It was before one-thirty in the afternoon the next day when Jenny saw that creep again. He just walked into the cafe, sat down, and patiently waited for service with a genial smile. Jenny cut in front of a waitress to see to him. Excitement enhanced his pretty light blue eyes as she quickly, yet elegantly, walked over to him and gave him a menu.
"Hello, welcome to Conner's Cafe. My name is Jenny and I'll be your waitress today. Would you like to start off by ordering a drink?"
"I'd love a coffee and a chat with the owner." His grin would have been so enchanting if Jenny didn't think he was a disgusting son of a bitch. He had the teeth of an actor and the face of an angel. That glorious blond hair of his was combed back, looking very well settled against his gently tanned skin. His remarkably clean hands were relaxed against the table.
"I'm sorry. He's not here right now." Jenny had on the phoniest smile she could muster.
As if he had every right to do so, the man made several unreasonable requests, all with a cheerful tone and a relaxed posture. "Fetch your cell phone. Return to me. Call him. Have him on speaker phone." He didn't even say please. What a prick!
Jenny was afraid he'd start something if she refused. Then again, it was highly possible that he wouldn't do anything too obvious. Even he must try to avoid attention from the police.
"Alright then. I'll be right back." Jenny strolled across the dining area and into the kitchen. She found her purse, and then her phone. When she was standing near the stalker blond again, she dialed up Cliff's number and waited.
Three rings sounded, and then there was his voice. "Hello?"
"Hi Boss! Listen, I'm about to put you on speaker phone. Mr. Pretty Boy Stalker here says he wants to talk to you."
For a moment there was nothing except the idle preening of the blond. He was brushing and pinching imaginary bits of dirt and dust away from his brand new slacks. Then she heard Cliff say, "Okay."
She tapped the little button. "Okay Boss, you're on."
That was when the creep leaned into her phone a bit and said with an energized voice, "Heeeeeeeeeelo! I'm Eric. How are you?"
Jenny cringed at him. She didn't want to, but she couldn't help it.
Cliff's voice from her phone's speaker bitterly replied, "Kind of pissed off."
That creepy man, his name was Eric. Jenny was pretty sure Jessa hold told her that, but she had misheard and thought his name was Elric.
He made something of a pouting face and spoke into the phone with a sad tone. "I'm sorry to hear that. What's the problem?"
"Well I had a girlfriend for about a minute but now she's gone."
Eric's light brown eyebrows rose. "She's gone? Where did she go?"
"I don't know, Man. Something about an ex-boyfriend scared her so bad she left town."
"So, you were dating one of your employees?" The way Eric licked his lips made Jenny give a quick shudder. "That's a little risky, especially when she hasn't been working for very long."
Jenny wanted to slap him.
"Why don't you come over here and talk to me for a while? I'll be right here."
Jenny wanted to punch him.
Cliff said, "You want me to drive over there just to talk to you?"
"I'm waiting." Then Eric personally reached for Jenny's phone. His fingertip tapped a red square on the screen, and Cliff was hung up on. He then put his attention back to Jenny's frowning face. "Get your pad, Miss."
She prepared to write, but she wasn't happy about it.
"Coffee, extra sugar packets, a glass of water, two plain waffles with hot syrup, two link sausages, two slices of bacon, two full slices of toast." He didn't even glance at the menu.
As she took that menu away, she replaced her fake smile and said, "I'll get right on that. Don't you worry."
***
He left Rebecca at his brother Ryan's house, along with all of her packed up belongings. Poor Rebecca was absolutely vexed, confused, even screaming at him at one point.
Michael was growling in the background. He wanted Eric dead.
"Vampire or not, the cops will look for him if he goes missing," he silently reminded the Beast. His foot slowly nudged the break pad down as the truck approached a stoplight. "If they find his body, it'd be better if it was in the woods, looking like a bear or a wolf got him."
Michael wanted to drag him into the woods.
"Well," Cliff thought, "that would just make me more suspicious, wouldn't it? You don't want to be in a cell, do you?"
Michael whined at him.
Cliff pulled into a parking lot and thought, "Calm down, Michael. We need to keep cool. We can't lose our temper again. We'll get him, just not right now."
When he opened the front door to Conner's Cafe, he saw the back of Eric's head and his broad shoulders. Big guy. Pretty bad, but pretentious as all hell.
He smelled like freshly dug up dirt. There was also the candy and expensive cologne, but mostly he smelled like earth. It wasn't a bad scent.
