Love And A Latte

“I think you should go for it, Chase,” Jackson said. “She’s cute. She’s the opposite of you. You’ll have some fun with her. I’m in full support of you expanding your horizons and having a little fling.”

Mariah let out a noise that sounded suspiciously like a growl. “Sometimes I wish I had sisters.”

“No, you don’t.” Jackson set a loud smacking kiss on Mariah’s cheek. “We’re more fun.”

“You’re as fun as a hive of angry bees.”

She left them then, leaving Chase with something to think about. Staying away from Amber might be a good idea. She did work for them and she was his sister’s friend. And she had the potential to be distracting. With this business just starting, he needed to focus on growing it.

Something made him look over to the coffee café where Amber was already hard at work. She looked up at him and smiled, and Chase knew then that ignoring her was going to be a losing battle.

It was a battle he would be okay with losing.

* * *

“I’m going to head out for the night,” Nita, another barista, said to Amber as she slung her bag over her shoulder. “Are you going to be okay with closing up alone?”

“Get home to that cute boyfriend of yours. I know he has been working nights lately.”

“Thanks.” Her eyes traveled over to the corner table in the café section. “Chase Drayson is here. If you hear something move, it’s him. I was here a couple of nights ago and nearly jumped out of my skin. I thought the world’s largest rat had broken in but thankfully it was just him.”

Amber laughed. “Thanks for the warning. I won’t make that mistake.”

“I’m surprised he took the leave of absence from his job to work here. Salary-wise, I’m sure he made in one day there what he makes in two weeks here.”

She hadn’t thought much about it, but all the Draysons had taken a risk to work here. Jackson was somewhat of an entrepreneur and was used to taking risks like these. Mariah worked here because she wanted to escape the difficult past she had with her former husband. But Chase... She wasn’t sure why he had taken this risk, yet she knew he loved his younger siblings. She could see it in the way they interacted. “Maybe blood is thicker than money, so to speak.”

“I’m sure he’s got enough of it to last him a lifetime already. A few years ago, a woman claimed she was pregnant with his baby in the hopes of cashing in. But that Mr. Drayson is one careful man. Of course the kid wasn’t his. I’m not sure he ever slept with her, but that’s the type of woman Chase attracts. Gold diggers. He’s a quiet man, but not a weak one and he certainly isn’t stupid. He knows what he’s working with and he chooses his partners carefully, but I don’t think he trusts easily. He goes for a very specific type of woman.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. Chase only goes for elegant, Ivy League–educated women from well-off families to avoid opportunists. He might have a little fling here and there, but no one ever knows about it. He seems like the kind of guy who should be married with two kids already, but I don’t think he trusts anybody enough to let them get that close to him.”

Amber nodded. It made sense. It made sense that he went for women who were the opposite of her. She usually stayed away from men like him. “How do you know so much about Chase?”

“He and his family are big in the Seattle society circles and so is my cousin, Simone, who used to date him. She always says he was the one who got away.”

“Oh. Tell her I’m sorry for her loss.”

“You’re no sorrier than she is.” She laughed. “I’ve got to go. I’ll see you later.”

She watched Nita walk out before she turned her attention back to Chase.

He was caught up in work again. Eyes glued to the screen, fingers on the keyboard. Forehead scrunched in concentration. She used to think that he was cold. Aloof. Maybe a little bit snobbish. But after talking to him a few times, she realized that he was none of those things.

What he was was incredibly focused.

And fine.

Amber was an artist so she could see beauty where others sometimes missed it, but no one could deny how handsome he was. How symmetrical his features were. How rich and deep the color of his skin was. She thought of chocolate diamonds when she thought of him. She loved her intricate wire pieces, but if she was going to design a piece of jewelry to represent him she would use chocolate diamonds and white diamonds swirled together in a beautiful necklace to be worn close to the heart. Something classic and elegant with a little bit of a twist.

It was no wonder he was a target for shady females. He looked like a man with a lot to offer.

She was staring at him this time, she realized as she wiped the same section of the counter for the dozenth time. He hadn’t noticed she was there. Hadn’t felt her eyes on him yet. She had noticed him at the sushi place. She hadn’t meant to stop. Told herself to keep on walking by, but she couldn’t go by without speaking to him, without having those gorgeous dark eyes of his focus on her. He pulled her in with those eyes. With that deep, smooth voice. He made her want to stay and talk and know more about him when she should have gone on and ignored him and stayed away from him.

He wasn’t her type of guy. He had money. He practically smelled of money. That may be a positive with most women, but it wasn’t for her. People with a lot of it didn’t often realize how hard it was to get. He didn’t bat a lash when he tossed a fifty-dollar bill on the table to cover a tab that couldn’t have been more than ten. It nearly took her breath away, though. She had to work hours to make that much money.

And then when he asked her to make the bracelets, he offered her more than she could have imagined. And he did it all while telling her to value herself more.

No man had ever told her that. No one had ever told her that.

He was all wrong for her. Too rich. Too organized. Too buttoned-up. But she still couldn’t force herself to stay away.

She turned back to her espresso machine and a few minutes later she once again slid a steaming drink in front of him along with a plate of shortbread cookies.

“You must have read my mind.” He looked up at her as he lifted the cup.

“You needed a caffeine fix?”

“No. I was thinking I needed a beautiful woman to bring me my caffeine fix.”

She tried to stay cool, but the line made her blush. “Oh. You’re smooth, sir. I thought you could use a break.”

“Please. Sit down.” He smiled over his mug just before he took a long sip. She watched him drink the special coffee she had made just for him and watched his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed. She wondered what it would be like to pop a button on his shirt and place her lips on his throat. She wondered how his skin would feel beneath her mouth. She wondered how he would smell. A clean scent. Or something a little darker, a little spicier. Either way she was sure it was intoxicating.

She mentally shook herself. Where did that thought come from?

She would stay far away from that neck. She didn’t like to mix business with pleasure. She made it a rule. She needed this job. It was helping her pay her way through school. She couldn’t afford a fling with her boss.

“Myers’ coffee is always good, but you did something special to this,” he said to her.

“Mexican coffee. My own special recipe with just a hint of vanilla, cinnamon and chocolate. When I serve it at parties, I go all out and make it with tequila, Kahlúa and melted vanilla ice cream. But I toned it down for you tonight. This bakery doesn’t have a liquor license.”

“Do you throw a lot of parties?”

“Between working here, getting my master’s and designing jewelry, I don’t have time to throw any parties. The last one I threw was for my ex’s thirty-fifth. I went through a lot for trouble for it, only to break up with him a month later. I’m kind of wishing I had broken it off before I bought him the most expensive thing I’ve ever purchased in my life.”

“Don’t tell me you bought him a car?”

“Do I look like the kind of woman that would go around buying men cars?”

“I don’t know. Women do all sorts of things for the men they love.”

He was right. She had been so much of her life leading with her heart. She had been prepared to give up a lot of things to please Steven, but in the end giving up herself seemed too big of a price to pay.

“What did you get him?”

“An original James Van Der Zee photograph. Do you know who he was?”