Tempting Isabel (Paradise South #1) (27 page)

CHAPTER 31

H
e walked toward
the hotel’s pool entrance, holding an inner argument with himself. She told him to leave her, she’d insisted. But he should have fucking stayed.

On the other hand, he had to take into account Isabel’s nature, the strong, fierce tigress that he knew her to be. Isabel was a rock, and although she’d just been shaken to her core, she didn’t need nor did she want a savior…not even in extreme assault scenarios.

And he realized that he didn’t want a damsel in distress, either. What he wanted, who he wanted, all he wanted, was Isabel.

*

As he neared the pool, he prepared what he needed to say to Stephanie. He was unsure of how long or from which point Stephanie had seen him or maybe even had been following him, but a vague and
matter-of
-fact response was all he’d give her.

“Oh, Zack, I was so worried! Was that Jezebel? Was she being attacked? Are you alright! God, those types of women and their provocative auras just attract that kind of element. But she was so lucky you were there! So”—she stopped for effect and maybe a moment’s breath—“what
were
you doing there?”

A growl of disgust rumbled in his chest. Forget the ‘luck’ reference, did the woman just insinuate the attack was Isabel’s fucking fault? Fury, raw and real, locked his breath.

But this woman wasn’t worth the breath.

Speak quick and go, Zack.

“I guess I just got lost in the right place at the right time,” he said, walking straight past her. “Well, I’m still feeling the alcohol from the party so…good night.” And he continued into the building, the hotel security door closing with a clank behind him.

*

Then the door buzzed and swung open again. “Zachary? With such a scary incident having just happened, I, um…I’m a little worried about going up to my room alone. Would you mind going with me?” Stephanie implored.

He looked up at the ceiling. Was this woman for real? No, she was more like a big wad of artificially sweetened bubble gum stuck to the bottom of a brand new pair of shoes.

“Since we’re on the same floor, Stephanie, fine. Let me get the elevator here.” And as he went to press the call button, her finger met his, a giggle escaping her lips and a ravenous hunger glowing in her eyes.

The elevator came quickly. Thankfully. “Ladies first.”

That is, if there was
a lady
present.

“Such a gentleman,” she flirted hopefully.

They got into the elevator, and to Zack’s disappointment, the car was empty.

Hoping for
elevator-super
-speed and Stephanie’s silence, he just hit their floor number, and up the elevator traveled.

Besides Stephanie’s frequent sniffling and wheezing, her allergic reaction apparently still affecting her eyes and nose, and now her breathing capacity, the quiet was deafening. Again, better than any more words out of her ignorant mouth. Zack just focused on each small creak in the
hydraulic-powered
elevator cabling and the sound of the
swoosh-swoosh
increasing and decreasing as they passed each floor.

Ding!

The doors opened, but it was only the eighteenth floor.
For fuck’s
sake.

A waiter with a catering cart appeared, framed within the elevator’s doorway.
Okay, company is good.
But with a look of disappointment being that there was no room for the man and his doublewide food trolley, the waiter, to
Zack’s
disappointment, disappeared the next moment. The elevator doors shut, once again sealing in the thick, radiating, awkwardness put out by his wedding party counterpart.

“Thanks for accompanying me,” Stephanie said. “And, you know, you’re more than welcome into my suite. For a last drink of the night. Or”—she looked at her watch—“the first drink of the day.” She giggled again.

Ugh.

Ding!

Finally! The
twenty-fifth
floor.

“Like I said, Stephanie, I really need to sleep. Big day tomorrow for my kid brother and your little sister,” Zack said, doubting she gave a crap about Amy or Darren, being such the spotlight hound. He escaped from the elevator into the hall as soon as the doors opened and moved quickly to his door three rooms down on the left. He pointed to her room only a few down from there. “Here we are, safe and sound. So sleep well, Stephanie. And feel better, you know, with your eyes and nose, and all.”

And his hotel room door opened, closed, and locked behind him all before she could ask him again to join her for anything.

CHAPTER 32

I
sabel finished with
the police and the hotel management’s accident report protocol very quickly, thanks to Charlie, who knew Isabel had a wedding to direct in less than nine hours.

