It Started with a Dog, page 19
“It is the best. I’ll definitely be back for more.”
“We’d love it if you did. Bring your friends—”
“Harper works at Deja Brew!” Amy shouted, much like Jonah imagined Paul Revere must have shouted to warn that the British were coming. It worked—Jonah’s dad stared at Harper. He could almost hear his dad’s thoughts—how could a woman love their blackberry pie and then stab them in the back with Deja Brew? It was a legitimate question.
“That’s right.” Harper stood up. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Roy Rogers. But speaking of Deja Brew, I have to run. Thank you all for that outstanding piece of pie.” She turned her lovely green-eyed gaze to Jonah as Burt wandered into the now empty dining room. He was wearing an American flag bandanna and a muscle shirt. “Did you say if you could help me out?”
“Someone moving?” Burt asked as he wiped his hands on a dishcloth.
“Hope so,” Amy muttered.
Jonah could feel the eyes of Amy and his dad on him, and probably Burt, too, although Burt was rarely interested in what was going on in the restaurant. He was already at the soda machine, refilling his cup.
Still, Jonah could feel eyes boring through him, curious. “Sure,” he said. “Happy to help.”
“Thank you, Jonah! I owe you one.” Harper fished a key out of her bag and slid it across the table to him. “Fits the front door. I’ll leave a note for them to contact you when they arrive.” She picked up her bag, waved at Amy. “Great to meet everyone,” she said with a smile. “We’re going to be neighbors! I hope you can all come to our grand opening on Saturday. I’ll return the favor of your pie with the Tiny Pies. They are spectacular. It’s going to be great.”
Amy and Jonah’s father exchanged a look. “Supposed to rain this weekend. This time of year, you might get ice,” Jonah’s father said.
Harper laughed. “Your weather app didn’t tell me, Jonah!”
Jonah smiled a little. It was the evergreen fantasy of Austinites every winter that there might be a freak snow to make winter feel like winter.
“Anyway, I’m not worried about ice. It’s seventy-five degrees outside,” she said. “They say it’s one of the warmest winters we’ve ever had.”
“I hope for your sake it’s not too bad,” Jonah’s dad said. “Would be awful to have to cancel.”
“Canceling would be a disaster. I’ve got several vendors lined up and a musical act, lots of fun things planned. But not a tarot card reader, unfortunately, which would have been great.”
“A what?” Jonah’s dad asked.
“Oh! I’m sorry, I just noticed the time. I’m going to be late. That’s what I get for stopping in the middle of the day for pie. Okay, again, nice meeting you all! Thanks so much, Jonah. You’re a lifesaver.” Harper gave them a cheery wave and hurried out.
Jonah, his dad, and Amy watched Harper dart across the street and disappear into Deja Brew. Even Burt hung around to watch her go.
“I hope it ices over,” Amy said. “Everything. Just a solid sheet of ice.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Jonah said. “All the wishing in the world won’t make it happen. And even if it did, it wouldn’t matter, because canceling the grand opening will not stop them. You guys know that, right?”
“Hey,” Amy said, turning to face him, her arms folded. “How does she know that you get notices about the weather on your phone? How come you didn’t tell anyone here that you’re friends with the Deja Brew staff?”
“The whole world knows I get weather notices on my phone,” Jonah said. “And I didn’t know she was with the Deja Brew staff until very recently.”
Amy’s eyes narrowed. “I feel like there is something you’re not telling us.”
“I kind of get that feeling, too,” his dad agreed.
“I’m out,” Burt said, and went back to the kitchen.
But Amy and his father kept staring at him. “What?” Jonah asked. “Okay, Harper and I have gone out a few times.”
“Traitor!” Amy hissed.
“Now just a minute, Amy.” His dad put his hands on Amy’s shoulders. “Maybe Jonah has a plan.” He and Amy stared at Jonah, waiting for him to announce his grand plan to do God knew what.
