Must Love Coffee Read online

  She hit a mid-town department store and scooped up every little black dress they had in her size and carried her spoils to the change room. She lucked out when she put on dress number three and heard a chorus of angels singing. The dress had a cowl neck—her favorite kind—and hit her mid-calf, mysteriously, magically making her look both taller and slimmer.

  With time to spare, she sharked through the lingerie department. Not that she was planning on anyone seeing her underwear in the near future, but it was a sad fact that she hadn’t bought anything new for over a year, and things were looking a little saggy and grey in her panty drawer. She selected sheer black lace then stopped in her tracks when she saw a display for cherry red satin with black piping.

  “So hot,” she whispered to herself as she added a bra and panty set to her haul and headed to the change room.

  She left the red satin set till last and this time George Thorogood’s “Bad to the Bone” played in her head as she looked at herself in the mirror.

  “This is so not me,” she muttered. Then she turned and caught sight of her new tattoo and realized that maybe she needed to rethink her ideas about herself.

  She bought the dress and the underwear and went home to wait for buyer’s remorse to kick in.

  By ten it still hadn’t happened, so she ate a bowl of ice cream, drank a glass of wine, and watched 30 Rock till it was time for bed.

  The next day, for the first time in months, she went somewhere else for her morning coffee. She felt like a traitor doing it—she had Cuppa Diem’s name inked into her flesh, after all—but she didn’t want to accidentally run into Danny now that they were going on a date.

  She knew that probably made her a little nutty, but that was okay, she could live with it. What she could not live with was the coffee from the other shop, so she confided in Libby and her friend appointed herself Cassidy’s coffee bitch for the rest of the day, delivering perfect brews to her office.

  That took care of Friday. Saturday morning found her shaving her legs, moisturizing, plucking her eyebrows and experimenting with eye makeup. That killed a whole hour. The rest of the day dragged on and on like the last week of the school term, but finally she was in an Uber, heading toward the French restaurant.

  She’d calibrated her arrival so that she’d be just slightly late to avoid being the dufus sitting at the table waiting for Daniel to arrive. He could wait for her, and she could make an awesome entrance, slinking her way through the tables in her new dress, every step imbued with the secret knowledge that she was wearing the world’s hottest lingerie under her clothes.

  It was a solid plan, but things went awry when her driver overshot the restaurant. By the time he’d completed a lap of the block Danny was exiting his own Uber.

  They met in front of the restaurant. He was dressed in navy chinos and a cool jacket in a muted check with an open-necked shirt. When she got closer, she realized he’d had a haircut and that he smelled insanely good, like a heady mix of tobacco and leather and vanilla.

  “What is that?” she asked, unable to stop herself from leaning forward and sucking in a lungful of amazingness.

  “My aftershave.” Daniel’s gaze travelled down her body appreciatively. He looked a little dazed when his focus returned to her face.

  If that was the way he reacted to a simple dress, the red underwear would blow his mind.

  The thought almost made her laugh out loud, then it made her wonder if he was a boxer or briefs guy, and suddenly she was thinking about them both being naked, and her clothes felt too hot and tight.

  “Nice night for it,” Daniel said, and she tried to drag her mind out of her panties.

  “Perfect night. It’ll be summer soon,” she said.

  “It will.” He swallowed, the sound audible in the darkened street. “That dress is… You look…Yeah.” He shook his head as though he needed to clear it.

  It was the best compliment Cassidy had ever received.

  “How hungry are you?” she asked suddenly, meeting his gaze boldly.

  Daniel’s eyes widened slightly. “Are we…are we talking about food?”

  “No.”

  “Then I’m starving,” he said.

  She had no idea who took the first step, her or him, but the next thing she knew she was pressed against him and her arms were around his neck and he was kissing her. He tasted like mint and something else, something delicious that she couldn’t quite name, and his body felt warm and solid against her own, his fingers tightening on her hips as the kiss got deeper and wetter and more desperate.

  The sound of a car arriving forced them apart and they both took a step backward as a taxi disgorged its passengers.

  “How close do you live?” he asked.

  “Twenty minutes. You?”

  “Ten.”

  As one they turned toward the taxi before it could slip away. By mutual unspoken agreement they didn’t touch or talk during the short ride to Danny’s place. Cassidy kept her mind deliberately blank.

  She needed this. She wanted it. She wanted Danny. That was all that mattered right now. They were both single. They’d both been sad, and together they’d created some craziness and fun.

  It was time to see what else they could make together. Like orgasms. Hopefully.

  The taxi jerked to a halt in front of a low-rise apartment block. Cassidy handed Danny her half of the fare when he leaned forward to pay the driver.

  “That’s okay,” he said, then he saw her face and his mouth curved into a smile. He took her money. “Got it.”

