Page 15 of With Spite

I smiled, my first genuine smile of the day, then nervously got into the forklift.

I started it up and patted myself on the back for being able to do that.

I then put on my seat belt and pulled up YouTube again, pausing it frame by frame, as I figured out what to do and what buttons and levers to push.

Eventually, I backed it out, but immediately stopped when the screamy beeping started.

“That’s normal.” The trucker grinned.

I blew out a relieved breath, but still it came out through tight lungs.

Not fully gone yet.

Great.

I backed up, then pulled forward, happy now that I’d managed to maneuver it without breaking it.

And that it was cooperating with what I wanted it to do.

As I slowly drove into the back of the man’s truck, I breathed a sigh of relief when I was able to get the first pallet off.

However, when I got to the area that Vera had told me to put it, I realized that it wasn’t going to work.

Not with my inability to maneuver in the tight spaces that the other pallets forced me to do.

So I put them in a different spot, being careful and slow the entire time, right next to a shiny motorcycle that had to belong to Huxley.

It was on the last such trip that I got cocky.

I turned a little bit too hard and fast, and the motorcycle toppled over.

I stared in shock at the bike lying on its side and felt fear slither down my spine.

“Shit!”

“Whoops,” the trucker drawled.

“What. The. Fuck?”

I looked over to find Huxley, dressed in a huge plastic apron with rubber boots on, a knife in his hand, and blood up to his elbows, staring at me like he would like to murder me.

“I’m so sorry!” I cried. “I didn’t mean to!”

Harvey wheezed.

Hux elbowed him in the belly, forcing him to bend over to catch his breath.

Then Hux looked at the driver and frowned.

“JohnBoy, why didn’t you just do it for her?” Hux grumbled, looking pissed as hell as he stared at his bike lying on the ground.

I bit my lip, trying not to cry.

“Because Vera’s a bitch, and she’s going to make her figure it out anyway. Plus, like always, it’s not my damn job to unload. It’s y’all’s job. And Vera can unload it her damn self, but she’s too good for manual labor. Yet she has this poor girl out here doing it. You’re lucky all she did was hit your bike and knock it over.”

True.

I could’ve done way worse.