Love And Coffee: A Cup Of Grace Romance Series Book 1 (14 page)

              “I was thinking it might be a good idea if I maybe looked for another job,” he said, trailing off.

              “What?” I asked.  “What do you mean another job?  You don’t have time to add another job to your day.”

              “No, I meant, look for another job.  A different one. It would save you guys money.”

              I stared at him.  Why was he saying this?  Especially after the talk that we had.  “I thought you liked working here?”

              “I do.  Don’t think I’m saying that,” he said.  “It’s just that, I know finances are tight.  I don’t want to add to the burden of the shop.”

              “But we need you here.  We would just have to hire someone else,” Kathryn said.

              “Yeah, and you’re tall and we need a tall person to help reach things,” Jillian added. 

“Thanks Jillian.  You’re always practical,” I said. “Look Matt, don’t start talking crazy.  We need you here.  It’s settled.”

Matt sighed.  “Okay.”

“It almost sounds like you don’t really want to be here anymore,” I said.  “Is that the case?  Because I don’t want to keep you here if you don’t.”  I said it very carefully.  The last thing I anted was for him to leave, but I didn’t want him to feel obligated, either.

“No, that isn’t the case.  I’m just concerned for you is all.  Let’s drop it.  It’s a bad idea.”

I sighed.  I suddenly felt like there was an issue and I didn’t know why.

“Well, why don’t we get this place cleaned up.  The morning will be here before we know it,” Kathryn said.

We got to work cleaning up.  I dumped the left over coffee down the drain and cleaned the pots.  Everyone was suddenly quiet.

Janey and Jillian were whispering in the kitchen. 

After working for a while I went over to Matt.  “Hey,” I said.

He turned towards me.

“Yes?”

“I love you.”

He stared at me.  Then he smiled.  “I love you too.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

              “Excuse me, Miss?” a middle-aged woman said as I passed.  She was sitting with four other women at one of the tables in the front window. 

              “Yes?” I said turning toward her.  Her hair was blond and a little spikey up top.  Very cute.

              “I wanted to say to you that I am really impressed with your shop.  I have tried nearly everything in the bakery case in the past few weeks and I have to admit that my hips are showing it,” she said with a laugh.  “They are all delicious!”

              I smiled.  That was just what I wanted to hear.  “Thank you so much!  I am so glad that you are happy here.  What are you studying?” I asked, nodding at her open Bible and workbook.

              “Oh, it’s a weight loss Bible study,” she said and then burst out laughing.  “But don’t tell anyone.”

              I laughed.  “Your secret is safe with me.”

              I went over to another table and wiped it down with a damp cloth.  There were three Bible studies going on, along with several people by themselves either looking intently at their phones or notepads.  Now this is what I had imagined when I thought about Cup of Grace.  The atmosphere was quiet and mellow and everyone seemed happy.  I sighed.  Maybe the hardest times were behind us.

              Just as I had that thought, I looked up and saw roach lady barrel through the door.  Oh no.  I mean, this woman could knock a bull down.  Maybe eating roaches gave you super powers.

              She stopped and looked around.  I really wished I were near the kitchen or back storeroom so I could have slipped out of sight, but no.  I was right up front.  And my customers were about to get a show.

              “I wanted to speak with you,” she said, narrowing her eyes at me.

              “Yes, well, let’s go back into the office, shall we?” I hurried her out of the dining room and back to the little corner of the back room that we called the office.  A laptop was set up on a folding table with a folding chair to sit on.  I pulled another chair up and motioned for her to sit.

              “I want to know what you’re going to do about the roach,” she said, taking the offered chair.

              I wished that Matt or one of the others would show up.  I suddenly thought it might not be a good idea to be alone with here back here, but I didn’t want her making a scene out front, either.

              “Well, I’m not really sure what to do about it,” I said. I decided to try honesty.  That would work, wouldn’t it? It was such a bizarre, unusual thing that had happened.  I really had no idea where to go with this thing.  How do you tell someone not to worry about the roach they almost ate that was your fault?  Or at least the fault of the business that you owned?

              “I don’t want to hear any excuses from you.  I want results!”

              “Yes, well, um, I’m sorry, what was your name? I don’t think we were ever properly introduced,” I said, hoping to buy myself a few seconds to think.

              She narrowed her eyes at me again.  “Why do you want to know my name?”

              “Oh, no reason other than I would like to know what to call you,” I said.  This wasn’t going well.  Calling her roach lady to her face was probably a bad idea, but I didn’t know what else to call her.

