Punch, Pastries, and Poison by Harper Lin (ebook reader for pc and android .txt) 📕

taste just as delicious cold as it did fresh out of the machine. In fact, as far as I was concerned, if it didn’t taste good cold, it hadn’t actually been good fresh either.

To my surprise, Ephy didn’t shrug this time. “No, that’s dumb. I hate when people say that. Good espresso is good espresso. You could leave that sitting there until tomorrow, and it would still taste good.”

I fought back a smile. “Well, I think that would be a health code violation, but I see your point.” I picked up the espresso. “And I agree.” I took a quick sip and then slugged the whole thing back. It was every bit as good as I’d expected it to be.

So now I had a decision to make. Ephy’s personality and look weren’t exactly what I’d had in mind when I set out to find someone new for the café, but her coffee-making skills were top-notch, and I’d hardly have to train her at all. Unless I wanted to try to train her to smile, but I wasn’t sure that would be a successful endeavor.

I glanced around the café. Sammy was making the rounds with the coffee pot, offering refills and chatting up the regulars. I wished I could ask her opinion, but she’d barely exchanged two words with Ephy. Even if I asked, she’d refuse, saying she hadn’t spent enough time with her to be fair. It was one of Sammy’s best—and occasionally most frustrating—qualities.

I sighed and leaned back against the counter, folding my arms across my chest while Ephy examined her fingernails and picked at the already chipped polish. “You can’t do that if I hire you,” I snapped.

She raised her eyes to me, not seeming to be at all put off by my comment or my tone. If anything, she seemed confused. “Do what? Make good coffee?”

I barely stopped my eyes from rolling. I could easily regret hiring this girl within thirty minutes of her first shift starting. “Pick at your nail polish. In fact, I don’t want you coming in with chipped nail polish at all. Your nails should be bare or have a full coat.”

She shrugged yet again and shoved her hands in her pockets.

“And no holes in your clothes. And pull your hair back.”

One of her shoulders twitched, but that was all.

I took a deep breath and wondered if I was crazy to even consider hiring her.

The bell over the café door jingled, and I turned to see a group of twenty or so women pouring in, all clad in matching teal T-shirts emblazoned with Brookline Babes Beach Bonanza across their chests. Sammy looked up from where she was schmoozing with a small group crowded around a smaller table with their laptops. She went wide-eyed. Even without our regular customers, we were going to be slammed for at least the next half hour with that size group. And that was if they got their drinks to go. If they stayed, we’d be packed for at least an hour, maybe more.

I turned back to Ephy. “Tell you what. You stay here and help us out with this group, and if you do a good job, you’re hired. I’ll pay you either way.”

For some reason, I expected a little enthusiasm from her about my offer, but all I got was a cool “Sure.” She fished a hair tie out from the stack of cords and bangles on her wrist and pulled back her thick mane of wavy, purple-tinged black hair.

I caught Sammy’s eye as she hurried around the counter and dropped the coffee pot back on its warmer. “Sammy, this is Ephy. She’s going to help us out with this group.” I turned to Ephy. “Do whatever Sammy says.”

Ephy nodded from the sink, where she was already washing her hands. Maybe she wouldn’t be so bad after all. The next couple of hours would give me my answer.

I turned to the first customer, who was already standing at the register, and smiled. “Hi, welcome to Antonia’s. What can I get for you today?”

She stared up at Sammy’s handwritten menu on the chalkboard hanging behind the counter. “Uhhhh.” She sighed. “I never know what to get. I like the drinks that have all that whipped cream and chocolate sauce and stuff. What’s a macchiato? Is that something I’d like? That’s a fun name! Match-ee-ahh-toe.” She turned around and giggled at the rest of her group.

I sighed. This was going to be an even better test for Ephy than I thought.

Chapter 3

Three days later, I was actually happy that I’d decided to hire Ephy—mostly. She was, as I’d already learned, a wiz at coffee, and she’d surprised me by knowing a thing or two about baking as well. Her first scheduled shift, she’d come in—appropriately dressed and groomed, no less—and spotted a tray of shortbread cookies waiting to go in the oven. She peered at them for long enough that I was about to tell her what they were and maybe even what a cookie was based on the forehead wrinkles that marred her otherwise impeccable complexion. But just as I opened my mouth, she looked up at me.

“Shortbread, right?”

I nodded.

“Do you use cornstarch in them?”

“Nope. Just butter, flour, and sugar. It’s really easy, actually—there’s a ratio—”

She cut me off. “My grandma used cornstarch. It’s the best way to do it. Makes the cookie melt in your mouth. You should try it sometime.” She cast a disdainful look at the cornstarch-free cookies on the tray and walked away towards the espresso machine.

I went after her out of some combination of self-punishment and curiosity. “So did your grandmother bake a lot?”

She nodded as she checked over the machine. She used slightly different settings than the ones I liked, but I couldn’t argue with her results. In the couple of hours she’d worked with us after her interview, she’d earned raves from the customers. Not that the teal-shirted Brookline Babes were coffee connoisseurs, but they were pleased with their drinks,