Клео Коул - Murder by Mocha

When the doors closed on our elevator, I cleared my throat. “Listen. If this is the person I think it is, he could be real trouble.”

With newly alert eyes, the Blue-Toothed Matterhorn passed on my warning in a low rumble.

“I don’t know if he’ll be violent,” I said, “but better safe than sorry, right?”

Again the guard spoke into his headset. One of his meaty hands balled into a fist. By the time the elevator hit the ground floor, I was keyed up and ready for anything.

The guard walked me to a corner of the vast lobby. Five men in uniforms had formed a ring around their captive.

“Back off!” a deep voice boomed.

Oh crap.

I still couldn’t see the man, but his two-syllable yell told me all I needed to know. This party crasher wasn’t the Candy Man; it was my ex-husband.

“I’ve had just about enough pat downs in the last twenty-four hours!”

“What are you doing here?!” I cried.

“Clare! Will you please tell these tin-plated fascists who I am!”

“It’s okay!” I assured the guards. “I know this guy. I’ll sign him in . . .”

“This guy,” of course, was Matteo Allegro, the very same man who’d enticed me, with honey-drenched figs and a dazzling smile, into the room of his penzione more than two decades ago. At the time, Matt was barely older than my nineteen years and no better educated. In the language of love, however, the boy was a polysyllabic genius (the figs had been just as hard to resist).

With my unexpected pregnancy, Matt proposed marriage. It didn’t last. The primary reason: his nonstop use of linguistic talents—too many languages with too many women, about whom he didn’t give a fig. I might have forgiven him if it weren’t for the coffee-buying trips to Columbia, where recreational cocaine use slowly transformed my dream boy into a newlywed nightmare.

By now, our relationship had improved a great deal. Matt had kicked his bad habit (the drugs, not the women), and with my return to his mother’s coffeehouse, he and I became partners again—in the coffee business, that is, and in the business of parenting our daughter.

When Rock Center security finally backed off, I exhaled with relief. So did Matt. (One guard had a Taser all ready to go.)

“What are you doing here?” I asked again.

“I had a connection out of Paris,” Matt said. “Went straight from JFK to the Blend, where I heard about this little shindig from Dante and Gardner.”

“They’re holding down the fort for me at the coffeehouse. Tucker, Esther, and Nancy are upstairs.”

“Who’s Nancy?”

“My newest barista. She just stared a few weeks ago.”

“Well, Dante told me this thing you’re doing tonight is something major.”

“It is.”

Matt swept back his dark hair, much longer now, and a marked contrast from his usual closely trimmed Caesar. He’d grown a goatee, too.

My ex-husband had always struck me as a pirate, but now he more resembled one of the Musketeers. Aramis came to mind, dashing as all get-out but way too popular with the ladies.

Even now, with fatigue circles under his eyes, Matt was turning the heads of random females passing by. (No surprise.) His black sport coat was cut to hug his buff torso; his latte-cream button-down contrasted attractively with his tan—not the spray-on kind but a deep, natural glow from the kiss of an African sun. Even his jeans were fashionably scuffed, though in Matt’s case the wear and tear didn’t come from some urban house of design; it was earned via treks around the world’s coffee belt as he hunted the highest-quality arabica for the Blend and his other global clients.

“This is supposed to be a private party,” I informed him. “Invitation only. What did you think you were going to do? Charm your way past teenage usherettes?”

Matt folded his arms, suddenly looking pleased with himself. “I told them I had to make a delivery. A last-minute addition to your catering staff.”

“You mean you?”

“No. Not me, Clare. You know I don’t cater—”

“No, generally you’re the one catered to.”

“Very funny.” Matt jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Your new assistant is in the ladies’ room, freshening up.”

“Oh God.” My throat was closing up already. “You don’t mean Breanne?” (The second Mrs. Matteo Allegro and I didn’t much get along.)

“Relax. Breanne’s uptown. Like I said, I had a connection in Paris so—”

“Oh God! You saw Joy?”

“Better than that.”

“You mean—”

“Yup,” Matt said with a nod.

“Hey, Mom, I’m home,” a voice called from across the lobby.

“Joy!”

A moment later, my daughter and I were wrapping our arms around each other in a hug I wanted never to end.

After signing in my daughter with building security, our little reunited family moved to the elevator bank. The spring in Joy’s step fortified me, and I noticed her dark brown hair was much longer than I remembered.

Like father, like daughter, I thought , and not for the first time.

Over the years, Joy had picked up a few habits from Matt. The very worst of which (some drug use in nightclubs) I continually prayed would remain far behind us. Joy’s height was her dad’s, too, but her heart-shaped face and big emerald eyes were totally Cosi. What cheered me most of all was seeing the meat back on her bones.

Before she’d gone to France, a horrific ordeal had sunk Joy’s spirits along with her appetite. She’d lost enough weight to worry me. But now her figure was back to displaying its natural curves, the kind that seldom wanted for male attention.

“So tell me?” I fished, “what’s the boyfriend news? Another adorable French cook in your brigade?”

“Not even close!” Joy replied so quickly and lightly I flashed back on my own attempt to snowball Mike earlier in the day.

I folded my arms, shot her the maternal X-ray.

“It’s true, Mom! I’ve been way too busy at work.”

“Then how did you get away?”

She waved her hand—a gesture identical to Matt’s mother. It was so adult, so self-assured, I blanked for a moment, wondering how that could be. She was just five years old, wasn’t she? Helping me frost her grandma’s birthday cake. Or eleven, crying over some jerk of a neighbor boy who’d made fun of her. Fourteen, laughing as we tested a new recipe in our Jersey kitchen. Sixteen, alone at the stove, excitedly cooking a Julia Child feast for one of Matt’s visits. How could she possibly be in her twenties now? All grown up and living in Paris?

“. . . and next week Monsieur Boucher’s youngest sister is getting married. It’s a huge deal for their family. They rented a neo-Gothic castle in the Loire Valley, and since half his restaurant staff is related, he just threw up his hands and closed us down for a week.”

In the pause that followed, I stared at my daughter, willing my mind to catch up to the incomprehensible passage of time. “Boucher’s sister is getting married,” I repeated. “Well . . . I’m surprised you weren’t invited.”

“Oh, I was. But then Dad showed up and offered to buy me a ticket home.” She grinned. “How could I say no?”

My mind sharpened fast. Something about Joy’s tone sounded off. “I hope Monsieur Boucher wasn’t offended about your missing his sister’s wedding. What did you tell him?”

“Mon père et ma mère me manquent!”

My father and mother miss me. “Oh, honey, we do . . .”

As I hugged her again, I noticed Matt staring.

“No boyfriend?” he said. “Really?

“Oh, Dad, the French guys I’ve met are okay, but none of them are worth hooking up with, you know?”