Free 0451471040 by Kimberly Lang Page A

now.”
    The emphasis on him leaving was impossible to miss. “Good luck,” he said over his shoulder, leaving her in the doorway to Latte Dah.
    Odd as his conversation with Molly had been, it had one thing going for it that made him happy.
    It proved there was at least one woman in Magnolia Beach who not only asked for his advice or help, but was willing to actually take it as well.
    How refreshing.

Chapter 5
    A ttitude was important. Everything else could be taught.
    Three days later, Molly wanted to pat herself on the back for hiring Samantha Harris. Samantha still needed cheat sheets for recipes, and she was a little intimidated by the cappuccino machine, but she had a knack for creating rapport with customers and being attentive to their needs. The people she knew—more than half the clientele—teased and encouraged her and seemed to have great patience with her learning curve, but that rapport building meant the customers who didn’t know her also had no problems with her lack of speed and occasional confusion, either. She had charm and wit and was cute as a button, too. She was going to do just fine at Latte Dah.
    Plus, the girl could upsell like a master car salesman.
    “Don’t you want to take a cookie home to Anna? She’s four now, right?”
    “If you’re going to the council meeting, you might want to get a large coffee instead of a small. Don’t want to fall asleep in the middle of it!”
    “We have this coffee mug with a puppy I swear looks exactly like your Muffin. She was such a great dog. You must miss her so much. Here, let me show you.”
    Samantha did it all with a great smile and genuine interest, and damn if they didn’t all buy what she recommended.
    Molly was updating the payroll with Samantha’s information while Samantha frowned at the cappuccino machine again. “I promise it won’t bite you,” she said with a smile.
    “I just don’t want to break it.”
    “Well, I don’t want you to break it, either, because it’s an expensive machine, but at least show it who’s boss, Samantha.”
    “You can just call me Sam.”
    “Which would you prefer?”
    Sam looked up. “Excuse me?”
    “I’ve heard you called both, but noticed you put Samantha on your name tag. I thought maybe you preferred that over Sam. I mean, my real name is Marlene, but my grandmother always called me Molly. It stuck and I like it, but I know not everyone likes their nicknames.”
    Sam thought it over for a minute. “I actually like Sam better, but I always start out with Samantha. Later on, when someone calls me from across the street, I know if they’re a friend or an acquaintance.”
    “Very smart.” She totally understood. Being Molly all the time instead of Marlene or Marley was a nice line between old and new, Fuller and Magnolia Beach, and one of the many perks of moving to a town where no one knew her before she was Molly.
    Sam was studying her, head tilted to one side and eyebrows forming a little V over her nose. She’d seen the exact same look on Tate’s face before when he was thinking hard, and at that moment she realized how much the siblings looked alike. She knew Tate and Samhad another sister, and Molly vaguely wondered whether the resemblance was strong there, too. She’d met Mrs. Harris a couple of times around town, but it was clear Tate and Sam took after their late father.
    She and her sisters were split—Jolie looked like their mother, Molly looked like their father, and Hannah was a perfect combination of both. Hannah had definitely gotten the better roll of the genetic dice there. Personality-wise, both her sisters were just like their mother, though, and if that was the price of beauty in the Richards family, Molly was just fine being the ugly sister.
    But Sam’s scrutiny was starting to make her a little nervous. “You don’t look like a Marlene,” Sam finally declared. “A Marley maybe, but not a Marlene.”
    While she agreed, she wasn’t sure what Sam meant by that