A Season for Second Chances(64)

Annie saw one or two wry smiles and raised eyebrows around the café.

“Nothing I’m not already well on the way to recouping,” she replied sweetly. “As you can see, business is booming.” A little queue was forming at the kiosk window.

John smiled. His eyebrow twitched infinitesimally, Annie noticed, and she grinned inwardly.

Annie banged the milk jug on the counter to disperse any milk bubbles and poured the milk into the waiting espresso, flicking her wrist lightly as the coffee neared the rim of the cup, to create a perfect feather in the rich crema. She handed John his flat white and wondered if she looked as smug as she felt. John looked at it, one eyebrow raised slightly in what she had come to learn was John’s reaction to surprise. He took a sip—no sugar, she noted—and licked his top lip; Annie found her eyes lingering on his mouth and mentally slapped herself.

“Good coffee,” said John.

“I know,” Annie replied.

She turned away from him and continued with her work. It was a steady day, but she watched him out of the corner of her eye. He sat at the bench that looked out over the sea. He flicked idly through one or two magazines and glanced over the local paper but, after a time, he became still and sat sipping his coffee and gazing out of the window. How many times has he stared out at that view? Annie wondered.

As she was loading the dishwasher yet again, John leaned over the counter.

“If you like, I can get started on the decorations for tonight,” he said.

“Oh, thanks, yes, that would be great. If you give me a minute, I’ll run up and start bringing down the boxes.”

“It’s nae bother,” he said in his musical accent. “You’re busy here. I can get them. I’ve not got my keys with me; can I use yours?”

He held out his hands for the keys to the flat. Annie hesitated for a beat too long. John caught it.

“Are you afraid I might stumble across little John?” he asked with almost a straight face.

Annie’s cheeks burned scarlet instantly as she remembered John walking in on their book club. She recovered herself as best she could.

“He’s not called John anymore,” she said with as much nonchalance as she could muster. “Such a common name, John, not nearly powerful enough.”

John tried to suppress a smile.

“I see,” he said, his lips twitching. “And, if it isn’t too impertinent a question, what name of great power did you bestow upon it?”

“Mr. Knightley,” she said haughtily and with a completely straight face.

“Mr. Knightley?” he asked. “The stuffed shirt from Emma?”

Annie couldn’t quite believe that she was discussing the name of her dildo with her landlady’s nephew.

“Mr. Knightley happens to be an honorable man who is very much in love with Emma and aware of his duty of care to her and her father’s well-being.”

“Well, that’s me told!” He smiled. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to be nosing around. I’ll just grab the boxes and bring them down. No peeking, I promise.”

He grinned mischievously and winked at her. The gesture was so unexpected that Annie’s already crimson cheeks darkened further. She handed the keys to John. He took them and disappeared through the door to the inner hallway. It felt strange that he was so familiar with her home; he probably knew its nooks and crannies better than she did. And yet this familiarity didn’t make her feel uncomfortable or proprietorial; on the contrary, she was finding she liked it. As much as Saltwater suited her, it fitted John just as comfortably.





Chapter 51



The café emptied out and refilled, and the kiosk showed no sign of easing up either. Annie rushed off her feet was becoming a recurring theme. The chocolate pumpkin cupcakes she’d made last night were selling like, well, like hotcakes; people were buying them in boxes of four or six to take home for Halloween after the school run. Two empty pumpkin shells sat sadly on the shelf below the counter, waiting to be carved.

When John breezed back into the café with three large boxes piled one on top of the other, Annie was so busy she couldn’t think straight. The fine weather had brought with it an army of wanderers, aiming to enjoy the watery sun while it lasted. She saw John looking around for somewhere to sit to go through the boxes, but every space was taken.

“You might have to sit on the stairs,” she called to him over the noise of the coffee grinder. Four more people walked into the café and joined the queue.

“All right to sit outside?” a man in a gray hoodie shouted over.

“If you can find a space!” Annie shouted back as she handed out two large paper cups through the kiosk window and turned to the counter to take the next order from inside the café. “Thank you all for your patience, I will get to you all as fast as I can!”

There were nods and waves and noises of goodwill. She was going to have to seriously think about hiring someone; it was becoming impossible to serve the takeaway customers at the kiosk and the drink-ins inside at the same time. As she handed over the change to a woman in a wax jacket, she felt herself being gently shoved to the side. She looked up to see John looking down at her.

“If I’m here I might as well help,” he said.

Annie gawped.

“Shift!” said John. And she did.