No Shoes, No Shirt, No Spells (Mystic Cafe Series) by Rose Pressey Read Free Book Online Page B

disconcerting. Had they been spying on me?
     
    “ Yes, we do.” His expression was stern, the teasing tone had vanished.
     
    I leaned over to get a closer look and he slapped the file closed.
     
    “ Was that my picture stapled to the inside? How did you get that photo?”
     
    The picture was of Grandma Imelda and me last Christmas, smiling for the camera, both of us wearing reindeer antlers. Of all the pictures, they had to pick one where I looked like Rudolph?
     
    “ Your grandmother had to send it in when she applied for you to take over.”
     
    “ There’s an application process?” My mouth hung open. What I wouldn’t do to get my hands on that file.
     
    He nodded. “You look just like your grandmother, by the way, minus the gray hair, of course. Your hair is beautiful, though. Did your grandmother have dark hair like you?”
     
    “ Why don’t you look it up in your file?” I placed my hands on my hips.
     
    “ The antlers are a nice touch.” He smiled cheekily.
     
    “ It was Christmas and Grandma Imelda thought they were cute,” I retorted.
     
    “ I’m sure Santa would approve.” He flipped through the file pages again.
     
    “ What does the file say about me?” I demanded.
     
    “ Other than this little snafu, not much yet, and I’m hoping it’ll remain that way.” He scrubbed his hand over his face.
     
    “ I didn’t mean to mess up the magic, it was a slip up.” I crossed my arms in front of my chest.
     
    I couldn’t tell him it wasn’t actually my mistake. I mean, technically, I guess I was responsible for the magic until it reached its rightful recipient. It would be mean of me to rat Mary Jane out. No, I’d take whatever punishment I was handed. It was time to put on my big girl panties.
     
    “ So what happens now?” I asked.
     
    He shifted on the stool as he hesitated with the answer. “It’s been recommended that your café be closed until we can determine this won’t happen again.”
     
    A paralyzing anxiety smacked me in the stomach. “Closed? As in, not open? But I just took over. There has to be something else. My grandmother ran this place for thirty years, I have it for two days, and it’s shut down? I can’t do that to her. Isn’t there something I can do to make this up to...to whoever is in charge at whatever the name of the place is you work for?” I took a glass from under the counter, filled it with water, and took a big gulp. I wiped my forehead with a dishtowel.
     
    “ I’ll make some calls and see what I can do.” His tone softened a bit.
     
    Finally, a sign of compassion appeared on his face in the form of a half-smile. A small dimple appeared as if by magic on his right cheek. He certainly was good-looking, no denying that. But a good-looking stranger ready to close my café, nonetheless. If he thought a handsome face would stop me from running this place, he had another think coming.
     
    “ Can you please explain what happened? Slowly. I want to hear your account of the event.” Tom leaned forward, propping his arms on the counter, waiting for a play-by-play of my stupidity.
     
    Mary Jane still stood behind me, her breath hot on my neck.
     
    “ I made the food for Oscar Harrisburg. He’d had some problems with a woman.” I fidgeted my fingers against the counter.
     
    “ Uh-huh, that’s right,” Mary Jane chimed in.
     
    “ Ah, it’s always the women.” Tom smirked.
     
    I scowled and placed my hands on my hips. “It’s not always the women.”
     
    “ Yeah,” Mary Jane said.
     
    He held up his hands. “Okay, sorry, I can see I’m outnumbered here. Go on, please.”
     
    “ Thank you. Now where was I? Oh yeah, I accidentally placed the food down on the wrong table.” I cast a glance in Mary Jane’s direction. She had a huge frown spread across her face as she studied her shoes. “It was an honest mistake.”
     
    “ You didn’t remember that the spell was intended for someone else. The food had magic