4. Peyton #2
The inspector sets his keys and wallet down on the edge of my table, but his hazel eyes stay focused on me, quickly roaming over my lavender workout set before darting back up to my face.
He attempts to casually lean against the table, but it’s lower than he expected, and the height difference startles him.
He straightens and tries to play it off clumsily, while I stifle delight at his general befuddlement.
He awkwardly clears his throat. “Do you work out here?”
“Sure,” I say, nodding slowly.
“Cool. That’s cool,” he stumbles. “I’m Callum, again. What’s your name?”
Callum. That’s right. In the grand scheme of our last interaction, his name got lost within the lengthy title.
I pull my phone out of my leggings’ pocket to call Kevin. “Actually, I’m on the clock, so…”
His head tilts. “So you do work here. I thought you worked at MingHin Kitchen.”
“I don’t work there anymore.”
Callum runs his hand through his hair’s tousled, short waves. It looks positively windswept pushed back from his forehead. “But… They’ve only been open a week. They fired you that fast? Did you rob them or something?”
“Actually, the reason for termination was ‘lack of food safety knowledge.’ Mr. Chung said it was my inability to retain the internal temperature of cooked chicken.” I add a dramatic sigh for emphasis. “After that, I stood no chance. Now, I have no idea how I’ll ever pay my rent.”
I watch almost all the light leave his eyes as his jaw goes slack. “Oh my God. I can call them. I didn’t mean for my assessment to have any impact on your employment with…” He trails off, narrowing his eyes at my smiling face. “You’re messing with me.”
I speak in a high-pitched, innocent tone. “Am I? That does sound… exactly like me. In any case, I can assure you I no longer work there.”
A tiny pinch forms between his thick, auburn brows. Poor, confused, Toledo-Lucas County Health Inspector. Those furrowed brows of his haven’t changed a bit since I saw them last at MingHin Kitchen. If I wasn’t me, I’d almost be tempted to smooth them out with my thumbs.
I’m about to put him out of his misery when Kevin comes into the dining area. “Ah! Peyton, you’re here.”
The inspector’s eyes flash to mine in a moment of personal triumph, like my name is the answer to a century’s old riddle he’s been tasked to solve.
“Kevin. Great to meet you in person. I’m so pleased to be working together. Should we talk business somewhere more private?”
It’s not that I want to keep my job from Callum, though his general bewilderment has been surprisingly fun for me. It’s that clients typically like to avoid any public impression that they’re paying tastemakers. Influencing works best when buyers are under the illusion it’s authentic.
Kevin follows my gaze to the inspector. “Cal! Thanks for doing this favor for me.”
“No problem. Just hope no one spots me and tells Carter I walked into the big chain gym.”
Kevin winks. “Eh, technically you’re just here for work. And Waterton’s too far to poach members, anyway.” His sneakers squeak as he pivots toward me. “We can chat while he completes his inspection. Go ahead, Cal.”
Callum moves at a snail’s pace behind the counter, like it’s taking everything in him not to plop down right next to me for a casual seven hour interrogation. He gives an exasperated sigh before pushing the kitchen door open, leaving me and Kevin alone.
Kevin sits down in the chair across from me and leans forward, his body language telling me that he might shake my hand.
I pick up my stylus and poise it over the tablet I brought with me before he can reach out.
Reading the signs of impending touch from men has become a superpower of mine over the past three years.
“The shop looks great, Kevin. Tell me more about how Healthtopia came to be.”
Kevin walks me through the smoothie shop’s origin story in about ten minutes, starting with the orchard his family owns in Michigan. He gets some of the fruit directly from his parents’ backyard.
“I love the personal connection you have to the business. How can I help you reach your sales targets?”
Kevin releases a long exhale. “Well, I accidentally purchased twelve hundred gross of peanuts.”
I tilt my head. “Twelve hundred gross?”
