AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I wiped down the counter and secured the loose items for the journey to the parking lot a few blocks from the shelter. Gemma Seton, my mentor, had taken care of the fees for the first year. She’d helped me financially with everything and asked for nothing in return. That made me uncomfortable, but given the choices—having my food truck or not—I didn’t dwell on it. One day, I would repay her.
“All right, Delores. Ready to go home for the night?” I patted the steering wheel lovingly.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
I squeaked, putting a hand over my heart. The face of a police officer appeared in my window. I rolled it down with the manual crank.
“Hi, Officer.”
“Are you aware you’re parked illegally?”
Crud.
I swallowed hard, shifting in my seat. “Umm, no.” In all the time I’d been here, I’d never parked illegally.Why today?
“This is a no parking zone after six p.m.” He pulled out a ticket book and clicked open his pen.
“No. Wait.” At the frantic tone of my voice, he paused. “I have a permit. Hang on a sec.” I held up a finger and bolted out of the driver’s seat to the box under the counter where I stored my important paperwork.
With trembling hands, I rifled through it. Business license. Food vendor license. Health rating.
“Here it is.” I tugged on the paper and lifted it where the officer could see before I straightened.
I gave my parking permit to him through the window and bit my thumbnail as he inspected it. I braced my hands on the back of the seat, unsuccessfully trying to get a read on him. The man was stoic.
He checked his watch and looked back at the paperwork. “Still have to ticket you, miss.”
“What?”
He tapped the permit. “This says you can park here until 6:15 p.m. It’s 6:22.”
“Seven minutes? You’re giving me a ticket over seven minutes?” I threw my hands in the air, begging him with my eyes for some mercy. He simply stared back.
I opened the door to the truck, and the officer jumped out of the way, narrowly avoiding being struck. His nostrils flared. I shrank back until I was against the metal side.
“The law is the law,” he said through gritted teeth.
His arms were so solid he could snap me in half in seconds. Darkness crept into the fringes of my vision.Not now. Not. Now.
I shoved down my fear. “Please,” I whispered. “I won’t let it happen again.”
“When I write you this ticket, I’m sure you won’t.”
“I’m just getting my business off the ground. Every penny counts.” Cold brown eyes pierced me with zero sympathy. I forged on. “Come by every day. If I’m a minute late again, you can write me a ticket. Please, just . . . give me a break this once.”
“And what if I let someone who litters go without a citation? Or a driver who runs a traffic light? Should I ignore all violations?” He scrawled in his ticket book. “License, registration, and insurance please,” he said without looking up.
I touched his arm to stop him from writing. “Please.” My hand trembled, but I had to do something.
“I’m going to have to ask you to refrain from touching me or I’ll be forced to detain you.”
“You mean jail? I can’t go to jail.” Panic bubbled over. Now, the side of the truck was propping me up.What if Huxley found me there?I shook my head violently as terror gripped me.
Blue. Green. Yellow.
I tried to visualize the colors of my safe place, but blacks and grays kept interfering.
“Everything okay here?”No. Blue. Green. Yellow. “Miss?” a man asked.
