Dead Cold Brew

One

Sixty years later . . .

A pelting rain transformed the Village Blend's French windows into tiny, wood-framed waterfalls. I pulled my sweater tight against the autumn chill and considered the predawn clouds.

Sure, the weather was lousy, and it was the first day of another long workweek, but (all due respect to the Carpenters) I utterly refused to let rainy days or Mondays get me down.

Why should they? I was back home in New York, once again managing my beloved Greenwich Village coffeehouse and living in the same city as the man I loved. Everything felt so right, what could possibly go wrong-other than my opening team calling in late?

Hey, an easy enough problem to handle.

Switching tunes, I swayed across the restored plank floor to the "Rhythm of the Rain." Humming the old Cascades hit, I pulled upside-down chairs from the cafŽ tabletops, setting things right as I went.

Next I calibrated the espresso machine, restocked our dairy products, and accepted the pastry delivery. I was about to kindle a blaze in the brick hearth to dispel the dampness when my phone buzzed.

"Madame? I'm surprised you're awake. It's only-"

"Six fifteen am. I'm well aware of the time, dear."

"Is everything all right?"

"That's the question I have for you."

"Excuse me?"

"Something's not right with Matteo."

I almost laughed. "And you just figured that out?"

"Don't crack wise at this hour, Clare. Withstanding wit takes at least two pots of coffee, and I'm only on my first."

"That's not wit. It's crankiness. I haven't had any coffee yet."

"Then you have my sympathy, but not my surrender."

"What makes you think there's a problem with our intrepid coffee hunter?"

"I'm his mother. I can sense these things. Didn't you-with Joy?"

"Plenty. But mostly in her teen years . . ."

Which made me reconsider my employer's concern, given my ex-husband's penchant for acting like an overgrown adolescent (seeking thrills and shunning consequences).

"Okay, you got me. How can I help?"

"If you wouldn't mind using that snooping sense of yours to fact find for me, I'd appreciate it."

How could I say no? Matteo Allegro and I were no longer partners in marriage, but thanks to his mother, we were now coupled in business.

Not that it happened overnight.

After Matt and I split, I spent ten years in the quiet suburbs of New Jersey, raising my young daughter through grade school and high school, Girl Scouts and girlfriends, broken toys and broken hearts-until she headed back to the city on her own, a confident young woman, ready for Manhattan's crowded streets and one of the country's best culinary schools.

I'd hardly had time to mourn my empty nest before Matt's mother called with a generous arrangement. She hired me back into the Allegro family firm, not only as a manager and master roaster, but also as a partner and heir.

Now my ex-husband and I had good reasons to put the past behind us. Not just for ourselves, but for Joy, because it was our deepest wish to leave this thriving coffee business as a legacy to our daughter.

Once again, the Village Blend was the center of my life, along with its diverse blend of customers-from young hipsters to senior hippies; aspiring actors to investment bankers; NYU students to nearly every badge working the Sixth Precinct of the NYPD.

We all depended on Matt to source the best coffees in the world. So if he had a problem, it had the potential to hurt our entire business.

"I'll see what I can find out, Madame. I promise."

"Good."

I stifled a yawn.

"You sound tired. Are you getting enough sleep?"

"That community board meeting last night went on forever, and the official from Sanitation refused to move the Dumpsters from that vacant building down the block. He says the property is private and it's the owner's responsibility, but the owner halted renovations and left the country. Now partying kids are using the Dumpsters to boost themselves onto the fire escape and up to the roof. The police can't waste officers babysitting a Dumpster 24/7. But the city should do something before someone gets hurt . . ."

Madame listened until I was tired of hearing myself vent. She then reminded me that bureaucracies were like bus routes: "Wait a little while and a better driver will come along . . ."

Shifting subjects, her voice suddenly dropped an octave-a tone I only heard when she felt grave concern.

"Clare . . . have you seen the newspapers this morning?"

"No. I just came down to open when you called."

"Well, when you do, I'm here for you."

"You're there for me? Why? What's in the papers?"

When she demurred on saying anything more (except a hasty good-bye), I gritted my teeth and gazed longingly at the espresso machine. A double wouldn't be enough. I could tell already-

This was going to be a triple-shot day.

Two

Fifteen minutes later, my ex-husband buzzed for entry.

