Page 10 of Flesh and Fury
“Granddaddy, please—” the woman began.
“You ssstop, Carmen!” the man drunkenly hissed, stabbing a fat finger at the woman’s face. “Acting like a whore with…with...”
“Hey! Watch your mouth, old man! I don’t care who you are! You don’t talk about women like that, especially your granddaughter!” the other man shouted, lunging for the drunk and taking him to the ground along with a waitress who’d been balancing a huge serving tray full of drinks and had moved into the line of fire at the wrong moment.
They were off their barstools and racing across the room before Eoghan could think twice about it. He redoubled his efforts when he caught sight of blood gushing from a deep gash in the server’s arm. Broken glass was everywhere, and people were slipping in spilled beer and wine as they scrambled away from nearby tables to give the fighters a wide berth. By the time they got to the two men, they were rolling on the ground, hitting each other, with the very pregnant woman at their table screaming for both her grandfather and her forced fiancé to stop what they were doing.
“Help! Help!” she cried.
“U.S. Marshals!” Eoghan shouted. “Get out of the way, ma’am.”
Both men looked strong, each over six feet tall, and the older man weighed at least two twenty with a big gut and wide shoulders. Ari went for him while Eoghan grabbed the other guy, admonishing him to stop attacking the older one.
“Knock it off or you’re both going to jail!” Eoghan yelled, grunting as the younger man’s elbow caught him in the solar plexus, momentarily blinding him with pain and knockingthe wind out of him. The woman’s screaming wasn’t helping things. The more she cried and screamed, the worse the two men fought. The man Ari was fighting was shouting everyone down now, throwing drunken punches that failed to land, cursing the young guy up and down, and shouting at his granddaughter to “shut the fuck up!”
No matter how hard he tried, Eoghan couldn’t get the guy away from the old man. He had amazing strength…almost inhuman strength.
When the man rolled him, and Eoghan was suddenly looking up into the guy’s eyes, only then did he notice the glowing yellow ring around his irises. He’d only seen those once before and his blood suddenly ran cold, knowing without a shadow of a doubt, that he was indeed staring into the eyes of a werewolf. As the guy looked down at him and his lips peeled back just far enough for him to bare his teeth, the four elongated canines almost made him wet himself. The low growl, which came from somewhere down deep inside the man, made Eoghan feel faint but it was the gleam of pure blood lust in the man’s eerie, yellow eyes that frightened him nearly to death.
When they’d run toward the fighting men, he’d absently registered who they might be, but having it confirmed by staring into the eyes of a werewolf who was now focused on him, probably planning his death, was a whole new thing.
Just as he was about to lose it, the weight of the man suddenly vanished as quickly as the man himself. Eoghan sat up as he watched a much bigger man lift his attacker as if he were nothing but a feather and heft him over his shoulder into a fireman’s carry.
Eoghan dragged in huge gulps of air, trying to catch his breath as he watched his rescuer striding away from them. He shook his head, not believing the strength it took toheave the man literally off his body, somehow rendering him unconscious, and no longer a threat, then head for the door. He glanced around, spotting Ari sitting on his ass about fifteen feet away, equally stunned that his attacker—the older man—was being carried out the door as well. The pregnant woman was following meekly, sobbing into a cloth napkin as people made way for the group to pass through to the outside.
He glanced over at Ari again and in alarm, noticed that he had a cut on his cheekbone, just beneath his left eye. He scrambled to his feet, crossing the gap in seconds.
“Jesus! How badly are you hurt?” Eoghan asked, bending to take Ari’s bearded chin in hand, and gently tilt it up.
Ari glanced up at him, and Eoghan could already detect the swelling beneath his eye, knowing it was going to fully blacken by tomorrow night. Ari reached up, prodding his cheekbone and wincing. “He got a few good whacks in before someone pulled him off. I gotta tell you, I’m sure as hell glad someone intervened because I was on the losing end of that fight. The guy was stronger than fuck, Eoghan. For an old guy, he sure as hell knows how to pack a punch! Help me up.”
“That wasn’t just any guy,” Eoghan said, hauling his partner off the floor before glancing around and noticing the people who’d witnessed the fight were either gathering toppled belongings, or making their way toward the exit. All serving had ceased around them and he knew the brewery would probably shut down for the rest of the evening based on the way the servers, busboys, and a manager looking dude were behaving. They were picking up toppled chairs and a few tables as well as collecting broken dishes and discarded food. One kid already had a broom in his hand and was sweeping up shards of broken wine glasses.
“I thought I noticed a yellow glow around his irises,” Ari grumbled, letting go of the hand Eoghan offered. He met hispartner’s knowing glance. “I take it that was a werewolf,” he said under his breath.
All movement and noise in the restaurant came to an immediate standstill, making Eoghan and Ari look up. Every single person in the restaurant had turned in their direction and they were all listening. Not a voice, clink of silverware or glassware could be heard anywhere in the place. You could have heard a pin drop.
“Sorry,” the server said, prodding at the bleeding cut on her arm. They both turned to look at the girl. “But did you say something about a werewolf?”
Eoghan stared at her for a few seconds, noting the nonplussed expression on her face. For someone who shouldn’t know anything about werewolves, she certainly didn’t look at all like she cared or was even interested. He looked around, noting everyone—to a person—was staring at him and Ari, not grabbing their loved ones and running in fear from the mere suggestion that something as dangerous as a werewolf could be real.
Everything dawned on Eoghan at once.
He let out a long-suffering sigh and glanced over at Ari before looking back at her.
“Eoghan, what’s going on?” Ari asked in the quiet room.
He ignored him and stared hard at the young waitress before speaking. “Sorry, but this place wouldn’t happen to be owned by either Oscar Garcia or Alvin Walters, would it?”
There was a collective groan as the server’s eyes momentarily flashed yellow before she nodded.
“Alvin Walters…who’s asking?” she replied. “The older man you saw carried out was Oscar Garcia and the younger man was Edward Walters.”
“And the pregnant woman was Carmen Garcia?” Eoghan asked.
The server nodded and then looked up as someone walked over with something wrapped in a cloth napkin, presumably ice. She thanked the busboy and then immediately pressed it to her bloody arm. She looked back at Eoghan. “That’s right. The bane of our existence is that girl. I wish she listened to her mother and gone off to college after high school, like a good girl. Now, she’ll end up barefoot and perpetually pregnant, raising some stupid—”
“Rebecca!” someone bellowed.