Asteraceae

THIRTY EIGHT

Surprisingly, Joshua was requested back at the diner. The Older Swan pushing around his salad while Joshua snacked on a sponge cake. He was merely there simply to keep the man from crashing down onto himself since he seemed so stressed over things that didn't concern him, and while Joshua already had his dinner at the Cullen's he decided that a little desert couldn't hurt. And a small part of him just wanted to leave the man to struggle. He had no place to comfort the human, and there was no reason he was even still talking to him considering their relationship was nothing but business. At last, Joshua was turning soft, his eyes taking note of the aggressive prodding that was happening to the cherry tomatoes.

"You seem on edge." I think that writing snippets instead would be better for this week as I can just work on it whenever I find the time and would not be so dependent on being prepared/available at a specific hour. "Something's bothering you?" He could be in bed at this time, the clock striking midnight as all the graveyard blue collared men got ready for work. He wasn't in that category, but a thought of leaving the old man to rot inside his own head wouldn't be so nice after he took the time to come out at this time.

"Do I? Just a bit worried is all." Charlie coughed, his awkward laugh getting a bit stuck in his throat. "Managed to get my daughter down here, but everything isn't going as smoothly as I hoped." The animals, they rarely had problems with the animals considering everyone here were aware of their surroundings, but that fisherman hadn't been so lucky despite being so far from land on his boat. "Damn bobcats." Joshua snorted; he wondered if humans really that were dense to think that such an animal would swim so far out into an almost bottomless lake just to snack on one fishy smelling human. The body was drained of blood with a few holes found on their body. They really didn't like thinking of anything other than themselves that could exist in this world.

"Bobcats? You are sure." His appetite was gone, and the cake looked vulgar compared to when he first got it. He'll confidently say that Esme baked a lot better than whoever did that dish.

"You're not in some city anymore Joshua." A huge assumption considering his kind prefers the mountains than some city. They were beasts that enjoyed the wilderness just as much as the shifters enjoyed the woods if not more.

"I see, but bobcats? Doesn't look like they've been bitten into." Or anything really, no bruising, no signs of fight, nothing, but Joshua never really cared to investigate how humans look when they die after such acts were committed. "Any animal just sounds farfetched."

And he wasn't helping the human either, his voice holding some type of sympathy for it, but at last he still sounded uninterested considering it had nothing to do with him. He didn't even care to find out if it was the same vampire, he had met previously that was causing trouble, or an entirely new one. Whatever they were made sure to stay far from his and the Cullen's property.

"Hadn't thought about that." Charlie paused, "but nothing else makes sense unless you got some psychopath out here draining blood from bodies." He finally started on his meal; the poor salad being devoured in record time with slight annoyance since it wasn't what he wanted to begin with. "Just a bit worried since Bella likes to wonder the woods from time to time." For reasons he hadn't asked, considering the girl was finally out of the house interacting with the world.

"Then you must be overwhelmed considering you've decided to open an old case recently." Curiosity was clearly shown, his eyes twinkling with the desire to know exactly as to what made the man want to do so. "I must say, it's been quite some time, about ten years or so since it last happened."

"I don't know why, I just figured I needed to do this." He wasn't the chief of police all those years ago, only three years after he was admitted to his position and the last Chief had died with regrets of closing such a case. It was strange, but because he was bombarded with so much work that was left behind, he had decided to work on that instead of the concerning thoughts his earlier higher up had on the matter. "I know you weren't around to witness such a tragedy, but it was the worst case we had on drug abuse." Such a respectable child overdosing on drugs was a harsh reality on how their department had no control over the rising drug problem they had going on.