“I try never to expect anything. Then I am always pleasantly surprised. In this case, I was more than pleasantly surprised.”

  He smiled.

  “I mean it. I’m very good about not getting my hopes up. Hope exists to be dashed.” She did not say aloud that she was also very good at compartmentalizing her feelings, wrapping them in pretty red bows and sticking them in dark corners, next to her tissue-wrapped achievements. She turned on her side and propped her head on her hand, too, so that they were facing each other. “I didn’t expect to feel so . . . intensely hopeful about you.”

  “Intensely, huh?” He stroked her arm.

  “This has been amazing so far, Jonah. I have to pinch myself because I . . . I can’t believe how well this has worked out between us. It’s like I already know everything about you. It’s like we’ve been dating for months instead of a couple of weeks.”

  Jonah caressed her arm. “I agree—it’s been really surprising and fantastic. It’s not like I’ve had time for squads of girlfriends. My family is a full-time job, and the truth is, my dating life had been pretty damn boring until now.”

  Harper was pleased that he considered them to be dating. She did, too, especially now, but it was nice to know they were on the same page. “Impossible,” she said. “You can’t tell me women aren’t finding ways to put themselves in front of you all the time.”

  “I can and I will. And on the few occasions they have, it’s been . . .” He shrugged.

  “When was your last relationship?”

  “A couple of years ago. And before you ask, I will tell you it was fine, perfectly fine, until it came down to who was and who wasn’t ready to take the plunge into matrimonial bliss.”

  “Aha. The age-old ‘Will you marry me?’ question. Let me guess—you weren’t ready for a major commitment?”

  Jonah looked offended. “I knew you’d say it was me.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said, backpedaling. “I—”

  “It was totally me.” He laughed at her expression. “She wanted to get married. And I . . . didn’t. Now you probably think I’m a commitment-phobe.”

  “I don’t.”

  He grinned. “You do.”

  “Okay, maybe just a little. Aren’t all guys a little bit commitment shy?”

  “No,” he said, clearly appalled by it. “I’m not a commitment-phobe, Miss Thompson. I liked Megan and we had some great times together. But I never felt that way about her, the ‘let’s do this the rest of our lives’ way.”

  “No one should be made to declare yes or no before they are absolutely ready.”

  “Or maybe, if it’s not a yes early on, it’s never going to be a yes.”

  “Or maybe, sometimes, you just know.”

  Jonah held her gaze a moment. “Yeah,” he said. “Sometimes, you just do.”

  Her gut began to swirl with emotions. Desire. Curiosity. Fondness. True fondness. If she had to make a list of all the things a person feels as a precursor to falling in love, she would add all these emotions to it—and an inability to draw a full breath. A tingling in her scalp. A rush of something warm and gooey in her chest. If she had to say yes or no right this minute, she would say yes. If someone asked her if she knew, she would say she did.

  “What about you? When was your last relationship?”

  Harper thought about her last boyfriend. Douglas. Perfectly nice guy. They’d lasted six months, which was actually pretty good for Harper. She didn’t like to be too attached. She liked to be able to go at a moment’s notice for the right opportunity. “It’s been a while,” she admitted.

  He stroked her arm. “Tough breakup?”

  Harper smiled wryly. “Not for me.”

  “Oof. That had to hurt the poor guy.” Jonah winced sympathetically. “What went wrong?”

  “Nothing really. He didn’t like how much I worked and wanted me to scale back to spend more time with him. He thought that after six months of dating, I owed him a reduced work schedule. In fairness, I was working some long hours, but it couldn’t be helped. Or maybe it could have been helped . . . but he wasn’t the one I was going to cut back on the work schedule for. It sounds pretty cold, but I was more interested in my job than I was in him.”

  “Ah. The age-old dilemma—which came first, the job? Or the boyfriend?”

  “Exactly.” That probably sounded cold to Jonah, and she didn’t like that it did. She changed the subject. “What did you mean, your family takes up too much of your time?”

