Heart of the Hunter (87 page)

“I can’t believe he took to you so soon,” Grace said from the grill. “He usually hates new people.”

“What’s to hate?” Elle said with a smile.

Then she went back to the counter and refilled the coffee mugs of the row of mechanics, lumberjacks, laborers, and forestry workers who were devouring their food.

“She’s going to work out just fine,” Grace said to Kelly, and Elle smiled quietly to herself when she heard it.

There was something about the place, about the whole town, that was bringing out the best in her. She’d worked her share of diners, but nowhere before had the customers seemed to welcome her so open-heartedly, or had the boss been so willing to see the strengths she brought to the job. At heart, Elle was a people person. She could take a look at a mother coming in with a bunch of kids, or a laborer coming in after a hard day’s work, and know instantly what they needed. Not food necessarily, she didn’t know what they’d order, but she knew what they
needed
. Everyone who came into a restaurant needed something, and Elle knew it wasn’t only about having something to eat. People needed the company, the interaction, someone to give them a smile and bring a little cheer into their day.

“You going to stop pouring sugar into that cup before it gives you diabetes?” she said to a gruff looking park official who worked on the mountain.

He looked up at her in surprise but she was already gone, grabbing a basket of toast for another guy at the counter.

More than one customer asked Grace about the
new girl,
and they all had an approving tone in their voice when they did it.

“It seems you’re going to work out,” Kelly said, when the two girls had a brief moment’s rest between customers.

“Do you think?”

“I know it.” Kelly turned toward the grill. “Right, Gracie? She’s going to work out?”

“If she keeps working like this, and doesn’t bring any drama into the place.”

Elle shook her head. “No drama, Grace, I swear it.”

“I don’t know,” Grace said, kindly. “Girls your age, how old are you?”

“Twenty three,” Elle said.

“Same as me,” Kelly said with a grin.

“Girls your age attract drama. Romantic drama. Believe me. I know.”

“Grace was a bit of a
femme fatale
in her day, weren’t you, Gracie?”

“Those days are long gone now.”

“Oh, it’s never too late, Gracie. Love might be right around the corner.”

Grace laughed, “You two look after yourselves. When I was your age I had my hands full, I can tell you that much. You both have some catching up to do.”

As if on cue, the door opened and a group of guys in their twenties came in. There were four of them, accompanied by a cold gust of mountain wind.

“Oh, boy,” Kelly said. “Here comes trouble.”

Elle watched the boys come in. They were a a few years older than she and Kelly but still under thirty. Their clothes bore the logos of various local sports teams. They wore ball caps and sneakers, despite the fact that it was below freezing outside.

“Shit, Kelly,” one of the boys said, “four coffees, and make that shit fast.”

Elle was surprised at how quickly Kelly jumped at the boy’s demand.

“He can wait like anyone else,” Elle said.

“I don’t want them to cause a fuss,” Kelly answered as she hurried over to the table with the coffee.

Elle stayed put at the counter, sipping her own coffee. She wanted to know what was up with the boys. They weren’t exactly her type, a little scrawny looking, mangy beards, stained shirts. They wouldn’t be winning any fashion contests anytime soon, but she knew more than to judge people by their appearance. It could well be that they would turn out to be good guys, despite their rude entrance.

“This shit’s cold,” one of the boys said, sliding his coffee mug across the table.

Elle didn’t think he’d meant for it to fall off the other side of the table, but when no one stopped it, it slid off the edge and smashed on the ground. For a second, all four boys, and Kelly, looked at it in surprise, as if there was something surprising about a sliding mug falling to the ground, and then the boys, simultaneously, started laughing.

“I guess you’ll have to bend over and clean that up,” one of them said.

“Good thing you’re wearing a skirt.”

“Shame it isn’t a little shorter.”

Elle turned to Grace. Gracie looked back and sighed. “I can’t turn them away. I need the business.”

“Are they always like this?”

“Ever since Kelly broke up with the tall one there, Phil, the ring leader, a little while back.”

“He’s being awful to her,” Elle said.

