He put his hands up. “Not Tim’s fault. He tried to call Toby in, but he’s all the way in the city with Elisa. I guess we shouldn’t try to have date night on the nights he has off.”
“If that’s even going to be a problem anymore.” I polished off the bread and took a sip of Greg’s beer. “What has he told you about him and Elisa? Things seemed a little tense today at the staff meeting.”
“Even with you handing out bonuses? That’s odd.” Greg took the bill from the waitress, and handed it back with his credit card. “Typically when you give people money, they’re in a good mood.”
“I know, right.” I thought about Toby’s behavior. “Well, actually, it happened before we gave them the envelopes. I think he felt pretty bad about being a jerk then.”
“Toby usually isn’t a jerk.” Now Greg looked thoughtful. “Come to think of it, I haven’t heard him talk about Elisa for a while. I just thought he was keeping his private life, you know, private.”
“In South Cove? Like that’s going to happen.” I slipped on my sweater and stood after Greg got his credit card back. He carried a large Styrofoam box with what should be our clams. “Too bad you’re not going to get any of those. Or the cheesecake I brought home to serve with coffee.”
“You’re evil, you know that?” Greg put his arm around me as we walked out of the restaurant. “But I still love you.”
The words “I love you” were still new to our relationship. I got a delicious chill every time he said them. Especially after he called me evil. He held the truck door open for me and set the box on my lap. “So, what’s going on that Tim needs help?”
Greg kissed me before he answered, making me sad he wasn’t coming over after dinner, and not just for the cheesecake. He rubbed my bottom lip with his thumb. “Normally with official South Cove police business, I’d say none of your business, but I’ll give you this one. Someone broke into that food truck parked outside of Austin’s Bikes and trashed the insides.”
“Vandalism?” We’d had problems in South Cove before with businesses being targeted, but typically, there was an underlying reason behind the attack. I grinned at him. “Or terrorism.”
He shook his finger at me. “Don’t you start.” He shut the door and came around to the driver’s side. Starting up the engine, he turned toward me. “Your new friend Kacey says someone stole all her recipes.”
I didn’t even turn my head so Greg couldn’t watch me jump to the same connection he’d already made. The only person who would want Kacey’s recipes was the woman from whom they were stolen originally. “There’s no way it’s Sadie,” I finally said as we approached the turnoff toward South Cove.
“Honey, even with all the reasons why it could be, I agree with you. Sadie just doesn’t have a mean bone in her body.” Greg parked the truck and came alongside to open my door. We walked to the porch and I realized I wasn’t hungry anymore.
“You’ll call me later, right?” I unlocked the door and flipped on the inside light. Greg set the to-go box on my little table and pulled me into a hug.
“Don’t worry, it’s not Sadie.” Greg squeezed me, then stepped back on the porch. “Lock up. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
I locked the door and watched him drive away before I went to the kitchen to put the clams in the fridge. I got a soda and let Emma inside. He hadn’t said he would tell me anything, I realized as I wandered upstairs to try to lose myself back inside the pages of the book I’d been reading before our date.
The alarm shrieked me awake the next morning. Tuesdays were always hard, mostly because I typically read until I dropped asleep the night before. Today was no exception. I only had my morning shift now, even though Aunt Jackie had Tuesdays off as Sasha had taken over the evening slot. I stumbled downstairs, let Emma out, and grabbed a cup of coffee. Thank goodness for delay-set brewing pots. I didn’t know what I’d do if I had to actually make coffee in this condition. I headed upstairs to shower, sipping the coffee as I walked.
I beat my first commuter customer by twenty minutes and for the next hour, I filled travel mugs with our best brew. Aunt Jackie had finally agreed to a customer rewards card, with one caveat. They had to purchase one of our travel mugs with the CBM–South Cove logo and bring it back in every morning to purchase their coffee. Then I could punch their card. Ten visits, they got a free coffee. And on those days, most of them picked up a treat to take with them to their day job for breakfast.
I had to admit, the program had increased the number of commuter visits a week. They loved the free coffee; I didn’t even clip coupons to save money.