12. Under Her Rules #2
I unbuttoned my cuffs and rolled the sleeves of my dress shirt past my elbows. I didn’t bother hunting for rubber gloves. I stepped up to the sink and plunged my bare hands into the foul liquid.
The scalding heat bit into my skin. I winced, gripping the edge of the basin as the water turned my forearms bright red.
My fingers scraped the metal bottom of the sink, searching through the sludge.
I found the cast-iron grease trap. I hauled the grate up from the water and rested it against the slanted draining board.
I grabbed a wire brush resting on the soap dispenser. I dug the stiff bristles into the caked-on grease, dragging the metal over the iron grooves. The sound filled the cramped kitchen. Filthy water splashed up over my forearms, soaking the rolled fabric at my elbows.
I paused, catching my breath in the heat. I looked over my shoulder.
A small window in the upper half of the doors offered a clear view straight to the front register. I watched Wren through the scratched glass. She was boxing up a row of pastries for an older woman at the counter.
Wren handed the box over the counter. She smiled. It wasn’t the tight, polite expression she had worn at my parents’ dinner table. It was a genuine, radiant smile. She looked relaxed, standing in her flour-dusted apron, thriving on an hourly wage.
She was fine without me. She didn’t need Kensington Holdings. She didn’t need the penthouse or the private car service. Watching her laugh with a stranger in this building made me grip the steel rim of the sink.
“I’ll spend the rest of my life proving you made the right choice, Wren,” I had told her at the altar. “I promise.”
“For better or for worse, Cassian,” she had replied, her voice soft against the church acoustics. “I’m choosing you, no matter what happens.”
I had managed to destroy that devotion in less than a year. I turned my back on the window and faced the sink. I gripped the wire brush and drove it into the iron grate.
The brush rasped against the metal. I dug the bristles harder into the burnt sugar, ignoring the scalding water on my wrists. I pressed my weight over the basin, scrubbing until my arms ached. I would scrub every pan in this miserable town if it earned me one ounce of her forgiveness.
“I’m not going to lose you,” I muttered to the filthy water. “I’m going to fix this.”
The double doors slammed open. A blast of heat rolled down the narrow kitchen aisle just ahead of Gemma.
She marched toward the dish pit, her denim overalls dusted with fresh white flour, balancing a towering stack of crusted baking sheets against her chest. She didn’t slow her pace as she approached the basin.
She dropped the entire stack of pans directly into the murky water.
The liquid sloshed over the rim of the sink. A foul wave of gray sludge splashed over my forearms, dripping off my skin and into the basin. I gritted my teeth against the heat, gripping the edge of the basin to steady myself.
Gemma stood beside the basin, crossing her arms. She stared down at the cast-iron grate I had just spent ten minutes scouring.
“You missed a massive spot of burnt sugar on that tray, rich boy,” Gemma said. “If it isn’t spotless, you’re doing it again.”
I stared at the stubborn brown stain wedged deep in the corner of the iron groove.
I fought the immediate urge to buy the entire building and fire this woman on the spot.
A single phone call to Marcus could have the title of this bakery transferred to a shell corporation by morning.
I could have Gemma evicted from her own kitchen before the lunch rush ended.
I looked through the scratched glass of the doors. Wren stood near the espresso machine, handing a paper bag to a local customer. She was safe out there, letting Gemma stand as a wall between us.
Gemma was baiting me. She was testing my patience, waiting for me to snap and prove I was exactly the same man who had pushed Wren away.
“It will be spotless, Gemma,” I said. “Just give me another wire brush, because this one is destroyed.”
I tossed the mangled wire brush onto the draining board. The stiff metal bristles were flattened, ruined by how hard I had been scrubbing the iron.
Gemma reached over to a caddy sitting next to the soap dispenser. She grabbed a fresh wire brush and dropped it onto the wet metal in front of me, refusing to hand it over directly.
“Stop complaining and use some elbow grease,” Gemma said. “Wren works twice as hard as you every day, and she’s carrying a baby.”
The blunt truth of it silenced me. She was right.
While I had been sitting in a climate-controlled boardroom delegating merger paperwork, my pregnant wife had been on her feet for eight hours a day, managing a lunch rush for an hourly wage.
The blisters forming on my palms were nothing compared to what Wren was putting herself through just to get away from me.
I picked up the fresh tool. I hauled the iron out of the sludge and pinned it against the slanted draining board. I dug the bristles into the burnt sugar, pressing my weight down over the basin.
The wet iron was slick with old grease. My grip failed. The brush slipped off the groove, and my knuckles slammed against the rough edge of the grate.
My knuckles split open. A stinging pain radiated up my forearm as a drop of blood welled to the surface, mixing with the foul dishwater dripping down my wrist. I stared at the torn skin for a second.
I didn’t stop to ask for a bandage. I dug the bristles back into the burnt metal, determined to scour every inch of that iron until the stain was gone.
The swinging doors squeaked open, letting a draft of storefront air into the stifling kitchen.
I braced my weight against the edge of the sink, assuming Gemma had returned to dump more dishes into the basin.
Instead, a teenager dragged a yellow mop bucket down the narrow aisle.
He wore a faded T-shirt and a crooked name tag that read ‘Leo’.
He tipped the bucket forward. A wave of dirty mop water sloshed over the rim, hitting the floorboards just inches from the dish pit.
The harsh chemical stench of floor cleaner hit the back of my throat. The puddle spread across the wood, soaking the toes of my shoes.
“Watch your step, there’s a spill by the front door,” Leo muttered.
He didn’t offer an apology for soaking my shoes. He just dropped the mop handle against the wall and pointed at the rubber drying mat next to my sink.
“Hey man, you’re supposed to stack the clean pans on the metal rack, not the drying mat,” Leo said. “Gemma’s gonna yell if you don’t move them right now.”
I stared at the cheap lettering on his name tag.
Yesterday, I had sat at the head of a boardroom table and dictated the liquidation of a multibillion-dollar hospitality empire.
Today, a teenager making minimum wage was giving me orders.
The collar of my dress shirt clung to the back of my neck, soaked in sweat.
Sweat and elbow grease were the only currency left.
“My mistake, Leo,” I said. “I’ll move them to the rack immediately.”
I dropped the brush onto the board and picked up the stack of pans I had just finished scrubbing. The torn skin on my knuckles throbbed as the pans pressed against the fresh blisters. I carried the stack across the aisle and slid it onto the shelf.
“Yeah, you better,” Leo said. “And don’t leave the floor wet by the sink, because it’s a massive slipping hazard.”
Leo grabbed the mop handle and dragged the bucket back toward the swinging doors. The wheels squeaked against the wet floorboards, fading as the doors flapped shut behind him.
The harsh smell of sour mop water lingered over the basin. I leaned over the sink, wiping sweat from my forehead with a blistered forearm.