What Charlie didn’t know was that she’d had less than three hours sleep between last night and the night before. She was running on fumes. Then add the crazy and sickening drama that was just thrown at her, and her emotional state was all that more fragile, shaky, and irrational.

Case in point: Her deep concern, however unwarranted, over Roberto’s status.

“Charlie, where did they take Roberto? I just want be sure he’s, you know…okay. I mean, maybe I shouldn’t press charges?”

“Isabel. You aren’t safe unless he’s put away and gets some help. And that won’t happen unless you do this. Listen, you just need to get some rest.” Charlie walked her out to the back door where a guard waited for her. “He’ll be booked tonight locally. Tomorrow morning I’ll follow up with my contact at the precinct. And I’ll press for a psych evaluation. Maybe getting him to the secure mental facility up north will solve all your concerns. But right now, you need to take care of you.”

Isabel was escorted to her car. Before starting the ignition, she dialed Antonio. The guard seemed intent on waiting for her to completely exit the resort before leaving her there, so she held up two fingers and smiled in thanks for his patience. There was just no way that she was going home to an empty house.

Antonio answered her call, groggy from sleep, but quickly raised his voice to screaming, and cursed Roberto to the “depths of hell.” She let him spew fireballs for a solid minute, but then brought him back down to practical.

“I just need you to meet me at my house right now. I’m leaving the hotel parking lot. I’m fine, just a little shaken up. Roberto’s detained and Charlie will keep me posted. He has a connection on the force who’ll let me know that Roberto is okay.”

“Okay! Who cares if he is okay, Isa?”

“This is my fault on so many levels, Antonio.”

“God, Isa, do you hear yourself? We should’ve listened to you!”

“No, I mean, it’s
my
hex,
my
influence, and my blindness! But all that aside, the fact is he is…was…my best friend. We can keep me safe by keeping him away, but we’ve gotta make sure he gets help! It’s Roberto, for Christ’s sake!”

“Just get home, Isabel. I’m already pulling out of my garage.”

Her car keys rattled slightly as she tried to start the car. She took a deep, calming breath. And with that breath, she thought of Zack.

Zack had been there for her.

And just the thought of him calmed her, comforted her, steadied her.

*

She left the hotel premises, throwing a final wave of thanks to the guard as she went. Merging onto the main drag, her mind shifted up a gear, back into anxiety mode.

Was
Roberto safe? And was she the shovel that’d dug the hole he’d fallen into? She just hadn’t realized how serious Roberto was about her. Had she been too flirtatious with him? And not direct enough?

But to force himself on her like that! He’d actually attacked her! And it was unforgiveable. Threatening her, hurting her.
Damn it, Roberto, what the fuck were you
thinking?

And, she knew he’d seen her with Zack at the bar, but how the hell did he know anything about Drew from Germany or DJ Chris? God, just how long had he been following her? Watching her? Her head spun. Her date with Drew was before she’d even made the
God-awful
mistake of sleeping with Roberto! Just how far back did this go?

A whirlwind of instances flew at her at once.
But wait!
Did she remember correctly, or was it just the trauma of the night, the words Roberto had shouted at her as he was taken away. “Just wait ’til I
do
make love to you…”

When “I
do
make love to you?” But they
had
slept together. She’d gotten stupid blackout drunk and broken her rule. He’d told her so. She’d blacked out that night, and he’d told her they’d had sex when she’d woken up naked in his arms, in his bed, that was what he’d damn told her!

Adios Mio!
Had he set it up? Undressed her to make her think…and then lied about it? Wait. Was it even worse than that? He had made her all her drinks that night, at least the ones she could remember! Did he drug her? She really couldn’t put it past him at this point. She couldn’t rule out anything.

And it was all because she’d selfishly hung on to him, to her one friend on Earth. And, no, even that wasn’t permitted. Not even Roberto was allowed in her cursed world. She’d broken her goddamn rules long before the night they’d supposedly slept together. She’d blurred her lines long before that. Safe distance? No. Unsafe, lethal.

Her chest was caught, no air. Screaming, sprinting thoughts.
Justify it, Isabel. Justify ’til your heart’s
content.

