Stealing Phin (16 page)

Marco smiled again and looked at me with narrowed eyes. “It is good, no?”

“Um, yeah,” I lied. “The aftertaste is...bitter.”

“You know what makes everything that is bitter, sweet again?” Marco took my hand and pulled me back toward the dance floor. “Dancing.”

Although I hadn’t drank that much, the rum went straight to my head. As I half-willingly followed Marco, I felt like I might wretch.

“I don’t feel right,” I told him.

He didn’t seem to hear me, though, and pulled me closer to him. He draped my arms around his neck, which I didn’t really like, but I didn’t withdraw them because I felt unsteady on my feet.

The music went in and out—sometimes sounding muffled. The flashing lights bothered my eyes. Suddenly, the floor beneath me shifted, and I lost my balance. My body lurched against Marco.

“Sorry,” I slurred. My voice echoed in my ears, the way it did when I had water trapped in them.

Marco grunted and held me too tight. “It is all right, amiga. Everything will be all right.” He turned ninety degrees, taking my body with him. Then he turned another ninety degrees. A camera flashed from directly across the room. I thought I saw Pablo holding his camera up. The flash hurt my eyes. Marco turned another one hundred and eighty degrees, so that we were facing the original direction. I could see another flash from behind us reflected in Marco’s eyes. His movements made me dizzy. By now, my ability to stand on my own was severely impaired.

“I need to sit down,” I said.

“You can sit on me, amiga,” Marco grunted. The look on his face turned predatory. No longer admiring, it made me feel threatened. I tried to create space between us, but my body and mind weren’t responding right.

Suddenly, I felt his hands go to my ass. The next thing I knew, he reached under my skirt.

“Stop it!” I cried. I tried to yank myself out of his grasp, but he was so much stronger than I was. He held me in place easily with one arm while his hand came to the front of me and reached up between my legs. And then, oh God, his fingers were inside me.

I bucked against him and opened my mouth to yell. But he was too quick. He clamped his hand over my mouth. His mouth was at my ear, spitting harsh Spanish words into it. I recognized the word for whore.

The world around me spun, and I was barely able to discern the fact that he was half-dragging me toward the back exit of the club. I tried to fight my way loose, but my sense of balance had disappeared and my strength was gone. I felt drunker than I’d ever felt before. The entire place swayed, and my focus went in and out. I wanted to grab one of the people we passed and ask for help, but my wits and my voice had left me, too. I heard Marco telling anyone who looked our way something in Spanish. Panic filled me as I recognized the word
Guaro
and the word for
girlfriend
. Some of the passers-by laughed and nodded in response to his false explanation.

This
can’t
be
happening,
I thought through the fuzz obscuring my mind
.
Where
are
you
Dez?

Suddenly, Marco stopped. I turned my head and saw a figure standing in front of us, blocking the path to the back exit.

“Fuera de mi camino,” Marco growled.

I looked at Marco’s face just as a fist connected with his jaw. Marco let go of me and stumbled backwards. I crumpled to the floor. I struggled to get up but only fell over again. I tried to keep focused on what was happening.

A man moved into the space between me and the angry Argentinian. It must’ve been the person who hit Marco because he lunged at the man. The flash of a knife blade in Marco’s hand caught my eye.

Look
out!
I tried to yell.

The man was ready for him, though. As Marco slashed at him, the man grabbed his wrist, twisting it expertly. The knife fell to the floor. Then, he cocked his fist back and slammed it into Marco’s cheek. The Argentinian landed in a heap.

Then, another man, smaller than Marco came at him. It was Pablo. The man easily handled Pablo, grabbing him by the front of the shirt and lifting him off the ground. Pablo looked afraid. The man said something I couldn’t hear, and Pablo responded. But the man didn’t seem satisfied with the answer because he shook Pablo, until he relented and said something else. The man released Pablo, who hit the ground like a sack of flour.

He turned toward me, but the back of the club was much darker than the front, and I couldn’t see his face. As he approached me, I relented to an overpowering urge to close my eyes. While I tried to fight it, I felt my body being lifted into the air. The stranger had me in his arms, and though I didn’t know who he was, I felt safe.

“Thank you,” I whispered. It was the last thing I remembered before I blacked out.

Slowly, layer after layer of dense fog lifted from my mind. My senses also began to come back to life. My ears picked up a sizzling sound. My nose twitched at the pleasant smell of bacon. A bitter taste stained my tongue. The taste triggered fear in me. The image of a thick, ugly troll came to mind. He looked as if he were going to eat me. His features were twisted, and he looked like a monster. I didn’t recognize him, but he felt familiar. Maybe it was just a remnant of a bad dream—one that I didn’t remember having…or necessarily
want
to remember.

Eventually, I was able to open my eyes. I rubbed the sleep out of them and yawned deeply. My head was throbbing, and my mouth felt cottony. I needed a drink of water in a bad way. I just needed to roll out of bed and make it to the bathroom.

Wait a minute. Something wasn’t right. I wasn’t in my bed. I was on a couch. There was no couch in my suite. Where the hell was I?

Frightened, I sat up and immediately regretted it. I groaned and clutched at my head. Someone came running.

“Dez?” I whispered hoarsely.

A hand touched my shoulder and steadied me. I looked up.

“Byron!”

“Hey there,” he smiled, though there was worry in his eyes. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I’d been cryogenically frozen and brought back to life,” I croaked.

His smiled faded, and he looked serious. “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into the next room, which looked to be an en suite kitchen.

How
does
this
guy
always
manage
to
get
the
best
suites?

