Cliff looked down his straight nose at her. “Rodents.”
Dixie struck her indignant hands-on-hips pose. “I know what vermin are, Mr. Inspector. What I don’t understand is why someone would report seeingverminhere when we ain’t got no rats, no mice, no roaches, not even a skeeter. No nasty critters of any kind.” She gave him a narrowed look that broadcast she was staring at the only exception.
“Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.” Cliff hovered his pen above his clipboard.
“She’s my manager, Dixie Dobbs,” Noah huffed. “Come on. Let’s get this over with so we can get back to work.” He motioned for them to follow.
Hailey fell in behind, her feet like lead as they shuffled toward the kitchen. Before she got there, though, Cliff asked Noah to direct him to the pantry. “Where your dry goods are kept.”
“He knows what a pantry is,” Dixie snipped.
Noah jerked his head toward his closed office door. “Dixie, why don’t you go finish up that order?”
“I will not,” the stubborn woman shot back.
A muscle in Noah’s jaw jumped. “And maybe you can check to be sure I turned off the stove upstairs while you’re at it.”
Chance! He wants Dixie to make sure the dog can’t get out.Hailey resisted the urge to reach out and pinch her.
“But you never—” Dixie’s blue-eyeshadowed eyes widened. With a quick head bob, she turned and hustled toward his office.
Noah gestured Cliff and Hailey toward the pantry with a sweep of his hand. “Right this way,inspectors.” Icicles dripped off his last word, and he threw Hailey a few extra eye daggers.
All of her felt like crumpling inside.
She wanted to scream, “I’m just doing my job.”The job that pays my bills. The job that’s funding my dream. The job that keeps me safe.She’d used the same tired phrase on hundreds of kitchen managers before him, but none of these reasons kept the words from ringing hollow.
Cliff entered the small room, Noah on his heels. There wasn’t enough room for three bodies to work comfortably, so Hailey began scanning the vestibule and storage area, moving toward the kitchen as she quicklyticked boxes and jotted notes on her form.Might as well minimize the pain by making this as quick as possible.
Her heart dropped further when she heard Noah exclaim, “There’s no fucking way they could have gotten in!”
Oh no, oh no, oh no!
She ducked into the pantry, coming to a standstill. Ice formed in her veins. Noah’s mouth hung open as Cliff, on his knees, extracted five dead mice from the gap between the floor and the lowest shelf.
His eyes gleamed with triumph as he looked up at Noah. “Your restaurant is closed until further notice, Mr. Hunnicutt.”
Chapter 21
Cliff Notes
Questions strafed Hailey’s brainlike laser bursts from a Star Wars X-wing fighter, and she stood frozen in place. Noah didn’t, though. He pounded out of the pantry, and she recoiled from his death glare. She sucked in a slow, steadying breath and, just to give her hands something to do, checked her strands to be sure none had escaped the bun.
Cliff was talking animatedly into his phone as he took video of the tiny carcasses. He had discovered a few more to add to the damning pile. “We have a high priority violation on our hands,” he announced with authority. Besides his usual pompous tone, she could have sworn she detected a thread of glee in there.
She needed to move, to dosomethingwith the nervous energy pulsing inside her. “I’ll take pictures of the room.”
He responded with a grunt.
Snapping on a pair of latex gloves, Hailey crouched on the floor and swept her flashlight back and forth beneath the shelving and every othernook and cranny in the room. She took stills and video on both her work and personal phones as she went.
When she was done, she stowed the cameras and held up a mouse by its stiff tail between her gloved thumb and forefinger. “Not exactly ROUSs, are they?” In fact, they reminded her of immature mice from a pet store.
Cliff glanced up at her, and the void behind his eyes had her mentally shaking her head.
“Rodents of Unusual Size?” she offered. “Haven’t you seenPrincess Bride?” Of course he hadn’t. “Never mind.”
She kept further comments to herself as they continued prowling the food prep and storage areas. As Cliff moved toward the walk-in, Dewey stepped in his way.