No, damn it!
It wasn’t rationalization, her attempts had been real, her intentions had been true. She’d tried to keep Roberto from harm, even asked him to keep away. And now, tonight, was this the lesser evil? Her dearest friend having gone out of his mind? She’d driven him to the brink of insanity. Would death have been better than the torture Roberto would face in a damn mental ward for the criminally insane?

Stop being so melodramatic, Isabel.

Melodramatic?
Seriously, fuck you, fate!
Just, goddamn you to
hell.

She felt sick to her stomach, ready to spew her guts out. She knew she should pull over, but was too scared to. And so tired.

So goddamn tired. Too tired to work it out in her head anymore, the unseen darkness that plagued her was draining her dry.
Bones-in
-
the-desert
dry.

“Fuck you!” she screamed. She pounded and pounded her steering wheel with both hands, again and again and again. With the last slam of her quivering hands, she mistakenly hit the horn, which startled her into a slight swerve on the thankfully empty road. Then her eyes welled with blurring tears, and she just unfolded.

Sobs, years and years of salty wet sorrow. She had no choice but to pull off to the side of the road then, as she cursed the
never-ending
shit storm that was her life. She took long breaths to get control while her nausea still threatened, but didn’t send her over the edge. Only her tears dove to their deaths. A billion, trillion tears.

What seemed like hours later when only minutes had passed, the glow of a truck’s oncoming headlights broke her daze.
Get home, Isabel. Antonio’s there. Just get your ass
home.

She pulled back onto the road and reached for her volume control, thinking her heavy metal music would steady her for the rest of her drive. But another cyclone of thoughts came first.
For Christ’s sake, leave me alone!
Can’t I have ten minutes of
peace?

No.
An alternative surfaced. The awareness that if Roberto had not been waiting at her car just hours ago, then it would have been Zack…alone. And as drunk as she knew he’d been, having had her peripheral on him throughout the entire rehearsal dinner, he would have done the very same as Roberto.

But Jesus! Here was the undertow of guilt; she would have welcomed
that
attack.

Finally being honest with herself, she would have accepted Zack’s advances in the far off, poorly lit staff parking lot. Why? Because when it came to Zack James, her willpower was just too damn weak. And it would have all potentially gone down with Stephanie,
Zack’s
“stalker”, on the sidelines, which of course would have been the end to her career.

*

Antonio was on the edge of the pullout bed when she got home. He was heaving pissed, God, like she’d never seen him. She broke his zone with the sound of her car keys clanking on the sideboard. And a second later, he had her wrapped in his arms. “God, Isa. I am so sorry. So, so sorry.”

Her brother couldn’t blame himself. She wouldn’t allow it. “Fate, brother. Just fate,” she whispered. Not that she really believed that. She still put it all on herself. But she knew Antonio wouldn’t accept that. She pulled away from him slowly. “Sleep. I’m fine. Hitting the bed now.” She just wanted to end this hellish night.

He nodded, kissed her forehead, and she went straight to her room.

She lay in her bed and focused on the sound of her own breathing—in and out. In and out. Finally, thank God in heaven, no thoughts. Deeply in. And completely out.

Soft sleep came. Then dreams.

CHAPTER 33

I
t only took
thirty minutes of pacing, inner debate, and outward muttering before he punched a hole in the wall.
Damn her pride!
I should be with her now!
For the aftershocks
.
Fuck!

He wrapped a towel around his
cut-up
fist, picked up his room key, and left the suite. He wasn’t leaving Isabel down there by herself. He’d just keep her company…or whatever the fuck she wanted to call it. And he had every right to be there, to give his account of the assault. It was a fucking real time attack, damn it! Didn’t she get that?

He continued his inner defense, preparing what he would say to her when she tried to push him out and away again, her horrible goddamn habit. But he had nothing to prove, he would tell her. And just like he wouldn’t abandon his brother, his brother’s
soon-to
-be wife, a friend, or even his fucking attorney, he wasn’t about to leave the woman he was admittedly falling for—more like had already fallen for—to deal with this by herself. On second thought, maybe he’d leave the last bit out for tonight. He’d save it, but the rest she’d hear, whether she liked it or not.

