Page 97 of The Thief Who Saved Christmas

She gives me a level look, and for half a second, I think she’s going to kick me out on my ass. And then she laughs hoarsely. “You handled those kids’ questions well. You’re hired. Provisionally. Clean up your mouth.”

“I’m hired?” I ask excitedly, because I’d mostly expected this was a one-and-done situation.

“Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Three p.m. until closing.” She pauses, chewing her gum with a thoughtfullook on her face. “That kid who pulled off your beard…his mother brought him over before they left.”

“Did you rap his knuckles with a ruler?” I ask, mostly because that was the favorite punishment of one of my foster mothers.

She ignores the question and says, “He let on that some guy came up to him. Gave him twenty bucks to pull off your beard. Maybe it was just one of those schmucks who like to cause trouble for the fun of it, maybe not. I figured you should know, either way.”

“Did he say what the guy looked like?” I ask. One summer, I got it into my head that I wanted to get the honey out of a bee colony I found at the park. But when I knocked it over, hundreds of bees flew up around me. This moment feels a little like that, except the bees are caught inside my skull.

There was someone following us earlier, I’m sure of it.

What if it was Roark, and he’s decided to be a problem after all?

But he wouldn’t have given a kid cash to pull off my beard. He’d have told me to get my head out of my ass and then pushed me into the back of an unmarked car.

So it must be…

Weston.

All the anxiety I had fifteen seconds ago is burned away by rage. Weston has been watching us. I’m guessing he hired someone to do it, because the car that was following us earlier wasn’t his. Anabelle would have recognized it if it had been. Besides, the guy driving it was too good at trailing us.

She lifts a shoulder carelessly and chuckles. “He said it was some blond guy who looked like a pencil.”

Weston himself. That tracks. A private investigator would follow a couple of people, but he wouldn’t give a kid a twenty to pull off a store Santa’s beard.

I’d laugh if I weren’t so pissed off. I’m not going to let Ole Westie get away with this. I’m going to go have a talk with him.

“So…you want the job?” she asks, popping her gum.

“Yes.”

I head for the door, and my hand is on the handle when she asks, “What do you really want to do, kid? We both know this won’t hold you for long.”

“Maybe I don’t want to be held for long,” I lie.

She holds my gaze, her face completely no-nonsense even though there’s a piece of bubble gum on her cheek.

I tap my cheek, showing her where it got stuck, and she shakes her head. “Don’t care much about that. You get to be my age, you don’t worry about your appearance anymore. Not like you, stud. But you’ve got a pretty girlfriend, and it seems to me that you’re a man who’s trying to turn his life around. So what do you want to do?”

I release the door handle, shocked. Why would a stranger care this much about my failure to plan properly?

“I think I might like to work at a restaurant. I like to cook.”

She sniffs. “Restaurant work will cure you of that dream quick enough.”

“Did working here cure you of liking kids?”

“No,” she says with a smile. “I’ll always like the little delinquents. You know, one of my old foster kids runs a restaurant about fifteen, twenty minutes away. I don’t think he needs anyone right now, but I’ll talk to him.”

“Why?”

I didn’t mean for it to sound so raw, but a million different emotions are rolling around inside of me.

“I like you, kid. I sense you could use a break. Everyone needs a break sometimes. But no more swearing. The last thing I need is a parade of parents showing up at dawn. The kids, I like. The parents, I could do without.”

“Thank you, Ada,” I say, feeling choked up. “I’ll be here Friday.”

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