Laid Bare - Lauren Dane [14]
Running the café gave her tangible goals. She started and finished tasks every day. It marked time in a positive way. She needed it.
Brody, her older brother and the owner of the other half of the building—his tattoo shop—ambled in, and she turned to get him something to drink.
“Hit me with some caffeine, sister,” he said as he slid onto a high stool.
She made him the latte he preferred, very hot with extra foam. She even made a foam design in the shape of a leaf for him and popped in a curl of shaved chocolate.
He sighed happily as he drank it. “Awesome. Thanks.”
“Late night?” She grinned at him.
“You know what it’s like when Raven’s in town. We went out late, saw a show. She doesn’t have to be up and at work, so it wasn’t a thing for her to roll in at four.”
“You didn’t have to be at work until eleven! Admit it, you’re too old. I know I am.”
Absently, she made an Americano with room for a customer, followed by a mocha. Her staff consisted of herself and two part-timers, which suited Erin just fine. They handled the early coffee rush during the week, and she took the weekends. The café closed by two p.m. and she had the rest of her day free. Not a bad deal.
She liked her employees enough to consider them friends. Especially Ella. The other woman was young, vibrant and funny. She was working to try to finish a degree at the University of Washington, so she worked at the café to pay for books. Erin admired that, especially in light of some of the personal problems Ella had been going through.
“You’re thirty-four years old, Erin. That’s not exactly an old-timer.”
“But you’re thirty-seven. Tell me you can go on two hours’ sleep like you could at twenty-seven, huh?”
He laughed. “No shit. What’s for lunch today?”
“Pasta salad, three-bean soup, tuna or veggie panini sandwiches. It’s Thursday.”
“Tomorrow is clam chowder day, my favorite.” He grinned as he sipped his latte.
“You’re lucky you got the good genes from Mom, because all that cream would kill you otherwise.”
She heard the chimes over the door sound and finished her greeting to a customer at the counter before looking up.
And into the sleepy brown eyes belonging to Todd Keenan. She froze a moment at the unexpected emotions welling within her, but they wisped away. That Erin had been another person, in what had been an entire lifetime ago.
Still, she took a quick look to the left, where a large mirror hung. Not bad. Thank goodness she’d put on earrings and some makeup before she’d left the house!
She realized, as he moved toward her in what felt like slow motion, that he hadn’t recognized her yet, and a horrifying thought that he wouldn’t remember her assaulted her gut with a cramp.
His eyes slid down her body and back up again. The way his expression went half-lidded and sexy made something low tug and spark after being dead a long time.
Her nipples beaded against the thin shirt she wore, and he stopped there for several moments of appreciation before meeting her eyes again. He hesitated a moment and then smiled.
It was then that recognition hit his gaze. “Erin?”
She hadn’t known how she planned to greet him, but the beautiful, open smile he gave her and the way he stepped around the counter brought her into his hug and against his body.
Her arms moved to hug him back, every cell in her body reacting to being touched again. Not as a sister, not in grief or mourning, but as a woman.
The unexpected beauty of it, the bittersweet sensation of sexual attraction after being dead inside for years, made her want to grab a pen and start writing. Crying could wait.
For that moment she reveled in it, in feeling something so lovely.
Finally, after a hug long enough to let her know he enjoyed the attraction between them still, Todd kissed the top of her head and let go enough to lean back and look into her