Like Cats and Dogs by Kate McMurray (scary books to read TXT) 📗

well, we may start a book club or something next. Diane’s letting me hire a couple of extra people, so if we start staying open later, it’s not an undue burden on the current staff.”

“Sounds like you’re expanding.”

“Yeah. It’s weird. I’ll admit, when I took this job, I loved it, but I thought it was kind of a novelty. I used to manage a coffee shop, and a cat café opened up nearby, tucked into this storefront around the corner, but it lasted maybe four months.”

“And you took the job anyway?”

“Diane is persuasive.”

Caleb wanted to ask more about that, but he felt like an idiot just standing on the sidewalk. “Uh, you have plans tonight?”

She smiled. “Not really, no.”

“I’m headed home myself.”

“Oh.” She seemed disappointed by that.

“I was going to walk. Would you like to walk with me? Maybe get some dinner close to my place? Meet Hank?”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

She smiled, which made warmth spread in his chest, a feeling he didn’t want to analyze too closely. “Sure, that sounds nice.”

It wasn’t until they turned the corner to walk north toward Caleb’s apartment that it registered: He’d asked her to do something and she’d said yes and they’d exchanged nary an angry word. Caleb didn’t want to think too hard about what that meant. Had something in their relationship changed? Should it have? Did he want it to?

Best not to think about it. Asking her to come home with him had been an entirely spontaneous decision. He had no motive beyond wanting to spend time with her. And why did he want to spend time with her?

Nope. Not going there.

They walked and made small talk about how nice the weather was for the next block. Then he said, “So how did you end up going from a coffee shop to managing a cat café?”

She laughed. “I don’t know. Life is strange sometimes. My college degree is in art history.”

Well, that figured. Caleb didn’t want to be judgmental, but Lauren did strike him as the sort of person who would spend a lot of money on a degree in something useless.

“I see your face,” she said. “You’re not wrong. My original plan had been to go to grad school and get a job as a museum curator, but one internship at the Met taught me those jobs are pretty hard to come by. But I had a job as a sales associate at Bloomingdale’s, mostly fetching shoes from the back for customers. After I graduated, I got a promotion, and then I saw the opening at the coffee shop and got a job as a manager. Diane used to get tea there regularly, so we’d get to talking. I mean, you’ve met her. She treats everyone like they’re her old friends. When she offered me the job, I thought she was kidding.”

“So, wait, she just randomly offered you the job?”

“Pretty much, yeah. That’s kind of how Diane is. She operates by instinct, not logic, but her instincts rarely fail her. So I came to check out the space, and she showed me the business plan for it. I already knew how to run a café, but adding the cat component was an interesting challenge. I had cats as a kid, but nothing like this. But I was over working at the coffee shop and having to put out fires with wealthy patrons who yelled at me for everything, from not carrying coconut milk to the depth of the roast on the coffee beans to the speed with which my employees made lattes. So when Diane offered me the job, it seemed like a fun opportunity, and at the time, I figured if it was a flop, it might be the kick I needed to try to find a job that was more fulfilling. Luckily it worked out.”

Caleb shook his head. He couldn’t imagine taking such a leap of faith. “So you just…took a job managing a business you didn’t think would last, working for a woman you didn’t know very well?”

“Well, it sounds silly when you say it like that. It was a good opportunity. Was I supposed to sell bossy rich people overpriced hot beverages for the rest of my life?”

“No.” That seemed like a waste of Lauren’s talents in fact. “I’m just…” But he was trying not to start a fight with her. His instinct was to argue, to point out how foolish such a choice had been, to demonstrate she was flighty and impulsive. But that was this jerk version of himself, the one who kept everyone at a distance. The one who was lonely now. “It’s not something I would do.”

She nudged him with her shoulder. “Nice save.”

“I’m trying to turn over a new leaf. Not be such a jerk.”

“It’s fine, you know. Don’t try to fight your own nature.”

He laughed. “No, it’s just… I’ve always had a plan. In high school, I knew I wanted to be a veterinarian. I studied biology and animal science in college, I went to vet school, I opened a practice. I did all the things I was supposed to do. I’m not… I don’t like spontaneity. This evening notwithstanding.”

They walked silently for a few minutes. Then Lauren said, “Ah, I see.”

Something in her tone rubbed him the wrong way. “What do you see?”

“That was why your divorce threw you for such a loop. You didn’t see it coming and it wasn’t part of the plan. You met your ex-wife in vet school, right? You got married after you graduated? That was all part of your plan. Your wife left you, and it threw a wrench in your plan.”

That was…quite astute, actually. But it also showed why he and Lauren would never work as a couple. He needed more stability in his life. She would uproot him on a regular basis.

“Well, now that you’ve assessed me psychologically, how was your day?” he asked.

“Fine. Busy. We had enough customers today to more than justify my desire to hire more people.”

“That’s good.”

“You? How was work,