Sheriff James Camden was having a bad day and he needed to unwind. Most of the stress from the job came from complaints over silly things and he was sick of hearing about cats on trees. Like, couldn't they get the cats themselves? Why involve him in such a trivial issue? He was tired of his job and the people of the town. He needed relief and it was in the form of an angel he met at Bryan's place.
At first, he was struck by jealousy, but then he remembered who Bryan was, the proverbial clueless man. He couldn't take a hint even if it was staring at him right in the face and playing whack a mole. Which was a good thing, Bryan may have been his friend but he didn't want anything to do with him. He was his own person and Bryan always seemed to make everyone look bad with his goody-too-shoes attitude. He was a grown man yet acted like he was out of his element in the modern world. With his looks and mannerism, he'd score at least ten girls in six months without breaking a sweat but no, he had to play the angel while everyone else paled in comparison to his nature.
But that was going to end. He saw the way Bryan looked at Beverly, saw the way his eyes darted from side to side, trying to meet her eyes and failing in the attempt. It was the sign of a man hopelessly struck by love, if he believed such balderdash. But he was a man of logic, and whatever he wanted, he got. He'd set his sights on Beverly since that day and after a month of harmless meetups and dates, she finally invited him over to her place. He wasn't going to play second fiddle to Bryan, no, that was not his style. He was going to steal her right from under his nose, just to see him break out from his act and act like the humans around him weren't just mindless animals.
Sheriff James flicked the cigarette he held in between his fingers, throwing the butt of the cigarette on the ground and crushing it underfoot. The truly strong ones crush the weak, the way he was going to crush Bryan Roland. He smiled as he prepared for his date, the tuxedo gleaming, beards cleanly shaven. He looked good enough to be on the cover of GQ. But that wasn't enough. To crush Bryan once and for all, he had to be better than him, all the ways.
"This would be fun to watch." He winked at his reflection, a small smile playing at the edge of his lips. Bryan wouldn't know what hit him until it was too late. The thought was exhilarating.
Beverly stared at her reflection in the mirror, wondering why she even went through with the date she planned with the sheriff. Sure, he was a nice guy but something about him screamed hostility. It wasn't in the way he carried himself or the way he talked, it wasn't something as basic as that. He was easy enough to talk to but the thoughts of him didn't send her heart racing. Unlike Bryan who wasn't perfect since he couldn't take hints but made her heart race and made her flustered. She had no way to combat the feelings he awakened in her, and her frequent discussions with Cameron proved it beyond a doubt. She was beyond help, wallowing too deep in the safety his presence held.
The sheriff was probably a second choice for her, but he was a good choice, even by her standards. He had proper etiquette and knew the right things to say without being told. Yet she wasn't as comfortable with him as he wanted her to be, she couldn't figure out how to let herself be free around him. He had the perfect anecdotes to tell, making her laugh a few times with his outrageous stories. But she couldn't seem to see him as more than just a random friend, no matter how hard she tried.
"I have to talk to Cameron," Beverly said under her breath, making the split-second decision before she could change her mind. Her mind felt clouded for various reasons and what the sheriff was indirectly asking of was at the top of that list. She didn't want to seem like a tease, canceling the dinner plans at the last minute but every cell in her body screamed for her to cancel it and never speak to him again. She was a grown woman, capable of taking care of herself. She didn't need some presumptuous notions her imagination concocted out of thin air to discourage her from what she wanted to do.
She decided to drop by Cameron's place for a last-minute clarity conversation and toyed with the idea of calling Bryan but thought the better of it and didn't. She drove her car, keeping the music blasting through the speakers to a medium. She needed a clear head since her mind felt scrambled beyond human comprehension. She tried to calm her breathing and racing heart when she saw a familiar car drive by, the one Bryan owned. As she was, about to dismiss it, the windscreen rolled down, and staring at her was Bryan. She didn't know when she pressed the brakes and her car came to a crawl before it eventually stopped.
Bryan pulled in behind her, his thoughts jumbled up. He'd been thinking about Beverly and how she didn't return his calls no matter how many times he called. He tried to reach out to her on various occasions but his efforts were met with a huge wall to ward him out. He regretted not asking for her address and over the course of the one month she left, he'd replayed the scenes of their meeting over and over again in hopes to find what went wrong. It was a pretty funny thing to do when she didn't want to talk to him but he knew that there was a hint somewhere, somewhere he hadn't looked at earlier.
"He-hello Bryan. You look well." Beverly stumbled over her words as she stood beside him, not knowing what to say or do. He was larger than life, consuming her senses once again. He wore a yellow shirt with a jeans trousers that hugged his thighs nicely. She was tempted to whistle in appreciation but thought the better of it and refrained.
