Chapter 12

“Well, here we are. Home sweet home.” Jasper unlocked the front door of Java Beans Café and stood back to let Emma walk in before him. As she passed, he tried not to inhale. The last thing he needed was to be caught trying to catch a whiff of her shampoo.

She turned around once he’d closed the door. “You know, I’ve heard of being married to your job, but living at your job takes it to a whole new level.”

“Says the woman who has barely left her office at Shady Acres for two weeks.”

“It’s a nice office.”

“It is not a nice office. The mountains of paperwork are likely to swallow you if you stay in there too long.”

“Fine.” Emma looked around, and Jasper found himself half-holding his breath, wondering what she thought of the place. “This is a much nicer office. Plus, it smells better than mine. Coffee beats antiseptic any day of the week.”

“Would you like some?”

“Are you kidding? You bring me into the legendary Java Beans Café and expect that I won’t want coffee?”

He smiled as he walked around the counter. “Legendary. I like it.”

“I believe that was your word, not necessarily mine.”

“You still haven’t tasted my beans in their prime location, which is here. They lose their java juju when they leave the shop.”

Emma laughed, and the sound of it made him want to amuse her again—over and over, so he could listen to the sound.

He pulled a mix of beans from containers and put them in the grinder as she slid onto a barstool. “I’ll convert you, too, even though you’re an East Coast girl.”

“Now would be a bad time to admit I prefer tea, right?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Coffee it is.” She looked above his head at the huge chalkboard the former owner had left, then laughed again. “What is with the menu, Jasper?”

He looked behind him like he didn’t already know what it said. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “It’s a little—snippy, maybe?”

“It’s clear. I strive for clear.”

“Oh, it’s definitely clear.” She started reading the three lines scribbled in his best green chalk. “ ‘No grandes. No lattes. No triple-anythings. We have coffee. Large. And it’s amazing.’ ”

“See? I ordered coffee in the city for years. It’s stressful. Here? Not stressful. You come in, you tell me how many, I give you the brew I think you’ll like best, and off you go to start your day.”

“You don’t even let your customers pick their own brews?”

“Nope.”

“And they come back?” Her eyebrows went upward, but she was still smiling.

“Every day, most of them. Because I know them, and I know what they like, and they know I’m right.” He shrugged. “That’s just how it is.”

“Okay, then.” She put her elbows on the bar. “What are you brewing me?”

“Magic.”

She laughed. “I’d guess no less. But what is it, really? What beans are you using?”

“Can’t tell. Java juju secrets.”

“Of course. I shall respect the juju.” She peered toward the swinging door to his back rooms. “So where are the kittens?”

“Back there.” He hooked a thumb toward the back, where he’d outfitted a rec room fit for a family of ten. And, lately, a laundry basket full of itty-bitty kittens.

“Uh-huh.” She nodded like she was considering something. “Is now a good time to tell you that I called my best friend before we left Shady Acres, and I gave your full name, number, and contact details in case you’re actually a serial killer in disguise, luring me with the promise of cute kittens?”

He stopped in the process of filtering the water, looking over his shoulder at her. Was she—could she actually be—nervous? Around him?

“Good to know. And that was smart.”

Her eyebrows furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I’m practically a stranger, right?” He shrugged. “I mean, you’ve been here for two weeks, and all you know about me is—well, probably not much yet. I’m glad you let somebody know where you are.”

“Seriously? It doesn’t make you feel—I don’t know—like I have trust issues? Or that you exude some sort of serial-killer vibe?”

He laughed. “If I exude that vibe, then I’ve got problems I didn’t even know about. And if you have trust issues, I imagine you’ve got reasons. Either way, I’m not remotely insulted that you called someone.”

He poured coffee into two large mugs. “Cream?”

“Black, please.”

“Atta girl. You may stay.” He lifted his mug. “Cheers.”

“Cheers.” She smiled, and her eyes held his for a beat longer than she probably meant for them to, given the way she blinked and looked away after a few seconds.

“Want to see the kittens?”

“Yes.” She practically jumped off her stool. “Yes, please.”

He grabbed the bottles he’d made up earlier, then led the way to the back room, which he’d painted a deep, buttery yellow after he’d refinished the wooden floors to a high sheen. He’d outfitted it with three huge leather couches, a Native American patterned rug he’d fallen in love with, and a large-screen television that hid behind a cabinet on the wall.

“Wow.” She stopped just inside the doorway. “Do you let your customers come back here? Because I have a feeling they’d never leave if you did.”

“Nope. This is a friends-only spot.”

“It’s nice.”

