Catching Fireflies

“At six o’clock in the freaking morning on a Saturday?” she grumbled, all of the kindly thoughts she’d had about him fleeing.

This time there was no attempt to hide his laughter. “Definitely not a morning person. Good to know. I was hoping to persuade you to go for that run with me.”

Sufficient blood finally reached her brain for her to comprehend what he was asking. “You woke me up to ask me to go for a run?”

“That’s the invitation,” he confirmed. “Breakfast after.”

“Was there absolutely anything in our very brief acquaintance to suggest that I run?”

“Nope, but I don’t mind if you’re a beginner.”

It suddenly dawned on her what he really wanted. “You’re looking for a buffer to warn off that other woman.”

“Congratulations! For that you get a giant mug of coffee to chase away the rest of those cobwebs.”

“You’re certifiable, you know that, don’t you?” She felt totally within her rights to declare that. No sane man made the sort of request he’d just made.

“But you’re considering this, right?” he pressed. “What’ll it take to push you over the edge? Danish? Croissants? An omelet?”

Since she was awake by now and surprisingly hungry, she gave up the fight. “I’ll take the omelet,” she said decisively. “With hash browns. And I need an hour to get ready.”

“Nobody needs an hour to get ready for a run,” he said. “I’ll give you fifteen minutes, twenty if you insist on me stopping to pick up that coffee.”

“I insist,” she said fervently. “I’m going to need a lot of coffee.”

She hung up without waiting for a response or offering him her address. If he couldn’t figure out where she lived, so much the better, but something told her he wasn’t the sort of man to leave a detail like that to chance.

* * *

J.C. pulled to a stop in the alley behind Sullivan’s. Half the town knew that sous-chef Erik Whitney was there at the crack of dawn and that he always had a pot of the best coffee in town brewing. Thanks to the occasions when they’d hung out at the gym and the frequency of late-night calls when Erik and Helen’s little girl had earaches, he allowed J.C. to take advantage of that from time to time.

“Sarah Beth’s next appointment is free if you’ll give me three cups of coffee to go,” he told Erik.

Erik grinned. “You sound like a desperate man. Late night with the pretty schoolteacher? And exactly how does that third cup of coffee fit in? Sounds mysterious.”

“It wasn’t that late a night,” J.C. admitted, figuring there was little point in denying that Laura was involved. “But apparently by her standards, it’s an early morning. I convinced her to go for a run by promising her coffee. Yours is far more likely to impress her than Wharton’s.”

“Interesting,” Erik said grinning. “So, the two of you really are an item? That was the hot topic in here last night, anyway, after your cozy meal together. I suspect there’s already a pool going at Wharton’s. Grace loves a romance.”

J.C. winced. “Whoa! We’re just acquaintances,” he insisted. “I asked her to bail me out of a jam this morning, and she’s gone along with it. I need to hurry, though, before she changes her mind.”

“You’re in a jam that involves going for a run?” Erik asked with unmistakable confusion. “Do I even want to know? And you still haven’t explained the extra cup.”

“If you’re like everyone else in this town, of course you want to know,” J.C. said, amused. “But I don’t have the time or the inclination to fill you in. Coffees, please.”

Erik handed over the cups. “Okay, but you owe me more than a free office visit for Sarah Beth. My wife’s not going to be happy if I come home without details. Then, again, she’s getting together with Maddie and Dana Sue this morning. If anything’s going on, they’ll already know about it.”

Sadly, J.C. thought, they probably would.

* * *

Laura was waiting outside on the front steps of her apartment building when J.C. rolled to a stop on the street. She walked in his direction, regarding him with suspicion.

“There had better be coffee,” she said before even touching the handle of the passenger door.

He held up a cup. “Freshly brewed, as promised.”

“Gimme,” she said, getting into the car. She took a deep sniff. “I don’t recognize this aroma. It smells amazing.”

“Sullivan’s.”

“They’re not open this early,” she said, regarding him with amazement. “Who’d you bribe?”

“Erik. I promised him his daughter’s next office visit on the house.”

“Given what doctors charge these days, this is one pricey cup of coffee,” she said as she took her first sip. “Oh, my God, it’s worth every penny.”

He laughed. “That’s what I think every time I take advantage of Erik’s good nature by sneaking in there before work. I think he considers the coffee to be his version of community service.”

“I really do need to get to know him better,” Laura said. “Do you think Helen would mind if I start hanging out with her husband?”

“She’d probably string you up a tree,” he said with conviction as he pulled up in front of an unfamiliar house.

“Why are we here?” she asked, then remembered. “Ah, the date. Would you like me to escort you to the door?”

“No, I think I’ll be safe enough from there to here. Just don’t drink her coffee.”

“If she’s a real runner, she probably doesn’t touch the stuff,” Laura said. “I’m actually surprised you do.”

“Some men have sex to start the day. Since there’s none of that in my life at the moment, I drink coffee. Seems to work,” he said right before he headed up the walk.

Just as he reached the door, it opened and a woman came out with her red hair pulled high in a sassy ponytail. She was wearing running shorts and a tight-fitting sports top, both meant to display an awful lot of well-toned flesh. Laura glanced down at her sweat pants and ancient T-shirt and sighed. There wasn’t a woman in the world who’d buy that she was serious competition for the woman walking her way, talking animatedly with J.C. as if it weren’t practically the middle of the night. She might be up at dawn on weekdays, but most Saturdays she indulged herself by sleeping as late as she wanted. Today’s was the first Saturday sunrise she’d seen in ages.

In the car, J.C. made the introductions, then headed for the park. As Laura had anticipated, Jan turned down the coffee and stuck to bottled water. J.C. practically gulped down a long swallow of the rejected coffee, then gave Laura an apologetic look. “Did you want this?”

She grinned at his guilty expression. “Not to worry, I’m still savoring the first cup.”

“Good,” he said and took another long slug of the coffee.

“Careful there,” she said, lowering her voice. “You don’t want to choke in front of your date.”

He glanced at her with a frown. “Was inviting you along a mistake?”

She beamed at him. “More than likely. So far, though, I’m fascinated to see what’ll happen next.”

Jan turned out to be a perfectly pleasant, intelligent woman who took her running seriously. When J.C. dutifully insisted on staying back with the lagging Laura, she ran on ahead, clearly determined to make it a real workout.

“You could go with her,” Laura told him. “I’m not going to catch up. In fact, I’m thinking I wouldn’t mind sitting in the shade of that old pin oak over there for a while and enjoying the rest of my coffee. It’s a beautiful morning. It finally feels like fall.”