  Jonah bent his arm behind his head and idly scratched his chest. “I’m not complaining,” he said. “But they aren’t good with technology. We have a small store, and they need to upgrade and change with the world, you know?”

  “Boy, do I.”

  “We were sort of getting there, but my mom had a scare, a lump in her breast.”

  Harper gasped.

  “She’s okay—it was benign. But then my parents went on vacation, and while they were gone, Dad started feeling bad. When they came back, he found out he had cancer. All that time we were worried about Mom having it, and it was him all along.” He turned his head away from her.

  “I’m so sorry, Jonah,” Harper murmured. “How awful for your family. How stressful.”

  “Yes,” Jonah agreed. “Dad is the business guy, but he couldn’t go into the office while he was doing chemo—he just felt so sick all the time. He wouldn’t even talk about it for the longest time. Every time I tried to bring it up, he shut me down. So I started going in around my work schedule to help out, and it became too much of a job to do part-time. I took a leave of absence from my engineering job, but I really waited too long—things were falling through the cracks and the business was losing money.”

  “How is your dad now? Is he okay?”

  “He’s still recovering from treatment.” He turned back to her. “He’s better. But he’s not the same. He’s really quiet now, like he’s rethinking everything.”

  She had so many questions—what sort of business was it, what was falling through the cracks, what was his dad rethinking? But she remembered that he had said he had a big opportunity at his engineering job. “Wait . . . what about the satellite project?”

  “Right.” Jonah rolled on his side again, facing her. There was a different look in his eyes. Excitement. “They want me to lead it. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but it would require time out of the country. NASA has a deep space communications facility outside of Madrid and I would be training and researching there for about six months.”

  “Jonah!” Harper sat up and pressed both hands against his chest. “That’s amazing! Oh, I am so envious right now. Spain? Are you kidding? For work? How can you not take that job?”

  “Because my family needs me. They have always needed me. Ever since my sister died, it feels like they are afraid of losing me, too. I don’t know, I’m not trying to imply that Dad’s illness and me helping out were because of my sister, but honestly, they’ve always felt a little helpless to me. Like they need me to approve of what they are doing. I don’t know what to do. I mean, what would you do if your dad had cancer and they needed you at home?”

  “For starters, my parents have never needed me. If anything, I was kind of in the way.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true.”

  “Oh, it’s true,” she insisted. “Don’t you worry that if you don’t take this opportunity, you will regret it? That you won’t have this chance again? Do you want to be on your death bed and think about the fantastic opportunity you had, that you let go to help with your mom-and-pop shop? Don’t you believe you have to make your own way in the world, because in the end, you only have yourself?”

  Jonah’s brow rose. “Well, that’s cynical. I hope I will be proud of myself for being there for my parents.”

  “You’re right, it probably is cynical, and you should be proud of the man you are. But maybe it’s also a little practical? Or maybe I’m just . . . I don’t know, like I said, my parents have never needed me.”

  Jonah pushed himself up and put his back to the headboard. He touched his fingers to her cheek. “I don’t know what is up with your parents, but that sounds really sad to me.”

  “It’s not like that. I know they love me. But . . .” She didn’t know how to explain how distant their relationship was. “I’ve always been a loner—I just pour myself into work and get gratification from that. I would love a new challenge and to see a new part of the world. To live there and really immerse myself.”

  “Still sounds lonely.”

  “People from close families always say that,” she said, smiling. “But I find it fulfilling. Accomplishments are my jam.”

  He stroked her cheek again. “So what do you do anyway?”

  Her job was not easy to explain, but it was easy to show. “Can I take you there? I have to swear you to secrecy, but I think it’s pretty special.” She laughed at herself. She was feeling so carefree. “I don’t want to say too much because I really want to see your reaction. What do you say we go check it out, and then we can get pizza?”

  Jonah leaned forward to kiss her. “That’s not quite the dinner I had planned, but I would love to see this super-secret job of yours.”

