French Pressed (5 page)

T
HE
tall, broad-shouldered police detective entered my coffeehouse like he always did, with the commanding authority of a seasoned New York cop. In one sober sweep, he scanned the room to take note of his surroundings, then his arctic-blue gaze came to rest on me and, ever so slightly, his expression melted.

“Hi, Clare.”

“Hi, Mike.”

In a city that hardened everyone—from little old church ladies to pretty-in-pink sorority girls—cops were the hardest cases of all. Mike Quinn was no exception. A square-jawed New York native, he had a long, powerful physique, short, sandy-brown hair, a dry sense of humor, and a load of street smarts from his years working a uniformed beat.

Like your typical poker-faced soldier of law enforcement, Mike didn’t give much away, but I’d been serving him double-tall lattes for well over a year now, and I knew how to read him.

Today, for instance, had been a hard one for him. The shadows under his eyes told me he was coming in here with the weight of a long shift on his shoulders. And the tension in his rugged face told me he hadn’t accomplished what he’d set out to.

“You closed?” Mike asked, his expression still stiff as he swept the empty room once more.

“Depends,” I teased.

“On what?”

“On what you’re here for.”

Mike strode across the wood-plank floor. He took his time stripping off his overcoat, a nicely tailored cinnamon-colored garment, which he’d finally exchanged for that battered old trench he wore in warmer weather. Then off came the beige sport coat, revealing a white dress shirt, slightly wrinkled by the leather straps of his shoulder holster. The butt of his service .45 peeked out from beneath his left arm—a turn-on for me; shameful, but a turn-on nonetheless.

He dumped his coats on one of the high chairs at the espresso bar and sat down. Then he glanced back up, right into my openly admiring eyes.

Since his wife had left him for a younger Wall Street whiz, Mike had been working out a lot more. His upper body was looking more muscular these days, and other parts of him were presumably tighter. This was pure speculation on my part, since (to my growing frustration) our first month of dating had remained chaste.

Oh, sure, there’d been kissing and touching (okay,
plenty
of kissing and touching), but although he was legally separated, Mike made it clear that he didn’t want us to rush the stages of our fledgling relationship. There were five of these little suckers, according to Mike, and we’d only progressed from stage one to two. What would catapult us to three? I didn’t have a clue.

I figured Mike was gun-shy—understandable, given the lying, cheating, and bipolar nightmares his wife had put him through (like the time she’d left a note informing Mike that she’d pulled the kids out of school and used his nearly maxed-out credit cards to fly them to Florida’s Disney World for a few days—a passive-aggressive reaction to a morning argument).

One thing I was sure of with Mike and me: sexual chemistry wasn’t an issue. Since we’d first met, he and I had flirted openly with each other. He’d been a loyal friend to me during some bad patches, always sticking his neck out to help. In return, I’d tried to be a good listener as he unloaded the problems of his perpetually rocky marriage. Because he was married, however, we’d never pushed for more. But now that he was separated, his wife was living with another man, and we were finally dating, I saw no reason to veil my attraction.

And, clearly, neither did he.

The moment Mike realized I’d been admiring his physique, his sandy eyebrows arched, and he turned the tables, taking his own good time looking me up and down.

Super,
I thought, remembering my wretched state.

At the start of the evening, my French-twisted hair had been semi-neat at best. Now I could feel stray strands slipping all over my head. My fitted cocoa suit had been sort of sexy, but I’d taken off the snug jacket to do the closing chores, and I was pretty sure my Village Blend apron held all the allure of a granny smock.

“So, Detective?” My grin turned into a smirk as I loudly blew a loose strand of chestnut hair out of my face. “Make a decision yet? Do you know what you want?”

“The same thing I always want when I come here, Cosi…”

“And what’s that?”

A slow, suggestive smile lifted the weariness in his face. “Stimulation.”

I blinked, speechless for a moment since the sudden rush of blood to certain parts of my body put a strain on my ability to form words.

“Well, then…” I finally managed. “Why in the world are you just sitting there? If you want to be served right, you’ll have to come around my counter.”