“Thank you. It’s sort of become the ad-hoc gathering spot for the Super Bowl and the NBA finals and all of those testosterone-filled events that require chips and beer and a lot of yelling.”

“Sounds—charming.”

“It’s not. Not at all. But it’s fun. Kind of like an old-fashioned men’s club, without the sexism.” He cringed. “Or it was, until the ladies of Whisper Creek talked me into letting them have a Jammie-Grammy party last year.”

“What is that?”

“I’m not even sure. A lot of chocolate was involved, and way too much mooning over musicians who—I gotta say—couldn’t even sing. But I think the point was more about having a girls’ night in their pajamas while their men held down their respective forts.”

“I think I need to meet these Whisper Creek women.”

“I’ll take you out there anytime.”

His offer was in the airspace between them before he had time to think about whether he should even put it out there, and he wasn’t sure what her reaction would be.

He was sure that he actually cared what it was, and that was a revelation that didn’t sit too well in his gut.

“If you want, I mean,” he backpedaled. “You really do have to see the place.”

“My friend Ari will kill me if I don’t get out there and send her pictures before I leave, so I might have to take you up on it.”

“Sounds good.”

Yeah, he’d leave it there. She hadn’t said no, right? So that was almost a yes. Sort of.

“Oh!” She squeaked as she spotted the laundry basket in the corner. “Is that them?”

She headed for the basket, kneeling beside it when she got there. He watched as she tentatively reached toward the little fluff-balls, like she was afraid to touch them. He had a heat lamp over the basket and hot water bottles in blankets so they could keep warm, and so far, they were doing okay. All of them had survived the first two weeks, and every single one of them was growing.

He was probably inordinately proud of that fact, but he guessed in some sort of misplaced sense, he had a right to be.

“Go ahead and pick one up.”

“You first. I don’t want to break them.”

“They’re less breakable than they look.” He scooped one, who mewed quietly at the disturbance before nosing around for the bottle she knew was waiting. “Try the black-and-white one—he’s the biggest.”

She reached in tentatively, putting both hands under the kitten and drawing it out of the basket and to her chest.

“Oh-h.” She made a sad face as the kitten mewed plaintively. “Shh. It’s okay. Dinner’s coming. Shh.”

“Here’s a bottle. He won’t be quiet until he has it firmly in his mouth, believe me.”

She took the bottle and positioned it so the kitten could drink, which he did, frantically at first. After about ten gulps, though, he calmed down and started purring, and Emma’s face melted.

“Do you hear that?” she whispered. “He’s purring!”

“Yup. I think he likes you.”

“Ha. He likes his food.”

“Maybe, but you’re the one feeding it to him, so right now, he likes you.”

She smiled, cuddling the kitten closer. “I’ll take it.” Then she leaned over the basket, where the others were waking. “Uh-oh. This is going to get loud in a minute.”

“Yup.”

“How do you coordinate feeding all six of them?” Her eyes widened as the mewing cranked up a notch. “Because yikes. They’re hungry.”

“I manage.”

He did. With the help of a color-coded feeding schedule provided by Hayley the vet, but hey, he hadn’t screwed up the instructions once yet.

His kitten finished her bottle, so he set her down and scooped up another one, trading bottles quickly. Emma’s kitten sucked down his last drops at just about the same time, but she seemed reluctant to put him back into the basket.

“Can he just lie here while I feed the next one?” She pointed at her lap, where the kitten had already curled up comfortably.

“If you’re coordinated enough to pay attention to both of them, go for it.”

“I’ll be careful.” She smiled, then pulled another kitten out of the basket, getting the bottle into his mouth like she’d been doing it for years. In response, the cat curled his paws around her wrist, holding on for dear life while he sucked greedily on the bottle.

“Watch yourself.” He used his chin to indicate her wrist. “Their claws are like little needles.”

“Their claws are completely adorable. And their noses. Omigod, their little noses!” She petted the kitten in her lap with her left hand while she steadied the other with her right. “How could someone just leave these on someone’s porch?”

“Probably because it’s the cat’s third litter this year and they’ve had enough of kittens.”

“I suppose pointing out that there are surgical solutions here isn’t helpful?”

“Not to whoever dropped them off. Probably can’t afford to spay the cat. But at least they brought them to someone they knew would take care of them. Better than the alternatives I imagine they considered first.”

Emma’s face fell as she cuddled both kittens closer. “That’s terrible.”

“Yeah, but it’s reality. When you have trouble feeding the human mouths in your house, adding six kittens to the mix just isn’t feasible.”

“So this area? Not as idyllic as it looks? Not everyone’s living the fairy tale out here?”