“Are you kidding?” he asked with all sincerity. “I don’t have a plan. I’m dating her. That’s all, that’s the plan.”
“Oh. My God,” Amy said, her eyes widening. “You’re sleeping with the enemy, Jonah!”
“You’re crazy,” he said and, with a shake of his head, picked up the enemy’s key. “Don’t you have something to do?” he asked the both of them.
“Belinda finished the jigsaw puzzle we were working on,” his dad said. “I was just going to check the news.”
He turned and went back to the private dining room. Jonah could see his aunt’s knitting basket at the end of the dining table. Nothing said success like TV and jigsaws and knitting.
Amy gave him one last glare and started back to the counter. Just then, a cable news network blasted into the dining room. “Roy! Turn it down, please!” Amy shouted.
Jonah sighed and returned to the office to await Harper’s delivery.
Eighteen
When Harper burst into the StreetSweets conference room, fifteen minutes late and panting slightly from her jog up the stairs, the door just missed hitting the back of Kendal’s chair. He was sitting with Soren, Veronica, and the architect around the Japanese-style dining table. And he wasn’t there to take notes, quite obviously.
“I am so sorry I’m late,” she said. “Traffic is horrible.” Always a good excuse and avoided the airing of the family laundry—namely, that no one had told her about this. She strode around the table to an open cushion.
“Ah, Harper. We are all cock-a-hoop that you are able to join us at all,” Soren said. “Please—affiliate and dovetail into the discussion.”
The architect looked curiously at Soren. Veronica rolled her eyes and looked at her phone. And Harper? She was focused on putting herself on that stupid cushion without looking like a clown getting into a clown car in her short dress.
When she had settled, she happened to glance at Kendal. He gave her a smile so cool that she could almost believe someone had opened a window and an icy blast had come into the room.
“Harper, it is my great pleasure to acquaint you with Pradeep Luthra, the principal architect at Anderson, Luthra and Pearson.”
Harper turned her attention to Mr. Luthra and smiled. “It’s such a pleasure to meet you. I’m Harper Thompson, Vice President of Development. I’m so sorry I’m late.”
“Think nothing of it,” Mr. Luthra said. He was a handsome man with manicured hands. He wore a diamond pinky ring that kept catching the light of the candles Soren had lit, because of course he had lit candles. Mr. Luthra leaned across the table to shake her hand. “I’ve heard you’re planning a grand opening of your latest store. I’m looking forward to seeing it.”
“If you’re in town over the weekend, I would love to have you at the grand opening.”
“It’s supposed to rain this weekend. But we’ve already taken him to the north location, so . . .” Kendal said.
So what? “Then he can compare and contrast,” Harper said, and smiled at Mr. Luthra.
“I’m just saying that if he can’t make it, Mr. Luthra has seen the concept of the Deja Brew Coffeehouses, albeit it on a smaller scale, so he will have an idea of it.”
“Excellent thinking on your part, Kendal,” Soren said.
Harper couldn’t argue. But the other stores didn’t have two stories and Suzanna in their courtyard.
Mr. Luthra, probably sensing a squabble brewing, said, “It’s a very inventive use of space. Kendal was very good about showing me all the design features.”
That tour should have been left to Harper or Veronica, as either vice president of development or vice president of assets, respectively. But if Veronica was bothered by Kendal’s usurpation, she didn’t show it. She was probably very happy to have someone do the tour for her.
“Pradeep has drawn up some conceptual renderings of the bistro,” Soren said, and gestured grandly to the blueprints spread across the table.
Harper leaned over to look at the blueprints. They were quite detailed. How long had Mr. Luthra been working on this? She looked at Soren, but his attention was on the plans. She wondered if he felt any remorse at all for having misled her.
“Here,” Soren said, pointing. “The quiet room. Headphones required. No phone conversations, no videos. This is where our customers will go for contemplation. We’ll have bookshelves along one wall, no?”