              She stared at me for what must have been a full minute.  “Mary Donoghue,” she finally said.  “Don’t think that you can sweet talk me.  My husband and I have already seen a lawyer and we are going to sue the pants off you.”

              I swallowed.  “Well, Mary, may I call you Mary?”

              “It’s my name isn’t it?”

              “Yes, of course.  Mary, I wish I could tell you just exactly how sorry I am for that little, um, incident.  I had no idea something like that was ever going to happen.  We really do keep a very clean shop here, as you can see if you look around, and I and my partners are just mortified at what happened.”  I could feel my cheeks go red.  I really did not want to have to handle this, but I had no choice.

              “Well you should be.  Wait, you have partners?  Business partners?” she said leaning back in her chair and examining me anew.

              “Well, yes, you see my two friends and I were laid off of our jobs at the newspaper and we decided to take money out of our 401K accounts, money that we worked very hard to earn, I might add, and-“

              “Listen, I said I didn’t want to hear a sob story.  Everyone works hard.  So do I, and when I want to go out and spend some of that hard earned money, I do not want to eat something pest infested.  I could have caught a disease!  Roaches are full of diseases!  I went to the doctor and had all sorts of lab work done.  Someone has to pay for that!  Are you going to pay for that?”

              Oh boy.  I swallowed again.  I could feel my face flush even more red.  “I, I, need to speak to my friends,” I said.  Where did I go from here?  This conversation was getting worse by the minute.

              Just then the door swung open and Matt appeared.  He stopped in his tracks when he saw roach lady, er, I mean, Mary.

              “Oh, hello,” he said and forced himself to smile.  “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

              “Oh you weren’t,” I said quickly.  “Mary, this is Matt.  Matt, Mary,” I said hoping he would take over the conversation.

              “How do you do?” Matt said and extended a hand.  Mary sat and scowled at him.

              “Young man, do you know that roaches carry disease?” She asked him.

              “Um, well, I never thought about it,” he said, glancing at me.  I shrugged my shoulders.  I had no idea how to get rid of her.

              “Well, Mary, if I may call you Mary, we surely do apologize for the um, incident.  We are terribly, terribly sorry,” he said looking at me again.

              “Sorry isn’t enough,” she said.  “My husband and I are getting a lawyer.  We are taking you to court!”

              Oh boy.

              “Well Mary, isn’t there some way we can settle this without getting the courts involved?” Matt asked.

              “Settle?  Yes, we can settle.  For payment of medical bills and fifty thousand dollars,” she said with a smug smile.

              “Fifty thousand dollars?” I nearly shouted.  “We don’t have fifty thousand dollars!  Matt, tell her!  We can barely get all the bills paid as it is.”

              “Now, Tara, let’s be calm about this,” he said and turned to Mary.  “Now Mary, I appreciate that this incident caused you discomfort, but we are in no position to pay that kind of money, I-“

              “Well, then I’ll see you in court!” she said and got to her feet, pushing past Matt.  She was gone before I could say another word.  Not that I had any idea what that word would have been, had I said it.

              “What will we do?” I said, tears rolling down my cheeks.  “Oh Matt, we are ruined!”  I could just see the permanently closed sign across the front of Cup of Grace.

              “No, don’t say that,” Matt said and then pulled me up to hug me. “It will be okay.  We’ll figure something out.”

              “I don’t see how,” I sobbed.  “This is terrible.”

              “I think you had better look into getting a lawyer,” Matt said quietly.

              “Really?  I had thought God would take care of it.  And where do we get the money for a lawyer?” I asked.  I had prayed so hard about this.  Why wouldn’t God answer my prayers?  And where would we get money for a lawyer?

              “He is going to take care of it, Tara.  We just need to have patience.  I have a cousin that’s a lawyer. Maybe he can help.  Granted, he’s a contract lawyer, but he must know something or someone.” Matt reassured me, stroking my hair.  He looked into my face and wiped the tears off my face.  “It will be okay.  Just have faith.”

              “Does he charge a lot of money?  I don’t have much money,” I said, as if he didn’t already know this.

              He smiled.  “I happen to know that he owes me a favor or two, and I’m sure he would exchange that for a consultation or advice or something.”

              “Do you really think so?” I said, brightening just a bit.

              “Yes.  You see, I happen to know what happened to a certain sixth grade girl’s lunch money, so he owes me big time.”

