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NYLA

“Another beer, love.”

“Make it two.” A hand cracked the table, and I was glad it wasn’t my backside.

Ugh, I hated it when customers tacked endearments on the end of their wants and needs list.

“Order’s up, Nyla!”

I waved a hand over my head and directed the next free waitstaff I had to the dinging bell that accompanied Sully, my best and most reliable chef who called out each order as it came up from the kitchen at the other end of the restaurant.

But his urgency wasn’t the only priority I had to deal with right now.

“Table ten wants their birthday cake five minutes ago!”

“Fifteen has a complaint about the pepper sauce. Again.”

The four conversations aimed in my direction—five, if I counted Brady at the back of it all pointing to the upstairs toilet—clashed in magnificent fashion.

I nodded to the latter and sighed at that last order, pushing away from the till where I’d been trying—unsuccessfully—to pre balance the cash because I suspected we were out.

“I got the pepper sauce. Can you do the cake?”

So much for getting on top of things before they got away from me early in the night.

“I can do cake.” Jenny ginned and waved on her way to the cool room.

“That’s a load off. Thanks,” I called out to her retreating back, although I doubted she heard me over the hubbub of Cowboy’s Pitstop , a truly horrendous steakhouse themed restaurant situated on the southside of Brisbane.

I’d walk away from the restaurant, except that my sole source of income and Brady’s inheritance was tied up in his father—and my more than frustrating ex’s–silent share of the business.

Plastering on a smile I didn’t feel any more, I faced my next customer and took their payment by rote.

“Lena, can you wipe down fourteen, please? Then there’s a couple at the bar who have been waiting patiently,” I murmured as I tossed a handful of silver into the tip jar.

My fake smile stayed in place as I stared at the booking ledger for the mezzanine conference level on the floor above that had a full Saturday night striped through it for the next weekend marked out Sanford Sentinels Christmas Party.

I closed my eyes on a groan.

Brilliant. All we needed was a club party on one of the busiest nights of the year, and we were already down staff with two out from sickness this week.

I scrawled in set menus on the diary next to the booking, taking the choice away.

“You got it,” Lena shouted in my ear over the hubbub in the bar.

The rotund, bouncy waitress darted between tables, cloth in hand, menus already tucked under her arm.

My back ached already, and the night wasn’t halfway done.

A blur attacked me from the side.

I held up a hand, but Lena hadn’t doubled back.

“Mum!” Brady looped his arms around my waist. Chocolate smeared his mouth side to side in a goofy grin.

“Oh, my G—” I grabbed a handful of napkins and swiped his face, relieved the front counter was bereft of customers for the time being.

“Brady. What has Chaz got you into now?”

Our chef had a French twang I wasn’t sure he didn’t put on for Brady’s benefit and spoiled him rotten.

A good thing too, as I often couldn’t get a babysitter in time for extra shifts, especially on weeknights.

Brady populated the kitchen when he shouldn’t but Chaz and the kitchen staff didn’t mind, feeding Brady’s endless appetite and playing up to the kid with an infinite amount of energy.

And I was beyond grateful for their efforts.

“You’re being good back there, right? You’re not annoying the boys?”

“He is doing fine. We made you dinner, Nyla.” Chaz, his voice stilted in an accent I was almost certain he hadn’t been born with, presented me with two plates.

One held chicken tenders and steamed vegetables drowned in mushroom sauce.

The other contained a serving of chocolate brownie swimming in a pool of chocolate gooeyness.

I looked at both of them.

“Is this what you’ve been doing?” I said sternly, fighting a smile.

Thank you, I mouthed to Chaz over Brady’s head as my son crash tackled me again at above waist height.

All the breath left me at once.

Apparently those lessons were paying off.

“You are having a growth spurt, mister.” I kissed the top of Brady’s head.

“Is it cake for me and veggies for you?”

“Ugh, mummm ,” he protested, wrangling the cake from me under no small amount of duress.

Hey, I wasn’t giving up cake for no good reason, and certainly not without a fight when it came with chocolate sauce that looked that moreish.

Chaz smiled broadly and pulled a second serving of steaming chocolate brownie out of who knew where.

I took the offering with gratitude, bowing to his finesse and placed it on the shelf behind me along with my dinner that I knew would be lukewarm at best before I got to it.

“Okay, why don’t you boys head back to the kitchen and don’t demolish all the cake before the customers get to it!” I called to their retreating backs.

The couple who had entered through the swinging saloon doors, one that hung not so artistically off its hinges and was just plain broken but thankfully didn’t look that way, laughed.

“Sorry, I’m attempting to feed my child. Do you have a reservation?” I asked.

The rest of my night passed in a blur.

