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graduate-level espresso

Ayla

Today was exactly what the doctor ordered.

Not my doctor, mind you. Just the elusive medical professional we all call on to beg off responsibilities and have some happy.

The sun on my skin and the wind in my hair.

The good music to sing along to on a picture-perfect day.

Seeing Mom and learning about Eleanor. Seeing the shop and being inspired by what I’ve done, knowing I get to find something snap worthy in the next few days.

I’m ten feet tall and floating.

Until I walk into the kitchen from the garage to find a sour looking Christian, standing, hip against the island, arms crossed, waiting. “Good day?”

His gruff question is enough for my keys to tumble from my hand. I manage to keep the phone in a white-knuckled death grip. I calm my racing heart and force myself to swallow back the fear. “Great day, actually.”

I set my purse on the island, feeling my mellow day drain from me.

“Ayla?”

“Sorry.” I shake my head, but it doesn’t hurt like it did yesterday. That’s progress or I’m too distracted to notice. “I met Mom for lunch today. It was a beautiful day, and I needed it.”

“Why?”

“Why what? ”

“Why did you need it?” He sets his coffee mug down on the thick marble island that separates us.

“Oh, you know.” I put my keys in the back pocket of my handbag

“But I don’t, Princess. Enlighten me.”

I don’t owe him shit, but seeing as how I live here, for now anyway, and I need it to be as stress free as possible, I oblige.

“I’ve lived here one day. One day that was full to overflowing.

You, Corinne, Halley. The dark room. The reading room.

Until I fell into a crazy sleep in a bed I’ve never seen with a man…

” I look up and meet his eyes. “I know you’re mad I can’t remember?—”

“I’m not mad. I’m hurt. And it’s not even that.”

“You said last night you didn’t care if I had memory issues… That you had expectations.” I stiffen my spine and stand up as straight as I can, holding his eyes, but allowing the fingernails on my right hand to make crescent moons in my palm.

He rounds the island in a hurry, but halts before making it to me. I’m afraid my relief is audible when he doesn’t crowd me.

“Baby, I said I expected us to keep the vows we took, whether you remembered them or not. That’s not me not giving a fuck about your injury.

” He comes closer and reaches up to trail a finger over the scar that slices through my hairline just above my temple.

“That’s me honoring the ‘in sickness and health’ part. ”

He places a light kiss right where the scar ends at my temple, and I fight not to go stock still.

“Was yesterday not good?”

I pull back and look him in the eye. “Yesterday was beautiful and scary. It was a surprise and a relief. It was overwhelming and terrifying. And”—in a moment of weakness, I drop my forehead to his chest—“none of it should be anything of the sort. My brain won’t cooperate.”

“Yet.”

“What if it never does?”

“Then I’ll recreate the best of our time together, avoid all the parts where we missed the mark on being kind to each other, and woo my wife into falling in love with me all over again.”

His answer is too perfect.

“So what did you do today?”

“I drove around a while. I dig the Audi. It was the perfect day to have the top down. I met Mom for lunch and asked her to clue me in on some things.”

He stiffens and steps back to study me. “And did she?”

“A little. About little things. Nothing the doctors would fuss over. Just life things that make me feel caught up.”

“Anything I need to know?”

It’s my turn to study him. “Nothing I’m sure you don’t already know.”

“I’m listening to my wife tell me about her day, not fishing…”

“Have we met Eleanor, Ci’s puppy?”

“Yes. And she adores you, though I wouldn’t call her a puppy anymore.”

“Can we stop by on our way back from Kenosha tomorrow?”

He slides his phone from his pocket and taps his thumbs against the screen for a few moments.

“Done. Cian said he can’t wait and to tell you he loves you.”

He walks back to his coffee cup and lifts it to me. “Want a cup?”

“Not really, but I’ll drink one if you show me how to use that monstrosity. Whatever I did this morning was not worth the trouble.”

“Well, come on then.”

I grab my phone and round the island.

“What are you doing?”

“Taking notes. This is like graduate-level espresso. I could just buy a Keurig.”

“Woman, you bruise me.”

“Why do we do all this for bean water?”

“Because, Princess, you demanded this. Or a barista on staff at all times to meet your caffeine whims.”

I’m shocked and I can only guess my face says as much when Christian barks out a laugh.

“I’m a diva? ”

“I don’t think anyone uses that word anymore, but, yes. About coffee anyway.” He points to the cabinet below the espresso machine. “Check out what’s in there.”

