HUNTED

October had never felt this cold in all of Elena's twenty-three years, and she shivered under a threadbare hoodie that did nothing to cut the wind. Why am I stuck in a dress this short in weather this mean? she thought as another shiver walked along her back. The uniform was awful, but it came with the only paycheck she had managed to pick up since slipping out of New York. Slipping was the honest word for it; she had run, and she refused to let herself linger on that now. She could not afford to unravel before a shift. So she kept her mother out of her head, and her father, and the little sister whose face she had not seen in almost five years. She refused to chase the memory of why she had stupidly traded Miami for New York at eighteen, and she refused to chase what had pushed her further, to this quiet town outside Toronto. Most of all, she tried not to measure how utterly alone she was inside all of it. She tried, and still she lost. Fluttering her hands in front of her eyes did nothing to hold the tears back, so she gave up and simply dragged a breath in. Pull it together before you get out of the car, she told herself. She patched herself up as best she could, then stepped out and shut the door. The cold had settled into her bones, and the diner was barely warmer than the street. The bell over the door jangled as she went in, and the tinny opening of a Beatles number drifted out of the old jukebox. Tessa was at the counter pouring coffee, so Elena walked over to her. "Hey, girl," Tessa said. Elena shrugged off her hoodie anyway, because the manager would grumble if she kept it on. "Morning, Tess," she answered, using the nickname Tessa liked best, and then she steadied herself for the shift ahead. Tessa was a bright-eyed redhead who had welcomed Elena from her first shift. Elena suspected that was mostly relief at finally having another waitress on the floor; the days probably crawled when you were alone. Tessa had a sharp tongue and, in her own phrasing, did not take crap from anyone. She was tall and slim, though most people looked tall to Elena, who barely cleared five feet. "Morning, girls." Their boss, Bruno, called through from the kitchen. Bruno was short and stocky, and he stood too close and put his hands where they did not belong. He unsettled Elena, but she needed the paycheck too much to say so out loud. Tessa, as usual, had no such trouble. "What do you want, creep?" she said around her gum, then popped a bubble. "I warned you about that mouth, Tessa. You keep it up, I dock your check. Yes?" Bruno laughed it off, the way he always did when she spoke to him like that. Tessa gave him a tight, fake smile, her red lipstick bright against the ugly yellow-and-mustard uniform. "Sorry." She rolled her eyes, leaving no doubt she was not sorry at all. Elena forced a small laugh and set about wiping down the booths. She had no interest in making friends here, so she kept her words with Bruno and Tessa short. Attachments were a luxury she could not afford; this life, like the last one, would only hold until she had to move again. The bell above the door rang again and her head jerked up. The breath she had been holding eased out when she saw it was not him. Come on, Elena, there is no way he has found you yet. Yet was the word that chilled her most. Even this far from New York, she knew he would eventually follow the thread back to her and haul her home. Most nights that thought was all that kept her awake, wondering whether she was spending her last day of freedom or whether he would drag it out a little longer. His cruelty had soaked into her even though she had not laid eyes on him in months, into her thoughts, her skin, her sleep. She lived every day braced for the next person through the door to be him, and she had no choice but to keep living like that. Glancing over her shoulder was exhausting, but it was how she had learned to stay alive. Three men in dark suits walked in and slid into a booth at the back of the empty room. Tessa called for Bruno while watching them over the rim of the coffee pot. Bruno came out of the kitchen and the smile he normally wore collapsed into something closer to fear. He swallowed hard and started toward the booth. Before he reached it the bell rang once more.