I saw Brady a few more times and managed to eat my vegetables and tenders though by the time I made it to my brownie it was a congealed, soggy, semi brick—the conundrums of chocolate kind—in chocolate soup.

I sighed and poked at it as I settled the til and came up short.

Well short.

Frowning, I set my barely touched brownie aside, if it was still worthy to be called such a thing, and recounted.

Nope, still short. By a good two hundred flat.

That’s too round a number to be a missed table.

And that happened. Hell, human error happened.

As well as walking tables.

But a round figure? That felt…

Wrong. My gut knew that, and it wasn’t the missing, congealed brownie at my side.

The broken saloon doors that looked nothing like anything had ever appeared in Australia’s history, swung inward.

“We’re closed,” I muttered, my head still down as I recounted in no small amount of desperation for the third time.

Please be wrong. Please be wrong.

Please, please, please.

But I wasn’t. The money still counted out as short.

Which meant someone was skimming and I knew that, before I started.

Had known for a while.

What I didn’t know was who .

Which meant one of my staff had stolen from me.

My singular bite of brown swooped in my belly.

“Fuck,” I muttered.

“That’s not very professional.”

My head jerked up to meet eyes I never expected to see in the restaurant so late.

Or in the restaurant much at all.

“Stuart.” My voice flattened out at the sight of my ex.

“What are you doing here?” I gripped the cash in my hand.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

Of all nights for him to come in—I’d have to tell him we were short if he asked and then he’d?—

What, blame me?

Yes, absolutely. But more than that, he’d sack someone, because Stuart Jennings was an asshole.

It’s why I left him in the first place, and why Brady called him by his first name rather than Dad.

Kids had a way of working that sort of thing out on their own, funnily enough.

“I own the place, or did you forget?” He breezed past me as I closed the till and locked it, pocketing the key.

Nothing else was going missing, though the only people left in the restaurant were myself, Brady, Chaz in the back singing opera at the top of his lungs and now Stuart who fixed himself a drink in the bar.

“That’s all cleaned up,” I protested.

“Josie and Kesh finished up an hour ago. Don’t screw with their system, Stu–”

“You don’t tell me what to do, Nyla. No one does.” Stuart poured himself a large glass of top shelf whiskey without marking the bottle or writing the freebie in the staff book, and headed toward the stairs.

“I’ll be up here until you leave. Then it’s my night with Brady, or did you forget?”

Double fuckity.

I had forgotten.

“I don’t have a bag packed,” I hedged.

“It got crazy for a Thursday night, and we were short two staff.”

“Your ineptitude is not my problem. Let me know when he’s ready to leave.”

I watched Stuart walk up the stairs with a drink that couldn’t possibly allow him to drive, my protests dying in my throat.

I hate this life. What the hell do I have to do to leave it?

Tears welled in my eyes as I plunked myself on my seat that till and unlocked the cash drawer, counting out the cash again.

And again.

Then I did the EFTPOS.

At least that came up correct.

And then the tears began to fall.

A steaming, reheated, if slightly mangled brownie pushed in front of me.

“Chaz said to give you this before I go,” Brady said in a small voice.

“You forgot, huh?”

I nodded and held out an arm, not trusting myself to speak as I hugged him.

“Gonna miss you, bud,” I kissed the top of his head, realizing I used Mason’s terms that I’d been listening to for the past week.

“I’ll pick you up after coaching, okay?”

“Okay, Mum. Love you.” Brady kissed me all chocolatey.

I made a quick calculation in my head.

“Do you think you could handle a phone soon? You’re getting pretty responsible.”

And then you can call me directly if you need me to come and get you.

Panic closed around my heart at the thought of not having him for another day, or anywhere near Stuart.

“Sure, Mum. That would be great.” Brady perked up.

“One of the guys at school has this game. It’s made of maths. You can send a guy sailing off cliffs when you dissolve things. It’s really fun.” He peeked up at me.

“Sounds awesome,” I managed, sending Stuart a message.

NYLA: Brady’s ready to go.

I waited for a response but I didn’t get one.

Just footsteps on the stairs a few minutes later.

Stuart didn’t even acknowledge me as he ruffled Brady’s hair.

My son stiffened slightly but slipped out of my grip all the same.

“Love you, Mum. See you tomorrow afternoon!” he called.

“Love you,” I whispered to the swinging broken doors that encapsulated my life at that moment.

The only thing that could fill the gap right now would be if one of them fell off.

I cooped up a mouthful of brownie as Chaz joined me at the counter, wrapping me in a big, end of night, chef-smelly bear hug.

I didn’t even care. It was human contact.

And right now, I needed that more than anything else before I went back to my empty townhouse. Alone.