“Yeah, I can do it. It’s been a while since I had real Colombian coffee anyway.”
“Stay out of her sight,” I told him. “She shouldn’t know you’re there.”
“Do you think you’re talking to some wet nose recruit? I know what I’m doing.”
“Thanks, Jameson.” I nodded.
For the rest of the drive to the airport we discussed logistics of his trip to Colombia along with other stuff that I could only halfway focus on. The unsettled feeling I’d had since I woke up that morning grew more intense.
Jameson’s reminders of the difficulty of maintaining relationships in our line of work weighed heavily on my chest. Despite my shutting him down, I knew it was the truth. I’d seen more men than I could count wind up divorced or in failed relationship after failed relationship.
A wife or girlfriend would often be understanding in the beginning. But after one too many missed dinners, events at the kids’ school, or wedding anniversary, it was all downhill. I’d lost a few specialists on my team because of the strain the job put on their homelife.
And I worked more than they did. Until then, my job had consumed my life. I hadn’t minded that either, since it felt like my purpose, my calling.
But now?
What would it look like now?
CHAPTER12
Mia
I sauntered back into my private room at the coffee farm, feeling physically exhausted. But the heaviness in my chest wasn’t a result of the hours I’d spent working with and roasting coffee beans that day.
It was the same heaviness that’d traveled with me from Mexico. I expected it to lighten at some point, but it hadn’t in the month since Brutus returned to Williamsport.
Though my sadness shrouded me like a cloud, my one bright spot of the day was in thirty minutes when he would be calling for our daily video chats.
I rushed to shower and moisturized myself before climbing into bed. After making sure my phone was charged, I saw that I had an email. I gasped when opening it.
A second later, my phone buzzed with the video call from Brutus.
“You didn’t,” I blurted out as I answered.
His smile widened, and the muscles in my belly tightened. “Didn’t what?”
“Buy me the audiobook. I just checked my email.”
“You said you wanted to read it next.”
Those butterflies that I’d become used to over the past almost two months started fluttering around. Two days earlier, I’d mentioned that I wanted the audiobook version of Jennifer Lewis’The Mother of Black Hollywood: A Memoir. I wanted the audio because she reads the book herself and her voice is spectacular.
“Thank you.”
“Have you started listening yet?”
I shook my head. “I just got in a little while ago.”
“How was the coffee roasting?”
“Long. There are so many steps to making a great cup of coffee.” I sat up on my knees. “But, babe, it’s so worth it. We tried three different types today, and oh my gosh. So scrumptious.” I groaned. “I definitely want to work with the distributor who buys from this farm. I have a meeting with them tomorrow.”
“I’m so damned proud of you,” he stated.
My breath caught. A part of me didn’t know how to respond to a man being so supportive of my dream. Exes in my past were semi-supportive but up until a point.
“You’re doing something you’ve always wanted to do and doing your damnedest to be ethical about how you go about it.”