              “Wow.  A lawyer that’s a thief?  That’s different.”

              He gave me a wink and I felt a little better.

TWENTY-THREE

              “So, we go to see your cousin, and then what?” I asked Matt.  It was after closing and we all sat around a table, drinking the last of the day’s iced coffee.

              “We’ll just have to wait and see what he says,” Matt said, taking a bite of a sugar cookie.  “Oh look, I’m lucky in love.” He said and leaned over and kissed my cheek.  I was crazy about Matt.  We didn’t need the sugar cookies to help us out.

              “I wonder what we would find if we Googled Mrs. Mary Donoghue?” Kathryn said, turning the laptop on. 

              “Maybe she’s a mass murderer and after the lawsuit, she’ll come back here to kill us all with an ax?”  I asked.

              “You have quite the imagination,” Matt said.

              “It does get a little out of hand sometimes,” I replied.

              “Okay, let’s see, for $9.95 I can get her address, phone number, and criminal record,” Kathryn said.

              “Oh, get it!” Janey said.  “Let’s see what she’s all about.”

              “Yeah, let’s do it,” Jillian said.  “Maybe she IS an ax murderer.”

              “Want to?” Kathryn asked, her eyes lighting up.

              “I don’t know. I feel kind of funny about that,” I said.  I really didn’t want to know any more about that woman than I already knew.

              “Why don’t we just wait and see what my cousin says?” Matt suggested.

              “Yeah, what if the cops came in here and confiscated the computer and saw that we had been getting information on her?” I asked.

“I highly doubt they do that kind of thing for a civil suit,” Kathryn said dryly.  Always Miss Smarty Pants.

              “Well, there has to be something,” Jillian said looking over Kathryn’s shoulder as she searched.  “Hmm, let’s look at Facebook.”

              “Okay, Mary Donoghue,” Kathryn said.  “Well it looks like Mrs. Donoghue enjoys playing Farmville2 and crocheting. And let’s see, she only has fifty-three friends.  Not a real socialite.”

              “Ha!  I knew it!” I said looking around triumphantly.

              “Knew what?” Matt asked.

              “She only has fifty-three friends!  And I bet they’re not real friends!”

              “And?” Matt said looking puzzled.

              “No one likes her!  I don’t like her either!” I said triumphantly.

              “Okay, so not that people like her,” Matt said correcting me.  “But what does that prove?”

              “I have no idea,” I said and stuck my tongue out at him.

              “Let’s try again,” Kathryn said going back to Google.  “Hmm,” she said.

              “What?”  I asked.

              “It just seems like if a person has a history of suing people, that something should show up somewhere.

              “Google ‘frivolous lawsuits’ and her name,” Janey suggested.

              “Okay, here goes,” Kathryn, said.  “Shoot.  Nothing.”

              “Well, I would think nothing would show up unless there was a reason for someone to be writing about her and her frivolous lawsuits.  Like an article or research piece or something,” I said.  “And that seems like a stretch anyway.”

              “I say we wait and see what my cousin says,” Matt suggested.  “There’s no use getting ourselves worked up over this when we really don’t know what we’re doing anyway.”

              “I guess you’re right.  We aren’t going to find anything on our own,” Kathryn said with a sigh and closed the laptop.  “Let’s get this place cleaned up and get out of here.”

              “Yes, let’s.  I’m exhausted,” Jillian said as we all got up to get to work.

***

Friday afternoon, Kathryn, myself, and Matt sat in front of Matt’s cousin Jeffery, in his spacious office while he listened to our story.  I have to admit, I was a little jealous of his digs.  He had a corner office on the ninth floor and the outer walls were huge windows.  The desk he sat behind was massive carved mahogany.  Jeffery was doing all right for himself and thanks to Matt being his cousin and having dirt on sixth grade Jeffery, we were getting a free consultation.

              “Well, you could check to see if she has a history of frivolous lawsuits,” he suggested turning toward his computer

              “Oh, we’ve done that and couldn’t find a thing,” Kathryn explained. “We didn’t find much besides a Facebook and Pinterest account.”

              “Did you check the Vexatious Litigants List?” he asked, typing on his keyboard.

              “The who?” I said.  “I don’t know Latin so if you expect to communicate in a foreign language, we are in trouble.”

              He chuckled.  “It’s a list that the state keeps on people that repeatedly bring frivolous lawsuits.”

              “They have one of those?” I asked.

