His eyes narrowed. His hawkish nose looked particularly sharp in that moment. “The reason doesn’t matter. If you were responsible, you would have left home sooner and taken an earlier bus.”
“But—”
This time Samantha’s defense was cut off by Kendrick’s voice. She jumped a little, not realizing he’d come back into the kitchen and to the office until she heard him speak.
“It’s all right, Samantha. I’m sorry you lost your job. But we’ll help you find something else. We take care of our own. And we have all the evidence we need to proceed with our case.”
She was about to ask what in the world he was doing but stopped when her eyes fell on the shiny golden badge he was holding.
“Who are you? And you can’t be back here!” her boss cried.
“I’ll address the question first,” Kendrick said, lowering his badge and stepping closer. “My name is A.C. Slater. I’m with the Health Department—Law Enforcement Division. We approached Ms. Mayfield weeks ago, asking her to get us evidence and feed us information.” He shook his head as he clucked his tongue. “You’re in a lot of trouble.” He turned around, stepped into the doorway, and made a show of looking out into the kitchen. “She’s found enough violations to trigger a formal inspection. I mean, just look at that grill!”
“The grill?” Mr. Tress said, hurrying to look for himself but accidentally bumping into Kendrick’s back.
Kendrick spun around and cast a deadly serious gaze down at the diminutive man. “Whoa there. Assaulting a Health Department officer isseriousbusiness.”
Tress threw his hands up. “I didn’t mean to… assault you.” He spit out the last two words as if they tasted bad.
“I’m going to let it slide. This time.” He shook his head and then turned around, placing his hands on his hips. “That grill. You’ll have to deep clean it if you want any chance of passing tomorrow and not getting shut down.”
Tress was white as a sheet. “The inspection is tomorrow?”
Kendrick just nodded.
“But… I only have one waitress now that I fired Samantha. They can’t deep clean the grill! They have customers to wait on!”
Samantha nearly laughed when Kendrick shrugged and said, “That’s not my problem. If I were you, I’d get to cleaning. And Imean every square inch. If you even want a shot at passing the inspection.”
Mr. Tress smiled as pleasantly as Samantha had ever seen him. His voice was syrupy-sweet as he said, “I was too hasty in firing you. Please. You can have your job back.”
For a moment, she was tempted to accept the offer. Even scrubbing an oven all night would be better than being jobless.
But one look at Kendrick told her what he wanted. She fought back a smirk as she read his eyes.
Daddy didn’t want her working there. She didn’t know what she’d do, but she trusted him.
“Sorry. You fired me. I don’t think I want to work here, anyway,” she said.
The look on Mr. Tress’s face was priceless. Samantha couldn’t wait to get out of there so she could double over in laughter.
“Please! I’ll raise your pay by… eh… let’s say fifty percent!”
“Sorry, Mr. Tress. I’m out.”
She brushed past Daddy. For a moment, she wondered if he’d forget the act and take her hand to escort her back to his truck. But he stayed in character, nodded curtly, and said, “Ms. Mayfield. Thank you again.”
She could hear Mr. Tress groaning as she left. As down-to-business as he was, he was probably already looking for the cleaning supplies so he could get started scrubbing that grill. He’d be working half the night!
Outside, Samantha waited for Kendrick who came out about two minutes later.
They got in the truck.
“A.C. Slater?”
He put his seatbelt on. “Yeah. I don’t know why my mind automatically went toSaved by the Bell. But I knew I couldn’t say Zach Morris. He was the blond, white guy.”
She laughed. Her facial expression turned serious as she said, “You kept a badge?”
