Witness

by Rachael Orman

  “But…” I panicked. I didn’t have time to cover a shift. I needed to leave… like last night.

  “No, buts. You left yesterday and now we need help. Get your apron on and get out there,” he said, not willing to take any excuses.

  I debated running out the back door and just taking off, but I wasn’t that kind of person. No one had attacked me so far, so it should be fine if I helped out just for a little bit. I couldn’t leave them in a bind.

  “Okay. Okay,” I said, grabbing an apron from the extras and dropping my bag in an out-of-the-way spot. I’d left my normal apron at home since I didn’t expect to work. There were a few pens and pads around, as well, so I stuffed them in the pocket and went to find out how to help out front.

  “Oh, thank God!” Demara exclaimed when she saw me. “We are slammed. I thought I was going to have to handle this all on my own.”

  “Nope, I’m here. Tell me where you need me,” I said, looking around at the packed diner, glad that I’d decided to help. This was normal. This was something I could deal with. Immediately, I felt a calming wave wash over me. I could handle a room full of demanding customers. If it helped me forget the fear from the night before, then that was all the better.

  Demara directed me and, before long, I was too busy to think about anything but taking orders, filling drinks and dropping off food. By the time the rush was over and more tables were empty than full, I had almost completely forgotten about my need to disappear.

  That was until I spotted the same mysterious man sitting in the same booth in the corner. Instantly, my heart tried to beat out of my chest and a cold sweat broke out over my body.

  “Oh, I see you’ve spotted Eric,” Demara observed, sidling up to me where I had been restocking straws on the bar top.

  “Eric?” I looked at her, surprised.

  “Yeah, that’s his name. He’s been coming in here for a few months. He doesn't talk much, and he just sits there drinking his coffee, watching people for an hour and then leaves without eating,” she said, handing me more straws to put in the jar.

  “He’s been here before?” I asked, completely confused.

  “Oh, yeah. How have you not seen him?” She gave me wide eyes, like it was the most absurd thing she’s ever heard.

  “I have no idea,” I whispered more to myself than her, dropping my eyes to my task. If he’d been coming here for so long and I hadn’t noticed, maybe I wasn’t as on my toes as I thought. Maybe he wasn’t there to kill me, like I’d thought. Maybe I’d just gone off the deep end from always looking over my shoulder.

  “Why don’t you go over and meet him?” Demara suggested, sliding a pitcher filled with water across the counter.

  “No, no, that’s okay,” I said, pushing it back toward her.

  “Stop being so shy. Just do it. He seems to want to meet you from the way he keeps looking at you.” She moved the water back toward me.

  I looked toward Eric and saw that he was looking at me yet again. Sighing, I grabbed the pitcher and headed toward him.

  “Refill?” I asked, holding it up as if he didn’t realize that was what the pitcher was for.

  “Sure,” he said, holding his glass up for me. “What happened to Demara?”

  I knew he’d seen us talking and looking in his direction.

  “Uh, she had to go to the bathroom,” I lied.

  “Mmm.” He nodded as his eyes flicked behind me.

  I looked back and saw that Demara was still at the counter. Fire burst over my cheeks at being caught. I cleared my throat and spun away from the table. Leaving the pitcher on the counter, I went immediately into the kitchen.

  “Mark, the rush is over. Can I go?” I asked as soon as I saw the heavy set man at the grill.

  “No,” he grunted.

  “Oh, come on,” I sighed. “I wasn’t supposed to work today at all. I have other things I need to get done.”

  Mostly, I needed some alone time to decide what I was going to do. Was I going to leave? Or was I going to stay? Did this Eric character want anything to do with me or was it simply a coincidence that he had a killer's eyes?

  If I was sticking around, that meant I had to take care of the things I normally did on my day off. All the mundane and boring but necessary chores.

  “I’m sorry, but no. You skipped out yesterday, and there are plenty of people around here that would take your job and not leave me shorthanded. So, if you leave now, you are out of a job,” Mark said, putting his foot down. He normally gave me and the two other morning shift girls a lot of leniency, but apparently he was done with that right when I needed it most.

  I bit back a heavy sigh and just nodded before walking back to the front. If I was staying, I’d need to keep my job so I was stuck. Mark dinged the bell, announcing there was an order to be delivered, so I went to the window.

  “I hate being a dick, but it’s how it has to be,” he said, pushing two plates onto the shelf.

  “I understand.” I didn’t want to, but I did. He had a business to run, and he needed workers who showed up and stayed their whole shift. I grabbed the food after glancing at the table number on the receipt between the warm plates. Of course, as good as my day was going, it just had to be for Eric.

  “Here you go,” I said, setting the food down in front of him a bit harsher than normal.

  “Thank you,” he mumbled, pulling a plate closer.

  “Enjoy.”