  He led the way through the foyer and into the elevator. They stood in opposite corners and fucked each other with their eyes, playing a game of chicken that threatened to set Cassidy’s underwear on fire.

  He walked ahead of her when they arrived on his floor and she could feel her knees starting to tremble as he slotted his key into the door. She wasn’t sure if it was excitement or nerves. It had been a long time since she’d been with anyone other than Jon. Maybe she’d forgotten how to do sex. Maybe she’d been doing something wrong all these years, hence Jon’s betrayal. Maybe -

  “So you know, it’s every man for himself once we get inside,” she warned him, falling back on bravado to vanquish her doubts.

  “Took the words right out of my mouth.”

  “That’s not the only thing I’m going to take,” she said.

  He pushed the door open, eyebrows raised. Daring her.

  She launched herself at him, but he was waiting for her and they staggered into his apartment locked in a kiss that was part-sex, part-warfare. She tore at his shirt buttons, fumbling them open, then reached for his belt buckle. He found the tab on her zipper and yanked it down its track, making the bodice of her dress sag. Then they were in his bedroom, landing on his bed in a tangle of half-naked limbs and clothes.

  “Just let me—”

  “I need to—”

  “Holy fuck.”

  The shock and awe in Danny’s voice and face as he stared at her red satin bra was deeply, deeply gratifying. She’d made a good decision in that change room two nights ago.

  “Lucky I’m a young man, or I’d be dead right now,” he said, hand pressed to his heart. Then he used his teeth to drag her bra cup down and pulled her nipple into his mouth.

  There were definitely going to be orgasms. Maybe even before she got all her clothes off.

  Determined to wreak her own havoc, she wrestled his pants off, then slung a leg over his hips and rolled on top. He let her be in charge for almost a full minute before he rolled them both over, pressing a very, very respectable erection against the damp satin of her panties.

  By the time she regained the upper hand they were both naked and a condom had been deployed. She ran her hands over his chest—thank God, he didn’t shave, she loved a hairy chest—and circled her hips. Then he was inside her and thinking became a thing of the past.

  For long, delicious, decadent minutes there was only him and his mouth and his erection and the s
ounds he made and the sounds she made and the feel of his skin beneath her hands and the way his muscles tensed as he thrust into her and building tension and friction and…OH GOD, YES, THERE. RIGHT THERE.

  Afterward, Cassidy lay in his tangled sheets and tried to remember how to breathe. Her body felt as soft and malleable as butter on hot toast. She was done. Finished. Replete. Spent.

  The sheets rustled, then Danny’s hand found hers. She wove her fingers with his and returned his gentle pressure, letting him know that yes, she was still there, and yes, it had been amazing, and yes, they were definitely going to do that again, very soon, when she’d caught her breath and her vagina had woken from its pleasure-induced coma.

  “I don’t feel like a loser,” Danny said after a while. “Just want you to know that. Also, that tattoo looks really cool.”

  “Good, because it hurt like fuckery,” she said.

  They both laughed. He rolled toward her and she opened her mouth to him as he kissed her, a slow, lazy, thorough exploration.

  “There’s something you should know,” she said as he reached for another condom from the bedside drawer. “I still feel like a winner.”

  He laughed, the sound low and sexy and deeply male. “Good. Long may it stay that way.”

  Then he moved on top of her and she forgot how to think all over again.

  Epilogue

  Six Months Later

  “Lattes all round, right?” Daniel asked, pausing before the doorway to Cuppa Diem.

  It was the weekend, so there wasn’t a captain of industry ready to elbow him in the face in order to get to the coffee before him. A nice change.

  Cassidy nodded enthusiastically. “Large one for me, please,” she said, pushing her sunglasses up her nose just as Jasper jerked hard on the lead, nearly pulling her over.

  “Jasper, not cool,” Daniel said, grabbing the Border Collie by his harness and pulling him back to heel.

  Jasper looked up at him with bottomless brown eyes bright with intelligence and the need to herd things.

  “Okay, yes, I get it, you need a run,” Danny told him. “Just let us fuel up and we’ll head straight down to the river.”

  Jasper’s tongue unrolled out of his mouth like a miniature red carpet, which Daniel took as a sign of approval. He and Cassidy had rescued Jasper two months ago and they were all still getting used to each other, but every day their good boy rewarded them for their decision.

  “He can’t understand a word you say. You know that, don’t you?” Libby said, her long sundress billowing like a spinnaker behind her in the warm summer breeze.

  “Just for that I’m ordering yours with almond milk,” Daniel said.

  “I’d like to see you try,” Libby said, her blue eyes intense as laser beams.

  “Definitely time for those coffees,” Pete said, ushering Daniel inside.

