Page 58 of A Taste of Vanilla

His hands are big and rough, with small scars across his knuckles. He has a nick near one thumb. They’re actual hands, not the smooth, manicured hands of a man who uses the word portfolio too often and thinks assembling IKEA furniture is a survival skill.

He looks at Oliver first. “Black coffee.”

His voice is low, and it settles somewhere under my skin and makes itself comfortable.

Oliver stares at him. “This is a bar.”

The man’s expression doesn’t change. “You have coffee.”

“I have regret and a machine I use under protest.”

“Black.”

Oliver’s mouth flattens. “Please?”

The man looks at him for a beat, and then says, “Please.”

I bite the inside of my cheek.

Oliver turns toward the coffee station, visibly irritated, and the stranger takes the stool two down from me.

I face forward and wrap my hands around the water Oliver shoves back at me, pretending not to be a little insulted that the stranger didn’t take the stool beside mine. I try not to look at him again.

I make it four seconds. Maybe three.

The man’s profile is also rude. Strong eyebrows, a straight nose, and a jaw made worse by the dark trim of his beard.

He’s sostill.

Not stiff. But still. Controlled.

I wonder what it would take to make him lose that control.

Then I wonder why my brain has decided to be disgusting in public.

Then I remember I am one week out from finding my fiancé between his secretary’s legs, so maybe my brain has entered its revenge era and picked the nearest attractive stranger with emotionally damaging shoulders.

Oliver sets a white mug in front of him. “Black coffee.”

The man nods once. “Thank you.”

Oliver leans his forearms on the bar and looks at me.

Pointedly.

I look back.

Innocently.

His eyes narrow. I smile. He does not.

The stranger lifts his mug and drinks. No sugar. No cream. No cautious first sip to test the temperature. He just drinks his black coffee after midnight in a bar like a man constructed from boundaries and poor coping mechanisms.

Against my will, I say, “Do you always order coffee in bars?”

Oliver closes his eyes.

The stranger turns to me slowly.