A few minutes later, he came back with a tray full of offerings. A glass of juice, some iced water, a steaming mug of coffee, a plate of scrambled eggs, pancakes, and bacon—my favorite breakfast.

“Drink the water first,” he instructed. “You’re dehydrated.” He set the tray down on the coffee table in front of me and handed me the water.

I gulped it down. Already, I could feel an improvement. I reached for the coffee next, thinking the caffeine could help my headache and already knowing that Byron had fixed it just the way I liked. I tried not to give him too much credit for this, though. After all, what was a cup of coffee compared to the shit he’d put me through?

Byron sat in a chair next to the end of the couch where I sat and watched me carefully.

“Try the pancakes,” he said. “I made them from scratch. My mom’s recipe.”

“Byron, what am I doing here?” By now, my mind was functioning fully enough to be increasingly confused by the situation. How did I end up on Byron’s couch?

“Eat first, then I’ll explain.”

I started to protest, but my stomach chose that precise moment to growl very loudly. I felt terribly hung over. Maybe some food would help. So, I picked up a pancake from the plate and bit into it.

Byron grinned.

“What?” I said through a mouthful of pancake, which was, in fact, delicious.

“I’ve never seen anyone eat a pancake like that.”

“What’s wrong with the way I eat pancakes?”

“Nothing. It’s just that you eat it like a giant cookie.”

“Well, it sort of is.” I put down the pancake, suddenly self-conscious. I wasn’t used to a guy noticing all the details about my habits…or me, for that matter.

“Don’t mind me,” he said, holding a hand up, “I’m not making fun of you. Please, eat. Before it gets cold.”

I obediently ate a bite of egg, making sure to use my fork this time. “Will you tell me what happened?” As I chewed, I realized that every time I tried to remember the events of last night, all I drew up was a big blank. It gave me a bad feeling.

“Do you remember any of it?” Byron turned serious again. He flexed his hands. His knuckles cracked. I noticed they looked bruised.

“I remember going into the club. Dancing.” I pressed my fingers against my temples, as if that might help me channel my memory banks. “Then, Carlito ditched me.” I frowned. “He kept looking at his watch.” I furrowed my brow, trying hard to sort through the fuzz in my brain.

“Do you remember another man? A bigger, older guy?”

His words jogged a memory.

“Yeah, I do.” I squinted my eyes as if that would help me recall things more clearly. “He was an Argentinian. And he came up to me, making excuses for Carlito. Said he was Carlito’s cousin.”

I paused as a rush of inexplicable fear coursed through me. The image of the troll monster I’d dreamed of came to mind. This time, he had a face I recognized.

“He name was Marco. He brought me a drink. Argentinian rum. It tasted so bitter.” I nearly gagged at the memory of the aftertaste.

An ominous thought struck me as I started to piece things together. “There was something in the drink, wasn’t there,” I said with a shaky voice.

Byron nodded gravely. “It was a pretty strong dose of rohypnol, judging from you’re your symptoms.”

I closed my eyes for a few moments, suddenly ashamed.

“What’s wrong?” Byron leaned closer and sounded concerned.

“I should’ve known better. I shouldn’t have accepted the drink, even if he was Carlito’s relative. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

The edges of Byron’s mouth tightened. “This is not your fault, Phin.”

His words seemed to carry a meaning that went beyond consoling me about what happened at the club. It seemed that he was implicating himself as the person to blame in this situation, but I didn’t understand how that made any sense.

“Do you remember anything after you took the drink?” he probed.

“After that, things got blurry. I felt dizzy while we danced. He was kind of rough with me. And then, oh God—” My voice hitched as a sob rose in my throat. The memory rose as well, from a dark place I wished it could stay locked away in forever. “And then his hand went up my dress, and—” I couldn’t go on. I put my hands over my face and sobbed.

The couch shifted as Byron moved to sit next to me. He drew me in his arms and held me tightly. As I cried and cried, he rocked me back and forth. The humiliation I felt over how the Argentinian had violated my body feel made me physically ill again.

“It’s okay, Phin,” he whispered into my hair. “You’re safe now.”

He held me close until all my tears were spent. Byron’s warmth and tenderness made me want to stay in his arms forever.

At this point, another piece of memory floated into my tired head. “You were there last night, weren’t you,” I said quietly. “You were the one who stopped him from—”

“Yes,” Byron interrupted. I was glad he did because I didn’t want to say the words. “I got to you before he could take you out of the club.”

“Just in time.”

His face darkened. “Not soon enough, Phin. Not fucking soon enough.” The muscles in his neck looked strained.

“How did you find me?”

Byron stiffened. “I got your note,” he said carefully. “There aren’t very many places in Tamarindo that are open late. I took a guess that you’d be at the disco.”

“Lucky guess,” I said. “Lucky for me, anyway.”

“And for me, too,” Byron’s chest heaved as he took in a sharp breath.

I looked up at his face. His expression was strained, and once again, I wasn’t able to untangle all the emotions knotted into it. Guilt. Anger. Worry. And something else that seemed out of place…the same something I’d identified the night at the Lava Lounge. The look of someone with a secret. Except now, he seemed to be breaking under the burden of whatever secrets he kept.

“If I’d guessed wrong,” he said, “or gotten there any later…” The tangle of emotions fell away from his face as one overrode them all—anguish.

As much as I was surprised at this, I was also touched.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I put my hand on his cheek to try to comfort him. “You were there. And I’m fine. That’s all that matters.”

He gazed down at me. My heart swelled until it felt as if it would burst through my sternum. The urges I’d felt the last time I was with him came flooding back.