  “I hope so. I don’t normally order food, so I’m not sure what to expect, but I’m hungry enough to find out.”

  “It’s greasy, so be prepared. I don’t think your body is used to handling this type of food,” I admitted, then bit my lip to stop the stupid words that were spilling out of my mouth. Now that I wasn’t so focused on him possibly wanting to kill me, I had to admit he was quite attractive. The flat, scary eyes were still there, but his posture was more relaxed as he leaned back in the booth and smiled at me with a broad smile that made him look younger and more carefree.

  “No, I don’t indulge often, but if it gives me an excuse to talk to such a lovely woman, I think I can handle it. I’ll just have to run a couple of extra miles later,” he said with a shrug as he took the first bite of his scrambled eggs.

  It was hard to hold back a laugh at the cringe he attempted to hide.

  “It’s not that bad,” he managed to say after he swallowed, then followed it with half a glass of water.

  “Why are you forcing down the food if you don’t enjoy it?” I couldn’t help but smile at him. It was cute, the way he obviously didn’t want the food but was still eating it.

  “Because it gives me the excuse to talk to you, of course.” He winked and shoved another bite into his mouth.

  I rolled my eyes. “Right.”

  “Why don’t you believe me?” he asked, setting the fork down and looking at me like he’d wait as long as it took to get an answer.

  “Because you had no idea that I’d be the one to deliver it when you ordered it,” I explained what was obvious to me.

  “Ah, but I did. See, Demara wasn’t too hard to persuade to not be around when the order came up.”

  I quickly looked around the nearly vacant diner to realize that she was indeed missing.

  “What’d you do to her? Did you threaten her?” I asked, instantly worried. While he might not be there for me, that didn’t mean he wasn’t everything I initially thought he was.

  “Did I threaten her? No, babe, I don’t have to scare women into doing the things I want.” He let out a deep laugh as I glared at him.

  So he was a player. That seemed fitting. With a body like his, I doubted he had any issues picking up women and getting them to do anything at all.

  “That’s really fantastic,” I said, shaking my head then walking away from the table before he could say anything more.

  “Well, well. Seems like you had no problem getting the beautiful man to talk.” Demara popped out from the kitchen as if she’d been waiting for me.

&nbs
p; “Yeah, whatever. He’s a disgusting player who likes to use women,” I grumbled.

  “Then use him before he uses you,” Demara said.

  “What?” I looked at her in surprise.

  “Fuck his brains out, then leave before he can kick you out,” she said as if it was no big deal.

  “Not my style. You do it.”

  “Oh, no, he asked me to help get you to his table so he could talk to you. He isn’t interested in me,” she said, then let out a wistful sigh. “If he was, we’d already have plans for tonight. Like right after I got off, I’d be getting off.”

  I laughed. “Gross.”

  “You just haven’t gotten laid in so long, you’ve forgotten how good it feels,” she announced a little too loud for my comfort, and I glanced around to see who might have overheard. To my complete mortification, Eric was silently laughing. Even if his eyes were on the plate of food in front of him, I knew he’d heard.

  “Whatever. Get back to work,” I groaned and went to check on one of my tables in order to escape. Would this day never end?

  I was way too excited by the time the night shift showed up. The day had seemed to drag, especially when Eric had left without another word to me, but he had left Demara all over my ass about trying to hook up with him the next time he came in.

  “Thank you for staying even though you weren’t happy about it. I appreciate it,” Mark told me before I walked out the back door with my bag.

  Once in my car, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. Time to make a choice.

  Had I overreacted when I first saw Eric? After seeing him again and speaking to him, I really thought that perhaps I had. Part of me was glad that Aaron had inadvertently kept me from leaving. Part of me still thought that I should go anyway. I had been in the same place for a while, and maybe it would be safer if I moved about a bit. There was a number programmed into my cell phone that I could call if I needed to talk to someone from the FBI, but I was afraid it’d only draw attention from Michele and his cronies. Then again, they had gotten me out in the first place. I hadn’t had contact since I’d testified against Michele, and I really didn’t want to risk it.

  There was a tiny chance he’d forgotten about me and wasn’t looking for me anymore. However, I wouldn’t hold my breath. Men like him didn’t just forget, not when it was their wife. Not when it had been the woman who’d been in their life for seven years that testified about a murder they’d witnessed them commit, which ended up in them getting a life sentence. He’d never be getting out of jail, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t still have contacts on the outside that would seek out his revenge.

  I shivered at the thought and decided that I was too tired to make such an important decision. After pulling out, I drove to my apartment. The laundry and grocery shopping I normally got done would just have to wait. After a little nap, I could tackle those tasks and think things through some more.

  I parked in my normal spot, retrieved my bag from the backseat and slid my gun into the back of my pants. As I climbed out, I was surprised to see Sheriff Aaron slowly driving by.

  “Hi there,” he said with a wave.