              “Yep, and it’s public.  Let’s see what we have.”  A few moments later, he said. “Well what do you know?”

              “She’s on it?” I exclaimed.

              “She certainly is.  Do you know her husband’s name?” He asked.  “We can check him out as well.”

              “No, we don’t,” Kathryn, said.

              “What kind of lawsuits has she brought?  And what does this mean to us?” I asked.

              “It doesn’t say what kind of lawsuits she has filed, but in order to get on this list, you have to have filed at least five lawsuits in the past seven years, not including small claims court cases. Or, she could have had a filing that went against her in a case and she has repeatedly filed again on that particular case, or against the people involved in the case.  In other words, she has made herself a nuisance to the court system,” he said and smiled at us.  “

              “So what does that mean to us?” Matt repeated my question.

              “It means if she does file a lawsuit, the judge may throw the case out before it ever gets heard.  The courts frown upon people that try and make a living by filing frivolous lawsuits.”

              “Do you think that will happen in this case?” I asked, getting excited.

              He sighed.  “Did she really find a roach in her scone and did she really eat part of it?”

              “Well, yes she found one, but it’s not like she bit into the middle of the roach. And we don’t really know how it go in there,” I said.  “Since she does these frivolous lawsuits, maybe she brought a roach into the shop and said she found it in the bag.”

              “I suppose it’s possible.”  He said like he thought that was kind of crazy. 

But it wasn’t.  I swear, I wouldn’t put it past that woman.

              “She might have,” I insisted.  “She has a history of this sort of thing after all.”

              “No,” he corrected.  “She has a history of frivolous litigation.  You can’t go accusing people of one thing just because they are guilty of another.  That’s called supposition and a judge will not allow it in the courtroom.”

              “Well that doesn’t seem fair,” I whined.

              “So what is your suggestion,” Matt asked, ignoring me.

              “I would suggest that if she comes into your shop again, that you point out that filing phony lawsuits can get her into deep water.  But I think, since she already came back and hinted that she wanted money, she already knows this and isn’t really going to sue.”

              “Yes!” I exclaimed.

              “What if you’re wrong?” Kathryn asked.  “What if she does sue?  What then?”

              “Hush Kathryn, this is going our way.  Let’s focus on the positive,” I said.

              Kathryn looked at me.  “I want to know best and worst case scenarios so we can prepare for them,” she protested.  “Don’t you think we should know that Jeffery?” She said his name with a little hint of something—you know what I mean?  And she was smiling at him ear to ear.  Hmm…

              “Well then, I suggest that you get a good lawyer,” Jeffery said.  And now he was blushing.  That was a slight pink tinge I saw on his cheeks, wasn’t it?  “But I still think there’s no way she is going to do it.   It would be foolish.  She would waste money on lawyer fees and I’m sure she’s well aware that she is on this public list.”

              “That is exactly what we needed to know, Jeffery,” Matt said.  “I think we can handle this from here.  If we need more legal advice, would you mind helping us out?”  Matt asked.

              He smiled.  “I have no problem with that.”  He was talking to Matt, but his eyes were on Kathryn.

              “Well we don’t want to take up anymore of your time,” Matt said.  “I know, being a hot shot lawyer that you have a lot going on.”

              Jeffery looked at him.  “Don’t you forget that I am a hot shot lawyer, okay?” he said in a much more familiar tone. 

              We stood up to leave.  “Thank you so much for your help, Jeffery,” I said and extended my hand. 

              “My pleasure,” he said, shaking my hand.  Then he turned to Kathryn.  “If you need anything, let me know.”

              “I sure will,” she said and her cheeks turned pink as well.  “Oh, and if you are ever in the neighborhood, stop in.  I think you deserve lifetime free coffee and scones.  Minus the roach, of course,” she said and she winked.  She actually winked!

              “Wait, lifetime?” I asked as we headed out of the office.  “What do you mean
lifetime
?”

              “Will you shush?” Kathryn said.  “He just gave us all peace of mind, and that, my friend, is priceless.  So he can have all the coffee and scones he wants.”

              “Oh yeah, and I bet he’ll want some of Jillian’s heart shaped love cookies, too, won’t he?”  Yeah, okay, I was getting juvenile, but it was fun.

              “Oh shut up,” she said as we got onto the elevator.

              Matt was looking at us with a bemused look on his face.  “You two are way too much.  When we get back to the shop, you both are getting a time out.”

              I did the only thing I could do at that moment.  I gave him a raspberry.