Mocha, She Wrote by Ellie Alexander

Author:Ellie Alexander
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Publishing Group

Chapter Sixteen

“How did Benson get you involved in the Barista Cup?” I asked, hoping my tone matched my passive expression.

“He recruited a bunch of us back in the day.” Sammy pushed her purse to the side. She rubbed her forearms repeatedly as if we were in the middle of a Siberian snowstorm.

“Is everything okay?” I asked.

She took another bite of the cake, stabbing her fork with force to break off a piece of the light and airy slice. “I can’t find my medication. My doctor prescribed a pill that helps me relax during competitions.”

That wasn’t a shocker. Sammy’s fierce approach to the Barista Cup would definitely fray her nerves. What I did wonder was whether the missing medication could be linked to Benson’s murder.

“It’s missing?”

She rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah, I must have left them at the hotel.”

I dropped the subject for the moment. “Anyway, what were you saying about Benson encouraging you to compete?”

“That was the way things went when the Cup started. Listen, this is when the coffee scene was underground. You had to know the right people or get invited. It wasn’t the free-for-all it is now. There were no newbies. The Cup was reserved for the best of the best. I’m talking about baristas who lived and breathed coffee and understood the science, history, and culture that goes into each cup. I mean, any barista from Starbucks, or one of the big corporate coffee chains, can compete today, which is total crap if you ask me.”

“Really, so Benson recruited baristas?” That seemed odd. Why would a judge recruit contestants? I didn’t bother to respond to Sammy’s commentary on who should or should not be allowed to compete in the challenge. I could tell that she and I likely had opposing viewpoints on that issue. Although her words may not have completely spelled it out, I suspected she her choice of “newbie” was a dig at Andy.

Sammy answered my question before I’d had a chance to voice it. “He started the Barista Cup, you know that, right? It’s common knowledge.”

“No, I didn’t know that.” That wasn’t entirely true, but I wanted to hear what she had to say.

“Yeah. It was his baby.” Sammy stopped short of saying duh.

“It sounded like it still was his baby.”

“Yeah. He was pretty protective of the Cup. But he deserved to be. He built it from nothing to what it is today. You could say that he helped make coffee a trend. He was the Seattle Times food critic for years. Seattle was the hub of the coffee scene then. That’s where Starbucks started. Seattle’s Best, Tully’s, Caffe Vita. All the big players in coffee originated in Seattle. Once that trend started to take off, Benson began writing and reviewing coffee shops just like restaurants. He was one of the first critics to make the shift.”

“I had no idea.” I took a drink of Sequoia’s frothy almond milk latte. The almond milk gave the coffee a light texture and brought out the nutty undertones in the roast.

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