“Son of a bitch.” Cade slammed his fist on the chipped Formica table, and the six customers seated at the counter of Table Tops diner on the corner of Fourth and Pine stilled.
“Would you like coffee with that?” Dawn tried to keep her voice steady and willed everyone to go back to their respective conversations. Anything but watch the drama unfolding in the corner booth of the cheap restaurant where she worked six mornings a week, remarkable only for the fact there was absolutely nothing notable about it. Brown vinyl booths lined the walls across from the curved counter; a plastic palm tree, its leaves heavy with dust, took up an empty corner; and a newspaper stand filled with day-olds perched in the corner. The kitchen was partially open, filling the restaurant with scents of grease and coffee, and the walls were decorated with pictures of cats. Lots of cats.
“What the fuck happened to your face?” Cade stared at her aghast.
“Cream and sugar, sir?”
Conversation resumed around them, slowly rising to a gentle murmur, and Dawn’s tension eased. Hopefully her boss, Stan, had missed Cade’s outburst.
“I had a run-in with a bus shelter.” She kept her voice low and her eyes on her notepad. There seemed little point lying to him. Although she’d done her best to cover up the bruises with makeup, she couldn’t hide the swelling around her eye.
Cade’s lips pressed into a rigid line, a far cry from his warm, affable expression of only moments ago. “It was Mad Dog, wasn’t it? I’m going to fucking kill him.”
She caught a flash of red out of the corner of her eye and saw Stan standing by the door to the kitchen in his Table Tops uniform: black pants, red polo shirt, and white apron. Dawn wore a skirt instead of pants and instead of the word MANAGER stitched across the top left corner of her uniform, her shirt read WAITRESS. As if people wouldn’t know when she took their orders.
“Quiet,” she whispered. “I can’t afford to lose this job.” And then she raised her voice loud enough for Stan to hear. “How would you like your eggs, sir?”
Cade ripped the napkins from the holder and crumpled them in his fist. “Scrambled.”
“Any toast?”
“Yeah,” Cade muttered. “He’ll be fucking toast when I’m done with him.”
Dawn leaned in and tugged the napkins out of his fist. “Bad pun. And get it together. My boss isn’t the most understanding of people.”
“How the fuck am I supposed to get it together when I walk in here and see your face all banged up? I don’t see you for one day and look what happens.”
“Life is what happens. My life. And yeah, it’s fucked up. But I have a plan to get back at him.”
Resolved not to let Jimmy scare her, she’d come up with her plan last night while tending to her cuts and bruises. This was her town. Her safe place. Jimmy had never assaulted her in public before, and she’d never had a friend in the sheriff’s department. Maybe this time, the police could help.
“I’m going to see the sheriff’s deputy after work tomorrow to report the assault.” She tucked her order pad in her apron and gave Cade a cheeky smile, hoping to calm him down. “Want to come?”
“Why the fuck would you go to the police?” Cade attacked the napkins again, grabbing the bundle she had just tucked away and tearing it apart with one fierce yank. “They can’t help you.”
Dawn glanced quickly behind her and saw Stan frown. When he took a step in her direction, she turned back to Cade and cupped his jaw in her hand then bent down to touch her cheek to his, whispering in his ear. “Cade, honey, please calm down. Stan is on his way over and I really, really need this job.”
Cade gave a contented rumble and stroked his thumb over the bruised apple of her cheek. “I shoulda been there. He said he was going to give you an ultimatum. I shoulda realized he wouldn’t do it over the phone.”
“It’s nothing to do with you.” Dawn drew his hand away from her cheek and backed away. “It’s my messed-up life and I have to deal with it.”
“Everything all right here, Dawn?” Stan came up behind her, so close she could smell the bacon on his breath and feel the faintest brush of his belly against her back. Stan never went farther than surreptitious touching, but even that made her skin crawl.
“Yes, just taking this order.”
He rested a clammy hand on her shoulder. “You’re taking a long time and we’ve got other customers waiting to be served.”
Dawn gritted her teeth and shook Stan’s hand away. “I said it’s fine, Stan. I’ll finish here and then I’ll go and check on the other tables.”
Cade tossed a wad of twenties on the table. “Buy ’em some coffee on me. I’m not done deciding what I want.”
Stan frowned. “I’m afraid I can’t allow—”
“Now.” Cade shoved the money to the edge of the table. “Or I call up a bunch of my brothers and invite them all for a free meal.”