Revenant

Chapter 34

He did, however, have his left arm pressed tightly against his side, and it wasn't moving as he walked. Right arm was moving freely, left, not so much.

I instantly became more alert, and placed my left hand on the table as I thumbed the safety of my gun to the 'off' position with my right.

It probably wasn't a gun, whatever it was he was concealing under the left arm of his jacket. As a federal agent he was licensed to carry, so he could have shown up with the gun he usually carried with him without issue. Despite this fact, how he held himself suggested he was hiding something there, and generally speaking I'm not a big fan of tense, hurriedly arranged get-togethers where something is being hidden from me. Hidden somethings are usually meant to be a surprise, and most of the surprises people in my line of work encounter are of the lethal variety.

He waved to the waitress with the coffee pot before sitting down in the booth seat opposite of mine, took his sunglasses off with his right hand and casually placed them on the side of the table before fixing me with a friendly smile. Still slouched in place, I didn't smile back.

"Can I get you anything to drink?" the waitress asked, appearing at our table a second later. I could see her in my periphery, but most of my attention was focused on the man who was sitting across from me, as well as the area around and below his left shoulder.

"Coffee," Moss said, turning the cup in front of him over so it was no longer upside-down. "And two menus as well, please."

"I'm not eating anything," I said quietly.

"Well, bring two anyway... my friend here might change his mind. Thank you," he added as the waitress finished pouring coffee into his cup.

"I'll be right back with some menus," she said brightly before turning and heading back to her station. Moss smiled at her, then turned his smile on me.

" I was half-expecting a cave somewhere, or an abandoned building." he said, finally. He glanced at his surroundings. "Denny's, huh?"

I nodded. "This place is sacrosanct for people in my profession. Sort of like holy ground, actually. It's a sacred oath we all swear to, and that none of us will break – nothing bad is allowed to happen in a Denny's."

Moss's eyebrows went up. "Really?"

I rolled my eyes briefly. "No, not really. But it was fairly close by, it's a public place without too many people, and it seemed like a reasonable place to talk. That's what you wanted to do, getting together like this, right? To talk?"

"Exactly right. Thanks for sitting down with me, Joe. Or-" He cocked his head and gave me a look. "Sorry, is it John today? Or is it okay if I just call you Joe from hereon out?"

Well, he'd already made me... that much had been established. Couldn't exactly hurt at this point.

"Joe is fine," I said, adjusting both how I was sitting and the grip I had on my gun. "And one of the reasons I ended up paging you is because it turns out I need something of a favor."

He smiled and nodded, but in a way that was reminiscent of a man who already knows what's coming before it gets spoken aloud, which I figured was a little odd.

"I figured you might, which is why-"

He cut himself off mid-sentence once the waitress appeared holding two menus. Smiling up at her, Moss took both menus from her with a 'thank you', somehow intercepting the one she'd been about to hand me in the process. Once she'd turned to go back to her station Moss transferred one of the menus to his left hand and held it close to his chest, then began to reach inside of his coat with his right.