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CHAPTER ONE
Shale
There’d been thirty-seven customers in all day.
It was difficult not to start to feel like there was any hope when those were the numbers.
Thirty-seven people who were willing to give my coffee shop a try.
I knew it had been risky opening in a town with a wildly successful indie coffee shop already. I figured that She’s Bean Around was busy enough for some of their customers to get frustrated, and make their way in my direction. Lord knew I never had a line out the door.
The problem was, no one came.
The placement of the shop wasn’t helping.
But it was the only place in Navesink Bank I could afford.
It was in the center of a small strip mall, and the only storefront in operation. If you could call this operating.
Sighing, I wiped down the top of the coffee grinder.
I needed to close soon anyway.
Tonight was the night when the shipment came in.
I couldn’t be late.
Too much was on the line.
Like, you know, my life.
No biggie.
Sighing, I was about to walk out from behind the counter when the door flew open.
And there he was.
One of my very few regular customers. He’d been MIA for a week or so. I was beginning to think I was losing him to a rival shop. Or, worse yet, one of the chains.
There he was, though.
In all of his stupid handsomeness.
Tall, fit, with dark blond hair and blue eyes.
Slung over his shoulder was his ever-present black backpack. Inside was his laptop that I think cost more than my monthly rent.
I normally would have just thought of him as a gamer or a perpetual student.
That was until, a few months back, I’d seen him in action when he’d been trying to track down a woman who’d gone missing from my parking lot.
He was a hacker.
If that monster of an SUV he rode around in was anything to go by, he was good at what he did.
“Hey, Shale,” he greeted me in that smooth voice of his.
I’ll admit it.
