Push and Shove: The Ghost Bird Series: #6 (The Academy) by C. L. Stone Page A

started scraping and stacking as I was dragged out of the kitchen.
    “Luke,” I said softly. “Why can’t I just show him my ID?”
    Luke squeezed my hand, a light smile playing on his lips. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just easier, that’s all.”
    I felt there was more to this, but I didn’t know the questions to ask. How was this easier? Uncle made it sound like a complication. Although when I thought about it, I didn’t really know where my ID was. Didn’t I have one? Did he mean a birth certificate? It must have been at the house somewhere. I’d try to look for it later.
    The dining room was nearly empty. I scanned for the guy that had been there before, but didn’t see him.
    Luke guided me to the register by the counter. “Okay,” he said. “What you want to do is guard this thing with your life.”
    I glanced at the computerized register. “Guard it?”
    “You stand here,” he said, nudging me behind the register. “I pass out these tickets to customers.” He plucked one up from off of the counter nearby. He showed it to me. “There’s a bar code.” He pointed to a laser gun thing sitting on a pedestal by the register. “Scan the code.” He scanned it. The register beeped and displayed an amount, and asked about payment. “Cash or charge only, we don’t handle checks. If it’s a charge, take the card, run it through this.” He pointed to the edge of the register where there was a credit card machine. He showed me buttons to push and where to stack finished receipts.
    “Okay,” I said. It seemed simple enough, but I was still nervous. This wasn’t like making a pie. This was handling money. Other people’s money. What if I mixed up tickets and credit cards? What if someone couldn’t pay? What if I broke it?
    Luke wrapped an arm around my shoulders, squeezing me. “I’ll be right here,” he said.
    “Should I sit people?” I asked.
    “Not barefoot,” he said. “I’ll show you how to do that another day. Right now, it’s not busy so just babysit this thing.” He leaned in, kissed me on the forehead. A warm tremble started through my head as it was the first time his lips touched anything other than my hands. He’d done it so quickly, like he was trying to get away with it. “And no flirting with the guys.”
    “Does that include you?”
    He laughed and walked off.
    The good thing about guarding a register is that it doesn’t move anywhere. I thought if I had to work while I was supposed to be relaxing, this was the easiest job to have. It was another half hour of standing and staring at the walls before a customer arrived at the counter with a ticket. He’d been sitting at one of the booths reading a newspaper and sipping a coffee.
    I was smoothing out the ticket so I could scan it when the man opened his wallet, dropped a five dollar bill on the counter, and started for the door.
    My mouth fell open and my heart stopped. What just happened? I gazed at the five dollar bill on the counter and then checked the ticket price. A dollar ninety-five. All he had was one coffee. Did he mean to leave a whole five dollars?
    I lifted my head, checking the dining room but the man was out the door already.
    “Oy, Trouble,” Gabriel positioned his cleaning tray on the counter and stood next to me. “Why are you looking like a fish out of water?”
    “That guy left a five for a two dollar ticket.”
    Gabriel smirked and shoved a hand on his hip. “What? Old Cody? He drinks more than five dollars’ worth of free refills on the coffee when he comes in here.” He nodded his head toward the register. “Just drop three dollars into the tip jar.”
    “What tip jar?”
    Gabriel fetched a plastic to-go cup from under the counter. He picked up a pen next to the register, and wrote “Tips” on the outside. He plopped it on the counter next to the register. “There,” he said. “That’ll work for now. Most of the time they just leave it on the table or the waiters take care of it. If