And he was in the market for wellness?”

  “Our health insurance company sent her after Spalding’s health scare.”

  “Oh.” I turn that over in my mind and come up blank. “Something happened to him?”

  “Well …” She frowns. “Eighteen months ago he had a panic attack. But he thought it was his heart. And then he didn’t go to work afterwards, just in case. My husband’s company sent her to shoehorn him out of his convalescence.”

  “Okay?” I wait for more.

  She shrugs. “The more I talk about it, the weirder it sounds. Spalding had some kind of midlife crisis. I don’t know if he’s really that easily frightened, or if he just relished the attention and the time off. If I’d known then what I know now, I would have walked away from him sooner. Instead, I spent a lot of time worrying about him while he was busy meditating with his future child bride.” She rolls her eyes. “I should have hired a P.I. to figure out if he was cheating on me. I should have fought harder to keep my net worth out of the red. But I hate confrontation almost as much as I hate liars. So here we are.”

  Three women walk through the door of the pie shop, interrupting this revealing little conversation. And when I turn to greet them, Posy disappears.

  But later that night, I take another hard look at Saroya. Her wellness website was registered a year and a half ago, which means that she would have turned up on Spalding’s doorstep almost the moment she opened for business.

  That’s weird, right?

  I write an email to Max and his hacker minions, asking them to take a look at her bank accounts. And what they find is that Saroya was cashing checks last year from a restaurant—the Coconut Grill on Third Avenue. But not from any corporations.

  And earlier today, I demonstrated that Saroya had prior knowledge of Posy’s family. Her mother worked for Mr. Paxton long enough for all the waiters to be a little afraid of her.

  By the time I shut off my computer at the late hour of ten-thirty, I have more questions than answers. What the hell is Saroya after? And what does it have to do with the Paxtons?

  I don’t have the first clue. But she’s the only pie shop insider who’s getting more interesting instead of less.

  What’s your game, Saroya D? And where is it headed?

  17

  Posy

  The low repair bill still troubles me. But I write out a check anyway and tuck it into my purse.

  I sure hope my father’s connection to the restaurant industry didn’t have anything to do with the low total. Gunnar doesn’t understand how important it is to me to succeed without the influence of Peter Paxton III. My dad is toxic. He taught me to doubt myself.

  And I’m still good at it. A whole week passes before I gather the courage to invite Gunnar out to dinner. I choose Friday for this moment of bravery, because Saturday is Gunnar’s day off. If I go down in flames, I’ll have thirty-six hours to avoid him before we come face to face again.

  Thirty-six hours won’t be nearly enough, will it? Maybe this is a terrible idea.

  I worry about it all day. But suddenly it's closing time, and Gunnar has already counted the drawer, cleaned the bar, and is tipping all the chairs upside down onto the tables.

  I'm about to lose my chance.

  Meanwhile, I fuss with the flavored syrups, taking inventory of every flavor. But I’m so nervous that I count the coconut syrup three times. And then I overfill the raspberry syrup until it leaks all over my hand when I try to replace the pump.

  "Shit," I whisper, just as Gunnar also says something from directly behind me. "What?" I yelp, whirling around, startled. And then I collide with his hard chest.

  Gunnar looks down at the front of his Posy's Pie Shop T-shirt, where raspberry syrup is smeared in a glossy, dripping blob.

  Now I’m mortified. "Omigod, I'm sorry. What were you saying, anyway?"

  “I said, careful, I'm right behind you.” He lifts his pale green eyes to mine and shakes his head. “At least it's quitting time.”

  “You can’t leave like that. Come back to my office a second,” I urge, pointing with sticky hands toward the back. “I’ll grab you a fresh T-shirt for the walk home.” I flip on the sink and plunge my sticky hands under the water. “I keep a couple of extras for emergencies.”

  "It's not far," he says with a shrug. "I don't really care."

  "You look like you're starring in a b-grade slasher film," I point out. "And you'll smell like a fruit pop."

  "You say that like it's a bad thing." He gives me a silly wink, and my achy little heart thumps wildly. Can you still ask a man out after you spill red goo all over his pecs?

  “Come on,” I say, brushing past him to get to my tiny office. “I’ll wash that shirt this weekend, okay? Maybe I can even get the stains out. Take it off.”

  Yeah baby! my hormones cry. Take it all off.

  Down, girl.

  By the time I get my hands on an extra-large shirt and turn around, Gunnar is standing there in the hallway, shirtless.

  Holy shit, my hormones whisper. We already know about the muscles. But we had no idea about the tattoos. Gunnar's chest is decorated with an elegant vine that climbs asymmetrically across his ribcage. My gaze traces its stem from one side of his waistline, up his stomach muscles, and finally across his pecs. And in the center of it, there’s an old fashioned key looped into the tendrils.

  It’s beautiful.

  “Had your fill, yet?” Gunnar asks quietly. “Can I put the shirt on now?"

  Oh dear. I’m suddenly conscious of my open jaw, where my tongue is practically hanging out. I thrust the shirt at Gunnar. “Sorry. Here you go. Can you have dinner with me tonight?” I blurt.

  Oh, crap, my hormones say. That’s our bad. Sorry about the awkward timing.

  Gunnar's hands freeze in the midst of pushing through the arm holes of the shirt. When his face reappears through the neck hole, it's wearing a wince. “Hell, Posy. I can't. I'm sorry. It's not that I don't want to.”

  “I’m sure you're busy, no big deal,” I rattle off.

  “There's something I have to do tonight. A favor for a friend.”

  “Yup
. Of course you do.” I want to die now.

  “Look,” he rests one powerful arm against the door frame. “It would be a bad idea anyway. Not that it isn't tempting. Because we wouldn't stop at dinner.”

  I gulp.

  “You're the boss. And I'm just a bad bet.”

  We love bad bets! my hormones shriek.

  “I understand,” I say. Then I pull myself up to my full height and make my face as impassive as possible. “Have a lovely day off. I'll see you on Sunday, okay? Rest up for the brunch crowd.”

  “Right,” he says, tilting his head to study me with those pale green eyes. “You have a great Friday night.”

  I give him a wave, because it’s either that or admit that my Friday night is going to be pretty lonely. Gunnar steps out of view. I hear him gather his backpack and his jacket and let himself out the door.

  I just stand there for a minute, breathing. And I remind myself that this was good practice. In the unlikely event that I meet another man who's even half as appealing as Gunnar, I'll do better next time.

  Then I go out front and lock up, pulling down the security gate—the one that Gunnar found for me, damn it. He's a better man than I ever guessed. He's a great employee. But he doesn't want me. Maybe he can sense that I'm not that much fun. That I don't know how to walk the naked path of joy. Maybe he could tell just from a few kisses.

  Or maybe I'm being a psycho right now and beating myself up over nothing. The man has plans, and he doesn’t want to bang his boss.

  I double check the locks on the front and back doors. Then I order myself to go upstairs and plan a little fun for tonight, no matter what. Except Ginny and Aaron are at a kindergartener’s birthday pizza party, so my two sidekicks are unavailable.

  Since I refuse to sit home alone, I change into a short skirt, grab a book, and then take myself out to the same bar where I ran into Gunnar two weeks ago. I sip another of Jerome’s special cocktails and try not to think about a certain hot barista with a tattooed chest.