“Yes,” Mr. Luthra said, and pointed to where the bookshelves would go.
“Harper? Have you any input for Mr. Luthra on the quiet room?”
Input? She hadn’t even seen the plans yet. “Well, based on the very little bit I’ve seen here . . . for the first time”—she glanced pointedly at Soren—“I would say it looks good at first blush.” Not to mention she was having to contort her body from the damn floor cushion just to see it.
“Interesting,” Soren said. “Kendal?”
Kendal looked at Harper. He seemed almost . . . apologetic. “This room is too big, in my opinion,” he said, pointing to the quiet room. “Soren and I have a difference of opinion about it. I think customers will come to our establishment with friends and families. There should not be significant demand for single space, which is essentially what this is. And I think,” Kendal continued, leaning across the table to have a better look, “that there needs to be more space in the foyer. Perhaps with some bench seating.”
“Hmm,” Mr. Luthra said. “We’d have to shorten the counter a bit to make that change.”
Harper was being trounced. Get it together! “But this isn’t a restaurant,” she quickly pointed out. “People won’t need to wait for a table. They’ll come in, walk up to the counter and order, then take a seat or go on about their day.”
The three men in the room looked at her. Even Veronica looked up from her phone.
“What?” Harper asked.
“Ideas can be revised, reformed, and recast,” Soren said.
“Meaning,” Kendal said, looking directly at Harper, “that may be true in our current configurations, but in the new bistro, they’ll be waiting for a table.”
“Excuse me?”
“It will be hostess seating,” Soren said.
Since when? Why was this all news to her? Harper looked at Kendal, but he studiously avoided her gaze. She looked at Soren, who was studying the plans. Oh, but she hated him right now with the force of a thousand suns.
And so it went—every time Harper spoke, trying to reiterate the vision that she thought they’d agreed to, the three men looked at her, talked over her, or just outright ignored her. Veronica seemed bored with the whole thing. Harper couldn’t figure out what was happening, and that left her feeling a little panicky and a lot furious. When had the plans been revised and reformed and recast behind her back? This concept was not a coffee bistro—it was a fucking steak house, and when she had asked Soren about that very thing, he had said it was a different take on a coffee bistro.
Why hadn’t Soren told her? What was with all the gamesmanship? Could Kendal be taking advantage of him? Soren had a tendency to get lost in his imagination, so Harper could see how it could happen. But Kendal was new to the company and had moved straight from some mystery administration job into restaurant design, and it seemed outrageous that he’d go straight for the jugular.
No. She was beginning to realize this was all Soren’s doing. After all her work for him. She’d started with a food truck and worked her way up through all the facets of Soren’s company, had put up with his weird communication style, and his sudden decisions that left everyone scrambling. She’d listened to his stupid advice and had jumped when he said jump, and worked her ass off, and this was the thanks she would get? She had to compete for what was rightfully hers with Kendal because he was the new shiny hire?
By the time the meeting concluded, Harper was looking for a brick wall to put her fist through.
Soren and Mr. Luthra went out together, talking about some show on Broadway. Veronica was still on her phone, almost as if she hadn’t noticed the meeting had broken up.
Kendal slowly came to his feet and glanced at Harper. “I know you think I’m after your job, but I swear that’s not the case. I’m just trying to do my job as best I can. That’s it.”
“Okay,” she said slowly. She couldn’t think of a retort—she was too furious.
Kendal shrugged and went out. Harper glared at his back and his perfect haircut, then shifted her gaze to Veronica. “What the hell is going on around here?”
Veronica looked up from her phone. “What are you talking about?”
“What is Soren trying to do?”
“How should I know?”
“Come on, Veronica. You know this is my promotion. Why is Soren trying to give it to Kendal?”
Veronica slid her phone into her bag and stood up. “That one is easy. You know Kendal came from Starbucks corporate, right?”
“What? No, I didn’t know that.”
