Dead Island (4 page)

As ever with a batch of new arrivals, the first hour was a flurry of activity. Xian Mei and her three colleagues, who were often interchangeable depending on their shift patterns, tried to get through the check-in procedure as quickly and efficiently as possible. They all knew there was nothing more annoying for customers who had spent the whole day travelling, and who were desperate to freshen up and relax, than having to wait in yet another queue. But however efficiently she worked, she knew it was inevitable that one or two people out of a group of fifty or sixty would give her a hard time. In this case, it was a young, muscular, tattooed man with a flushed face and a slight limp. He thumped his elbows on the desk and leaned in towards her with a leer. Xian Mei tried not to recoil at the smell of alcohol on his breath.

‘So where can a guy get a little action around here?’ he said by way of introduction.

Xian Mei gave him a professional smile. ‘That depends what you mean, sir. There is an abundance of restaurants and bars on the island.’

‘That so?’ said the man thoughtfully. ‘And I guess you’d know all the best ones?’

Xian Mei hesitated. ‘I don’t go out too often. I work long hours here, and I’m usually very tired at the end of the day.’

‘Sounds to me like you could use a little R’n’R,’ said the man, leaning in even closer.

‘As I say, I work long hours,’ said Xian Mei. She focused on the monitor in front of her. ‘Do you have a reservation, sir?’

‘I do indeedy,’ said the man. He grinned and leaned back, like a hunter who had failed to bag his target on this occasion but knew it was only a matter of time.

‘Could I take your name, please, sir?’

The man pushed out his bottom lip, feigning offence. ‘You mean you don’t recognize me?’

Xian Mei glanced at him. ‘I’m afraid not, sir.’

Next to her, her colleague, Lan, was dealing with the reservation of a young black man wearing a red bandanna. The black man glanced over at Xian Mei’s customer and shook his head. ‘You givin’
this
nice lady a hard time now?’ he drawled in a voice as deep and warm as melted chocolate.

The tattooed man spread his hands. ‘I’m just being friendly is all.’

The black man raised one eyebrow. ‘There’s different types of friendly. I don’t think the nice lady likes
your
particular flavour.’

Xian Mei smiled, genuinely amused. ‘It’s really not a problem, sir.’

‘You see!’ said the tattooed man triumphantly. ‘Not a problem.’ He turned back to Xian Mei. ‘I think you and me are going to hit it off just fine.’

Xian Mei smiled, but didn’t comment. Instead she said, ‘So if I
could
take your name, sir?’

The tattooed man sighed theatrically. ‘It’s Carter. Logan Carter.
Football star
, Logan Carter.’

‘
Ex
-football star,’ muttered the black man.

Logan scowled. ‘Just like you’re an
ex
-rapper, you mean?’

The black man turned and gave Logan a cool, appraising look. ‘We’ll see about that, won’t we?’

‘Yeah,’ Logan said. ‘I guess we will.’

Xian Mei typed Logan’s name into her keyboard and pressed Enter, and immediately his details scrolled up on her monitor, together with a flashing red symbol in the top left-hand corner. Because of her briefing from her manager that morning, she recognized the symbol as the logo for the US National Blood Drive Campaign. Looking up, she said, ‘I see you’re one of our blood drive people, Mr Carter?’

Logan nodded. ‘Sure am. Helped promote the blood donation campaign, what with being a nationally-known face and all. Had my picture taken giving an itty bit of blood and got an all-expenses-paid holiday in return. Sounded like a damn good deal to me.’

Beside him the black man said, ‘Snap.’

Logan turned. ‘Pardon me?’

‘I’m in on that blood drive deal too. Gave some blood at a celebrity event in New Orleans. Next thing, I get a call offering me a two-week gig here in Banoi. Pretty cool, huh?’

Before Logan could respond, a voice behind the black man said, ‘Double snap.’

Both men turned to reveal an elegant and strikingly beautiful dark-skinned woman in a short, sleeveless, green summer dress. The woman waved her plastic room key, on which was stamped the red National Blood Drive Campaign logo.

‘After I gave blood I didn’t even know I’d been entered in a sweepstake till I got a call to say I’d won an all-expenses-paid holiday. Thought it was a scam at first.’

