Chapter Twenty-Six
Tennyson
The new kitchen was just about ready for its official inspection. It amazed me how quickly things fell into place when Mr. Johnson decided to sell his empty building. Rumor had it he’d had offers upon offers for the place, which shared the city block with Just One Lick, but that he always rejected them unopened, saying it wasn’t time.
Little did we know that when he adopted his poodle-shepherd mix at our pet adoption event that when he said, “I think it is time,” he referred to selling the building and not to getting his fluffy ball of love.
Only three days later, he’d approached Greer about the space. It turned out he had been afraid the building would be taken over by a business that wouldn’t fit into the neighborhood. Between the shop and connecting him with his new fur baby, we apparently fit the bill.
The spot was ideal, and we spent weeks with planners, contractors, and people from the city getting all the necessary permits, but we were finally crossing the finish line. All that was left was the final inspection, and our new kitchen could be put to use.
“I’m nervous.” Greer waddled in from the back storage room. I’d never had a passing thought that waddling could be sexy, but the man worked it.
“It should all be a formality,” I assured him. “I have checked through the list more times than I care to count, and we have met or exceeded the guidelines.” I hoped. This was my first real task since going to work for my mate, and I needed to prove my worth.
Not that Greer had made me feel anything but an equal. No, he treated me like his partner in all ways, and I loved that about him. It was me who wanted to prove my worth to both him and myself.
I hadn’t completely shut down the idea of working in academia. Maybe I’d transfer my love of teaching to homeschooling one day or possibly tutoring local students. Or maybe I’d go back and work at the community college, but, for now, I wanted to be close to home and with my omega.
Home.
That was something I hadn’t ever truly recognized my need for until I found him, and now the word meant everything. Sure, we’d travel someday as a family. My days of wandering the world looking for something I couldn’t quite identify? Those were long past me.
“I’m still nervous,” he said. “Maybe a kiss will help.”
Who was I to deny a request from my omega? I stepped into his arms, or partway anyway, his bulging belly keeping me at a distance. I kissed him as deeply as possible at that angle, only to be interrupted by our wee one.
“You behave, little one. Papa needs a kiss,” I spoke softly to Greer’s belly before giving it a kiss.
“Awwwwww,” a new voice said from behind me, and I snapped around. “Sorry. I—the door was open, and you were so adorable.”
“’Tis true.” Greer smiled as I righted myself and took his hand. “I’ve got a keeper. You here for the inspection?”
“I am. Shall we begin?”
The inspector, whose name turned out to be Alex, looked at every nook and cranny of the place, asking random questions here and there and writing far more words on his clipboard than I was comfortable with. He checked every outlet, every permit, every faucet, and took temperatures of not only the freezers, but also the hot water. No detail was left unchecked. In the end, he handed us a certificate of occupancy and a bunch of other papers which equated to “open for business.” We would still need the health inspector to come in after we had everything in place for production, but Alex felt more than confident we were ready to go.
“Before I go, I need to ask— Are you— Oh, there is no unawkward way to ask this so here I am being not very politically correct. Do you have employees with physical limitations?” Alex looked down as if embarrassed.
“Umm no, why?” Greer asked holding his belly, which was moving beneath his shirt. Greer referred to it as “gymnastic time” when our baby went all-out mobile. That just could not be comfortable.
“Because you went to such lengths to make everything accessible, far beyond the requirements for an establishment of this size, so I thought maybe it was personal.” He bit his lip and then added, “I apologize for my inappropriate comments.”
Poor guy thought he’d upset us. He hadn’t, and Alex was right. I had paid attention to that stuff, mostly out of habit.
“I worked on a lot of ADA compliance stuff at the university,” I added to make him a little less uncomfortable. Really, he hadn’t done anything wrong, but me telling him that probably wasn’t going to be helpful. “It felt right to do so here while we were at it. We might have a small business, but that doesn’t mean we need to limit our employee pool based on lack of foresight to have counters at varying heights.”
Alex seemed much more relaxed when I gave my little spiel, and Greer puffed out all proud.
“Are you hiring now?” he asked as he packed his clipboard into his messenger bag.
“We wanted to be sure things passed first,” Greer answered, his eyes still on the certificate of occupancy.
“May I have an application, then?” Alex slipped the messenger bag over his shoulder. “Not for me. Obviously, I have a job, and you might not believe it from my babbling, but I am generally quite professional and strong at it.”
“Let me get an application.” Greer wandered out to the office to retrieve one. Sure, most places were all online with that process, but Greer decided meeting his applicants face-to-face was better, and I got that.
“My brother is looking for work. He has a bad leg and sometimes uses a walker or a chair, depending on the day.” Alex officially won my heart with that. “Chad has a degree from culinary school, but most kitchens are off-limits now.”
“Here you are.” Greer came waddling back in all sexy-like. “Should I keep my eye out for a particular name?” He handed the paper to Alex.
“Naw. He wouldn’t want to think my job had anything to do with why he did or didn’t get the position.” Alex slipped the paper in the bag. “Not that you would do that, but alpha pride and all.” Alex looked directly at Greer while he spoke as if an alpha couldn’t possibly understand. I hadn’t caught it, but I was pretty confident there had been some eye rolling.
“Chad,” I said as soon as Alex made his way out of the facility. “His brother’s name is Chad, and he is a culinary-school graduate with a bum leg or foot. Alex didn’t go into details.”
“Can we afford a real chef?” Greer wrinkled his nose the way he did when he was concentrating, and I could no longer concentrate because of it.
“Come here, sexy mate. We need to finish our kiss.”
“What brought that on?” he asked, his voice dropping an octave the way it did when he was all about the sexy times.
“You did that thing with your nose. I’d kiss it, but it is too far away with your belly,” I sassed as I dropped to my knees. “Looks like I may need to kiss you a little lower.”
And kiss him I did.