He did. Inside of five seconds, Mike was pulling me into his arms. He kissed me deep and long, his hands roving over me, and I felt something different in him…something new. He tugged loose the strings at my neck and waist, yanked the apron off me, and tossed it aside.

My arms lifted high to pull down his head again and get back to the kissing, but the moment my hands locked around his neck, he began dancing me backward—

“Mike?”

With a slight bump, my back end hit the wide work counter beneath the marble espresso bar. He reached behind me, shoving aside two empty milk-foaming pitchers. Then his hands were on my hips, lifting me up. He set my bottom on the cleared counter and stepped between my stocking-clad legs.

“Mike!”

He smiled. “You’re serving stimulation, Cosi. Don’t hold back now.”

This was the most sexually aggressive he’d ever been with me. My skirt was hiked up, his strong thighs between my own, making me understand that there was absolutely no issue with his physically wanting me. With a groan, he started kissing me again, pressing into me.

“Whoa, Mike,” I murmured against his mouth. “You know there’s a perfectly good bed upstairs.”

“I know…” His lips moved off mine, trailed kisses along my jaw. “And if I had time, we’d be on it right now.”

“You mean it?” I gently pushed at his chest.

He leaned back. “Clare, I’ve been on duty for the past ten hours, and all I can think about is
you
.”

“Really?”

He sighed, rubbed his bloodshot eyes. “I think about you every day, Clare, and every night. Especially at night. I’m losing sleep. I
had
wanted to wait a little longer, make sure things were right…” He paused, letting his voice trail off, as if he wasn’t sure what to say next.

“What do you mean
right
?” I pressed.

“Just that…” He shook his head. “Forget it. I can’t wait anymore, sweetheart. You’re messing with my focus on the job. We can’t have that.”

“No, we can’t,” I said, practically giddy. “So let’s go upstairs.”

Mike checked his watch and sighed. “I’m only being spelled for thirty. Not that I couldn’t make the earth move in that time—” He smiled. “But there’s no way I want our first time to be a quickie.”

“Yeah…I don’t want you leaving me—after. Come back later, when you’re off, when you can stay.”

“Okay…” He nodded, kissed me again. Then he lifted me off the counter.

“Come on up to the duplex in the meantime,” I told him, tugging my skirt back down over my thighs. “I’ll press you a pot of my new Morning Sunshine Blend before you have to get back. It’s a Full City roast, so it has more caffeine than your regular latte, and stimulation
is
my business.”

“You don’t have to tell me.”

He grabbed his blazer and overcoat off the bar chair, and I picked up my apron. Then I switched off the main lights and, before heading upstairs,
finally
locked the front door, vowing never to tell Esther that, thanks to her genius boss, a Blend customer could have walked in on something a lot more obscene than rap music.

“S
O
what’s the job tonight?”

Standing at the marble counter, I pushed the plunger down on the French press. The coarsely ground beans filled the apartment’s cozy kitchen with arousing, floral notes. Mike made a show of inhaling the aroma.

“Mmmm…nice,” he said, his eyes following my every move as I filled our mugs. Then I bent over to grab a carton of half-and-half from the fridge’s bottom shelf, and Mike murmured, “Even nicer…”

I turned around. “Mike, did you hear me? I asked what’s up with your job tonight.”

The detective arched an eyebrow. “If you want me to focus, Cosi, then
don’t
bend over in front of me.”

“Mike!”

“What?” He plucked the carton of half-and-half from my hand and dumped a little splash of light into his pool of black. “You have no idea how distracting that ass of yours is.”

O-kay,
I thought,
the man’s definitely ready to shift us into another gear.
This was fine with me, except for the fact that he was out of here in twenty, and I didn’t appreciate being left hot and bothered for the next few hours.

“Go ahead,” I warned, “keep up the suggestive talk, and
see
if you make it out of here unmolested. Now
focus
, will you, Detective?”

“I’ll try,” Mike said behind smiling eyes. Then he downed a few healthy swigs of my coffee and sighed, letting the hot, fresh blend revive him.

MRRROOOOOW!

