Grey nodded. “Fair enough,” he said. “Then it stays between you and me. Don’t worry about anything coming out of this. And if you want to keep it to yourself, try being more careful when you take the pills. Go to the bathroom, or something.”
I nodded and grinned, then stood up. It had been a long day. “Thanks. You mind if I clock out? These pills are pretty heavy-duty. I don’t think you want me wielding a knife, and Rafael’s holding down the fort, anyway.”
“Yeah, go ahead,” Grey said with a wave of his hand.
I ducked outside and took a deep breath of fresh air. I glanced toward the kitchen entrance but thought twice about going in and collecting my stuff. It would still be there tomorrow. Right now, I just needed to get home. But there was a problem: I wasn’t feeling awake enough to ride my bike, and even if I did, the throttle required a turning motion in my wrist that I didn’t feel up to.
Beau was on his way out of the kitchen, heading to a car. I shouted his name and waved to get his attention.
“You mind giving me a ride?” I asked, and he nodded, gesturing to the passenger side to indicate that I should get in.
I looked up at the restaurant as we drove away, thinking about Rafael in the kitchen.
He’d turned me in.
Not even stopped to listen to my explanation.
I wasn’t looking forward to my next day at work.
I could hear the shouting before I even walked inside the building. I rushed forward to grab the door and head inside, wondering if there was something I needed to be involved in.
It crossed my mind pretty quickly that maybe they were arguing aboutme.
I heard Rafael first, and saw him first, too, as I rounded the corner from the storage hallway to enter the kitchen proper.
“We can’t just let him get fired like this,” Rafael was saying. “It’s not right. He’s just a kid. And I get the feeling he really needed this job.”
“Who are we talking about?” I asked, shucking off my coat and glancing around. Beau and Ainslie were already here.
“It’s none of our business,” Ainslie whined, at the same moment that Beau and Rafael both gave me the answer: “Luca.”
“So, he was fired last night?” I asked. I’d had a feeling that it might have been the case when I didn’t see him during the whole getting-called-to-the-office thing.
“Grey told him to get out,” Rafael sighed. I noticed he was avoiding looking at me, but if he felt any surprise or guilt about seeing me, he didn’t show it. In fact, he was doing a pretty good job of hiding his face and his emotions entirely behind his glasses. “But it’s all over nothing. The customer was a grifter.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yeah, we’re sure,” Beau said. “I saw your plating. It was flawless.”
“Well, obviously.” I felt a swell of pride at his words – a swell that was quickly deflated by Rafael’s derisive snort. I shot him a look and then deliberately glanced away, not wanting to fuel whatever his problem was with me.
I looked carefully at Ainslie. He was messing around with something in the dishwashing nook – getting some of his tools cleaned off, I realized. He wasn’t taking part in the conversation, and it didn’t seem as though he wanted to.
“What do you think, Ainslie?” I asked.
He clattered a couple of knives down against the counter, a metallic sound that rang uncomfortably in my ears. “I think Grey does whatever he likes, and nothing we can say or do is going to stop him.”
“We can’t just give up,” Rafael insisted. "This is a member of our team.”
“He’s only been a member of the team for weeks, not years like the rest of us,” Ainslie countered.
And I had been there not even twenty-four hours more.
At least I knew where I stood with Ainslie, now. He wasn’t going to miss me for a single second if I lost the job to Rafael, it seemed.
I turned and started to head back into the storage hall, wanting to grab my whites and change.
“What about you?” Rafael asked, aiming the words at my back. He hadn’t faced me once during this whole conversation, but he seemed plenty bold enough to talk now I wasn’t looking at him. “We’re going to talk to Grey as soon as he gets in. Don’t you want to talk it over, discuss the evidence, so we can present a united front?”