“A lot of people are. And I’d put Carefree up against any town in the country for quality of life. It would win. But yeah. Not everything’s as rosy as the surface presents. That’s just reality.”

“Mm-hm.” She nodded slowly, like she wasn’t terribly surprised. “Florida’s sort of a study in extremes, as well.”

“Are you about to mess with the tourism board’s message again?”

She smiled. “No. It’s just as beautiful as the pictures. But there’s a lot of poverty, and the crime rate’s high in places. There’s an entire forest in central Florida where hundreds of homeless families live. And then you travel the two coasts and see millions of dollars in boats and houses and glitz and glitter.”

Jasper traded kittens, putting his back into the basket with her sister, then picking up the last one, who was about to break the sound barrier with her mewing. Once he got her settled in his lap with her bottle, he looked over at Emma, whose hair had fallen softly over her shoulder, obscuring half of her face.

She’d pulled one of the soft washcloths out of the basket, and she now held a bottle for one kitten while two others vied for space on her lap. She giggled softly as they batted at each other, then uttered some version of a curse when one almost toppled off her lap.

“Eesh. I don’t know how you’ve been doing this all by yourself for a week.”

“Helps that I don’t have to go to an office. And I’ve got a couple of teenagers working the morning shift for me in the café, so they’ve helped out a little.”

“How often do they need to eat overnight?”

He chuckled, pointing his free hand at his eyes. “You see these dark circles? That’s how often.”

She laughed. “You look pretty good for a dad with six newborns, though. Gotta say.”

“Thank you.” He rolled his eyes, but inside, a familiar slice of pain rocketed through his gut. “Thankfully these guys will be self-sufficient before too long.”

“You know, a couple of months ago, I was reading about a nursing home somewhere in the Midwest that partnered with a local humane society. They brought in animals once a week and let the residents hold them and pet them, and it had a super-positive impact on their states of mind.”

“No kidding.”

“No kidding. I think, if I remember right, there was even a story about kittens like this. They brought them to the nursing home, and the residents just cuddled with them all day long. They fed them and everything until they were ready to be adopted.”

“That sounds like an excellent program.”

“It was.” She nodded, then he saw her jaw harden. “I proposed doing a trial run of it in one of our homes, but my supervisor was not in favor of it.”

“Why not?”

“Health regulations.” She rolled her eyes. “Allergies and dirt and peeing and pooping.”

“Well, I guess those are fairly legitimate concerns.”

“Maybe, but when you weigh them against the benefits? Not even a contest. I tried three different proposals, and they were nixed every single time.”

“I’m sorry. Sounds frustrating.”

“It is. It really, really is.”

“Happen a lot, this nixing thing?”

She shook her head. “You have no idea.”

“Well, my dad still lives at a place that sounds like a graveyard, even though you tried to rename it, so I have some idea.”

She laughed. “I guess you do.”

He bounced his eyebrows. “Ever try the ask-forgiveness-later approach? Instead of the ask-permission-before one?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, if you keep coming up with perfectly legitimate, well-researched ideas that keep getting shot down, aren’t you ever tempted to say screw you and just make something happen, then show them what a great idea it was?”

“No. I’m—I don’t think that would go over very well with this management crew. And I really like my job. Also, I need it. I’m dismally unqualified to do anything else.”

“Except get lost in the pyramids.”

“Exactly.” She smiled like she was secretly thrilled he’d remembered their earlier conversation. “And I can handle Florida heat, but I really don’t think I can handle Egyptian-style scorching.”

“Well, I’m not sure how brave you’re feeling, out here all by your lonesome with no particular management oversight, but it might be an excellent time for a little experiment.”

“I was expressly forbidden from doing any experimentation while I’m out here.”

Jasper narrowed his eyes, studying her, unable to comprehend what was so threatening about this woman or her ideas that someone would be constantly shutting her down.

“Sounds to me like maybe somebody’s afraid you’ll skip a ladder rung and step on his head on your way by.”

“Huh?” She looked up, her eyebrows drawn together like she had no idea what he could possibly be talking about.

“I don’t know.” He shrugged like it was no big deal. “Just seems to me you have some pretty good ideas, and it also seems to me that someone’s been pretty good at never letting those ideas out of the gate, even though they’re things that are being researched and used in other places, with good results. So it begs the question—why is someone so threatened by your ideas?”

“Oh, I don’t think he’s threatened. He just—I don’t know—doesn’t like them.”

“Well, he’s an idiot.”

She sputtered out a surprised laugh. “He’s actually a very smart man.”

“If you say so. I stand by the idiot thing for now, though. And also…I have an idea.”