Chapter 2
Izzy jogged up the stairs of the office building where his parole agent, Mrs. Rossi, had her small office. The terms of his release couple of months ago were weekly meetings with Mrs. Rossi and keeping away from anyone that had anything to do with his past life.
Frankly, that wasn’t a problem in the least; Izzy wanted to see those people about as much as he wanted to jump out of a plane without a parachute.
At least Mrs. Rossi had told him that smoking weed sometimes was okay, but if she found anything else in his random drug tests, he’d go back in for the full sentence. At first, she’d been keen to forbid it completely as he didn’t have a medical marijuana license, but when he’d confessed that he used it for anxiety more than anything, she’d told him to stay inside the amounts he could have on his person by law and for fuck’s sake not to use anything else or swear to God. Her words, not his.
He knocked on her office door and got called inside immediately.
“Hey, I’m not late, am I?” he asked, knowing full well that he was on time, as always. It was one of his points of pride in life, always being on time if he could help it.
“Nope, sit down, Izzy.” Mrs. Rossi was in her fifties, sort of handsome for a woman, and she had a wicked deadpan sense of humor Izzy appreciated. She wasn’t motherly in the least, more like the fun wine aunt who had stopped drinking, got a bit cranky because of it and was currently trying to deal with the help of generous amounts of caffeine.
He took a seat in the very uncomfortable chair in front of her desk and waited for her to find something in the mass of papers in front of her.
“So, Istvan Kostas, how have you been?” she finally asked and raised her gaze to meet his.
She meant business, using his actual name like that, he just didn’t know what was going on yet. There was no cup to go piss in next to her keyboard like usual if she was going to surprise test him, so it wasn’t that.
“Eh, the usual. Hating the roommates, really wanting to get a dog, and all that,” he replied, but kept his tone much less flippant than it would be for someone else.
“Still no job?” She knew the answer, of course. She would’ve been his first call if he’d gotten a job.
“Nope. They’re all still not very keen on hiring an ex-con.” A fucking stupid one at that. Maybe if he’d been smarter, looked more neutral maybe?
“Well, I have a lead on a job you might like. It’s less than an hour away and I’ve managed to put some of my other parolees there before.” She tapped her short and blunt fingernails on the sheet of paper.
“Okay…?” But what was the catch? There always was one.
She sort of tilted her head and looked at him, as if she was trying to figure something out. Then her expression shifted into a “well, what the hell” type of one, and she asked, “How are you with the LGBTQ community, Izzy?”
Izzy blinked. “I don’t have anything against them, if that’s what you’re asking?” He didn’t have strong opinions. He knew he was a guy, had never been interested in anything but girls—not even in prison, which seemed to be where quite a few straight guys strayed—and that was about it.
“Okay, well, first of all the business is owned by Justin Abbot, he’s the husband of that celebrity chef, Del Abbot, you might’ve heard his name somewhere. Big on YouTube these days and so on.” She waved her hand dismissively. “Anyway, Justin owns an organic vegetable business. He has several greenhouses; I think six at the moment. They’re on the same property the family lives on though, so it’s not like a separate farming business somewhere.”
Izzy frowned. “What, and you’re afraid that I’ll flip out if I’m exposed to the gay?” He tried to control his tone, but it came out pissed off anyway.
“Izzy, you know what kind of people I deal with on the daily, right? You’re one of my easiest, best clients. Do you think I would send just anyone to work on the property of two gay men and their family, when I think at least one of their kids is underage?” Mrs. Rossi looked ticked off now.
“Yeah, of course not, I’m sorry,” Izzy conceded. “I know you are trying to do what’s right for everyone.” He sighed and let the tension out. “What’s the job?”
“Whatever they need and can train you to do inside the business. Might be anything from packing up produce to heavy lifting to deliveries if needed.”
Izzy tried to lean back a bit to make himself more comfortable. “So they sell to restaurants? I know that organic shit is expensive.”
“Yes, and they also have a small shop attached to the business, but they do charity work, too.”
Right, rich people and their “charity” work.
“They give ten percent of the produce out to poor families and homeless shelters each week,” she added as she finally handed him the paper.
Okay, Izzy had to give this Justin person some credit, rich or not.
The sheet in his hand stated working hours and potential housing on the property in case the worker was homeless or didn’t have a reliable vehicle. That might come in handy if he lost his shit at the house he shared with five other people who were all either ex-cons or kids who had aged out of the foster system.
“So you think I could do this?” he asked, looking at her over the edge of the paper.
He hated that he needed the validation, but she was the closest to a suitable authority figure for that he’d had in a decade.