Matt was drenched and shivering from the chilly downpour, an irony considering his tropical tan and the designer sunglasses dangling from his T-shirt's neckline.

I opened the door with one hand while closing my mouth around a buttermilk-tender sample of our new Farmhouse Apple Cake Muffins, my own recipe with the baker's addition of Cinnamon-Vanilla Glaze. (The perfect kiss of spice and sweetness; the very description I'd used for Matt's smooches, once upon a time. If not for his compulsive need to spread them around the globe-the kisses, not the glaze-we still might be husband and wife.)

"Your mother and I were just talking about you," I informed him while licking my fingers clean.

"And this is news? Now are you going to let me in or let me drown?"

I stepped aside, and he moved through the doorway, dripping Niagara.

"I thought you were still in Costa Rica for the harvest."

"I was, and I'm going back. Urgent business forced me to take a red-eye from Juan Santamaria to JFK . . ."

As he spoke, he shrugged out of his hooded Windbreaker and hand-combed his disheveled, dark hair. That's when I smelled something far less appealing than apples and cinnamon.

"Well that explains it."

"Explains what?"

"Why you're so . . . shall we say pungent? You're suffering from jet lag."

"I've been back for two days."

"Is there a plumbing problem at Casa Breanne?" (That seemed doubtful. Matt's fashionable wife ran her personal life with the same zealous efficiency as she ran her fashionable magazine.) "The Queen of Trend usually keeps you pampered with the latest fancy soap and designer cologne."

Matt sniffed his shirt and frowned. "I'll shower at the health club later."

"I'd suggest sooner. Unless the hot new trend is eau de body odor."

"Very funny. Now thank me. I brought over your consignment in the van."

"From the warehouse? Why were you in Red Hook at the crack of dawn?"

"I told you I had business to take care of. And so do you." He draped his sopping Windbreaker over a chair near the now-crackling fireplace and waved me over to the coffee bar. "Sit. And brace yourself for another reason to thank me, because I have news. Big news."

I resisted the temptation to roll my eyes. The last time Matt had "big news" it involved his honorary judgeship at a Panamanian beauty contest.

While Matt pulled us fresh shots, I checked my watch. "Will you please get on with it? My morning baristas are late, I still have to mop up that ocean you dripped, and we open in twenty minutes-"

"I know that. Who do you think managed this place while you were playing footsie with the flatfoot in DC?"

"You now have ten seconds to tell me-"

"Okay!" He slid my espresso across the bar. "Drink up and listen. The Village Blend has been asked to create an exclusive signature coffee blend for a brand-new luxury cruise liner."

I blinked. "You're right. That is huge."

"It's huger than huge . . ." He took the stool next to mine, dark eyes gleaming. "Think of it, Clare. A luxury cruise liner carrying thousands of passengers every year, all of them drinking our coffee. Think of what it will do for our brand. All we need to do is come up with an affordable version of your Billionaire Blend . . ."

Creating the world's finest (and most expensive) coffee blend had thrust this century-old business into an international spotlight, so I shouldn't have been all that surprised at this chance to supply a luxury cruise liner. In terms of volume, however, that rarefied "Billionaire" roast was a Lilliputian part of our bottom line, available to a select group of elite clientele, only a few times a year.

Matt was clearly proposing a broader opportunity. I could already imagine contented travelers sipping an exclusive Village Blend espresso while gazing out at the Atlantic-or was it the Pacific?

"When and where will this ship sail?"

"There's a shakedown cruise next week, she goes from New York to Nova Scotia and back, staff only to work out the kinks. Then she tests passengers on short hops before embarking on ports of call in the Med and United Arab Emirates, where the real money is."

"I'll need some inspiration for this blend. What's the ship called?"

"The Andrea Doria."

I stared at my ex long enough to comprehend his reply. Then I punched him.

"Ouch!" He rubbed his arm. "What was that for?!"

"I'm barely awake. We're about to open. And you waste my time with a stupid joke?"

"It's no joke!"

I blinked at the man, wondering when he'd switched from caffeine to crack. "You want me to come up with a boffo coffee blend to serve on a ship sitting two hundred feet below the Atlantic?"

"Clare, are you nuts?"

"Me?" I clamped my hands on his muscular shoulders. "The Andrea Doria hasn't carried passengers since before we were born. She was struck on her way to New York and sank to the bottom of the ocean!"

