Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 89985 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 450(@200wpm)___ 360(@250wpm)___ 300(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89985 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 450(@200wpm)___ 360(@250wpm)___ 300(@300wpm)
That was all I wanted to do.
To be free.
Freedom wasn’t quite as fun as I thought it would be. There was always that fear. The fear of my father finding where I was and ruining it. This is why I didn’t even bother to try and make friends. I was guessing that was why the good locals of Pickle Quest hadn’t tried to run me out of town.
I was a single woman, working hard, and not getting into anyone’s business. This was all I wanted.
Plastering on a fake smile, I put down the latest steak-and-fries order. Three guys—I think they were ranchers—always came in and ordered the largest steaks the diner had to offer. The first day I worked here, I got their order wrong, and they made my life so damn hard that day. The next time, I got their order right, I expected the same kind of treatment, yet they left me alone.
This had been our pattern. They came in, ordered the biggest steak and fries, along with lots of coffee. I served them, they ate, and left.
When I first saw them, I thought they were going to cause a lot of trouble, but nope, just nice guys with a rough exterior.
My smile was pointless. With the last plate ordered, I spun around toward the door as I heard the bell dingle.
A guy I had never seen before stepped into the diner, cell phone in hand, along with a scowl on his face. My first instinct was to run. There was something about this guy that had every alarm bell going off inside my head.
I needed to run.
But he didn’t even look around the diner. He didn’t even see me noticing him, with how attentive he was to his cell phone. The only time he glanced up was to check for a seat, and I noticed he went toward the far corner of the diner and slid inside the small booth.
The diner wasn’t too busy today, so he did have a choice. Lunchtime run had already gone, which meant we were on a steady slump till about five o’clock, when the dinner rush would start. So far, I’d not experienced anything too troubling.
This man, though… My alarm bells were ringing with his deep-black hair, and I think I’d spotted blue eyes, maybe. I hadn’t really paid too much attention. He wore a white shirt, rolled up to his elbows, showcasing several tattoos, and that wasn’t unusual either. A lot of the men in Pickle Quest loved to get inked. Even the three guys I served regularly had their arms heavily inked. The man in the corner was also dressed in jeans and what looked like boots. Work boots? I didn’t know.
No one was serving that corner other than myself. This was a risk. I promised myself that any question of doubt, and I’d be hightailing it right out of there. That was the super plan. Only, running away would mean defeat, for a guy that might have never come into the diner.
With my notepad and pen in hand, I made my way toward the mystery man. Squaring my shoulders, I was trying not to seem as tense as I felt. This was next to impossible. I felt so incredibly tense.
Standing in front of this man, I tried not to think or to feel, or to showcase fear. I had no idea if I was managing to achieve these things.
“Afternoon, what can I get you?” I asked.
He didn’t even look up. His cell phone seemed to be interesting to him, which I was more than okay with. It allowed me to look at him closely to see if I recognized any distinguishing marks, like my father’s insignia. Finn Byrne liked to use the insignia of a bull with horns dripping with blood. It was always a small symbol, but it was ugly as fuck. My dad always said that anyone willing to mark their body with such an ugly piece of shit would be loyal to him. There also had to be the initials, “FB.” For generations my father and his father, and his father’s father, had always been called Finn Byrne. This is why it was important to my father to marry the woman who had given him a son.
I had a brother out there. Actually, I had a lot of brothers and sisters. A woman finally giving birth to a son hadn’t meant my father remained loyal to her. Nope. There were a lot of us Byrnes.
Seconds passed, maybe even minutes, as I stopped and waited for whatever he was going to order.
“What’s good here”—he stopped to look up—“Niamh?”
Okay, first, I loved his deep, guttural voice. It was kind of shocking, yet exciting at the same time. There was a slight accent there I couldn’t quite place. It was so subtle, it was impossible to detect. Then the way he said my name … wow.