“They’re a bunch of spoiled little shits,” Gracie said. “That one on the end, his father’s the mayor, the one who broke the mug, Phil, is the son of the sheriff, the other two’s dads are bigwigs too. The county judge, and the district attorney.”

Elle nodded. “I see,” she said, and grabbed a mop and broom to help Kelly.

When the boys saw her approach, they didn’t hold back. They threw everything they had at her.

“Oh, Kelly, baby, who’s your new friend?”

“Your new lover,” another added.

“You two a couple of lesbians?”

“Dykes,” another corrected.

“Wouldn’t stop me from stuffing them,” the first added.

Elle tried not to let her temper get the better of her. Grace had said she needed their business, even if they were abusive pricks, and Elle had no intention of letting Grace down. Not on her first day on the job.

As she bent over to pick up the pieces of broken glass, she felt a cold hand on her ass. She swung around to face the culprit.

“What the fuck?” she demanded.

The boy held up his hands in mock apology. “Whoa there, we’ve got a live one here, fellas.”

Elle wanted to slap him in the face but she restrained herself. She swallowed her anger and helped Kelly finish the cleanup, then she went back to the counter to help get rollups and menus. It was Kelly’s table but she wasn’t going to abandon her new friend to them. If she helped Kelly, the job would be done twice as fast, with less opportunity for humiliating either of them. Kelly noticed, and touched Elle on the shoulder when they brought the order back to Grace.

“Thanks, Elle.”

Elle looked her in the eye. “You’ve got my back, I’ve got yours.”

Chapter 6

Elle

T
HE FOUR BOYS DIDN’T SHUT
up until their mouths were full. It was a relief to Elle when they finally brought out the orders and the boys could divert their attention to their food instead of to the waitresses.

“Ketchup,” one of the boys demanded through a mouthful of hamburger.

“Certainly,” Elle said, keeping a fake smile on her face as she went to get it.

As she returned, a new customer arrived. Kelly made a face. It had already been a long shift and the two girls still had a few more hours of dinner to get through before they could flip the sign and knock off for the night. Elle knew that every new customer was going to get that same grimace from Kelly and she considered sending her friend home and trying to take the dinner rush on her own. She had no doubt it had been a while since Kelly’s last night off, but she wasn’t sure she could handle the whole dinner on her own. They only had the five customers right now, but it might get a lot busier later.

She looked outside and already could see traffic picking up on the street as people clocked off work. It would be dark in half an hour too.

“Sit anywhere you like,” she said to the new customer, and then, looking up, got a proper look at him for the first time.

He was the exact opposite of the four boys she and Kelly had been dealing with for the last half hour. He was tall and broad, with dark stubble and a mess of hair. He seemed about thirty, and while the four at the table were definitely boys, this guy was all man. His arms were thick and muscular, each muscle perfectly defined as if it had been chiseled. His skin was tanned as if he lived near the beach. His eyes were deep, with just a hint of fine lines around the corners, showing that he smiled a lot. He seemed thoughtful too. Elle was good at reading people, and in this man she saw a depth that was rarely apparent on the face of a man his age. He looked back at Elle and without saying a word, took her cue and found himself a seat in her section.

He walked slowly but purposefully. He was a man who knew where he was going, even when he was unfamiliar with the place. And he
was
new to this place. Elle was sure of that much. The way he looked around, taking in all the salient details of the diner as if he might need them later. He was the kind of guy who liked to know where all the exits in a room were before he let himself get comfortable.

Takes one to know one,
Elle thought to herself.

She suddenly felt as if the diner was empty, as if the four troublemakers were no longer there, as if Kelly and Grace were no longer there, and the only people in the room were her and the new guy. Forgetting to be subtle, she allowed her gaze to follow him to his seat. Then she almost tripped up, hurrying to grab him a menu before Kelly took him.

Kelly stopped her at the counter.

“Who’s that?” Elle hissed.

Kelly shrugged. “I’ve never seen him before.”

“He’s not a regular?”

“He’s new.”

Elle looked to Grace. “I don’t know either, but he’s caught your eye, hasn’t he?” Grace said.