Three

With the patience of a professor explaining thermodynamics to a chimpanzee, Matt informed me that he was not talking about the sunken flagship of the Italia Line.

"This will be a brand-new replica of the Andrea Doria. Get it now?"

"A replica?" I sat back, appalled. "Why rebuild a sunken ship? That's bad luck!"

"Oh, please. That's your nonna talking. Don't be so Old World."

"Excuse me, but I'll take Old World charm over New World smarm any day."

"Fine, then create the coffee as a matter of honor. The original Andrea Doria was the pride of Italy."

"That's your argument? The same come-on as every restaurant in Esquilino. 'Prego, prego. Our pasta is the pride of Italy!'"

"You can't compare the tourist traps of Rome to the Andrea Doria! That ship was a jewel on the ocean. Gourmet food. Top-notch service. Celebrity passengers, even royalty. Her decks were decorated with original art and sculpture, all of it lost when she went down. She was a beauty that deserves resurrection-and a loaded investor decided to do just that."

Matt waved his smartphone. "I want you to see something."

A few taps, and we were watching a prospectus documentary with a smooth storyteller talking up his dream come true, a new, ultramodern Andrea Doria that closely resembled the original-but with Wi-Fi, spa, fitness facilities, and other amenities today's travelers expected.

"Who is this narrator?"

"That's Victor Fontana, head of the consortium that built the ship. He's some kind of investor with a playboy reputation in Europe. You'll meet him soon, but we've already made an impression. Fontana is one of our regular Billionaire Blend customers-it's how we got this opportunity."

Matt froze the screen. "That's him."

Dressed with casual elegance, Victor Fontana's impressive appearance matched his reputation. Fortyish with an aquiline nose and direct chin, the man projected relaxed confidence and sharp intelligence, an attractive combination I'd seen often, in my recent brushes with the upper echelons of high tech.

Intense purpose shined in his aquamarine eyes, an aggressive energy nicely softened by boyish, Harry Potter glasses, shaggy brown "surfer" hair, and a crookedly enthusiastic grin.

"Fontana announced this plan last July," Matt continued. "He timed the replica's launch to coincide with the sixtieth anniversary of the original Andrea Doria's sinking. They're a few months behind schedule, but the superstructure of the new ship is finally completed. Now she's outfitted, and he's preparing to unveil her to the world."

"I don't know . . . It still feels wrong."

"This is a lucrative opportunity. Once in a lifetime. Are you going to let superstition drive your business decisions?"

"Don't put it like that."

"It is like that. You can use logic or cast runes and visit a palm reader. Which is it going to be?"

I hated to admit it, but I was out of arguments. No matter what I thought of the project, it was a tempting offer. Someone was going to supply the coffee to that ship. Why not the Village Blend?

At my reluctant thumbs-up, Matt clapped his hands. "Good decision!"

"Not so fast." I grabbed his damp tee as he tried to dash away. "I still have questions. For starters, if this is a true replica, the ship's galley may be re-creating the original menus. What kind of coffee did the Andrea Doria serve?"

Matt sat back down. "As far as I know, the surviving menu lists 'Italian and American coffees.'"

"That's it? No other details?"

He shrugged.

"Then I'll have to do research."

"We don't have time for that! Look, it's a luxury cruise liner, filled with sophisticated travelers who know quality when they taste it. Just create a versatile, premium blend that brews up rich, sweet espressos, magnificently complex cups of French press, and a smooth, clean cold brew."

"And while I'm at it, I'll cure the common cold and compose a thesis on the meaning of life."

"It's a tall order, I admit. But you have two weeks."

"Two weeks?!"

"Or we forfeit to the other roasters."

"Other roasters?!"

"Did I forget to mention this is a competition? There are five roasters in all, four of them European. We're the only Americans invited to participate, so it's double the honor."

"Oh, Matt, you made this sound like a sure thing."

"It is a sure thing. All you have to do is come up with an Andrea Doria blend that will blow those investors away, present it to the judges, and we're in."

"I don't know . . ."

"You can do it. Come on. Remember, I went along with that whole Billionaire Blend project, despite the fact that it took up too much of my time and failed to deliver nearly as much profit as we'd hoped. Now I'm asking you to come through for me. I need the revenue. We need the revenue."