Page 5 of A Monster Is Coming

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.

“Uh, pretty much everything on the menu is good.” I know because one of the perks of working here all day is they give you free lunch, so long as you try something on the menu. Over the last few months, I had tried pretty much everything.

The food was amazing. I knew why the diner was always so busy, and why a lot of people opted to come here to eat rather than cook at home.

Still, the guy hadn’t said another word, so I knew he was waiting for the recommendation. Reaching out, I grabbed the menu and quickly scanned over the new recipes. “The chicken burger is great. The Mexican sub is amazing.”

“I’ll go with the chicken burger, extra fries, extra cheese,” he said. “Also, chocolate milkshake, extra sauce.”

Okay, it was wrong to be attracted to a guy I had only just seen for like five minutes, probably not even that.

Extra of everything, and a chocolate milkshake.

I quickly wrote down his order, kept a smile on my face, and then turned to leave. My nerves had started to get the better of me. I felt that twisting in my stomach, and that sick feeling I struggled to ignore.

Ringing up the new order, I told myself not to turn back and look, but I just couldn’t help it. Turning back toward the corner of the room, the mystery man was still looking at his cell phone. He had absolutely no interest in me whatsoever.

I didn’t know why all my senses were going off, but right now, I hated every one of them. This guy posed no threat to me. He didn’t work for my father, and I needed to learn to stop freaking out. I’m the one that had nearly caused a scene. This was just a hot guy, traveling. I didn’t know his name, who he was, or what he was doing, and it didn’t matter to me either way.

We were two strangers who had found Pickle Quest, and that was how it was going to stay.

Chapter Two

Peter

Niamh wasn’t a total fucking idiot. That surprised me. The moment I entered the diner three days ago, I saw the way she tensed up. She sensed danger while I was close by. That was a good thing. She knew there were enemies out there, and at least she attempted to do something about it. Still, I didn’t fucking like it either way.

Sticking to my cell phone was the easiest option. Also, glancing through emails was quite innocent. Pickle Quest didn’t have a whole host of jobs, but there were some I didn’t want—like trash collecting. I didn’t have a problem with cleaning up trash, but that didn’t give me the opportunity to get close to Niamh. According to the information Ivan had sent me, she had a library card, worked at the diner, and it would seem she had joined the local gym.