Page 38 of The Good Char
The teenage boy looked between me and my boss, his own face flaming as he mumbled his order before fidgeting in place, waiting for it to arrive.
With a grunt, Mr.Dzik went to the fryer and threw a corndog in.
I let out a nervous laugh to break the tension.“You’re our first customer of the day!Lucky you.We make our corndogs fresh to order.Have you been here before?Don’t forget to tell your friends about us!We open a little before lunch until the mall closes.”
“Yeah… I know,” he replied apprehensively when Dzik stood beside me and handed him his order with a glare.The poor kid audibly swallowed and ran away to the farthest table from The Good Char.
“He was a nice boy wasn’t he?We probably should throw a few more corndogs in, you know, in preparation for the lunch rush.Boys like him always hang out in groups and they eat a lot at that age,” I rambled.
“Why do you know so much about boys, Kimmy?”he growled and I blinked a few times, taken aback by his strange question.
“I-I don’t?I mean, these are things everyone knows, right?”
He narrowed his eyes and I could see the vein on his temple pulse.Why did it look so hot?
I opened my mouth to blabber about something else when another customer called for my attention.Phew!
“Hi there!Welcome to The Good Char!How may I help you?”I let out brightly.
A warm breath caressed the nape of my neck and my eyes fluttered.“This conversation is far from over, Kimmy.”
Chapter23
DZIK
I closedThe Good Char the moment she left work and rode off on her bicycle.
“Where do you think you’re going?Closing sporadically as much as you do, I’m surprised you’re still in business, Dick,” Justin called out from his side, his blue apron burning into my skull.
“Mind your business,” I grumbled.
“The same way you mind yours?”he pointed his tongs at me menacingly, leaning his thin frame in my direction from behind his counter.“Don’t think I forgot what you did to me.And I hired two new employees.”
“Good for you.Now, stop talking to me.”I turned off the neon sign, removed my apron and threw it on the back counter, heading toward the mall’s exit.
“Hey!You know there are rules to abide by!”Justin called out.“If there’s something iffy back there, don’t think I won’t call the health department on you.”
I back stiffened and in the next few seconds I found my hand fisting the front of his shirt, lifting him off his feet.He squealed like a dying pig when I bared my teeth in his face.
“Would you like to say that again, Justin?”I enunciated, ready to send him to see my former employee in the underworld.
“Y-You can’t threaten me.That’s a crime.I’ll call the cops!”
I slammed his head on his counter and growled beside his ear.“You go ahead and do that, Justin.I’ll make sure the only thing they find is your corpse stuffed with baked goods and a sign that says ‘thank you, come again’, do you understand?”
He shook and I slammed his head again, causing some of the remaining patrons to run away screaming.It was a slow weekday, so not too many stragglers hung around past dinner time.
“I’m not going to repeat myself,” I growled and he whimpered.Agreeing.“Good.Now that we have a clear understanding of each other, good luck with your new employees.Good ones are hard to come by.Tell me, did the other two get fired or did they go missing?”
I cackled as I tossed him back into his bay and walked away, uncaring of what his response was.
Was it a bluff?He would never know because I was done wasting my breath on a knucklehead sugar pusher like Justin fucking Reid.
Getting in my Camaro, I drove the familiar roads toward her apartment.
Our apartment.
A grin split my face when I saw her little bicycle parked outside.I slowly got out and went toward my bottom level apartment.The jackass landlord secured me an ideal location that was directly below hers with just a single floor separating us.