  Twelve

  Harper wouldn’t give up any details as they headed south on Lamar. “You’ll just have to wait and see,” she said coyly, and laughed when he complained that two people who were obviously an item should not keep secrets from each other.

  “We’re an item!” she shouted out her car window.

  “I’m crazy about this woman!” Jonah shouted out of his.

  He held her hand between the seats, and it was all fun and games until she turned onto Congress Avenue and headed south. The Lucky Star was on South Congress Avenue. Call it intuition, but a hard knot formed in the pit of his belly. At first, Jonah thought it was some kind of joke. “Where are we going?”

  “Hold your horses, cowboy. We’re almost there.” She pulled up to the light at Riverside and grinned at him. “So close.”

  Jonah tried to laugh, but it came out in a cough. The knot got harder. He tried to shake it off. “This is a really big buildup to your job. Why is it such a secret anyway?”

  “Because my boss wants to make a big splash. We have a press release going out tomorrow. If I’d had my way, it would have gone out a week ago. I’ve told you a little about Soren. He’s a bit out there with his beliefs.”

  Jonah shook his head. He had a bad feeling about this. But Harper seemed perfectly at ease.

  She told him about Soren Wilder, and his weird habit of speaking with words that were completely made up or didn’t fit the context. After that, he lost the thread. They were getting closer to the Lucky Star.

  “Jonah?” She laughed. “You seem like you’re a million miles away right now. What’s wrong?”

  “I’m just trying to guess where we’re headed.”

  “Almost there.” At Mary Street, she turned left. The barriers that Deja Brew had erected on the avenue yesterday to finish the signage had been moved back to the sidewalk. There was no doubt now what the new building would house—big, shiny gold letters with a steaming coffee cup separating the words deja brew.

  Harper pulled to the curb and turned a beaming smile to Jonah. “Are you surprised?”

  Surprised and a little nauseous. He was fool enough to hope that he was just a bit carsick and not actually heartsick. “I am,” he said.

  “Hey.” Her smile began to fade. “Are you okay?”

  Jonah shifted his gaze to the building. “I’m fine. I’m just . . . confused.”

  “Be confused no more! What do you think?”

  He didn’t mean to be obtuse. “About what exactly?” He suddenly had the idea that she could be a sales rep of some sort. That she wasn’t actually Deja Brew.

  “The new Deja Brew Coffeehouse! I built it! I mean, I didn’t build it, but I oversaw the building and outfitting of it. Wanna see?”

  “Should we?” he asked faintly.

  Harper poked him in the shoulder. “What’s the matter? Nothing is going to jump out of the bushes and grab you, I promise. I built this place and can come and go as I please. Look, here is the key. Let’s go see.” She hopped out of the car.

  Jonah got out, too. His legs felt wooden. He couldn’t put it all together because he was buckling under his disappointment. It wasn’t as if she’d done it on purpose. She hadn’t picked up his phone then decided to quickly build Deja Brew to mess with him.

  Harper slipped her hand into his and pulled him around to the glass door entrance. She unlocked the door, and held it open for Jonah. “You first.”

  He stepped hesitantly into the building, then walked to the middle of the room. He turned one full circle, taking in the shiny fixtures and high-end finishes before facing her again. “Harper, I—”

  “Wait!” She was bubbly, excited. “Don’t say anything until I show you everything. You’re going to love it.” She grabbed his hand and pulled him along. “So this is it! My super-secret project. Not that secret, really, since anyone driving by can figure it out. Anyway, I’ve been tasked with building and opening this store. And now I’m working on the grand opening. And if it goes well—and I know it will, because I have worked my butt off—and the store performs well at this site—which it absolutely should, because we did a lot of market research, and even though Starbucks is a few blocks away, there isn’t another coffeehouse like this around here. Anyway, if it performs as we expect, I will be promoted to a new position.” She was beaming as she looked around the room. “I’ll be opening coffeehouses all over the country.”

  “Okay,” Jonah said uncertainly. “Wow.”

