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And the day after that. And the one after that too.
That was typically bad luck. Back in my underground days, rain typically meant I was going to bleed more than usual. Or find out some horrible surprise about my opponent during the match.
I wasn’t a superstitious dude, but when something happened often enough, I paid attention.
So I knew some bullshit was going to be pulled this week.
I just wondered where it would come from.
It wasn’t going to come from my neighbor, who avoided my gaze when he saw me every morning after our run-in. All I needed to do was raise my eyebrows, and the man would scurry back into his house, shutting his door and locking it behind him.
He did the same as I headed to my car. I simply smiled as I drove off. The rain obscured my vision, and I tried to ignore it as I drove to my brand-new business purchase. Purchasing a failing gas station and turning it profitable wasn’t easy, but I got the place for cheap, and the profit margins my business manager drafted were enough to pique my interest. These days, money was the only thing that could move me.
I never wanted to be hungry again.
But the thing is, despite everything that was happening, no matter how much money I had collecting dust in a bank somewhere, I was never satisfied. There was still a fire in my belly to make more and more. At the same time, it all felt fucking meaningless at the end of the day. The people who mattered were no longer here.
But there was nothing else to do with my time but work.
I parked and got out of the car, striding toward the doors of the gas station. A shorter man was stacking the shelves, and he glanced at me when I walked in.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
“Zane Kazan,” I said, and his eyes widened.
“Oh! You’re the new boss!” He nearly tripped over himself as he quickly moved toward me. “Sorry. We didn’t know you would be coming today.”
That was the idea. I liked to catch my employees off guard when I first met them because then I could scope out the place as it was.
“Show me around,” I instructed him as the man wiped his hands on the front of his apron.
“Sure! Of course.” He gave me a friendly smile and pointed to a door. “Let’s go in.”
The backdoor led to a kitchen that looked like it had been packed out.
“This is where we keep the meat,” he said. “But of course, we stopped ordering new stocks after we heard the place was going under. And over there are the non-perishables….”
I continued toward the room, letting the man glance at me from the corner of his eye. A part of him probably didn’t believe I was truly the owner of this store. He was probably expecting some rich, suave guy to come in here and take over, not a man who looked like he ate kittens for breakfast.
I raised an eyebrow, and he flashed me a nervous smile before glancing away entirely.
“This is the storage room,” he continued. “More specifically, it’s where we store old stock. You know, stuff we can’t sell anymore. And then they toss it in the morning.”
“Is it expired?”
“No,” he said. “Just doesn’t look pretty most of the time.”
“Why throw it away? Why not donate it?”
“Erm, we tried, but the old owner didn’t want the stuff donated. Said it was too much paperwork and that it decreased the value of the brand.”
Selfish dumbass. If his brand was sold at a gas station, how high-class could it be? “His brand is letting people starve and wasting inventory?”
He laughed and then glanced at my face to see that it was a genuine question. He coughed uncomfortably. “Well, I suppose. Anyway, this is the next one where we keep the new stock that arrives. Sometimes, the fisherman keeps it for a few more hours—”
I glanced out of the back and said, “There’s a lot of space back here. Ever thought of turning it into a bar?”
He frowned. “A gas station bar?”
