Free Death Before Decaf by Caroline Fardig Page A

door. Seriously considering not answering it, I quickly realized that was pointless since my car was now outside, in plain sight. If it was Detective Cromwell, he wouldn’t go away without getting what he came for. I sighed and headed for the front of the house.
    I was relieved to see that it wasn’t in fact Cromwell at the door, but unfortunately my caller wasn’t much more appealing. It was Seth, the sexy guy I had yelled at last night.
    I walked up to the door but didn’t open it. Pointing to the CLOSED sign, I yelled, “We’re closed. Come back tomorrow.” I turned to head for the kitchen, but he knocked again. I stopped and went back to the door.
    Seth yelled, “I came to see you.”
    I figured that, but I didn’t want to see him. Yesterday, I had resolved to apologize, but I was tired and grouchy and didn’t really feel like doing it now. “I’m very busy,” I replied.
    He smiled. I liked his smile a lot. “Look, Juliet, I wanted to come by and apologize for being such a dick last night, but I really don’t want the whole neighborhood to hear.”
    Oh. Well, that was pretty sweet. Men weren’t generally big on apologies, since it usually involved admitting they’d been wrong. I guessed I could hear him out. I opened the door and let him in.
    “Thanks,” he said, coming in and standing way too close to me.
    I took a step back. “I believe you said something about an apology?”
    “Right. I was rude to you last night.”
    “I was rude to you, too. I’m sorry.”
    “You don’t need to apologize. I provoked you. I guess I was a little jealous.”
    That surprised me. “Jealous?”
    He grinned bashfully. “I was going to ask you out. But when I saw you with your boss, I figured I’d lost my chance.”
    So he
was
interested. I had thought so, but it threw me when he busted me for supposedly drooling all over Pete’s song last night. There was no doubt that tall, dark, and handsome Seth was hot. Going out with him would probably be fun. And I didn’t see anything wrong with a little distraction.
    I replied, “Seriously, like I told you—there’s nothing going on between us…nor will there ever be. So, yes, I would be happy to go out with you.”
    “As a consolation prize,” he said quietly.
    Boo-frickedy-hoo. I didn’t even know his last name, and he was wounded about not being my first choice? I narrowed my eyes at him. “Are you a drama queen? Because I don’t go out with drama queens.”
    He seemed startled, then broke into a big smile. “No, I’m not, actually. I like you. You speak your mind.”
    “Thanks, I guess.”
    “So when do you want to go out?”
    I shrugged. “How about now?”

Chapter 6
    Seth Davis (I finally asked him his last name) took me to a trendy new club downtown, Mixology. To my delight, it was not a country bar, because even though Nashville is my home away from home, I’ve never been much of a country music fan. Choosing a cozy circular booth, we ordered some food and drinks and made a little small talk. I found out that he was a professor at Vanderbilt in the film studies department.
    “Film studies. You can major in watching movies?” I asked, puzzled.
    He laughed easily. “No, film studies is much like any fine arts major. You study the history of the craft. You study the differences between genres. You study how to create the art yourself. Just like majoring in music doesn’t mean all you do is sit around and listen to music all day.”
    Seth had said before that Gertie had told him all about me, so I didn’t feel the need to talk about myself too much. “Some days it
felt
like that’s all we did. So, being a film studies professor, do you only like artsy-fartsy movies or will you watch movies that regular people actually like?”
    “Artsy-fartsy? Is that a technical term?” He smiled again. I loved making him smile, because his already handsome face absolutely lit up.
    “Yeah, for sucky movies.”
    “Are you asking if I’m a film