It makes me want to bail right now. Put the café up for sale. Just give it to Sabrina.
Get them out of here.
Before they get hurt.
I angle a glance inside the room and catch Sabrina watching the kitchen door.
She looks away immediately, reaching for her mug as she says something to the woman beside her.
I flush hot, then cold, then hot again, and then I go lightheaded.
Dammit.
I don’t want to leave.
Even knowing this infatuation has to eventually come to an end, that I have to trust the people in this community to accept Zen and me for who we are, that I’ll eventually crave research again in a way that won’t be satisfied by running a kombucha bar with a bee theme and live beehives, I don’t want to leave.
And that’s scarier than hell.
20
Sabrina
There are some lines that I’ve sworn to myself I’ll never cross.
But I’ve never been backed into a corner like this before, and I’ve never felt like a task was as impossible as figuring out what Chandler loves.
My mom doesn’t have a clue.
Grandpa doesn’t know.
Laney gaped at me when I asked her.
The triplets fell all over themselves stuttering golf and cars and hating Theo, none of which can give us an actual plan of revenge for Grey. Even if Chandler’s favorite golf course would let us paint Chandler is an asshole on the side of a golf cart, that’s probably not sufficient.
I won’t bother Emma with this. Absolutely not.
I’m five days into Grey’s challenge to me to find anything else he can use against Chandler, and I have nothing.
“What did Chandler do to him?” I whisper to Zen while we’re watching the local fridge repair person finally tackle the leak while our local drywall guy fixes the dent in the wall behind the fridge where it nearly rolled into the bathroom during the cheese incident.
Which is the only thing I can bring myself to call it.
“Not my story to tell,” they reply.
“But you’ll share anyway,” I say confidently. “It’s in his best interest. I can’t be fully effective at my job if I don’t know all of the circumstances that led to this assignment.”
“Uncle Grey loves puzzles. He’s given you all the clues you get to solve this one. By the way, warn a person next time they’re about to eat chewy soap.”
“I tried. You weren’t looking at me.”
“Try harder.”
“Is there any chance he’ll give up this dream of being Super Vengeance Man and just let us keep running Bean & Nugget as it is?”
They sigh and make a pucker face. “You know he’s rich as fuck, right?”
If I could gag with my eyeballs at how much I don’t care about the size of his bank account, I would.
They actually grin back, but sober quickly. “Very, very worst case for Uncle Grey financially is that this place turns into a big ol’ tax break. You can’t buy it off of him. If I can’t talk him out of it, there’s zero chance that you can talk him out of it. And if you don’t give him something real, he will slap a bee the size of a freaking school bus on the side of this building without a moment’s hesitation.”
“He can do that and still let us keep the café.”
“I heard Emma was the rose-colored glasses one of your group.”
I wince.
They make the pucker face again. “Sorry, Sabrina. Can’t help you. And I say that as someone who’s also listening to all of the gossip to see if I can find another way, and as someone who’s done all of the market research that supports the idea that a kombucha bar would be more popular here than you think it would. Tell me the ski tourists who stay here because it’s cheaper than the resorts twenty minutes away wouldn’t pack the place every night.”
They have a point, and I have definitely picked up on the vibe that this renovation is more than petty justice. That Zen’s smart and Grey’s usually smart but hurt, and they could make something fabulous out of their kombucha bar.
So knowing that Grey has a beef against Chandler that won’t be satisfied by anything less than destroying something of Chandler’s, that they have a solid plan for making this place a success later, and that sex won’t convince Grey to let me keep my café, it’s time for the last idea I have.
I can either cross a line that I never would’ve considered crossing since the day I was born, or I can watch the café that’s been my entire life’s purpose wither away and die.