  “Don’t know why you want to poke the bear, man,” Pete said as they joined the queue.

  “I live for danger,” Daniel said.

  Pete huffed out a laugh. Daniel dug in his pocket for his card, his gaze roaming idly around the store. It took him a moment or two to register the new addition to the wall.

  “How long has that been there?” he asked.

  “Two days. It’s been killing her, waiting for you to notice,” Pete said.

  Daniel went to inspect the small frame that had been added to the installation he and Cassidy had jointly created. Inside was a black and white shot of him and Cassidy kissing, both of them holding a cup of coffee. The caption read “All’s well that ends well.”

  “Huh,” Daniel said. Suddenly Libby’s insistence on coming to Cuppa Diem for their weekend coffees made a lot more sense. He headed outside where he found Libby squatting beside Jasper, rubbing the dog’s ears.

  “Nice picture,” he said. “When did you take it?”

  “Finally, he notices. Finally,” Libby said.

  “What’s going on?” Cassidy asked.

  Daniel tilted his head toward the door, indicating she should take a look for herself. Frowning, Cassidy passed the lead over and disappeared inside.

  “You have no idea how long it took me to get that picture,” Libby said. “It had to have kissing, and it had to have coffee. With you two, you’d think that would be an easy brief, but lemme tell you, it was not.”

  Cassidy emerged from the shop, a bemused smile on her face. “That was pretty sneaky.”

  “Come on. People needed to know how it all turned out. You can’t just captivate the whole city with a cute tale of screw-ball antics and one-upmanship then leave them hanging,” Libby said.

  “If you say so,” Cassidy said.

  “I think I need to take issue with the caption,” Daniel said.

  “This’ll be good,” Libby said, hands on her hips.

  “‘Well’ doesn’t capture the situation properly,” Daniel said.

  “Agreed,” Cassidy said.

  “What word would you use?” Libby asked.

  Daniel looked at Cassidy. She smiled, then cocked her head, waiting.

  “Spectacularly,” he said.

  “‘All’s well that ends spectacularly’ doesn’t exactly roll of the tongue, though, does it?” Libby said.

  “Accuracy in reporting, babe,” Cassidy said, shaking her head. “A citizen journalist’s first duty, I would have thought.”

  “Oh my God, you two were made for each other. How was there ever any doubt?” Libby asked, casting her eyes to heaven beseechingly.

  “Good question,” Cassidy said.

  She smiled at him then, and he smiled back. He pulled her close and kissed her, and he could feel the love and light in her heart where it pressed against his own.

  Best of all, she tasted like coffee.

  Author’s Note:

  This novella was inspired by real-life events in my hometown of Melbourne, Australia. Melbourne is a town that is serious about coffee—some might say snobby—and the story of Fraser and Harriet’s coffee-based rivalry captured Twitter’s imagination in a big way. After calling dibs with my fellow romance authors on the meet-cute fodder that this story represented, I felt an obligation to get to work on my version of what might have been. Like Fraser and Harriet, I had a lot of fun with their battle for supremacy.

  If you’d like to know more about the real-life rivalry that inspired this story, you can read it about it in all these places:

  https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/23/the-great-australian-cafe-war-he-thought-he-was-the-best-customer-ever-but-was-he

  https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/peak-melbourne-the-epic-rivalry-between-two-loyal-coffee-lovers-20190823-p52k8v.html

  https://www.broadsheet.com.au/melbourne/city-file/article/feuding-sensory-lab-customers-stage-peace-summit-european

  https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/23/coffee-lovers-fight-named-cafes-best-customer-gets-hand-10618304/

  Afterword

  This novella was inspired by real-life events in my hometown of Melbourne, Australia. Melbourne is a town that is serious about coffee—some might say snobby—and the story of Fraser and Harriet’s coffee-based rivalry captured Twitter’s imagination in a big way. After calling dibs with my fellow romance authors on the meet-cute fodder that this story represented, I felt an obligation to get to work on my version of what might have been. Like Fraser and Harriet, I had a lot of fun with their battle for supremacy.

  If you’d like to know more about the real-life rivalry that inspired this story, you can read about it in all these places:

  https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/aug/23/the-great-australian-cafe-war-he-thought-he-was-the-best-customer-ever-but-was-he

  https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/peak-melbourne-the-epic-rivalry-between-two-loyal-coffee-lovers-20190823-p52k8v.html

  https://www.broadsheet.com.au/melbourne/city-file/article/feuding-sensory-lab-customers-stage-peace-summit-european

  https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/23/coffee-lovers-fight-named-cafes-best-c
ustomer-gets-hand-10618304/

  Also by Sarah Mayberry

  Her Best Worst Mistake

  Make Believe Wedding

  The Cowboy Meets His Match