Page 5 of Steeped In Problems (Badges & Baristas #3)

Chapter Three

Kristy had started to count on the mid-morning lull.

Every shift, right after the school stampede but before the lunch crowd trampled in, Brave Badge turned into her own personal spa.

She’d rest her arms on the bar, breathe in the cinnamon haze, and watch the sunlight fall in shimmery rectangles over the hero wall.

Rhonda always used the lull to “take her break,” which meant twenty minutes of scrolling Facebook in the stockroom.

Kristy didn’t mind. She loved the quiet, the routine, the way nothing chaotic could happen when the place was nearly empty.

The only customers were a mother with a baby who mostly napped and a guy in flannel who was either writing a novel or tracking a murder board in his spiral notebook.

Kristy wiped down the counter for the third time, refilled the sugar caddy, and tried to ignore the way her mind kept racing to intriguing thoughts about her boss, Blaze.

The door opened, and she looked up out of reflex.

The group that walked in next didn’t belong to the regular world of lattes and laptop campers.

She recognized them instantly, even without the uniforms: Dr. Patel, in a North Face vest and wire-rimmed glasses; Nurse Gomez, high black ponytail, badge still clipped to her belt; and Mike from the ER tech crew, shoulders hunched as if he was still battling a stubborn blood pressure machine.

For a microsecond, Kristy considered ducking below the pastry case, but she froze, caught somewhere between fight and flight. It was the first time since quitting County General that she’d seen any of them outside the fluorescent hospital haze.

“Oh my God, Kristy?” Nurse Gomez called, already halfway to the register. “Is that you?”

“Hey, yes, hi,” Kristy greeted, unable to keep her voice from shooting up an octave. She willed herself to stay planted, hands gripping the edge of the counter so tight her knuckles went pale. “Wow, you guys are up early for people who don’t have a shift.”

Dr. Patel gave her a slow once-over, his eyes lingering on her Brave Badge apron, then flicking up to her face. “You look...different,” he observed as if someone had swapped her out for a rundown model.

“She looks fantastic,” Nurse Gomez jumped in. “You’re glowing. Barista life must agree with you.”

Mike didn’t say anything. He just stood with his hands in his jacket pockets, studying the floor. Kristy remembered that about him—never the first to talk, but always the first to notice when something was wrong.

“Are you managing this place now?” Dr. Patel asked, leaning one elbow on the counter. “Or is this just a side gig?”

“Just helping out for a bit,” Kristy lied, bright and easy. “Needed a change of pace. Hospitals are...you know. A lot.”

Nurse Gomez snorted. “A lot is right. We lost three nurses in the last month. One of the new temps they hired passed out during a code. Literal face-plant. You would’ve loved it, Kristy.”

“Is that why you left?” Dr. Patel pressed, brows up. “Staffing’s a mess everywhere, but you were one of the best. Was it the pay? Or the hours?”

Kristy’s foot started tapping under the counter. “It was mostly me,” she told him, hands unclenching, then re-clenching. “Needed to do something different. Something not involving bodily fluids for once.”

That landed a laugh from Nurse Gomez, and even Mike cracked a ghost of a smile.

But Dr. Patel just kept looking at her, and Kristy recognized the expression.

It was the same one he used on patients who wouldn’t take their meds: concern, but with a side of judgment.

It made her glad she didn’t mention that it was all the death that had been the real reason. She couldn’t stomach it anymore.

“Hospital hasn’t been the same without you,” he said, voice low. “You know, if you ever wanted to come back, I could?—”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Kristy cut in a little too fast. “But I kind of like it here. No real emergencies. Less screaming and crying.”

Mike finally looked up. “Do you miss it?” he questioned. “You know. Work that really counts.”

She wanted to say no, that every day here was like a breath she didn’t have to count. She’d forgotten the sting of sanitizer and the buzz of trauma alarms. But the truth was messier, and Mike would probably see right through the lie.

“Sometimes,” she admitted. “But I can help people here, too. Just in a different way.”

There was a silence. Not awkward, exactly, but heavy. Nurse Gomez glanced at the pastry display, then pointed. “Is that lemon loaf as good as it looks?”

“Best in the county,” Kristy promised, and she meant it.

She poured their drinks—black coffee for Dr. Patel, oat-milk chai for Gomez, and a giant coffee with four sugars and half-and-half for Mike.

She sliced two slabs of lemon loaf, plated them, and slid everything across the counter in record time.

She made herself smile and ask how the old unit was doing, but the answers were just more stories of chaos and loss.

