With coffee from home that Grey didn’t brew for me, but did set up to minimize brain power this morning.
My favorite tumbler. My coffee grinder. My beans. My pour-over filter. My teapot full of water.
All right there on my counter along with a note.
Thank you for one of the best nights of my life. -G
What does that even mean?
And what does it mean that I haven’t seen Grey all day?
And that Mimi is apparently my new boss?
And that I want to cry with the absolute sweetness that is Zen telling everyone that Grey bought the café to give Mimi a chance to live out the dreams she had as a young woman?
I think I love him.
I think I’m a goner.
And I’m so much more okay with this than I ever thought I could’ve been.
He’s seen me at my worst. And he’s still here.
Or he was.
Last night.
This could work, the very, very most skeptical part of my gossip-loving brain whispers. He is your one.
“Go home,” Zen says to me an hour after my shift ends.
“I’m making up my time.”
“Sabrina. Go home.”
“I got her, Zen,” Decker says. He’s been hanging out under all of the leftover decorations from last night’s speed dating event too.
“Where’s Grey?” I ask Zen.
They roll their eyes. “He got a look this morning that could mean anything from we’re hightailing it out of this joint and moving back to San Diego where it’s warm to I figured out that butterflies are the secret ingredient to clean energy and have to go lose track of time and space in the name of research.”
My lips part, and it takes a hot second for my brain to catch up. “Who’s feeding him?”
“Um, the entire community if he’s at the townhouse. If he’s not, I have a tracker on his phone. I’ll find him before he starves to death.”
“C’mon, Sabrina.” Decker hooks a finger into the back of my shirt. “Nappy-poo time for you. I’m sure you’ll see your sweetie-weetie soon enough.”
“Can you be a little more immature?”
He grins.
The triplets are a couple years younger than me, and they don’t normally act like it, but they have their days.
I let Decker push me into my car and follow me to my house to make sure I get there safely. As soon as he leaves the parking lot, I dash outside and knock on Grey’s door.
No answer.
I knock again.
Still no answer.
Then I remember my mom still has my dog, and I load up and head back downtown.
Jitter’s the toast of the salon, and Mom tells me I can’t have him back.
She also tells me if Mimi hurts Grandpa, I’ll be in trouble.
“Zen says Grey gave Mimi the café,” I tell Mom.
“And how do you feel about that?”
My eyes flood. I try to blink it all back, and I can’t. “Really good,” I whisper.
It feels like his way of saying he’s gotten what he needs to feel even with Chandler.
I don’t understand it, but I feel it.
I don’t see him the rest of the day.
Saturday, Grandpa hangs out with Mimi all day while she fusses over the menu, samples coffees, and asks if she can bake oatmeal cranberry cookies to put in the display case.
“Your café, Mimi,” Zen says.
Grey’s not in.
Zen goes flat-faced whenever anyone asks about him.
Including me.
It’s Valentine’s Day.
And I haven’t heard from him since yesterday morning.
Before yesterday, I wouldn’t have thought a thing about not hearing from him.
But now?
Now, this is weird. And worrying.
I know things happen. I know stuff comes up. I know this might not be about me at all.
But I still corner Zen when my shift is over. “Did I do something wrong?”
They pull a face, and then the unthinkable happens.
Zen hugs me.
Not a little hug either.
A tight hug.
“Can you chaperone Mimi and Harry tonight and make sure they don’t break anything?”
“What did I do?”
“You called Mimi and set them up, so them wanting to go skating at midnight on a frozen lake under questionable lighting is your responsibility.”
“To Grey.”
They hug me even tighter. “He told me to start the paperwork to give the café to you once Mimi’s done with it.”
I suck in a breath. “I don’t want the café.”
“Okay, Queen Gossip of the Tooth.”
“I don’t. I told him that and I meant it.”