Page 27 of Cozen

“Dinner rush is coming, so hurry it the hell up, guys! Herald, get that prep work finished! Courtney, go fix your hair before you get back on the floor! Cozen—”

“What?” Cozen asked.

She slid the food order over the kitchen rack to one of the men working behind it—a helper to the one chef working the stoves, and making the food. The chef was another one in the place causing all kinds of chaos whenever he could with his ridiculous demands and loud demeanor.

Another man Cozen didn’t care about.

“I need you in the private room today,” Chase said.

“I think you need more people on the floor, actually,” she returned dryly. “It’s busy, and the girls need all the help they can get.”

“Yeah, well, you replaced Jett’s favorite girl, and my only job when that man comes through the front doors is to make him happy. So guess what, sweetheart? It’s your job now.”

Cozen cocked a brow.

Jett, huh?

She knew he would be back.

“You got it, Chase.”

Cozen didn’t wait to hear what the manager had to say, as she was already leaving the busy kitchen, and heading for the private area to prep it. She didn’t need to be told what to do—she already knew.

Jett wanted to be happy.

Cozen found her opening.

“Sir.”

“Sir.”

“Jett,” Sargon greeted.

Jett gave Sargon a cutting smile as he stopped at the back passenger door held open for him. In the gated, circular driveway of the Griffin estate, Jett truly was a king in his kingdom, and typically expected to be addressed with the same respect.

Sargon was not typical, though.

“Sarg,” Jett replied.

Sargon’s upper lip curled back a bit in his disgust. It was an automatic reaction he wasn’t very good at hiding whenever someone tried to use that nickname on him. For his new boss, the nickname had come after a conversation about shortening Sargon’s name to something less … strange and unique.

He quite liked his name.

“Still not a fan, huh?” Jett asked.

“Will never be a fan, Jett.”

Jett’s gaze drifted over the waiting men standing at the ready in the driveway. One would drive Jett while Sargon stayed close to the boss in the backseat, and another would follow close behind in a nondescript vehicle.

Depending on what Jett had planned for the day, he was known to take less or more men accordingly. He always had a small army guarding his four acre Long Island estate. Sargon, for the last two weeks, was ever present at Jett’s side.

Maybe because Jett found him mildly amusing and interesting. Or perhaps because he thought Sargon was capable of protecting him far better than the rest of his men should something happen.

Sargon didn’t know what it was. He did, however, know that the rest of Jett’s men—all of them being friends of the man he had killed in a back hallway of a restaurant—were not at all fond of his presence, or Jett’s preference to have him closer than the rest of them.

During the men’s downtime, Sargon often found himself excluded from the group in whatever way they could shun him. The others had no qualms about making changes in schedules or the way they handled their boss without first letting Sargon know.

They thought it bothered him.