  She gave him a funny look, obviously not understanding why he wasn’t more enthusiastic. “I bet you’ve never seen a coffeehouse like this, right? What do you think?”

  Jonah had to think of how to say this delicately. He put his hand on one of the suspended basket seats and pushed. It swung slowly, almost as if a breeze had rustled it. He looked up to see how it was anchored. “I think this place is very cool. Very hip. Exactly the sort of place that does well in Austin.”

  “Right?” She beamed with pleasure. “This is going to blow every other coffeehouse within five miles out of the water. At least, I hope it does. I feel confident that we have a decent chance of drawing the Starbucks clientele.”

  That wasn’t the only clientele she had a decent chance of drawing.

  She walked behind the counter and pointed at a machine. “Check this out. It’s a Sanremo Opera volumetrics espresso machine. Dual pump. That probably means nothing to you, but it’s a top-line coffee maker. Soren saw this coffee machine in Switzerland and had to have it. They don’t get any better than this.”

  “Dual pump, huh?” He stared at the machine. He didn’t even know what that meant exactly.

  “Yep. I’ve become a bit of a coffee machine geek. Oh, and look over here.” She showed him the small bar for evening alcoholic drinks, and the compact kitchen area. She took him back into the main seating area to the egg baskets. “Try it!”

  Jonah sat. They swung silently for a moment, twisting a little that way, then this way.

  “I haven’t shown you the library!” She popped out of her egg basket and walked to the library shelves. She gestured to them like Vanna White.

  Jonah stood up, too, and came to have a look. “So people just find a book they like and walk off with it?”

  “If they walk off with one or don’t come back with it, we’ll replace them.”

  “Is that cost-effective?” he asked curiously.

  “Not entirely,” she admitted. “But the books are very popular and our philosophy is that the benefit of drawing customers outweighs the loss of a few books purchased at wholesale. Surprisingly, most people bring them back. Want to see the garden? Oh look! The lights in the courtyard were hung yesterday.”

  She hurried to the glass doors and flipped a switch. Suddenly, a dozen little white umbrellas appeared to be floating gently to earth. The effect was really nice. It was a cozy outdoor space that could be used year-round, which would be a big draw.

  Harper was talking about the menu. The locally sourced ingredients from farms such as JB Gardens, the vegan options, the keto options, the Tiny Pies.

  He nodded dumbly. “What about your coffee beans?” he asked, his gaze on the coffee machine.

  “Fair trade, of course. Mostly sourced from Brazil and Colombia.” Her smile was waning—she kept looking at him with a worried expression. He was trying, he really was, but his thoughts were spinning like so many tops. He wanted to be over the moon for her, but he kept thinking of what this meant for the Star.

  She finished the tour at the front windows, where they had installed cushioned window seats, six of them, separated by hanging panels of etched glass.

  Jonah traced the peace sign that had been carefully etched into one panel. “It seems like you thought of everything.”

  Harper beamed. “I really hope so. I’ve worked hard to make this place a unique experience.”

  “It really shows.”

  “Okay,” Harper said, throwing up her hands. “You’re being really weird about this, Jonah, and I don’t understand why.”

  “I’m sorry.” He was sorry. He didn’t have much of a poker face. “I don’t mean to be a jerk. It’s obvious you’ve put in a lot of hard work, and it’s a very cool place. I’m just trying to absorb it.”

  Harper frowned. “Okay.”

  Jonah put his hands on her arms and tried again. “I’m really impressed, Harper. I am. I’m happy for you, too. But . . . do you see that?” He pointed out the window. She followed his gaze to the squat building across the street. The blue-and-white neon sign read, the lucky star coffee shop, and beneath that, premium quality beans. The sign was bordered with little coffee cups, and curlicues rose out of each one to indicate steam. The door was weathered, and the windows too small to let much natural light in. There was the stack of small Christmas trees piled next to the door and a rusted bike rack on the curb that was sitting lopsided.