The black man turned to Xian Mei. Nodding at their fellow guests who were still waiting in line to check in, he said, ‘Hey, are
all
these dudes here because of this blood drive thing?’

Xian Mei tapped a couple of keys on her keyboard. ‘No, just the three of you,’ she said.

‘Hey,’ said Logan, ‘we’re like a club. Well, ain’t
that
nice?’

The black man looked at Purna and raised an eyebrow. ‘Yeah,’ he said drily. ‘Maybe we should all get ourselves some T-shirts.’

‘
WELL
,
NOW
, AIN’T this somethin’!’

Logan stood out on the balcony of his hotel room, looking at the view. He had showered and changed, and was now ready to have himself a little fun. He swirled his scotch and soda round in his glass, liking the way the ice cubes tinkled and chimed. He had popped some Prozac a while ago and was currently feeling mellow, relaxed. His knee had been throbbing some after the flight, but a couple of Tramadol had taken care of that. He thought about the cute Chinese girl on reception and wondered what time she finished work. Despite her resistance earlier, he still had high hopes of reeling in
that
particular fish. In his experience, it was often the initially shy and reluctant girls who ended up being the wildest between the sheets.

Ten minutes later Logan was sitting at the hotel bar, his gaze roaming around the room. The place was full of couples and families, all dressed up for dinner. There were no single women here, not even that Purna chick. Maybe he should have knocked on her door on the way down – he, Purna and that rapper guy, Sam, had been given adjacent rooms, just as they had been given seats together on the plane, almost certainly because of that blood drive bullshit – though something told Logan he wouldn’t make much headway in
that
direction. The woman was stunningly beautiful, sure, but she was also tough and angular and had a don’t-fucking-mess-with-me look in her big brown eyes. In Logan’s view women should be docile and vulnerable and sweet if they wanted to attract men, not opinionated ball-breakers.

He had a couple more drinks at the bar and then decided to move on. He knew if he stayed in the hotel he could have free drinks all night, not to mention a free dinner, but he would rather put down a few of his own hard-earned dollars if it meant getting himself a little action.

‘Same again, sir?’ the bartender asked.

‘Maybe later,’ replied Logan. He stood up and began to make his way towards the exit, but then something occurred to him and he turned back. ‘Hey, I don’t suppose you know what time Sam B is doing his thing, do you?’

‘Ten p.m. I believe, sir.’

‘Thanks, buddy.’

It wasn’t until the fresh air hit him that the world started to spin. He paused a moment, blinking. Must be the jet lag. That and the fact that he hadn’t eaten in hours. He began to weave away from the hotel, heading for the bright lights of the main street. It was beginning to get dark now, streaks of lilac cloud appearing in the blue sky.

Every fisherman knows there are days when the fish just don’t bite, and such was Logan’s luck that night. He trailed the bars of Banoi’s main street for over two hours before deciding to head back to the hotel. He had talked to a few likely looking girls, had even persuaded a couple of them to accept his offer of a drink, but somehow they kept slipping the line before he got the chance to reel them in. By the time he arrived back at the Royal Palm, with nothing to show for his evening but a lighter wallet and a smear of seafood sauce on his shirt from the crayfish sandwich he had eaten in a bar called the Sailing Boat, he was foul-tempered and so drunk that the ground was tilting and yawing beneath him like the deck of a ship.

Noting blearily that the little Chinese girl was no longer on reception, he decided to make for the bar for an on-the-house nightcap or two. Then he heard the thump of music coming from somewhere off to his right and remembered all about Sam and his gig. Moving carefully so as not to trip over his own feet, he changed direction and followed the pulse of the beat. He was going not out of any sense of loyalty to his new-found blood drive buddy, but because if there
was
any decent and available pussy here in the hotel, then this is where he would be most likely to find it.

The main ballroom, where the gig was taking place, was hotter than a sauna. Logan breathed in the heady scent of sweat and perfume, his head swimming. All around him, people were gyrating or nodding in time to the music. The heavy bass throbbed in his teeth and chest like a second heartbeat. The darkness of the room, combined with the ever-changing light display up on stage and the alcohol in his system, seemed to scramble Logan’s senses, to blur individual bodies into a single pulsing mass of humanity. Feeling a little overwhelmed by it all, Logan felt instinctively he should head for the light, and so began to push through the crowd towards the stage, at first muttering ‘Excuse me’ as he barged his way through, and then, following his ball player’s instincts, simply lowering his head and charging forward.