“I think Soren offered him a pretty good deal to come here and do the same thing for us he was doing for them.”
“Wait a minute—he brought Kendal from Starbucks to be an administrator?”
Veronica laughed. “That’s just the title Soren gave him. He’s here to do pretty much what we all do—whatever Soren dreams up. But he has experience in design and opening stores.”
Harper gaped at her. “I didn’t know that.”
Veronica laughed and started toward the door. “You know what your problem is, Harper? You are so used to looking down your nose from your solitary mountaintop that you forgot to watch your back.”
“That’s not true. I have worked for my mountaintop. I deserve this shot.”
“Maybe. Maybe Kendal does, too. Not for me to say.” She went out . . . and left Harper reeling.
What had happened here? She had not seen this coming. She was out of the office most days, running around to see after all the stores they had, and building a new one, and what, she was supposed to have pulled up a chair to the receptionist’s desk in the middle of a chaotic day and ask what his background was?
Something dark moved across her thoughts, and Harper quickly shook it off. Once, a long time ago, she and Olivia had had a fight about yet another breakup Olivia had suffered. You’re so busy with your made-up to-do list that you don’t even see what’s happening with me!
Olivia had not been wrong. Harper was a master at building tasks around her so that she was never without a moment to think about how alone she was. She’d learned it early on and not to question it.
Whatever—she didn’t have time for Soren’s games right now. She had to pull off the best grand opening this company had ever seen. She would show him, remind him why he’d hired her in the first place.
She walked into her office and shut the door. She stared out the window a long time before she finally pulled her phone from her purse and texted Carly. Pulling out all the stops. On board for the King Mutt competition. I even know the mutt. I’d like Bob the Bulldog. Also, I’m going to need a list of things to buy for said dog.
Nineteen
The day of the grand opening was cold and gray, and two hours before the event, rain came in on a strong north wind. No snow, but it was going to be a cold and wet night.
Very few people had come into the Star today. Just Old Man Harris, who came every Saturday morning for breakfast, and Robert and Lloyd, who had both put on puffy jackets and come for their afternoon cup of two-dollar coffee and free pie.
Word about the free pie had traveled through their regulars—some that they hadn’t seen in a couple of years. They were starting to come around again.
“Good pie,” Robert said. “Hope Mrs. Rogers doesn’t get a job across the street.” He and Lloyd chuckled.
“If she does, you can expect to pay a premium for that slice,” Jonah said.
The veterans chuckled again.
Jonah had watched deliveries coming and going to Deja Brew all day, and even now, with the lights on, he could see people moving around the interior. The doors were supposed to open at five.
Amy stepped up beside him and peered at the windows of Deja Brew, too. “Who is going to come out in this weather to the opening of a coffeehouse?” She was dressed in her party best: a full skirt with a petticoat, a black bolero jacket, and rhinestone glasses. Her red hair was in a messy knot at her nape.
“Well, we’re going.”
“We don’t count. We’re doing reconnaissance. And we only have to cross the street.”
Jonah was suddenly struck with such force that he had to catch himself on a chair to keep from falling on his ass. He didn’t even have to look around to know it was Truck. The dog was rarely invited to the Star for this very reason, but today was a special occasion. He was even wearing a black bow tie Belinda had put on him and had managed to twist it around so the bow was standing at a weird angle and was partially covered by one of his floppy ears.
Amy scratched the top of Truck’s head. “Okay, Jonah, I have to ask. I don’t want to ask, but I can’t stand it another minute. What did the receipts look like this week?”
“Guess,” he said.
“Five hundred?” she asked hopefully, even though five hundred dollars in sales for a week was what they used to do on a slow Monday.
Jonah shook his head. “Four thirty-six.”
Amy’s mouth dropped open. “Oh my God, how are you going to pay me?”
“I’m going to pay you, don’t worry about that,” Jonah assured her. It would have to come out of the Star’s rainy day fund, but he would pay Amy and Burt.
