The bell above the Greasy Spoon's door had been broken for months, so no chime greeted Elias Thorne as he stepped inside.
Just the dull thud of the door swinging shut and the relentless buzz of a flickering fluorescent overhead.
The diner didn't bother with pretense. Its floors clung to Eli's sneakers, a slick blend of mop water, spilled coffee, and decades of grime.
Cracked leather booths, patched with silver duct tape, sagged under the weight of countless patrons.
The air was thick with the stench of burnt toast, fryer oil, and sweat—sometimes blood, depending on who walked in.
Eli slipped behind the counter, hoodie still up, head low. No one offered a "good morning."
Lou, the cook, didn't glance up from the sizzling grill, his stained apron already damp with sweat at barely seven. Hollow-eyed and silent, he ignored Eli's curt nod.
Eli clocked in. 7:03 AM.
His first table: two construction workers, shoulders hunched like they expected a fight from the furniture.
Eli poured their coffee with mechanical indifference, scribbled their orders without a word. They didn't meet his eyes. He didn't meet theirs.
The second table was a woman in caked-on makeup and a fur-trimmed coat, her long nails drumming a restless rhythm on the tabletop. She ordered coffee and a glass of ice, nothing else. Her bloodshot eyes, sharp despite the haze, flicked over Eli like she knew him—then darted away before he could pin her face to a memory.
The third table was trouble.
Three men, early thirties, in loud track jackets.
One, with a crooked nose, laughed at nothing, too hard. Another's neck was a canvas of prison ink.
The third, quiet, kept glancing at the door—watching for someone, or something. Eli served them fast, no questions, no smiles.
Don't look up. The rule. Always the rule.
Then the door creaked open, and the diner's hum faltered—not silent, but taut, like a wire pulled too tight.
Eli didn't need to look to feel the shift. Lou's spatula froze mid-flip. The laughing man's voice cut off.
The woman in the coat slid her hands beneath the table, slow and deliberate.
He looked anyway.
The man who entered filled the doorway—six-foot-four, shoulders like carved stone, neck thick enough to strain seams.
A dark jacket hung over a muscle shirt, his knuckles raw and bruised, as if he'd never learned to soften a punch—or didn't want to.
A thin beard traced his jaw, framing a jagged scar that slashed from the corner of his left eye to his mouth.
He didn't smile. Didn't need to.
Everyone knew him.
One of Big Rico's enforcers.
Eli had seen him once before, a shadow across the street when a pawn shop went up in flames. But never here, never in the diner.
The man moved with weight, heavy boots striking the sticky tiles like a slow war drum.
Eli tried to breathe evenly, to play the part of just another morning.
But sweat prickled his neck, his hands tightening beneath the counter.
His hoodie felt too warm, too heavy.
The thug didn't sit.
He stalked past the booths, past the counter, past the cracked mirror behind the drink station.
His gaze swept the room once, cold and unhurried, then fixed on the back—on the warped door marked "Office" in crooked letters.
Lou stayed silent.
The customers stayed silent.
Eli stared at his own hands, knuckles white.
Don't look up. Don't look up. Don't look up.
The guilt hit him again, that familiar rot gnawing at his chest. Every time he stayed quiet, stayed invisible, it grew heavier.
He hated it—the silence, the pretending, the way his legs locked in place.
This was his shift. His diner. His space.
But not really.
Not in Eldridge.
He poured a coffee no one ordered, hands unsteady.
The liquid sloshed over the rim, scalding his fingers. He didn't flinch, just wiped the burn on his jeans.
Behind the office door, voices rose—muffled, sharp, unfriendly.
The words were lost, but the tone wasn't.
It crawled up Eli's spine like ice.
No one moved.
The woman lit a cigarette, defying the no-smoking sign.
No one stopped her. The construction workers sat rigid.
The track-jacket trio muttered, their words low and urgent.
Then, a voice—deep, gruff, close—cut through the haze.
"Tell your boss I don't like delays."