Their Sweet Haven (The Men of Evergreen Mountain #6)

6. Hannah

SIX

hannah

It takes some time to close a deal, so Elias’s dreams of overalls and a straw hat didn’t instantly come to fruition. He also still had a sense of duty to the job he was appointed to. Despite not liking it, he truly did feel what he did was important, and I agreed. I didn’t exactly want to go into a diner, order a burger, and find it stuffed with roaches.

Three days after the whole mess started, business had gone back to normal. The accusations of health inspection violations didn’t harm my business one bit, as most of the town assumed it was all nonsense.

The ‘most’ part of that statement needs to be emphasized.

“Hannah Lee, the woman who sleeps with health inspectors to get a clean grade,” a sneering voice says as he pushes into my store.

A visit from the competition. “Good morning to you too, Henry.”

Haughtily he looks about. “I can’t believe this town doesn’t see this filth for what it is. Especially when a better product is literally across the street.”

Melanie pokes her head in from the kitchen. “Have you ever considered hiring security? I know a friend’s brother who’s looking for a job and would be perfect for something like this.”

“I don’t need security. I just need this guy to shut up.”

The door opens again. I hope it’s good news, but it’s anything but.

“Miss Lee, I’m informing you of the formal complaint I’m putting against your clearance.”

“Good morning, Fred.” I’m learning how to say the words ‘Good Morning’ in increasingly hostile ways, I suppose.

“This is a clear incidence of corruption, and your closeness to the inspector who cleared you is all the proof I need.”

“I guess the nuance that I never met him until a day beforehand has no weight?”

“Tell it to the judge, Miss Lee. Bribing public officials is a serious offense.”

“Seriously,” Melanie adds in. “Crack their heads together, throw them both out on their asses.”

I ignore her. The bell over the door rings again as someone else comes in, and at this point I’m expecting Satan himself to come in and give me shit.

“Good morning, Miss Hannah.” Thankfully, it’s one of the furthest things from it. Ben comes up to the counter, ignoring the two intruders.

“Morning, Ben. How are you? After your usual?”

He shakes his head. “I’m feeling pretty eh. Do... do you got like Ginger Ale or something?”

I shake my head. “No. I’m sorry.”

“Anything else to settle my stomach? I know it ain’t your forte, but I kind of just came here because it’s my routine. Didn’t think too much about it.”

“Figures,” Henry shouts. “This man comes in here every day? And clearly has food poisoning?”

I continue my task of ignoring them. “I don’t have anything to sell, but I can give you some of the pink stuff as a friend.”

“Pushing drugs won’t help matters, Miss Lee,” Fred adds.

“Are you two going to buy anything or just heckle me all day?” I snap at them.

“Did I come at a good time? This doesn’t seem like a good time.” Elias is my next visitor, and I’d be glad to see him no matter what.

“Mr. Lawson,” Fred announces. “There is a regular customer of Miss Lee here who is clearly sick because of her health-code violating products.

“Hey,” Ben turns around. “I’ve been here for years, and I have never been sick after my orange cranberry muffins before. Don’t go accusing Miss Hannah of anything on my account.”

“Yet you eat here every day, and you’re sick as a dog.”

“I never felt like this, but uhm,” Ben rubs chin. “I guess the only thing different is that when Miss Hannah’s bakery was closed, I still wanted a muffin so I went to Henry’s Baking Factory instead. Got a Cherry Cranberry muffin instead. Wasn’t very good. Didn’t have a lot of flavor. And I’d been feeling kinda off ever since then. Maybe it’s his muffins instead?”

I cross my arms. “Hey, yeah. Why don’t you go and investigate Henry’s bakery instead? Isn’t this cause for suspicion.”

Fred narrows his brow at me. “How dare you? Weaponizing health inspections against your competitors? That is a sign of corruption if I ever saw one, Miss Lee, I’m sure the court would love to hear about it.”

Elias is taken aback by the scene. I’m sure he just wanted to stop by to say hello and check up on me, but it’s all gotten a bit more complicated. But soon he smiles. “No, no, she has a point. In the interest of fairness, I should subject the Baking Factory to the same inspection as the Sweet Stoppe.”

“I have nothing to hide,” Henry says, with haughtiness. I think I see some doubt in him.