Yeah, now he felt empowered, imagining himself standing by her, sitting with her, comforting her like he should have insisted on in the first place. His steps down the hall were heavy, dense, emphatic, to support the argument he’d prepared.

Just then, a clicking sound caught his ear, then a creak, and before he could glance over his shoulder at Stephanie Rine’s door, another
click-then
-bang.
My very own stalker
, he mused, and continued to the elevator.

*

When he got to the front desk, he asked to speak with security immediately. One of the officers who had come to the scene appeared and shook Zack’s hand firmly. The officer’s other hand held a
half-cup
of coffee, like he was on break.

The officer called him an
hombre valiente
—Zack had a
decent-enough
base in Spanish to know he’d been called a “brave man.” He didn’t feel brave, though, leaving Isabel like he had, but Zack nodded his thanks.

“Can you tell me where
Señorita
Ruiz is now? And is she alright? Have the reports been completed? Can you take me to her?”

But the officer only stared at him and sipped his cup of joe. The man’s lackadaisical attitude boiled his blood.
Keep calm, Zack.
The guy’s just a graveyard shift security guard.

He swallowed, took a deep breath, then repeated the request in Spanish as coolly as he could, when all he really wanted was to pour the coffee over the guy’s head.

“Sorry,
Señor
, but she left already.” Spoken in perfect English.

Zack came down hard with his fists onto the granite reception counter, jolting the officer, his coffee, and the front desk girl who stood frozen, phone lines ringing and flashing like crazy.

Zack blinked and sighed. “
Lo siento.
” He shook his head then nodded. “Really, I’m sorry.” He knew the security dude hadn’t done anything wrong. No, it was Zack who had fucked up, again, by leaving Isabel at the scene in the first place, against his own damn gut. He’d fucked up huge, and he wanted to fix it. He wanted to tell Isabel he was there for her.

Before Zack could get his bearings and unclench his iron locked jaw to even utter his next question to the officer, a silver haired man in a full suit, obviously a manager, came out from the back office. Maybe this guy had a more accurate status report, and maybe the officer didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. Maybe Isabel was
going
to be escorted…soon, but hadn’t been yet.

The older gentleman approached, arm outstretched. “You must be Zachary James. A pleasure. An honor, in fact. Thank you so much for helping Isabel. She had a real stroke of luck tonight with you being there!” The man seemed to know her well and genuinely care for her wellbeing. At the same time, Zack sensed that this man was almost surprised that she was okay, shocked even. “A real stroke of luck…finally,” the man reiterated, almost to himself.

Zack knew it was no stroke of fucking luck that he was there to save her. Not because he believed in luck less than he thought the goddamn Loch Ness Monster was alive and kicking, but more than that, he hadn’t even been at the right place at the right time for any noble reason. He felt a sting of hot guilt in his gut. He knew exactly why he’d been there originally. His fucking
hard-on
for Isabel had gotten him there. More disgust flooded him.

You’re a fucking asshole, Zack. You don’t even deserve
her!

He wanted nothing more than to go back to his room and hit and crush and pound more things with his fists.

“My name is Charlie. I’m the customer service manager here at the Bay View,” the man interrupted Zack mid thought. “It looks like you’re really shaken up, but not to worry, Mr. James. Isabel was escorted to her car by security twenty minutes ago, and she just gave word by text that she got home safe and sound. Her family is with her there.”

Damn it! He really had missed her. But at that point, he could’ve faced her. Zack stood there like a lost fucking stray.

“And I’ve already followed up with the police. The assailant is in custody and won’t be released any time soon. The police will be back for your statement tomorrow morning, before your family’s affair. But for now, why don’t you get some sleep, Mr. James?” Charlie said, patting Zack’s hand like a father would.

Zack shook the man’s hand and attempted a smile in thanks, then headed toward the elevator bank. A surge took over as he
zombie-walked
, worse than the emptiness he’d felt whenever Isabel was far from him. This was more a cold liquid mercury through the veins, a slow creeping paralysis. And he knew the cause. He swore then, if given the chance, he’d never let Isabel down again.