Free Catching Fireflies by Sherryl Woods

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