  I nodded at him and turned away; I wasn’t in the mood to deal with him. After locking the front door and putting the quilt and chair in place, I dropped the bag and kicked off my shoes. All I wanted was to get to my bed and pass out for a few hours.

  However, all thoughts of sleep fled my brain when I noticed the window in my room was open and the curtain was blowing in the slight breeze.

  “Don’t scream,” Eric’s deep voice spoke softly right next to my ear as a thick arm wrapped around my waist and a hand slid over my mouth.

  Chapter Two

  Every muscle in my body painfully tensed. My heart hammered. Air froze in my lungs. I couldn’t make myself move for a long moment, until time seemed to unpause and everything came whirling back in real time.

  I sucked in a breath around his hand and blinked rapidly to moisten my eyes that’d dried from being open for too long. Slowly, I managed to ease my body back into a relaxed state, even if I was still mentally ready to pounce. All I needed was a chance. A single second that I’d been waiting years for.

  “If I move my hand, are you going to stay quiet? Or do I need to gag you?” Eric whispered. I nodded my head to the former and shook it to the latter. The last thing I wanted to deal with was something shoved in my mouth. Heaven knew what he’d use, anyway.

  Cautiously, his hand slid off my mouth bit by bit. As soon as the arm around my waist started to loosen, I spun around and kneed him right in the balls before jumping back. He managed to grab onto the bottom of my shirt to keep me from going far while he grunted and glared at me, his free hand holding his groin.

  I pulled the gun from the back of my jeans and pointed it right at his head in a steady grip.

  “Let me go,” I demanded, jamming the muzzle against his forehead.

  “No,” he said, even though he barely had a grip on my shirt.

  “What are you, suicidal?” I jabbed him again, harder than before. “I will shoot you, motherfucker.”

  “I’m not here to hurt you,” he said, letting go of my shirt and dropping to his knees as if to display he wasn’t going to launch himself at me. I didn’t trust him, no matter what stance he was in.

  “Then why are you here?” I asked, stepping back farther from him, but staying close enough to keep the gun pressed to his skin.

  “To warn you.” He held up both his hands to show he was unarmed. Again, it did nothing to placate me.

  “About what? You are the only stranger in this town. The only one I need to be wary of.”

  “You are mistaken, and I’d really appreciate it if you’d take that gun away from my head.” He emphasized his point by pushing at the barrel with his head. “If I wanted to harm you, I would’ve already done so.”

  “I surprised you. That is why you haven’t touched me,” I said, not lowering the gun an inch.

  “You certainly surprised me, but that is not why.” He lowered his hands to rest at his side. “I could take you down in a second.”

  I wanted to challenge his cockiness, but I also didn’t want him to prove me wrong. However, having a gun on him did give me the advantage, no matter what he said.

  Faster than I could follow, Eric moved and had me on my back with my gun in his hand, pointed at my head, and his body pressing mine to the ground. His knees trapped my arms to my side, effectively holding me captive.

  “What was that, princess?” He smirked at me. “Never underestimate hired gunmen.”

  I swallowed hard.

  “So you admit it. You are here to kill me,” I said in a hoarse whisper. I knew it. I should’ve run when I’d had the chance.

  “I may or may not have been hired to take care of a pesky problem from a few years ago. That doesn’t mean I will fulfill my contract. I’m more interested in finding out who ratted you out than I am in taking your life.” He straightened and handed me back the gun, butt first.

  I reached a shaking hand out and took it then set it down on the nightstand.

  “Why?” I asked, frowning. None of it made sense.

  “Because while I might be neck deep in an undercover operation with the mob, I am still an FBI agent. Someone in this little town reached out to your ex and let him know where you could be found. They even offered to do the job for a price, but Michele didn’t trust anyone but one of his men to do it right. Now the FBI wants to find out who in this little town wants to get in cahoots with the mafia.” Eric brushed off and readjusted his shirt so he looked perfect again, as if he hadn’t just had his life threatened or held a gun to someone’s head. “This is supposed to be a safe place, and if this person went to the mob letting them know about you, who knows what else they are willing to do?”

  “And you are telling me this, why? Why wasn’t I just contacted and moved again? I don’t care who it is; I want to get as far away from here as possible if someone is telling Miche
le where I am. It’s the only way I’ll survive,” I spouted off the things I’d been told by my FBI handler after I testified.

  “Because until we find out who this person is, we don’t know what they know or if they will follow you if you leave. There are a lot of variables, and it’s safer to keep you where we know we can keep you safe than drag you off somewhere where there will be a whole bunch of new threats to deal with.” He moved to the curtains still blowing in the breeze and closed the window. “You will now have a shadow twenty-four-seven. You may not see me, but I’ll be there until we figure out who else seems to have an unhealthy interest in you. This won’t be over until we know who is behind this.”