"Oh? Do I? I rarely notice anything nowadays. Are you well?" He asked staring straight into her eyes, not just looking at her but seeing through her.
The way he spoke made her body shiver uncontrollably inwardly, his words, washing over her like a waterfall, giving peace to her troubled mind. His influence on her was still as strong as ever, she couldn't even bring herself to deny it. He made all her troubles go away with just a word from his lips, sheriff James was completely forgotten to her. The planned date, the conversation she was to have with Camila, disappearing from her mind like they weren't there in the first place.
"I'm fine, well, just dandy. Why'd you ask?" She responded cheerily, knowing that she couldn't betray the depths of her emotions to him since he took her like just another charity case.
"You didn't come to see me after then. I was wondering if I did something wrong and, since I made the mistake of not asking you for your address, I couldn't get through to you through calls either. It was sad but I managed to survive just to meet you again. Destiny, don't you think?" Bryan stated matter-of-factly and she had no choice but to agree with him even though she had no idea why. He was intoxicating, taking her senses on a merry-go-round. She didn't trust herself with him yet he showed no sign of being self conscious around her. And truly, that hurt more than anything ever hurt her up until that moment.
"I was busy, that's all." She said in a perfunctory way, not giving him room to enter into her head again even if he already lived there rent free, literally.
"I see, sorry I didn't reach out sooner," Bryan tried to explain but at that very moment, a black Camry was driving towards them, slowing down as soon as it got to where the two were.
The sheriff stepped out, dressed as casually as possible, like it was just a, random meeting. But sheriff James was no fool, he knew that the probability of her meeting Bryan was pretty high due to the fact that it was a clear day and Bryan was fond of driving around on days, like that to clear his head. He contemplated going to Beverly's place that afternoon but didn't want to seem too eager so he decided to drive around like, a normal watchman, a sheriff well-loved by the town. The ladies loved his easy-going nature and he, in turn, loved using them for his fleshy desires. It was a win-win situation, victory on both sides for him. But not having Beverly at his beck and call irked him to no end.
"Fancy meeting you here Bryan, it's such a fine day, isn't it?" Sheriff James said in a bid to make small talk. He smiled when it was called for, laughed when the situation demanded it, and showed emotions deeply if he felt like it was needed. He was a creature with no sympathy or love for anybody asides from himself. He was selfish to a fault and always made others take the fall for his mistakes.
"Sheriff! It's been a while. How're you holding up? Not too stressed I hope?" Bryan asked the sheriff, shaking hands with him. He had no ulterior motives that Bryan could see but he still felt uneasy.
"Nah, I'm not. Did a little exercise here and there to keep in shape, with a good night’s sleep and rest of mind, I feel ten years younger." Sheriff James said heartily as Beverly watched the exchange with something akin to amusement and an underlying tension she just couldn't place.
"That's a good thing, sorry about this, Beverly." Bryan apologized as an afterthought, when he realized that he and the sheriff had blindsided her to the conversation. Though it was just pleasantries, but still.
"Nah, it's fine. Men doing men things, am I right?" She replied in hopes of lightening the atmosphere that was already frigid with tension.
"Oh, good day, Beverly. By the way, has Bryan told you about the new book he's working on?" The sheriff asked, like an afterthought. It was a purely calculated gesture that Bryan missed at first, but Beverly latched on to it.
"Oh? He's an author?" She asked, pleasantly surprised. The sheriff was grinning from ear to ear by then, knowing he just struck gold. He said it in an offhanded way but it was told to him in confidence by Bryan since he didn't want his business out in the open. It was meant to be confidential but whenever the sheriff played, he played dirty.
Bryan watched this exchange with wide eyes but he couldn't do anything to stop it. He was lost in the swirling conversation all around him, and he knew where the sheriff was leading the conversation to, he just didn't know why. There were various reasons for people to do whatever it was they did but he couldn't figure out why the sheriff was spilling the bean so casually like it was a discussion about the weather.
"Yes, one of the finest authors of this town. Why, in his debut novel, he shook the world. Silence and The Dark. That's the name. Isn't that right, Bryan?" Sheriff James threw the question at him like he was throwing a grenade, as innocently as possible. He'd already deduced that Beverly was a woman who valued trust and truth above all else. Yet, she didn't hear about his books from him, she heard about it from someone else. He could envision the gears turning in her head, the thoughts of betrayal. It was like a heady drink, he could see the effects right before his eyes, the evolution of her facial expression from shock to sadness to disgust, and then settled in a calmness that was unlike her.
"Oops! I'll be late for work. Stay safe, you two." Sheriff James said, executing a bow before he took off in his car. The seed had been planted, that was all that mattered to him.
Beverly gave Bryan a small smile before she entered her car and drove off. She didn't look back.