Publisher's Synopsis
A clumsy mistake. A priceless debt. A love story tied in knots.
Lotte van Dijk, a brilliant cultural anthropologist and a walking disaster, is swallowed whole by the chaos of Tokyo. Her mission: to write her thesis on subtle acts of urban rebellion. Her reality: getting hopelessly lost. She finds refuge in Misho, a minimalist café that is a quiet sanctuary from the city's roar. But in a horrifying moment of jet-lagged clumsiness, Lotte shatters not just a priceless vase, but the heart of the café's stoic, beautiful, and intensely private owner.
Shun Takahashi's life is a fortress of quiet rituals and controlled beauty. The celadon vase, the last perfect thing his mother ever made, was the soul of his café. Now, faced with its glittering green shards and the mortified, chaotic woman responsible, he makes a demand. Lotte cannot pay for the vase with money. She will pay with her time. She will work for him, a clumsy indentured servant in his world of perfect, silent order.
Forced to work side-by-side, the unspoken tension between them simmers, a heat more potent than any espresso machine. Lotte, who came to study rebellion, finds herself captivated by the quietest rebel of all-a man who communicates in the language of coffee, art, and the intricate philosophy of rope. When Shun offers a lesson not in punishment, but in the profound beauty of trust, surrender, and the art of the perfect knot, Lotte realizes the debt she owes is nothing compared to what she stands to gain.
But just as their fragile trust begins to mend, a rival from Shun's past emerges, threatening to expose his most private philosophies and twist them into a public scandal. And to make matters worse, Lotte and Shun discover they're not just boss and intern-they're direct competitors for the one grant that can secure both of their futures. Can a bond forged in guilt and tied in silk survive the bright, ugly glare of the outside world?
For fans of grumpy/sunshine romance, forced proximity, and steamy, philosophical kink, Matcha and Mischief is a heart-stoppingly tender and cathartic love story about how the most beautiful things can be born from the most disastrous breaks.
