Making sure that my gun is carefully hidden under my jacket, I walk into the diner. I half expect to see some version of Wendy there, but instead a dumpy, cheerful looking woman serves me coffee.
“In town for vacation?” she asks with a big grin.
“You could say that,” I smile, sipping on the coffee that isn’t as bad as the one from the last diner, but isn’t good either.
An up-and-down movement of her eyes tells me she’s studyingme but trying to be discreet about it.
“From the city?” she questions.
I shrug, taking another swig.
“We simple folks don’t get many visits from out-of-town,” she comments, setting a slice of peach cobbler before me without my asking for it. “But you’re not the first city guy to come to the diner this morning. Wonder if our little place is getting touristy, after all!”
My ears perk up. “Really?” I ask, trying to sound casual. Is it possible Noel has already been here? If so, he didn’t waste any time.
“Yeah, Mexicans or something like that. I think they were looking to buy an animal, or maybe find a lost one. They kept talking about a pet.”
I nearly choke on my coffee. That sounds like Noel, the fucker. Going aftermygirl. Guess both he and Gabriel have the same idea of vengeance. An eye for an eye, and all that bullshit. I could understand it better coming from Gabriel, the dead bastard—after all, Ididkill his little brother.
But Elias was just a friend of Noel’s. A partner. Noel should be going after one of my boys. Logan or Everest or Igor. Not my girl.
Coward. He knows he has no chance of ever killing one of us. He couldn’t even measure up to Everest. He’s hunting her because she’s weaker than him.
“Do you know them?”
“Huh?”
“Do you know them?” the dumpy woman asks again. “The two Mexicans. You looked like you knew them.”
The words echo strangely in my ears as I stare at her, mid-gulp. The coffee burns my esophagus but I don’t pay it any mind. Instead, I stammer, “Hold on. Did you saytwoMexicans?”
I’d been so focused on herpetcomment that I hadn’t heard another word.
Two Mexicans.
“Yep,” shrugs the woman in answer to my question. “Wonder what they were doing around here. We don’t have enough jobs to go around, let alone jobs for those dirty immigrants to steal.”
I don’t even lose time in reacting to the woman’s casual racism. My head is still reeling from the revelation.
Twomen. Does that mean Noel came with someone? If so, I’m going to have to be careful. Noel, I can easily handle. But if he’s trying to hide behind a bodyguard… Well, it would be typical for such a coward as Noel. But somehow, I didn’t expect it. I’m going to have to think things through.
“Thanks,” I grunt, leaving a bill on the counter.
I head back to my car, zipping my jacket as the late morning drizzle chills me. I’m glad I chose to come here during the day. I’m sure Noel is planning to attack at night, so I will have time to scope things out.
Turning on the engine, I roll up the steep cliff, then come to a grinding halt in the gravel just in front of the house.
Everest did a good job with it. It looks a lot more like the kind of place people might expect me to want than the cottage I did buy. Sorely out of place in the quiet countryside, it’s a looming, rectangular thing with large glass walls, and the furniture I get a glimpse of through the windows is very modern. Exactly like my apartment at Devil Tower, which I was perfectly happy with until Seraphina reawakened my childhood dreams.
As quietly as possible, I enter each room, turning on the lights while pointing my gun, ready to shoot. Everest did a good job with this too. There are lived-in signs: the bed, partially unmade, the shower curtain damp, some dirty bowls in the kitchen. Enough to convince Noel that we really do live here, but that we’ve probably gone out. I have a feeling he’s planning to come back in the middle of the night and gun us down in our sleep. But I’ll be waiting for him.
I return to the car and drive away until I find a little clearing off a small country road. I figure he will hear about my appearance at the diner. Now, it’s time to wait.
But I have the perfect pastime.
I take out my phone and click on the camera feed. It’s after noon by now, but Seraphina doesn’t seem to have any plans of eating. Tsk, tsk. She really doesn’t take care of her when I’m not around.
She spends the day going around the house, sitting on one chair then the other, occasionally flipping through a book or a magazine, staring at the clock, looking bored out of her mind. It all brings back fond memories of when she was my little captive, so bored by her captivity that it made her look forward to my visits. I always think back fondly to that time. For the first time, I wonder whether she does too.