His neck reddens. “One gross is a dozen dozens. So twelve hundred is—”
“Twelve hundred dozen dozens,” I whisper.
Kevin nods grimly.
My eyes widen. “Wait. That means…”
“I have around ten thousand pounds of peanuts to use. Before they go rancid.”
I set down my tablet and lean back in my chair. “Damn.”
“Damn, indeed. Decimal error. Working out those new business owner kinks, I guess.” He shrugs.
“I don’t have the freezer space to extend the nuts’ shelf life.
By my estimation, I’ll go through about three hundred jars of peanut butter a year.
Now, I have to plan for ten times that amount.
So, we’re solving for the excess peanuts with our new line of homemade nut butters, and I’d love for that to be your focus when you come back for opening day.
Any probing questions would be welcome, as they’d give me a chance to talk about the butters more naturally.
Our Nutty Nana smoothie will be the centerpiece for the conversation.
It has housemade organic peanut butter, bananas, gut-healthy yogurt, and two scoops of vanilla whey protein powder. ”
I send up a silent prayer of thanks that I’m marketing a food I actually enjoy. In my early days, I didn’t have the luxury of being choosy about what I was being asked to influence. A shudder runs through me when I remember the number of slimy, sulfury oysters I slurped down for my second-ever job.
Dark days. Dark, dark days.
“I love peanut butter, so this is right up my alley. And I’ve already prepared some questions in advance that are easily adaptable to the butters. First one being—”
The kitchen door swings open, and Callum appears with a tiny gray smudge on his white polo. When he takes off the plastic baseball cap he wears to inspect, a bead of sweat drips down his temple.
“Ah, Cal! How’d it go back there?”
Callum dusts himself off and walks toward our table.
“The quick sweep went well. Initially, I thought you had a leak behind one of the refrigerators, but it was just a cup of water that spilled. I’ll need to come back once the front bar is set up, but the kitchen looks great. So you’re all set for today.”
Kevin nods. “Stay for a smoothie before you go. It’s the least I can do after stealing part of your day. I need to make a drink for Peyton, anyway.”
Callum brushes his thumb against the soft skin at the edge of his lip. “Need to?”
I flash him a toothy smile, eating up his wary observation of me. “I’m just dying to try the Nutty Nana!”
Kevin beams as he stands up. “That’s perfect, Peyton. Exactly like that on opening day.”
“Exactly like what?” Callum asks, eyes darting between Kevin and me.
Kevin walks past Callum toward the kitchen before pivoting to face me. “Before I head back there to make the smoothies, what was your question, Peyton?”
“Oh, I was just going to ask where you source your organic nuts from.”
“Fantastic question. We get our peanuts directly from a family-owned farm in Georgia. The whey protein powder and gut-healthy yogurt are sourced from a local creamery. Grass-fed cows only.”
Jingling interrupts my thoughts, and I find Callum gathering his keys and wallet from the table. I haven’t missed the way his eyes narrow in suspicion at every piece of information he’s gathering while listening to my conversation with his family friend.
But Callum’s made no moves to get closer to me. In fact, he hasn’t done anything to make me feel uncomfortable. I’m completely unaccustomed to the type of attention he’s given me so far—this curiosity. And, surprisingly, I find myself allowing little pieces of my personality to peek through.
I really shouldn’t be having this much fun teasing him, but below all of his follow-up questions, maybe he’s having a little bit of fun, too. It’s not like he’s a client… We’ll never have to see each other again after this.
“Now, you two sit tight. I’ll be right back with the Nutty Nanas.” Kevin disappears into the kitchen, the door swinging shut behind him.
Callum slides into the chair Kevin was sitting in at my table, and I can almost hear him critically thinking. “So, Peyton. Former employee of MingHin Kitchen, current employee at Healthtopia… tell me, what is—”
“165 degrees. Final answer.”
His lips part, maybe in surprise at my astute chicken knowledge. Few things are more satisfying than flustering a man.