"I'm sorry, I'm really busy right now-"

"Hey, don't worry about it, babe. I can wait."

Sabine turned around and frowned, busying herself with arranging the vegetables set out to look more pleasing to the eye for the excuse of something to do to try and let the jerk that had been following her around for the past fifteen minutes know that she really could not talk right now.

Not that he was taking the hint.

And not that she would ever want to talk to him normally.

But her boss had made it clear that scaring off one more customer was a one way ticket to getting fired. And she needed this job.

"So, how about on your break you and I head around back and-"

Sabine was just deciding that she didn't need this job that much when a large shadow fell over her.

"Are you bothering my girlfriend?"

'Excuse me?!' Sabine looked up, paused, then looked even further up.

A young man, probably about her own age, was standing between her and the creep who had been following her around. He was, to put it simply, big. Sabine wasn't sure she had ever met someone so tall or broad, and her jaw dropped slightly as he crossed arms that had to be as thick around as her waist.

"I… um… uh…" The creep was backing away, attention fully on the man glaring at him.

"Get out of here. If I see you around again, I'll deal with you personally." The young man unfolded his arms to quietly pop the knuckles on first one, then the other hand.

Sabine was certain, as the creep scurried off, that she had just went from the frying pan to the fire.

Suddenly the young man's glower lightened, and he turned to beam a positively sunny smile at her. Now that he was facing her, she could tell that his eyes were bluer than any she had seen before, the blue of the deep ocean.

"Sorry about that, miss. I saw that he was bothering you, and I figured you couldn't tell him off because of being at work, so…" He gave a sheepish smile, rubbing at the back of his neck with one hand.

Sabine's knees went weak with relief, and she returned his smile with one of her own. "Thank you. My manager said that if I went off on one more customer that he'd fire me."

The man blinked, then frowned and stuck his chin out in indignation. "That's awful! You should be able to defend yourself while working. Do you get guys like him often?"

"Way more than I'd like." Sabine sighed and shook her head, nearly wanting to spit with irritation. "They think I'm exotic because I'm Chinese."

The man frowned a little, then gave her a shy, sweet smile. "If you want, I could come and scare them off anytime you need me to. I work in the bakery across the street as an apprentice." He suddenly jumped, and his smile became more than a little sheepish. "I'm Tom, by the way. Tom Dupain."

Sabine smiled, and reached out to take the hand he held out and shake it. "It's nice to meet you, Tom. I'm Sabine Cheng. And yes, I'd like that a lot."