The Co-op

Chapter Thirty-Two

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

The Fourth of July

DEACON

I roll out of bed and make my way to the kitchen, try to start coffee and go about breakfast as quietly as possible so I don’t wake her, but LaRynn emerges shortly after me, bleary-eyed and bed-headed.

“Morning,” she croaks, one eye squinted my way.

“Morning,” I reply, voice too loud for the quiet this early, when it’s still dark and the marine layer makes everything feel more still. “You’re up early.” The days she’s not opening at the shop she usually sleeps in.

I start moving things around the kitchen, not positive I’m doing anything productive. I don’t know what the protocol is for married friends who mutually masturbated, cried, admitted they liked each other, and then agreed to keep sex out of it going forward the night before. I’m not sure it calls for cereal, though.

LaRynn yawns at my side before she grunts and reaches for the coffeepot. She’s cute as hell in the morning, with everything a little puffier… even if she’s pouting. There’s no threat in it.

“Not a morning person, remember?” she says.

“You seem to do just fine at the shop,” I say.

“The shop’s different. I like feeling useful. And I like…” She sips her coffee. “Customers come in happy for their caffeine, and I guess I like being a good part of someone’s day.” She rolls her neck and her lips curl down, like the remark escaped her, but left a strange aftertaste on her tongue. It’s soft and sweet and so simple it makes something in me twinge, her wanting to be any good part of anyone’s day. I feel a little breathless with her admission, actually. It’s more powerful than the caffeine. “I just mean Elyse runs a good business, and people appreciate it,” she explains. “She uses as much locally as she can, including the roasters and the bakery items and everything.” I nod in response, since I already know this but don’t want to cut her off. “Have you talked to Jensen about how things are going business-wise, by chance?”

I shake my head. “No, but I can if you want me to?” I say. We settle across from one another at the table.

“I don’t want her to think I’m nosy. I’ve only been there for like, six weeks, but… Wait, are you in a hurry or anything?” she asks.

“No, I’m good on time. Tell me.” I probably sound too eager, but fuck it. I am eager for all of these bits of her. I’m eager for us to capture this good feeling between us, too.

She blinks rapidly, sitting forward in her chair. It reminds me of when we talked about tweaking the layout and how excited she’d been to have her ideas heard.

“Well, the little touristy shop next door is shutting down next spring, apparently. The owner is retiring. And I can’t help but notice…” She puffs out a breath. “I think the coffee shop closing over lunch but opening up for dinner service is where she loses the most money. The park doesn’t even open until eleven on most days, and we close at eleven after the morning shift. There are—” She starts counting on her fingers, then says, “— six other dinner options with a full bar between the pier and this section of Front Street. We only have beer and wine for dinner service. I think… I think she’s missing out on lunch , plus not capitalizing on dinner, either. It’s called Spill the Beans, so no one even thinks there’s dinner. And, every single day that I’m there, someone tries to open the doors when they’ve already been locked for the afternoon. Not everyone wants the park food; some people want to grab a sandwich or a salad or something and hop down to the beach. If she expanded into the next door, even if she still only wanted to have deli and cold case options and not a full-service kitchen, I think she’d kill it. There’d be more seating for the dinner crowd, plus more seating for the outdoor lunch crowd, too. She could do music and trivia nights. There isn’t any plain, simple, semihealthy lunch option within walking distance.” Her excitement gathers with each point. “And the tourist shop has a much bigger sidewalk section out front. I measured it the other day, and we could easily continue our outdoor space over there. From what I understood on the county’s website, it would be to code.”

“You looked up the regulations through the county?”

She sits back and takes another sip. “I was curious,” she says with a shrug. And it should absolutely not be arousing, her looking up things and measuring them and being driven and showing how much she cares so openly. This is not seductive LaRynn, thong-bikini LaRynn, or even sexy-angry LaRynn. This isn’t the LaRynn with her breathy sounds and her guileless answers with her fingers slipping over where she’s slick, either. But the way she studies her mug, her hair mussed in a heart-shaped halo around her face, the way she tucks some of it behind her ear. Fuck, I’m going to have to fake another reason to use the camp shower like a goddamn creep. Last night should have calmed me down and maybe it did succeed in taking off the edge, but now my wanting is tinged with more. I should’ve known every bit of her would make me want more.

I try to steer my thoughts back to the conversation. For fuck’s sake, she’s being open and the last thing I need is to turn it right back to sex. I refocus, thinking about all the times I’ve wanted a quick lunch out and had to drive somewhere or gone four blocks to sit down at one of the other restaurants nearby, or hit the taco truck for the millionth time. “Rynn, that sounds really great. You should absolutely talk to her about this.”

Her knee bounces with a nervous sort of excitement. “You think?” she asks.

“Yeah, I definitely think.”

She starts picking at her nails. “I know I need to meet with an advisor of some kind and I’d want to go over the numbers, and it’s a long shot anyway—who knows if Elyse would even be interested in doing anything with me—she probably wouldn’t. But I think I would love to do something like that with my money when we rent this place out. If I have that income maybe I could get a loan of some kind. Invest in something like that. Some kind of place that makes people happy that way.”

I want that for her, too. Her discomfort over simply sharing ideas and admitting to wanting something makes me want it for her ferociously.

“Maybe talk to Elyse about it when she picks you up today. I think you should do it.” Anyone with half a brain would want her on their team.

She goes back to her nails, but smiles timidly. “Thank you,” she says without looking back at me. She checks the clock on the wall. “I better get in the shower. You need the bathroom at all?”

“Nah, you’re good. Just remember to text Sal,” I reply.

She waves her phone at me. “Always do. I’ll see you in a little while?” she asks. The hope in her voice feels like a light in my chest.

“Yeah, I better get over there. I’ll see you later.”

“Let me know if you need anything on the way or anything. I’m sure Elyse won’t mind stopping.”

“Thanks, Lar– LaRynn, I mean.”

She tosses me a saucy look over her shoulder. “You can call me Larry, Deacon. It’s managed to grow on me. Don’t tell anyone else, though.”

I laugh and blow out a long breath as she walks away.

“Turn on the music before you head out, please!” she calls.

“Got it!” I grab what I gather is her favorite oldies compilation and put it on, grinning to myself when “Be My Baby” starts to play. The journey from last night to this morning, from quietly attempting to communicate through our shit to her soft confessions and shy smiles… it feels like we’ve scaled a small mountain. Or found a new path around it. Talking about her ideas and her wanting things feels huge, either way.

It also feels precarious. We’re already married, and between the insurance and the bank account and the other small things we’ve started sharing, we already have things we’ll eventually need to untangle from each other if this doesn’t go anywhere, let alone if it all goes south. We both want to manage this property together in the future, but we have to successfully finish the place before we can. We obviously can’t help our attraction, and now we both want to be friends. But I think… Shit. I’m worried I’ll want too much, too fast again.

It feels too soon to hope that she might want everything from me, too.