Elias, I, Henry, and Fred leave the Sweet Stoppe. For this, I’m willing to take a break, and leave up a sign that I’ll be back in about fifteen minutes. It’s not a long walk toward Henry’s store, and I’m reminded of how out of place it is. It’s a new construction and sticks out like a sore thumb, looking like some sort of microbrewery with all of its excessive wood paneling and brass everywhere. It’d probably be fine in Smithport, but it’s just tacky in a place like Evergreen Valley.

We enter, and Elias points to the door to the back. Henry opens it for him, shifting around, annoyed that he has to go through all of this. Welcome to the club, maybe you shouldn’t have started all of this.

“There’s nothing back there. I follow all the rules and bylaws. This is my fourth location, you know. And none of them have had any reports. None that stuck anyway.”

“This is a witch hunt,” Fred says in his increasingly nasally voice. “This won’t look good for you, Miss Lee.”

“Just... just shut up, Fred. Please. For once in your life, shut up.”

“I will not. The righteous will not be silenced.”

I massage my temples.

“Hey, what’s this back here?” Elias says from the back. “Your flour is awfully, uh, brown.”

Elias’s words cause people to gather around him.

Henry crosses his arms. “It’s wheat flour. Perfectly natural. All natural, even. Are you going to give me a mark for serving my customers wheat flour?”

“I don’t know, man, this isn’t the consistency of flour. Flour doesn’t do this,” he says, sifting it through his fingers. As a professional flour worker, I could tell something was kind of funky about whatever that was.

Elias brings it to his nose. “Is... is this sawdust?”

Henry’s eyes go wide and he clears his throat. “What? No. This is a bakery not a sawmill.”

“Oh god,” I say. “Are you seriously using sawdust? In the twenty-first century?”

“You can’t prove it’s sawdust!” He snaps back.

“That’s not a very innocent sounding rebuttal,” Elias says before he turns to me. “Uh, is using sawdust a common thing in bakeries?”

“Back in the ye olden days, shady bakers used to pad out their flour supplies by blending sawdust into their bread. Obviously, people did not like eating sawdust, and legend has it the bakers who did this would be put to death by being baked in their own ovens.”

“Can’t beat the classics I guess when it comes to making a profit.” Elias turns to Henry. “Yeah, pending confirmation that this is sawdust, I’m going to have to shut you down.”

Henry stamps his feet and begins shouting. “What? No. You’re just in the pocket of my competition.”

“That’s not something you can prove. But this? I’m pretty sure I can prove its sawdust.” He turns to Fred. “And you. I’m going to have to look into your accusations, given that’s is awfully convenient you’re focusing all your energy on one bakery and ignoring their direct competition.”

Fred puts on his worst acting and gasps. “Sir, I would never do anything of the sort.”

“They say that sometimes, every accusation is a confession, Fred. And if you’re going to harass my woman with false claims, I’m going to make sure you’re on the level. This will be my last act as Smith County Health Commissioner, so I have nothing to lose.”

“You can’t do that. I’m going to take this higher up the ladder! All the way to the governor if I have to!”

“Whatever you need to do.”

Henry is launching into a string of profanities laced together at Elias, words that are so nasty that I’m going to avoid sharing them here. “And your little butterface slut is going to be penniless after I’m done, too!”

The last in the string of insults turns Elias’s smug demeanor into a much more annoyed one. “You don’t know when to shut up, don’t you?”

“I’ll shut up when all is right in the world.”

“Oh, no, I was just going to do the standard. But now your shops better be pristine. Because if I find anything wrong? I’m going to use it to the fullest. I’m going to destroy your entire business, Henry. You should have stopped provoking me when you were already neck deep, and now I’m just going to bury you entirely.”

I smirk. Elias seems like such an easy going guy, but I have to say, I like when he gets spicy like this.

Henry takes deep breathes and seethes, knowing he’s messed up and crossed so many lines.

“Now, I originally came by to see if my love wanted to go and get some lunch,” Elias says, offering me his hand in the most gentlemanly fashion. “Would you, my dear?”

I giggle, and take his hand. “I would love to.”

Leaving the chaos behind us, we leave Henry’s Baking Factory behind us, and I remember there’s a lovely taco shop that I want to introduce Elias to.