Sixty

“What are you doing here, Clare?”

Clearly surprised by the security alarm, Matteo Allegro had wrapped a white bath towel around his hips and hurried to investigate. He smelled of soap, and a little lather still clung to the dark curls on his chest.

“You said we’d talk soon,” I said. “Now is soon enough for me.”

“I might not have been alone.”

“That’s why I sent a text warning. Didn’t you see it?”

“I’m not in the habit of taking my phone into the shower.”

As Matt secured his slipping towel with his muscular forearms, I turned my gaze away, staring hard at the shiny concrete floor, the spacious loading zone, the utilitarian metal stairs, the running loft that oversaw the whole complex, and the hundreds of airtight barrels of raw coffee cherries inside the glassed-in, climate-controlled storage area.

I looked at pretty much everything but my inadequately clad ex, whose deep tan from his last sourcing trip extended across his hard shoulders and all the way down to his still-firm abs—which gave me a clue how much time he’d spent with his shirt off under the Central Africa sun (likely playing soccer with the locals or relaxing by a pool with a special lady; probably both).

“You are alone, aren’t you?” I said.

“Yes, and you can stop averting your eyes. I’ll put something on.”

I gave Matt a head start, then I followed him up the staircase, the low heels of my ankle boots clanking on the metal steps. Matt disappeared into his balcony bedroom, where he’d drawn drapes for privacy.

“I’ll make coffee,” I loudly called, and heard my voice echo from the cozy loft space into the cavernous warehouse.

Matt’s kitchen was an efficient setup. A fridge, microwave, deep stainless steel sink, and two high-end hot plates—one of which was set on low with a pot gently simmering. I recognized the savory aroma and sighed. It smelled amazing.

While I loaded a French press and boiled water on the second hot plate, Matt reappeared in sweatpants and a tight black tee with Volcano Surfing! Black Hill, Nicaragua! written in Spanish—a reminder that Matt’s extreme sports–junkie addiction was still alive and well. I could still see the drone footage of his hike up the side of that live Nicaraguan volcano along with his death-defying descent, sliding down the ash on a thin board.

Gritting my teeth against that worrying memory, I forced myself to say something positive—

“Your beef stew smells heavenly.”

“It’s your recipe,” he said.

“I can tell, but I adapted it from yours…”

Early in our marriage, Matt made an excellent beef stew for me, using coffee as a marinade. When I tried the recipe, however, I found the large portion time-consuming to cook, so I shrunk the yield for a quicker and easier dinner and made a few tweaks, including replacing the coffee with red wine for a lovely beef bourguignon flare.

My “Cozy Beef Stew for Two” (as I called it) was a far cry from Addy’s brunch of fine dining delicacies. But while her dainty gourmet bites worked great for someone who sat at a laptop all day, they left me fairly famished. In my defense, most of us in the service industry (on our feet from sunrise until way past sunset) knew cuisine-that-sustained was the name of the game.

Matt seemed to read my mind. He pulled two bowls off a shelf, dished up the cozy stew, and sliced up a crusty loaf of sourdough. We sat at his kitchen table and feasted in silence. Finally, as we sopped up the last of the stew with thick hunks of bread, he tried to make small talk. But I was too bantered out after Addy’s brunch to beat around the bush—

“So, are you going to source coffee for Driftwood’s master roaster? Is that what the meeting with Cody was about?”

“If you think I’m going to source beans for the Driftwood label, then you don’t have a clue what’s going on—”

“By all means, Matt, clue me in.”

“Cody Wood wants to buy the Village Blend—”

I dropped my spoon. “YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING!”

“Calm down and listen—”

“To what?! Matt, please tell me that you are not for a blessed second considering selling our business and your family’s legacy brand to that purveyor of industrial waste—”

“He doesn’t want our business, Clare. We can still call ourselves the Village Blend, even though…”

“Even though what?!”

“Even though we won’t be in Greenwich Village anymore.”

Suddenly, I found it very hard to breathe. Is this what a panic attack feels like? “Jump right into my nightmare,” I rasped. “The water’s so cold it’s paralyzing.”

“Take it easy, honey. Breathe, okay? In through the nose, out through the mouth.”

I did. But my nightmare didn’t end because Matt kept talking—

“Look,” he said in a soothing tone, “it’s not as bad as it sounds. Cody simply wants to buy our landmark building and turn it into a Driftwood coffeehouse.”

“Oh, is that all?!”

“He’s put together some investors, and he’s offering more than double the market value for it. He’s sweetening the deal by adding a long-term contract that would triple our revenue.”

“Why would he do this?” I gasped. “We’ve been adversaries for so long!”

“He wants to put all that animosity behind us. He said times are tough for a lot of retail businesses, and we’d have a better chance at financial success if we worked together. He seemed perfectly sincere about it, Clare. ‘Money is money and success is success.’ That’s how he put it. And we should partner up for those ends.”

“Okay, Matt, let’s say I would consider the lunacy of trusting that shark enough to go into business with him. Out of sheer curiosity, how does Cody the Drifter propose to triple our business? With a force multiplier of AI baristas?”

“No. Driftwood would sell our beans—the cherries that I source and you roast—as a special Village Blend label in select Driftwood stores across the country. It would be a partnership of sorts, given the national business Cody would open up for us. But the whole deal hinges on, well, you know…”

“On selling him our landmark coffeehouse?”

“That’s right.”

“No, Matt, it’s wrong—as wrong as it gets.”