Loverboy (The Company #2) - Sarina Bowen Page 0,10

Every drink is a double.”

“Two ounces. Sure. That’s how we did things at Joe’s.”

A few seconds later she flips off the machine, plucks the cup off the ledge and hands it to me.

“Beautiful.” I peer into the cup, taking care to note the depth of the coffee in the cup.

“Aren't you going to taste it?” She asks when I hand it back.

God, no. “It smells great,” I say, and I guess that’s true. The scent of coffee is so much better than the taste. “I was waiting until after you fizzle the milk.”

“Fizzle. What do they teach baristas in California?” She grabs a little metal jug and shows it to me. "We use about a nine ounce pour for a latte." She grabs a gallon of milk out of a reach-in fridge below the bar. Then she tips it into a metal jug with the practiced ease of someone who does this a lot.

“Nine ounces,” I repeat. “Don’t you want to measure those out one at a time?”

“What? That would take forev—” she stops abruptly and levels me with a glare. “Very funny. But I’ve learned a few things in the last fifteen years, Gunnar.”

“Me too, gorgeous. Maybe I can show you sometime.” The ridiculous words just fall out of my mouth before I can stop them. “I meant behind the bar. Carry on. I’m ready for the swirly milk part.”

She gives me another dubious look and continues the job.

Then things start to happen faster than I can absorb. “Purge the steamer arm.” She turns a knob and the machine makes a loud squawk. “And go.” She twists something, and the arm begins to hiss and shriek. Posy holds the jug in a way that makes it hard for me to see. But mere seconds later she shuts it off, wipes it with a towel, somehow makes it hiss again, then whacks the jug on the counter twice.

And all the while she’s speaking a string of coffee lingo. She says something about foam and temperature and “polishing” the milk.

“You could do a heart or a fern, whatever design you have nailed,” she says inexplicably. She’s pouring the milk and twisting the cup and talking a blue streak. “And voila.”

I look down at the cup she’s handed me. “That’s a fucking rose,” I say, shocked.

“It’s my signature design.”

“A rose. In milk.” It’s got layers of white petals, stretching toward a coffee sky.

“The guy who taught me espresso drinks was a great artist. But like I said, it’s fine if you can only manage a heart, or a tulip. Everyone starts somewhere.”

“Cool,” I say.

I’m so fucked.

The bell on the door jingles, and three women walk in, approaching the counter. “Hi! Wow—are you the new guy?” one of them asks, smiling.

“I am,” I announce, hoping that I already have the job.

“Well, this is exciting,” one of the women says.

Posy grumbles something under her breath. It sounds like help me, Jesus.

“Could I please have a mint tea for here, and a slice of the Dutch apple?” She bats her eyelashes at me.

“You handle the drinks,” Posy grunts. “We’ll go over the cash register and pricing in a minute.”

“Of course. One mint tea, coming right up. Where’s, uh, the hot water?”

Posy blinks at me, and I know right away that I’ve asked a stupid question. Then she points to a random switch on the espresso machine.

It says “water” above it. Live and learn. “Right. I knew that.”

Posy shoots me a disbelieving look. Then she grabs a spatula and cuts a gorgeous apple pie with slightly more violence than is strictly necessary.

I find the mint tea bags on a shelf on the bar back and serve up the woman’s beverage with a smile and a wink. Her cheeks flush in appreciation. “What can I get you?” I ask her friends.

And that’s when the wheels come off. This woman wants a “skinny mocha.” I have no idea what that is. I look around helplessly for a second, hoping the information just falls into place.

With a low growl, Posy plunks a bottle down in front of me. Chocolate syrup. Oh, okay. Then Posy’s eyes flip toward the espresso grinder. So I realize the chocolate is going into her coffee.

So I put some chocolate into a cup, and then grind three seconds worth of coffee. But when I dispense it, my coffee titty is misshapen. So the tamper thinger can’t make a nice, flat surface, either. This means I’m struggling to put the shot into the espresso machine. I