The sudden jaguar yell echoed off the kitchen walls. I glanced around to find its source, which was not in fact a 300-pound carnivore, but a 10-pound female house cat with the lungs of a famished jungle beast.

MRRROOOOOW!

“Sounds like you forgot to feed Java,” Mike remarked, glancing around. “Where is she? Java!”

“I’ll have you know I fed her a delicious dinner. She’s just protesting now because all she got was cat food.”

“Excuse me? She is a
cat
, isn’t she?”

I shook my head. “You just don’t understand…”

White whiskers and two coffee bean–colored paws peeked out from under the kitchen table. Then Java’s whole furry form slinked out, and she began to rub herself against Mike’s leg. He reached down to scratch her head.

“Watch out,” I warned. “She’ll think you’re a soft touch.”

“I am.” Mike met my eyes. “Depending on the feline.”

He gently picked up Java and set her on his lap. Parts of my body melted as Mike’s hand steadily stroked her: long, sweet, gentle strokes. I sighed.
Lucky cat.

“Okay, I’ll bite,” Mike said. “If she doesn’t want cat food, what does she want?”

“Human food, of course.” I folded my arms. “She probably smells the butter-browned lobster on my breath from dinner. Sorry, Java honey, I ate every bite. No leftovers.”

MRRROOOOOW!

Mike laughed. “I can see that went over well.”

“Here…” I went to the cupboard, found a can of Pounce kitty treats. “Give her a few of these. They’re lobster
flavor
. Not the real thing, but then she doesn’t have the bank account for a Solange entrée. Actually, neither do I. Madame footed the bill tonight. Anyway, they should tame Java’s hungri-tude for awhile.”

“Hungri-tude?” He popped the can. Java’s ears instantly perked up.

“It’s what you get when hunger and attitude collide in a self-actualized female tabby.”

Java jumped down, and Mike threw her a few of the triangular-shaped treats. My companionable but languorous feline began scampering across the floor like an excited kitten, catching and eating each tiny triangle as if it were a fat mouse.

I might have accused the cat of having no shame, but then I probably would have joined her on the floor if Mike had started throwing out some of those champagne-poached oysters I’d devoured earlier in the evening.

Since Pounce treats were all he was tossing, however, I sat my “distracting ass” down across the table and lifted my own coffee mug. The swallow I took was long and satisfying. My Morning Sunshine was an even cleaner and brighter experience than our regular Breakfast Blend, thanks to my ex-husband.

Matteo had found us an exquisite crop of Yirgacheffe during a trip to Ethiopia, so I decided to make good use of it by creating the special blend. I savored the hints of lemon and honey blossom that the Yirgacheffe brought to the party. They also provided an amazingly juicy finish—the kind of salivation you’d get after a luscious bite of citrus fruit.

It was the perfect cup for my morning customers, because I’d stopped the roasting process at medium, so a healthy mug of it provided a higher caffeine content than a demitasse of espresso.

In my professional opinion, my Morning Sunshine was a superb, eye-opening coffee to wake up with—whatever time of day one needed waking. And I could certainly see, from Mike’s weary demeanor, he needed it tonight.

“So…what’s your duty?” I asked him again.

“I’m supervising three undercover teams at three different nightclubs.” Mike tossed Java another treat. This time she rose up on her hind legs and caught the treat with her two front paws.

Mike pointed. “Look at that. Java does tricks.”

“She’s just showing off for her new boyfriend.”

Mike laughed and threw another treat.

“So tell me what’s happening at the nightclubs. Drug sales? Assaults?”

“Confidence game,” he told me.

“A single perpetrator?”

“At least four, probably six. We’re calling them the May-September gang.”

“May-September?” I murmured, scratching my head. “They only operate in the summer?”

Mike laughed. “No. Good guess though. Care to try again?”

“Sure…”

This was our usual routine. Long before we’d started dating, Mike would come into the coffeehouse as a customer, belly up to my espresso bar, and we would get to talking about his cases, from his theories and interrogations to his methods of trapping an array of criminals. I’d learned a lot about detective work, just listening to Mike as he downed his lattes.