I pull open the door and slide the two inside drawers out all the way. Coffee syrups, ground chocolates and various cinnamons, powders, tea concentrates, flavored sugars, and extracts. “I own my own Starbucks,” I say with wonder. “Or I could with all of this. You did all this for me?”

“Of course, I did. Couldn’t have you running off with a barista who met your needs when I could do that at home. Vows, remember?”

“Can I say ‘not really’ and you take it as the joke it is?”

“Just this once.” He turns back to the machine in front of us. “Only eight more steps to go.”

“Are you serious?”

“We never joke about caffeine, Ayla. That’s your rule.”

“Seems reasonable for someone who requires all this.” I wave my hand at the coffee detritus in front of us.

“What flavor do you want?”

I look through the drawers, finding my mouth watering at all the choices. “I want it all.”

“Me too, Princess.Me too.”

I ignore his comment. “Let’s go cinnamon vanilla.”

He reaches past me brushing his hand and arm against my belly as he grabs the vanilla bean sugar and the Ceylon cinnamon. I should step back and give us more space. I see the error in my ways when he leans down and places a single kiss below my ear.

The hiss of steam in the frother doesn’t unlock any memory here, but it does make my heart happy. Call it serotonin or dopamine. Whatever. Happiness is caffeine, and it’s onboarding now.

“Oh, that’s good.” I mean it as a compliment, but the irises of Christian’s eyes overtake the rest. “I meant to ask you,” I start, but change my mind as his face goes from heated to hidden in under a second.

“Ask me what. ”

“Nothing. It’s no biggie.”

His eyes narrow, but I watch him calculate the situation before giving in.

I go with it. “Where are my camera bodies and lenses?”

“Several are at the shop. A few are here in the cabinet on the left when you enter the dark room. A couple are upstairs in your studio. And your TLR is right there.” He points to the glass-doored cabinets beside the fireplace.

I start for it, only to spin back around, struck by something he said. “I have a studio upstairs?”

“Did you not explore last night with Halley?”

“Just into the reading room, but we never left. Do I want to know how much suede curtains cost?”

He circles the island and falls into step beside me leading me with a warm hand at my back.

The heat sears there. It takes all the discipline I have not to push back into it.

At the top of the stairs, instead of going left to the reading room, we turn right.

Ahead of me there are double doors, and when we arrive at them, Christian stands aside, allowing me to pull them open.

I can only liken the experience to light bursting forward into me so much that it cannot be contained.

A solid wall of windows is visible opposite me.

They overlook the terrace, the back lawn, and out onto the Rockies.

I walk into the room. Behind me is a matte black wall with a lone image—the one from the gallery.

The one that I’ve spent all day wondering how I could bring home.

And I don’t mean the house. There’s something in that shot that’s home to me.

In my bones, it’s melody.

In my soul, it’s harmony.

It’s peace.

And it’s here.

“Does the light fade it?”

I watch Christian who stands just outside the door taking in my reaction.

“You own it, baby. You created it. You can print it every single day if you thought the contrast of the shadows didn’t do it justice. But it does. It’s…”

He never finishes and something about that is the loudest compliment he could’ve offered.

“Yeah. It is. I saw it today.”

“You did?”

I nod, never taking my gaze from the image.

I feel Christian at my back and ever-so-slowly, he pulls me into him. His arms wrap around me, low on my belly, as I get lost in that lone moose’s eyes… engaged in a stare-down that never ends.

“Yeah. I went for a drive before I met Mom. The shop is… I have no words. No, I do. It’s a dream come true.

It’s more than I ever could’ve wished for.

My work. That kind of location. Renovations that kept the character and history and allowed the space to be warm and inviting, but feel exactly like what I’d want in a gallery of mine.

I could swear that’s where the old hatmaker was. Is that right?”

The vibration moving through me from his voice and the warmth at my back are lulling me. “It was. Somehow the leather scent that still hangs in the air there and the tanning chemicals work for the space. It’s like old Denver colliding with the fresh air off the mountains.”

“I wasn’t alive for old Denver, but yeah. It’s warm and comforting. Very inviting.”

“I wasn’t alive for it either.” He squeezes his arms around me in what I assume is a playful gesture.

“Yeah, but, thirty-five. You might as well have been.”

The squeeze becomes tickling, and he folds over me as I strain to get away. Then wrestling becomes… something else. Kissing and groping. Pulling and feeling.