Free Luring Levi (Tarnished Saints Series Book 2) by Elizabeth Rose Page A

mean?”
    “Not sure,” said Dan. “So did you want me to help you clean or what?”
    “I don’t know,” he grumbled. “I’ll tell you what. Do you have a few strong friends that I could coerce into moving all this crap out to the dumpster out back?”
    “Sure, I know a couple of guys that might be willing to help, but you’re going to have to pay them.”
    “I don’t have any money. I’ve got a better idea. You get two friends to help you and get your brothers as well. If you guys clean the room and paint the building, I’ll make sure you all get unlimited free rides at the fair as well as all you can eat.”
    “They should go for that. But you know Zeke is lazy, he won’t help.”
    “Tell him there’s a pet rabbit in it for him if he does. I know how he loves animals, so that should work.”
    “Ok, will do.”
    “Just make sure to leave me the mattress and my bag of clothes,” he said, closing the door. He dug through the bag of clothes Angel gave him and pulled out an old shirt of Thomas’s that didn’t look too wrinkled. He donned it as well as a different pair of jeans that weren’t as faded. Angel had given him a pair of dress pants that he knew Thomas hadn’t worn since his first wife was alive and they’d attended church every Sunday with the kids.
    He couldn’t bring himself to wear them, as it just wasn’t him. Sweet Water was going to have to get used to a mayor who liked to dress in a casual manner. He left the room and headed toward the car, wondering what time it was and also when the hell he had started to actually care.
     
    * * *
     
    Levi pulled up to Margery’s Diner, really the only restaurant in town besides the pizza place and the shop that sold sub sandwiches, but those places weren’t even considered edible food in his book. This had been his favorite place to come as a child, as his father would bring the whole family here after church every Sunday.
    This wa s where he’d had his first taste of good down-home cooking that made him realize some day he wanted to have his own restaurant. And The Big Apple had been his dream restaurant for five years until the awful day he lost it.
    Levi pulled open the door to the diner and stopped in shock when he saw the inside. He hadn’t been here in years and was surprised that he hadn’t heard that there was anything amiss since he’d come back to town. But the place was void of customers and it looked so run down that he couldn’t believe this was the same heart-warming, bustling place he’d looked forward to visiting every Sunday as a kid.
    “Margery, what’s going on in here?” He flagged down the Margery Sacks behind the counter who owned the place. She was in her sixties, and he heard she had taken over the place when her husband died about five years ago.
    “Hi , Levi,” she said with a wave of her hand. “The council is waiting for you down at the last table. You won’t miss them, as they’re the only ones in here.”
    “So I noticed.” He looked around. “Where is everybody?”
    “It’s been a ghost town ever since I lost my head cook Carlos last summer. He was the only one who knew how to make a decent meal. People came in from three towns over to eat here.”
    “Why’d he leave?” asked Levi.
    “I couldn’t pay him what he wanted so he just up and left one day. It looks like I’m going to lose the entire business in another month. Oh well, I’m getting too old to keep doing this forever anyway.”
    “Don’t say that Margery. Something will work out.”
    “No, it won’t. Not unless you have some sort of magic power that will not only land me a decent chef but bring in some new customers as well.”
    “Well, now that I’m mayor, maybe I can figure something out.”
    “If you want to figure something out, then start thinking of a way to make the town council happy. They haven’t stopped complaining about you since they walked in.” She looked at her watch. “Yep, they said you’d be at least