If anyone protested or tried to stop him, Logan wasn’t aware of it. He simply kept pushing until there was nothing left to push against. When he finally raised his head it felt like surfacing from a warm pool. He was drenched in his own and other people’s sweat, his shirt sticking to him like another layer of skin. Right in front of him, level with his face, was the edge of the stage. The music was so loud now that his whole body seemed to be convulsing with it. He looked up.

And there was Sam B, prowling from one side of the stage to the other like a caged tiger. He was scowling aggressively, jabbing at the audience as he spat out his lyrics. He looked much angrier up on stage than he did in real life. He was bare-chested, a huge, gold ‘B’ pendant swinging on a chain round his neck. There was more bling round his wrists, and his stomach was imprinted with a tattoo – a black skull above a pair of crossed Uzis. He looked fit and predatory, totally in his element.

Logan was impressed in spite of himself – and more than a little envious too. He turned and peered drunkenly into the crowd. They were clearly enjoying themselves, grinning and bouncing and punching the air. There
had
been a time when Logan himself had enjoyed this kind of adulation – crowds cheering and whooping; girls wanting to fuck him; guys wanting to
be
him. All at once, standing there alone, he felt a wave of self-loathing sweep over him. Not quite knowing why he was doing it, he turned and waved his arms.

‘Sam! Hey, Sam!’ he yelled.

It was only when the rapper carried on as if he wasn’t even there that Logan realized he
did
know why he was trying to grab his attention. It was because he wanted Sam to acknowledge him, to bathe him in a little reflected glory. The fact that Sam didn’t even look at him caused a red mist to descend in front of his eyes.

‘
Fuck you!
’ he screamed at the stage. Then he turned and barged his way back into the crowd. ‘Out of my fucking way!’ he snarled.

People took one look at his wild eyes and stepped aside. Logan wondered how many of them recognized him, or half-recognized him, or maybe thought he looked vaguely like someone they might once have known. Fame was the best thing in the world when you were standing on its summit, looking out at the view. But he couldn’t believe there was a worse feeling than sliding back down the mountain and realizing there was nothing to stop you from hitting the bottom. To have been famous once and then to have lost it was surely worse than never having been famous at all. It was worse too, in its way, than the end of a relationship, or even the death of a loved one. In Logan’s opinion it was easy to find love again – people did it all the time. But how many famous people, once they had hit the slippery slope, managed to reverse the fall and make it back to the top of the mountain?

He was halfway through the crowd when he spotted Purna. She was standing alone, arms folded, eyes fixed intently on the stage. Making a snap decision, he staggered towards her.

‘Hi,’ he shouted above the music.

She looked momentarily startled, which gave Logan a vicious ripple of satisfaction. She’d seemed so in control before that it felt good to scratch her veneer a little bit.

‘Hi,’ she said guardedly.

He nodded towards the stage. ‘So whaddya think?’

‘He’s good.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s not my kind of music, but … yeah, I appreciate the artistry.’

Logan sneered. ‘Artistry?’

She looked at him a moment before replying, as if weighing him up. ‘You don’t think it’s an art?’

‘Fuck, no!’ He spat the words with such venom that he stumbled forward and Purna had to reach out with both hands to steady him.

‘Hey, you OK?’ she said. ‘You don’t look too good.’

‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘Just … hot. I’ve been up at the front. Thought I’d get a drink. You want one?’

‘No, I’m good, thanks.’

She turned away, as if dismissing him. Logan felt that red mist prickling at the edges of his vision again.

‘Why do you do that?’ he snapped.

She glanced at him, puzzled. ‘Do what?’

‘Turn away like … like I’m a piece of shit on your shoe?’ He knew that analogy didn’t quite make sense, but he felt as though he’d made his point.

She looked exasperated rather than defensive. ‘I don’t. It’s your imagination.’

‘Fuck that,’ he said. ‘You think you’re so fucking superior to everyone.’

‘I really don’t.’

‘Yeah you do. You’re doing it now. Treating me like I’m some … some bum pestering you for a dollar.’