She had riled him. Time to play confident without coming across as arrogant. Get him on side. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.‘I’m not allergic to waiting. And I’m not allergic to apologising either. Why don’t you let me buy you a coffee as a way of saying sorry? It’s the least I can do.’
‘I’m all right, thanks.’ His voice was terse, which only made it sexier. ‘Maybe just pay attention in future.’
‘Yes, of course. I’m sorry again.’ Bea was a little deflated. He was a tough cookie. She wanted away so she could blush and cringe in private. ‘Look, I’d better get back to my seat. I’ve left my laptop, but it was lovely to meet you.’ Taking her coffee and cake, she lifted her mouth into what she hoped was a softening smile.
‘Right. Bye then.’ The man slid his coffee off the counter and gave Bea a strange sideways glance. It wasn’t what she’d call a softening, more an indicator that he was completely baffled by what had just hit him.
Chapter 6
Cal
What the hell was that?Cal sat down with his coffee at the back of the shop.Or more to the point, who the hell was that? What an annoying woman.In fact, she was a perfect example of why he was swearing off females for the time being. Because so many attractive women were full of themselves and expected the world to revolve around them. Cal could appreciate feminine curves, delicate tendrils of red hair and peachy soft skin as much as the next man, but why did women like that use it to skip out of things like waiting in a queue or having manners? If no attractive women who also valued politeness and grace crossed his radar, Cal would remain single.
There was something about her, though. Cal couldn’t help but glance up towards the front window. Irritating as she was, he felt a charge in the air as they locked eyes.I’ve never felt that before.
The woman was wearing a crimson sweater and dark skinny jeans that hugged her shapely thighs, but despite hercasual attire, the space between them had sparkled more than with any woman he’d ever escorted out in a ballgown or evening wear. The chemistry was especially strange since she was unaware of other people, a trait Cal loathed.
Cal considered as he sipped his coffee that possibly he’d been a little harsh in reprimanding the woman. She was probably a tourist, and he’d obliterated the friendly Scottish image in one brief interaction. He should apologise. Offer her a free drink at the bar. He pushed his chair out an inch.
Then he stopped.
For all he knew, she could be another social climber hell bent on making his life a misery. He had to stop letting what was in his pants control his brain. But, my God, she smelt amazing. Amber and honeysuckle. And it was weird that he only came into this coffee shop about once a fortnight, yet the day did he choose to come, this sizzling-hot woman was here.
Jeez, Butler, you’re your own worst enemy. Such a sucker for a pretty face. And since when did you believe in all that fate nonsense?
Cal took his phone out of his pocket and opened his emails for a distraction. There were some about the second bar he would open soon in the New Town. There was also the possibility of expansion into Glasgow, although he didn’t want to branch out all over the place without the same care that had gone into the original premises. He valued his reputation as a businessman. The way Cal saw it was that if you took care of details such as customer care and providing a quality service, then the financial things fell into place. Also important was hiring the right staff and treating them properly. Cal could never understand employers who would complain about the rapid turnover oftheir staff – he knew plenty in the bar trade – but fail to consider rate of pay and working conditions. He tried to be fair to his staff and pay them well, and he believed that this was the reason he’d held on to his best bartenders, Kitty and Zack, for as long as he had.
Admittedly, Kitty was his sister’s best friend, but she’d had her fair share of short-term jobs and said she was happy working at Butler’s. And Zack was ambitious and had made this clear to Cal, who planned to reward him with a managerial role in the new bar. Things on that front were running as smoothly as expected, so Cal could lay off the worrying, thankfully, since he had enough to think about with his father’s health and the baby that may or may not be his.
Cal glanced across the coffee shop again to the almond-mocha redhead sitting at the front window typing away on her laptop. Maybe she was creating a vanity-driven social media post. Since being with Elisabetta, Cal considered an awful lot whether people were taking photos to post online. The bar had an active social media presence, but it was a tightly controlled and professional one. Elisabetta, however, would take photos of Cal doing things like drinking a morning coffee in his boxers and, without his permission, post it online. He knew that, considering he was only thirty-four, it made him a bit of a fuddy-duddy, but he wasn’t a fan of the way social media made people behave. And he especially disliked being used for likes. A bar owner didn’t need to be a celebrity, however minor. His younger brother, Jamie, who was never going to win any tech innovation prizes himself, found Cal’s attitude amusing and backward, often joking that their mother had a sharper grip on modern technology than Cal. ‘I can use technologyfine,’ Cal had said. ‘It’s the fact that I do know how it works that bothers me.’
Cal was thinking about the warm ivory skin on Almond-Mocha Redhead’s neck when she turned around and caught him watching. He glanced back down to his phone. Had he been staring at her? Scratching the back of his neck, to give the impression of being busy, he absentmindedly drifted to the Twitter account he rarely used. A dangerous move because when he opened his notifications, he realised someone had tagged him in about a hundred conversations about Elisabetta Angelsey’s baby – or #babybetta as it was being hashtagged. For goodness sake! Elisabetta herself was remarkably quiet, having kindled the fire that she knew would rage on of its own accord. He burned with irritation.
Rubbing his jaw, Cal glanced back up towards the redhead, who had turned to her laptop screen again, although she’d pulled her hair out of its clip and it was sitting in soft curls across her shoulders. How could the back of a woman be so damned attractive? Maybe he should offer to buy her a coffee.
Cal sauntered over to her seat by the door. It was then he noticed the woman had ear buds in and was laughing and chatting to someone on the phone. Her voice wasn’t loud enough to reach the back of the coffee shop, but anyone this close could hear it all. This put him off on two counts: one, she was busy so he couldn’t interrupt, and two, people who talked on their phones in enclosed public places were idiots.
‘I think I’ve found him, but lost him already,’ the woman said. There was a silence as she listened while the other person spoke, then she laughed. ‘But you know what? Youwere right. It has perked me up getting out of my comfort zone.’
Found him but lost him? Cal’s brow furrowed. Who was she looking for? Regardless, he’d missed the moment for offering her a coffee and now he had to get back to work.
The woman caught Cal’s eye as he walked past, and her face fell a little in surprise. He nodded politely and left the coffee shop.
Chapter 7
Bea
Bea hung up the call to Amira. She’d needed to debrief after the strange meeting with the man at the counter. Despite not witnessing events, Amira would help her see that she hadn’t made a complete fool of herself. But in Bea’s daze of chagrin, she had forgotten about the time difference, so the call was brief and she had let Amira go back to bed mere seconds after the man had left the coffee shop. It was shocking to see him inches away from her as she declared into the phone she had ‘found him but lost him’, but she had assuaged herself with the insistence that he couldn’t possibly know she was referring to him.
Bea decided that even if the man was a lost cause she could use the encounter somehow, so she spent the next hour making notes about the new hero of her next novel, using him as inspiration. But as she wrote, she became more and more intrigued about the actual person behind the cool and somewhat grouchy exterior. Was there a way to meet him again? Perhaps she should have followed him out of thecoffee shop when she had the chance: let him lead her to his place of work and…
Oh God, she sounded like a stalker.
But he was so handsome. And there was electricity – wasn’t there?
A short while later, Bea packed up her laptop, put on her coat and moseyed over to the counter to ask the barista another question. She was less nervous than last time, due to not having to orchestrate a meet cute with a smouldering Scottish man. This time her objective was simply to find out when he might be back here.
‘Um… you know that guy who was behind, or rather, in front of me in the line earlier,’ Bea asked the barista. ‘Does he come in here regularly?’
