“You should get going,” Rich says, pointedly looking at the wall clock. It’s four-thirty. “You know Fallon won’t be happy if you’re late.”
Sighing, I push off the doorjamb and move into his office. It’s cluttered and disorganized, but it’s always been that way. The one time I tried to clean up, he scolded me for messing with his system. Since then, I’ve left things alone.
Flopping down in the only chair across from his desk, I stare longingly at the work he’s doing. “I have plenty of time to get over there. It’s just I’d rather be here going through receipts than at a fancy art showing.”
Rich chuckles. “You and me… like peas in a pod. I never did like fancy stuff either.” His eyes turn a bit misty with memory. “But my Joyce did. She loved to get dressed up and hit the town at night. I indulged her always, of course.”
I smile, my gaze dropping to my lap as he reminisces. His wife Joyce died almost fifteen years ago, and I’ve heard so many stories about her that I feel as if I know her. When he talks about her, the love in his voice sometimes makes my heart hurt. It’s the painful squeeze of loss I feel when I think about my father, which has never lessened over time. I’ve merely learned to accept it.
“Listen,” he says, getting up from the chair. My head snaps up, and I watch as he moves over to close his office door. “Seeing as how you have a few minutes I want to run something by you.”
I sit up straighter in the chair because he sounds businesslike, and I want him to see I can be professional, too. “Sure. What’s up?”
Rich settles his frame deeper into the chair, which groans slightly from the weight. His hands settle onto the plastic armrests, and he drums his fingers while staring at me appraisingly. “You know I’ve come to rely heavily on you to run this business, right?”
Yes, I do. Rich praises me often, validates my skills, and pays me pretty damn well for a manager of a coffee shop, although it’s not enough to retire on. “I love what I do, Rich.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” he says, something in his face relaxing. “Which is why I want to make you an offer.”
I tip my head to the side. “An offer?”
“I’d like to sell One Bean to you,” he says.
I merely gape, eyes slightly flared, left eyebrow arched a fraction higher than the right.
He stares back at me.
I burst out laughing. “Sell the shop to me? Rich… are you going daft or something?”
I get no laugh in return. His kind eyes don’t even crinkle. He holds my gaze until I start to feel hot in the face and neck, and I realize I’ve misjudged this.
My smile slides off my face. “Are you serious?”
Rich sighs, rubbing a hand covered in age spots across the nape of his neck. It’s a sign of annoyance that I’m not taking him at face value, and he just gazes at me from under bushy graying eyebrows.
“Are you sick?” I demand, leaning forward in my chair. My voice turns shrill. “Dying?”
“No,” he declares with enough force and zeal that I instantly believe him. “Of course not.”
Putting my hand to my heart, I slump down in the chair. “You nearly gave me a heart attack, Rich.”
“Wasn’t my intention,” he mutters. “I get I’m dropping a bomb on you, but the offer is real if you’re interested.
Pulse back to normal, I perk up, straightening in my seat. “Why do you want to sell?”
“My son needs the money,” he replies.
“Richie?” I ask curiously. That’s his oldest, his namesake, and the one who can’t seem to keep himself out of trouble.
Rich shakes his head. “Daniel needs it. He’s going to go into marijuana production.”
A feather could knock me over at this news. Daniel is Rich’s other son, younger than Richie by three years, but a million times more mature, responsible, and successful. He’s a freaking CPA with his own firm.
“Marijuana production?” I can’t wrap my head around strait-laced Daniel doing this.
“It’s a fifty-billion-dollar-a-year industry, Finley. He’s going to invest with three others in an indoor grow facility. He just needs some cash upfront to get in on it.”
There’s no stopping my jaw from dropping. I’m not surprised Rich wants to help Daniel. He loves his kids. And there’s no judgment from me that Daniel wants to go into marijuana production. It’s completely legal here.
But I’m stunned Rich wants to sell the shop. It’s been his life for the last thirty-two years. It’s part of his identity.
“I just…” I stumble for the right words. “I just can’t believe you want out. I mean… this place is you, Rich. It’s your legacy, and I always sort of thought it would pass to Richie or Daniel.”