Sharing Steven - A Tale of Roles and Passion (The Education of Steven - Book 1) by Marilyn Owens

By Marilyn Owens
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person. If you are reading this nook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, the please return to Amazon.com and purchases your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work for the author.
     
    Copyright © 2013  CDH Publishing
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                  “Hello, Steven.”
                  “Hi, ma’am! Wh-what can I get for you today?”
                  “I’ll have what I normally do, if you wouldn’t mind, Steven.”
                  The strapping, slightly scruffy young man standing in front of Celeste at the coffee shop’s register swallowed and looked away as he punched in a few numbers on the register.
                  “Sure…” he mumbled, furtively looking around to see if any of his co-workers were looking.
                  Celeste smiled in satisfaction, flipping her silky auburn hair over her shoulder. She turned to the side and leaned against the counter a bit. “That’s not going to be a problem, is it?”
                  Steven shuddered. He avoided looking at her and pretended to diddle with the order processing on the register’s screen even though he only had to click a simple button to have Celeste’s mocha latte made in the back of the shop. It wasn’t that he was embarrassed, but exasperated; the beautiful woman standing in front of him had asked him for the same order every day. That in itself wasn’t too big of a deal, but over the last few months, she’d somehow learned his name and the fact that he paid attention to her enough to remember exactly what she wanted and how she wanted it.  She knew , but she hardly acknowledged it of him. She left him every day wondering “What does she want with me?”
                  As Steven continued fiddling with his register, he angrily cursed himself internally. I’m probably just making this whole thing up. She doesn’t like me, she’s just amused because she knows I like her. Why must she be so teasing, and why am I so afraid to ask her own? For some reason, the way she asks me to make her coffee…it…it embarrasses me. I don’t want the guys in the back to know how I’m so whipped over one chocolaty coffee drink…
                  And perhaps the biggest bash on Steven’s pride was a sign hanging over the counter at his place of work: “Our employees are not responsible for knowing your “usual”. Give your name, your order, and help us move the line along!”
                  Celeste, Steven guessed, had read the sign; she was a frequenter, after all. She seemed perfectly intelligent enough to read, likely fluent in English…perhaps even a little too articulate, too good with words to be playing with a frazzled young man’s mind. She would always smirk at him, her pallid and moist lips lightly dashed with sparkling pink lipstick. Her gaze nearly always scratched and clawed underneath his clothes like she’d never seen him before; Steven could have sworn it. Steven wore the same Bean-Bean Café smock every day, but she was always particularly fascinated.
                  At the tender age of twenty-five, no woman had ever given him that type of look before. He’d had his girlfriends, but even the long-term flings throughout college weren’t nearly as invigorating as his 9:10 mocha latte-ordering regular.
                  Celeste’s eyes were a piercing hazel, striking and dangerous. Beneath it rested a petite nose with a slight upturn—a doll-like quirk Steven loved most about her. She had a slim but curvaceous physique, often modestly covered up in a purple turtleneck. She dressed