Cliff's fingers were flitting about. He put his hands in his pockets. One pocket had a key-chain and a good number of keys for him to nervously finger.
Damn it. He wasn't a big, bad-ass, alpha mother fucker with a big ass family ready to die for him. Well, he was pretty sure his family loved him to death and would gladly fight for him, but Cliff didn't like the idea. He didn't want his family, or anyone else, to get hurt.
He was scared.
All he knew about this guy was that he had lots of money, super strength and speed, could grow fangs, and drank blood.
God damn. Was there anything else he didn't know? Did he normally have animal-like senses, like Michael did? Could he smell Cliff as he sat there, watching Jenny remove his dirty dishes? Could he hear him? Could he hear his terrified heart pounding his blood throughout his nervous body?
He must have covered up that murder that had scared Rebecca so much. How many other people had he killed? The last thing Michael had killed was a literal rabbit. Cliff had never killed anything bigger than a spider. When it came to actual people, none of them had ever actually done it.
But, he might have to kill this creepy ass son of a bitch, and he'd have a hard time doing it. He'd have to actually use his brain if he wanted to stand a chance. That meant that Michael needed to shut the fuck up for once in his life.
Properly chastised by the thought, Michael turned sober and quiet in Cliff's brain.
Then that Eric bastard turned his head. He smiled with teeth as white as clown makeup, teeth framed by admittedly nice lips that were almost girly. He didn't look like a blood sucking demon of the night. He looked like a guy who just had a nice vacation at the beach.
God damn it.
It was time to harness his very reasonable fear.
Cliff took a deep breath and kept a robust stride. He stopped before the man who was smiling like he was about to go on a date.
"The hell do you want, Man?" He purposely made eye contact for just a moment, and then quickly focused on his throat, then his shoulder.
He was mentally recalling Rebecca's behavior during her shyest moments, and his own memories of junior high, all the way up to his senior year in high school. Awkward, confusing years!
"Goodness, I feel like a valued customer!" Eric Hardy made a shooing gesture at him. "It's nice to have the owner greet me, but I need to pay for the meal."
"You have to pay up front, bring your check. I'll ring you up."
Eric slipped a fine leather wallet out of his pocket, opened it up, and took out a crisp fifty dollar bill. He slid the bill onto the table very delicately. "Lead the way, Mr. Owner."
As Cliff was walking to the register, he realized that the fifty bucks on the table was the god damn tip. Jenny was going to have a tantrum in the kitchen, unless Jessa could find the time to calm her down. Did Eric tip big like that all the time, or was he just showing off?
Cliff deliberately allowed a few second's worth of extra contact between their fingers as he took the ticket. He tapped out the total onto the touch screen, popped the cash drawer open, and put the cocksucker's money inside, not that there was anything wrong with being a cocksucker, he reminded himself. He didn't think it was a bad thing at all. He just liked coming up with new insults for the guy.
As he gave the dickhead his change, he once again allowed a slightly more contact with the man, as if he wanted to feel his smooth skin against him for just a bit longer. Cliff looked at the man's only somewhat wincing eyes, looked back down at his own rough hands, and closed the cash drawer with a lowered head, as if he were embarrassed of his marked skin.
Then he dared to look back up at Eric.
What a shit-eating grin!
"You ... uh ... you wanted to talk to me?" That's it. Nice and scared. He had to be nice and scared, with a hint of curious.
Eric's back was straight. Very quickly, his teeth went over part of his bottom lip. If Cliff hadn't been paying such close attention to him, he wouldn't have noticed it. "We shouldn't be around all these people. Let's try your office."
"You're not getting into my office, Man."
"The men's restroom, then. I assume it's clean?"
Cliff couldn't help but flex his hand at his words. "Cleaner than your teeth."
Eric clapped his hands together and walked through the dining room. Cliff watched him for a bit. Then he moved on in the same direction, putting his hands back into his pockets and fiddling with his jingling keys.
Hm, what's another good insult for him? Leech?
Michael howled at that. Cliff had to bite his cheek to stop himself from smiling.
The bathroom was as Cliff had said, cleaner than the leech's teeth. Eric was the one who locked the door. Was he about to get violent? He wouldn't, right? If Eric left a corpse behind, there would be an investigation. Cliff pulled his hands from his pockets, just in case.
Eric rested his back against the door, completely blocking Cliff's chances of escape, if he needed to escape. Cliff chose a similar position on the other side of the room, between the toilet and the little trashcan.
