2. A Night at the Moonlight
A Night at the Moonlight
soyer
P utting together the second date I was planning to go on with Amory was more involved than the first one had been, which resulted in me only parking the SUV across from the Moonlight Diner late, after ten. Night had fallen by then, traffic had eased, and the city’s illumination had created its own constellations in the dark.
I lowered the passenger window. The pawn I’d sent to watch while I wasn’t there was already walking toward the car. Probably had a good nose, that one.
“Sir,” he said through the window. His rain jacket shone with the remnants of the earlier drizzle.
“Anything of import to report?” I asked.
He pushed back his ball cap. “Well, that guy that’s sitting against the windows on the left now?” I looked over. The dude with the laptop who I wasn’t a fan of. “He eyed the table you sit at, almost like he wanted to sit there. But then he didn’t.”
“Hmm. You know which of the tables is mine how?”
“Erm, I went inside in the morning, sir. Just to get a spatial sense in case you wanted me to go inside. Had coffee and crêpes. Your scent was present.”
I accepted that with a nod. He was a werewolf, most likely, or some other shifter, which meant he had an innate understanding of territorial boundaries. I liked how he approached assignments.
“Anything else happen?”
“No, sir.”
“Good. You can call it a day here.”
“Thank you, sir,” he said while I closed the window back up.
I kept half an eye on the pawn as he left, and once he had, turned my full attention to the diner. There were still a good number of customers in there, a group of three women, the annoying laptop dude, an older man at the counter reading a newspaper, and two men having coffee and sandwiches at one table while looking at a file.
I can’t believe she’d do that, one said to the other. His lips were pleasantly easy to read even though he looked about ready to cry. A PI and his client I guessed. I turned my attention to the person I cared about.
Laura is excited for the play they’re putting on at school, Evil Eye Jenny told Amory, who was busy cleaning the blender they used for the milkshakes.
I couldn’t see what he was saying with his back turned, but Jenny went on, elaborating about a costume and things I didn’t really care about. Every now and then, the cook and owner took the time to look out from his kitchen.
The employee files Simeon had put together for me were waiting on the passenger seat. I picked them up, flipped through them until I got to the owner’s. Dwayne MacArthur, former military, though what he’d done exactly had been properly redacted. There was nothing to glean from the years he’d been enlisted in either. All those dates told me was simply that there had been ample opportunity for him to have been sent all over the globe.
I looked up from the file. “You’re not just looking out of your passthrough, you’re casing the place and where everyone is, aren’t you, McArthur.”
I dropped the file back on the seat and turned my attention back to the diner. Amory was wiping down the blender now, the guy at his laptop watching and not even really paying attention to what he was doing on his screen. I grabbed my binoculars. He had a colorful website open, and I saw a bare shoulder, a nice biceps. High-quality photos too, if I could make out that much detail from across the street. Interesting.
When Amory walked toward him, he changed the screen to whatever writing app he was using. Had pretended to be using. Very interesting. Not half as interesting as the conflicted expression on his face when he looked after Amory, who was making the rounds with his coffee pot, smiling at people and asking sweetly if they would like some more coffee.
I sighed. I’d seen enough. I collected the files and stowed them in the glove compartment, looked at myself in the rearview mirror to make sure my eyeliner wasn’t unfavorably smudged, and got out of the car.
The street was still rain wet under my feet, and I only cared insofar as that it would have made me easier to spot if Evil Eye Jenny or McArthur had been looking out and at me, but the luck of thieves favored me this night, and I got to the diner’s door unseen.
The bells jingled, and Amory said the “welcome” part of his greeting without looking, but then started smiling for the rest of it. Ah. Hopefully Mr. Laptop was paying attention.
Jenny certainly was. I ignored her and took a seat at my table, watching Amory grab a plate and put a slice of cherry pie on it for me. He was eager tonight, carrying the pie and the coffee cup in one hand while he grabbed the pot with the other. Jenny vanished through the swing doors that led to the back, but Amory’s focus was on me as he walked my way with his hands full.
“Hello, Amory.”
“Hi. I brought you the usual.” He was very neat about setting everything up in front of me, clearly wanting to do a good job of it.
“Thank you for remembering.”
He huffed. “You make it hard not to.”
“Hard, yes,” I said loud enough for Mr. Laptop to overhear. “Has your shift been going well, Amory?”
“Oh, you know. The usual. Regular people. Regulars. And strange ones.”
I grinned up at him. “Did you make up the last category especially for me?”
He shrugged. In anyone else, it would have been coy, but so far, I had learned that Amory didn’t do coy.
“I appreciate it,” I told him and picked up my fork. “Thank you for the pie. It looks delicious. Sweet. Just how I like my dessert.”
His cheeks reddened ever so faintly. “I’ll leave you to enjoy it then.”
He walked off somewhat awkwardly, not that his back wasn’t attractive. I watched. Mr. Laptop did too. I was about to glare at the man, then decided against it. Really, there wasn’t any need. From what I had seen, he wanted but never dared ask for what he wanted. And even after barely two weeks, I now had Amory’s full attention as soon as he laid eyes on me. Until our second date, that would be enough. No need to mark my territory further. Then, after, I would reevaluate. A part of me, not entirely a part that felt familiar, wanted Amory marked, permanently, so the world knew he was mine and forbidden to touch on pain of death.
Unless he asked for freedom from such urges, wanted me gone from his life. If that ever happened, I…well, I didn’t know. I ate a piece of pie, washed it down with a sip of coffee.
I stayed until closing as I always did, drinking the coffee Amory gave me, even asking him for a second slice of pie today.
When I left, I was already looking forward to having another slice tomorrow.