Page 49 of Bones

Aurora’s lips parted, and she placed her hand on my forearm, shaking her head. I offered her a small smile that died the moment I looked over to see Justin still standing there.

His jaw dropped. “You can’t do that.”

“Just did.”

“I didn’t know,” he repeated. “Why didn’t she just say something?”

I bolted up and got close. He might have been tall, but I was taller. And, like Kevin said, a scary motherfucker. Looming over him to see how he liked it, I roared, “Because she doesn’t owe you jack-shit, asshole. Now get the hell out of here before I’m the one calling the cops.” I took another step closer and lowered my voice. “And that’s if you’re lucky.”

He scurried back, a scared, cowering pussy. His pleading gaze moved to whoever was behind me.

“You heard him,” Chris said.

Shit.

I didn’t regret the decision. Especially when I saw the shame coating Aurora’s red face before she dropped it to stare at herknees. Witnessing that, I was tempted to throw Justin through the damn window we’d paid a fortune to have etched.

Rage or not, though, firing a sous chef without the head chef’s input was bad form.

“You can’t threaten or insult your employees. It’s a hostile work environment,” Justin blustered. “I’ll sue and own this place.”

“Hostile? I didn’t witness anything hostile,” Chris drawled. “Did you, Kevin?”

“Not from Deke. Justin, though?” Kev gave a low whistle. “That’s gonna make it hard to give a good reference.”

“Fuck all of you.” Justin stormed into the back with Kevin following close to make sure he didn’t cause any more problems on his way out.

“Be in to talk with you in a minute,” I told Chris.

“You fix the stock order?” At my chin lift, he said, “Then nothing else we need to talk about.”

I waited until he left before lowering myself next to Aurora again. I touched the dirty sleeve. “You check out the garden?”

Her wet eyes dropped to the smudges before her lids drifted closed, hiding the guilt she clearly felt.

Wrong.

It’s all wrong.

Hiding.

Wrong.

Unease bristled in my gut, but I pushed it down to deal with later. “It’s fine, baby. It’s the same here as at the house. You can go where you want. Touch what you want.”

My food I create with my own two hands.

My garden I grow with my own two hands.

Me.

She gave a little scoff.

I set my cell in front of her so she could type.

I got cold, so I went to grab the hoodie. I shouldn’t have touched your garden, but I couldn’t help it. Sorry.

“Touch all you want. You also wanna pull any weeds that you spot, I won’t complain about that.”

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