Not enough staff. Not enough time. More kids coming in with frostbite. More overdoses, even in the off-season.

“You made it seem easy,” Nurse Gomez praised, patting Kristy’s hand over the counter. “I don’t think I ever said thanks for all the times you covered for me when I needed to leave early to take care of my kid.”

Kristy blinked. “You don’t have to?—”

“I do,” Gomez insisted, with a finality that made Kristy’s throat go tight.

Dr. Patel nodded but still looked like he was studying a particularly confusing X-ray. “I hope you’re happy here,” he told her, voice warmer now but still tinged with disbelief.

The group took their coffees to a corner table, leaving Kristy to hover by the register, pretending to wipe down a clean countertop. She snuck glances at them every so often, catching them sneaking glances right back.

The next customer was a guy with a Bluetooth headset and zero patience. He snapped his order so fast that she had to ask him to repeat it twice. She smiled through it, but her mind was somewhere else. Every word from her old coworkers replayed on a loop, echoing in the silence after they left.

As soon as they stood and headed for the door, Kristy ducked into the hallway to the break room, pressed her back against the wall, and took a minute to just breathe.

She tried to convince herself she didn’t care what they thought, that it didn’t matter if Dr. Patel saw her as a burnout or a waste. But the feeling sat in her stomach, heavy as a stone, growing colder with every passing second.

A barista’s life was supposed to be simple, she reminded herself. It was supposed to be healing. It wasn’t supposed to bring the ghosts with it.

After a few minutes, she splashed water on her face in the staff bathroom, fluffed her curls, and returned to the counter, smile ready and practiced.

But her foot kept tapping under the bar, and she couldn’t stop thinking about the old life she’d left behind.

Not today, she chastised herself, focus on taking the next order with a smile. But she knew it would always be there, waiting.

By 11:20, the line at Brave Badge had grown teeth.

Kristy went into triage mode: two tickets deep, a woman barking for non-dairy caramel, and a guy in cargo shorts requesting “the strongest thing you’ve got.

” She cranked out shots, steamed milk, and poured—pour, pour, pour.

Daisy hissed and bellowed like an angry cat, which honestly felt appropriate.

Kristy’s head buzzed, but not with caffeine.

Every second she wasn’t double-fisting portafilters, her brain spooled back to that stupid hospital run-in.

Was she a coward? Had she actually let down the trauma unit?

Did they secretly pity her, wearing her ridiculous apron, pretending she was more than a nurse who flamed out?

“Grande, extra-hot, double-vanilla, light whip for Brenda,” she called, slapping the cup onto the pickup bar.

“Make that two,” came a voice from the waiting cluster. The guy ordering wore a Broncos hat and a tourist’s sunburn, but Kristy was too busy trying to remember how to spell “vanilla” to care.

Daisy let out a high-pitched squeal. Kristy nudged the steam wand off, dumped spent grounds and nearly scalded her wrist in the process. Her hands were jittery. She had to steady them on the edge of the counter before she could even wipe away the spilled foam.

“Rough morning?” Rhonda asked, hovering by the register.

“Just...brain fog,” Kristy excused, voice thin.

Rhonda eyed her for a second, then shrugged and went back to counting bills. “If you drop a tray, yell ‘timber.’ It’s tradition.”

“Copy that,” Kristy told her boss with a fake salute.

A new ticket spit from the printer, and Kristy grumbled under her breath. The order was a monster: two drinks, one a venti latte with three add-ons, the other a “secret menu” monstrosity that was basically dessert in a cup. She knocked out the first, then set to work on the second.

She almost didn’t notice Tanner emerge from the back room. He was carrying a sheaf of invoices, scowling at the numbers like he could burn a hole in them with his eyeballs. Kristy could tell from the lines on his face that the day wasn’t improving for him either.

He didn’t see her at first. She pivoted from Daisy with both finished drinks, one in each hand, and that’s when their trajectories collided.

He stepped left at the exact moment she spun from the bar. The world went slow, like an old movie. The top-heavy venti swung wild. Tanner tried to dodge, but Kristy’s wrist gave a nervous twitch, and the entire cup launched forward in an arcing splash of hot foam.

It hit him dead center, square in the chest, painting his dark shirt with a dramatic, frothy bullseye.

“Hey,” Tanner’s free hand shot up, but too late. The heat seeped in; the shirt stuck to his skin. He let out a hiss, dropped the paperwork on the floor, and tried to peel the cotton away from his chest.