“Here you go, Jenny.” Wanda handed her some folded bills. “This is for last week, but are you sure you have enough time to double up on the brownies and make an extra couple of apple pies all by Saturday’s lunch rush?”
“I really don’t like accepting that, Wanda.” Jenny shook her head. “It’s not right. Y’all allow me to do what I love and not have the food go to waste.”
Wanda grabbed Jenny’s hand and pressed the money into it. “And how long can you afford to buy ingredients if you don’t get paid?”
“But you always give me the entire price you charge the customers. At least keep the profit for you and DeeDee. Please? I love working here at Assjacket Diner. I feel guilty taking extra money home.”
“Don’t argue with your elders, dear. It’s not proper,” DeeDee said with a wink as she walked by carrying a gray tub of dirty dishes. The swinging doors squeaked on their hinges as she passed through them.
Jenny watched until the squeaking stopped. She’d practically grown up in this diner. She’d helped Wanda and DeeDee the minute she was tall enough to reach the register—per their rule. Prior to that, she’d happily filled ketchup bottles and stocked the tables with salt, pepper, and sugar packets.
She tucked the cash in the back pocket of her jeans, rolling her eyes at Wanda. “I’m never going to win this money argument, am I?”
The older shifter grinned. “Nope. So stop insulting us. It’s just a damn good thing you witches have such a crazy fast metabolism, or we’d need to have Mac build Assjacket a gym.” She nodded toward the coffee machine. “Do you have anything you need to add to my order for next week? Coffee, creamers, anything?”
She pulled the black book from her apron and opened it up. Cash on one side, her order pad on the right, Jenny handed a piece of scratch paper to Wanda.
“You ordered plenty of everything else last week. But Roger must have had a rough week. He was in every morning and afternoon, so we’re low on the peppermint creamer he loves so much. Other than that, we’re good to go.”
“You’re the best, Jenny. I’ll have it for Roger by tomorrow at three p.m. Now you go, take that book about Hawaii home, put your feet up, and relax. And, dear, you really should consider finally taking a vacation. You’re young and single, and it’s beautiful there.”
Jenny felt the panic constrict her breathing as her heart started racing at the mere thought. There was no way she could take a plane. She couldn’t afford to add extra expenses to a vacation when all she had to do was transport for free. The hotel and food would eat up any savings she had accumulated. There was also no way she could tell anyone she was deathly scared to leave her small town.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Wanda took the piece of paper and went on about her business. The dinner rush had been the same crowd as expected, her father included. Jenny had sold every cookie and brownie she’d brought in, plus almost both pies were gone. All she had left to do was cash out and leave her tickets and the diner’s money in the small safe on the shelf under the register.
“Damn it,” she whispered to herself as she counted her tickets and made notes for Wanda and DeeDee.
She’d put the book under the counter with her wallet and phone, right by the safe. No wonder Wanda knew it was hers. So much for being in the clear. Her father hadn’t even mentioned it was missing when she’d spoken to him at dinner. She exchanged her belongings on the shelf, folding her apron up for tomorrow.
“Well, fuck a duck,” Jenny mumbled as she opened the door to the fresh air and setting sun. She had a car, but her small home was a quick stroll from the diner, so most days, she walked everywhere she needed to go. Except for Zelda and Mac’s house, anywhere Jenny needed to go was within a one-mile radius of her home.
“No, Bill, really, it’s not a bother. I can get a hotel. I don’t want to put you and Lessy out.” Joshua tried for a third time to get that through his best friend’s thick head.
He heard some shuffling on the other end of the line and a female voice in the distance. Failing miserably at multitasking, Joshua spun his white leather desk chair away from his laptop and the spreadsheet he was screwing up while trying to make plans to visit West Virginia.
“Was that Lessy? Did I hear her correctly? Your town doesn’t have a resort, a hotel? Not even a bed-and-breakfast?”
His visions of a countryside cabin in the quiet small town vanished. He forgot most of the immortal world lived in such places as Assjacket, hidden away in plain sight. Mortals either didn’t know about those towns or didn’t choose to stop at such dilapidated little blips on the radar when passing them on the highway. Places that weren’t even on the maps of people who measured time in days, months, and years with an absolute end to life as they knew it.
Joshua understood he was lucky to live a lavish lifestyle among those who were not like himself, and he’d been taught to blend in perfectly with the mere mortals he did business with or saw while traveling. His magic was completely controlled, never used around the house for simple things such as cleaning his room. Their staff would suspect something, a risk his father absolutely forbade. It was the one hard and fast rule his parents had pressed upon him early on. The older Joshua became, the wiser he was about the reasons behind it.
He preferred living out in the open, with gorgeous homes, cars, tailors, five-star restaurants, and delicious bakeries. His one true downfall? Coffee. He was an absolute coffee snob, and he’d rather drink a disgusting Goddess-forsaken soda than the tar some places tried to pass off as his much-needed liquid octane. Only organic whole beans freshly roasted and ground before each cup and coconut milk steamed and frothed to perfection with a drizzle of caramel syrup over the top for him.
His coffee infatuation was the one place in his life where his parents allowed magic to seep in, but only since he had commercial-grade machines in both his bedroom suite and his home office, to keep up the show for the staff, of course. If he was alone, he could simply snap his fingers and have the steaming mug appear in his palms. It was a complete pain in his ass if he actually had to make it by hand. And the caramel… Too little was gross, and too much… He’d thrown out more than one mug of coffee because he’d had a heavy hand while pouring it.
As there were no hotels or resorts in Assjacket, there was absolutely no way in Goddess’s blood-orange fiery pit of hell he could go an entire day without a perfect cup of caffeine. Bill was so excited, Joshua could hear it in the other man’s voice. How could he back out on him now? He’d brushed his friend off for business and travel so many times, he really was starting to feel like the asshole others claimed him to be. He’d simply forgotten all about the lifestyle change Bill and Lessy had adopted. For him, it was the equivalent of an episode of one of those shows about leaving a large home and moving into a place the size of a shoebox. Joshua shuddered at the mental picture.
“All right. All right, fuck a duck, you win, I’ll stay with the two of you. I really appreciate it.” Joshua rolled his neck from side to side, then rested his head against the back of his chair.
How bad could it be? Have a couple of beers, stay the night—one night—and fake an urgent meeting he had to excuse himself to get to, with a sincere apology, of course, for leaving earlier than he’d planned on.
They said their good-byes and ended their call. His mother was outside, tending to her beloved flowers. He suddenly felt ugly on the inside. The call with Bill made him realize he was acting like a spoiled trust fund brat, despite his career and own fortune he’d earned.