“No he hasn’t,” Elle protested.

Grace smiled knowingly. “Sure he hasn’t.”

“I was just wondering if you knew him.”

Gracie looked over and squinted. Something inside her recognized something about the man, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. “I’m not sure,” she said at last.

Elle grabbed a menu and some cutlery.

“Just be careful,” Kelly whispered.

“Careful?”

“He looks,
dangerous
.”

“He does not look
dangerous
,” Elle responded, but as she walked over to the man’s table, she could feel her heart thumping in her chest. There was definitely
something
about him. Danger was one word. Smoldering was another. Knee-weakening might be another, if that was a word.

She cleared her throat as she reached his table. “How are you tonight?” she said, placing the menu in front of him.

He was sitting still, looking at a crumpled letter in his hands. He looked up at her as if she’d startled him out of his thoughts.

“Oh,” he said.

There was a moment’s awkward silence as Elle waited for him to answer the question before realizing that he hadn’t really heard it.

“You want something to drink? Coffee, beer, soda?”

“Coffee would be fine,” he said.

“Yeah,” Elle said. “Warm you up on a night like this.”

He smiled. She turned and ran, escaping from her own idiotic chit chat as much as from his presence. As she poured his coffee and got the cream and sugar she noticed that the diner had grown silent. At first she thought it was just in her head, but then she looked around her and realized. Kelly was standing behind the counter, surreptitiously watching the new guy as she pretended to roll cutlery in napkins. Gracie was letting onions burn as she watched him through the order window. Even the four troublemakers had shut up.

The place was silent, and the man was completely oblivious to the effect he’d had on the room.

Elle returned and put his mug down in front of him, followed by a spoon, some sugar packets, and a small jug of cream.

“You just get into town?” she said.

He nodded. She was holding the coffee pot in her hand and should have been pouring but something stopped her. She knew that as soon as she poured his coffee, she’d have no reason to stand there, next to him, and she wanted to stand there. She wanted to talk to him. She couldn’t have explained why.

“First time here?”

He let out a little laugh. “Actually, no,” he said. “This was home once.”

“You lived here?”

“I was born here.”

“So you’re back for a visit?”

“I guess so.”

“Family?”

He looked up into her eyes, and his gaze transfixed her. She felt like a deer caught in the gaze of a wolf. Something about the intensity of his stare, the power of it, robbed her of her ability to think. Her mind went blank.

“I guess that depends on how you define family.”

His face was like something out of a magazine, his jawline defined, his cheekbones high, his eyes deep and intense.

“What do you mean?” she faltered.

“Well, if by family you mean the people who love you and take care of you, then no, I’m not here to visit family.”

“I see,” she said, thinking about what he was trying to say. “And if by family I simply mean the people who brought you into the world?”

He smiled. “In that case, I suppose, yes. That’s who I’m here for.”

The man’s gaze dropped down to the letter, and Elle realized she was still holding the coffee pot. She began to pour the hot liquid into his mug. As she was pouring, without saying a word, the man reached out and touched her hand. It was a strange moment, an unusually tentative and affectionate gesture to show a stranger. It surprised Elle so much that she forgot to stop pouring, and the coffee overflowed the cup and spilled over the table and onto the man’s lap, burning him.

“Holy crap,” Elle said, snapping back to attention. “What am I doing?”

The coffee flowed over the edge of the table, onto the man’s jeans, and he had to stand up to stop it from burning him further.

“I’m so sorry,” Elle gasped.

The man shook his head. “No, it’s me. I don’t know what I was thinking. I shouldn’t have touched your hand. I wasn’t myself.”

He stuffed his hand into his pocket and pulled out a five dollar bill, which he threw on the table.

“No, it’s all right,” Elle said. “I don’t mind.”

But he was already gone, striding across the diner and out the door. It took Elle a moment to gather her wits, then she hurried back over to the counter for a cloth to wipe up the mess.

“What was that all about?” Kelly said.

Elle stopped. She looked at Kelly for a moment. “You know what?” she said. “I have no idea.”