The Perils of Panacea

Chapter 2

2

I’d only seen her once, in bad hospital lighting and under considerable stress, but that was Ben’s mom all right. A very drunk Ben’s mom. Three men between the ages of thirty-five and fifty and all looking alike enough to be brothers sat in a booth. Renee sat on the table, her back to the room and her feet on the bench next to one of the men. Looking at her, I felt decidedly over- or under-dressed; I wasn’t sure which. I hadn’t taken the time to change from my PJs―sweats cut off into shorts and a faded taco stand T-shirt filched from some boyfriend or other. Renee was wearing heeled espadrilles, short white shorts made even shorter by sitting with raised knees, and a navy blue top stretched tight across her small, pointy breasts. I half-expected a matching sailor’s hat. Her top rode up and her shorts gapped to expose a fair-sized section of her back. No tattoo, but I was disheartened to see the top of her thong when she shifted, laughing at someone’s no doubt brilliant joke. Three rednecks walk into a bar … Ouch! The thong was blue to match her shirt, not her non-existent bra—not that I could talk in my current PJ’d state. I took a deep breath, trying to shake off the smartass before opening my mouth. At least the thong didn’t show through her white shorts.

“Renee, is that you? Renee—”

That’s when I realized I didn’t even know her last name. It took her eyes so long to focus in my general direction, there was no way she noticed the hesitation. The three men, on the other hand, turned to look at me immediately, and their gazes weren’t friendly. At close range, I could see the common denominator in their looks wasn’t genetics, but rather an inability to practice regular hygiene. All three needed to shave, and though there was some variation in tone (a little blond? a little gray?), each had hair that could be described as greasy. The alcohol they’d consumed hadn’t taken the predatory edge off their stares, but instead sharpened them. It was as if they were afraid I’d snuck in to take their prize, which just might be what I was doing.

I spoke with a relaxed voice and held my bottle carelessly, as if I’d already drunk so much, what did a little spill matter?

“It’s Sydney, from next door.” Renee’s mind didn’t seem to be making the connection, but I preferred not to mention her son, Ben. “I know I haven’t seen you in forever, but I live in that brick place, next door. With the trees …”

I let my voice trail off. That described almost every house on our block, but I’d given her enough time to pretend to recognize me.

“Oh yeah, right, next door. How’s it going?” Renee’s head tilted. She knew there was something about me, something not right with the picture of us as friends, but she couldn’t get her booze-baffled head around it. “I don’t usually see you here, do I?”

“Nope, this is my first time. I came here with a friend, but she ditched me a few minutes ago. Left with some guy.”

I leaned toward Renee, stage-whispering. “Not that I can blame her. God, he was a hottie. I’d ‘a done him in a minute, too. Well, hopefully a little longer than that.”

I bumped my shoulder against Renee’s and snorted, getting an answering giggle for my troubles. Then I leaned back over the table, arching my back and twisting my head to try to see all the men at once. “He wasn’t a friend of yours, was he?”

I hadn’t spoken to any one in particular, but of course each one thought I’d been speaking to him. I could see the calculations going on, the heavy glances and nods between the men as they tried to figure out how to divide two women among the three of them. I hated to think of the possibilities if Renee had been left alone. For the next ten minutes, I sat next to Renee and talked mostly with her, building a chick rapport. Occasionally, I’d throw out a flirting comment to the scruffy peanut gallery to allay their suspicions. Then came the blessed words I’d been waiting for.

“All right, everybody, we’re closing up.”

The bartender’s voice boomed through the mostly empty space over a few halfhearted groans of complaint. “I don’t care where you go, but the cops do their regular drive-by in fifteen minutes, so you’d best be gone from the parking lot by then.”

Renee nearly fell when she slipped off the edge of the table to stand precariously. Her head wobbled in my direction.

“Well, listen,” she slurred, putting both hands on my forearm, “this was really fun. Seriously. We’ll have to do it again sometime. But now …”

Her eyes slid to the three men gathering around us. They looked at Renee as though they were about to cut her from the herd. Time to act before the fanged beasts did.

“What are you talking about?” I wrapped an arm around her shoulder and hugged her against my side. “The night doesn’t have to be over yet. When’s the last time you had a girls’ night out? I know this place over toward Pensacola that has some of the hottest male strippers you’ve ever seen.”

Renee looked tempted, but the predators weren’t as drunk as she was. They’d never bothered to introduce themselves, but I distinguished the one who spoke next by his pudgy jawline. It had an almost fluid puffiness that made my skin crawl at the thought of touching his face. If he had lips, they’d disappeared in his stubbly, disapproving scowl. The thin line looked odd on his jowly face.

“I hate to rain on your little party, sweet thing, but they’ll be closed by the time you get there, if they’re not already.”

I schooled my face to look disappointed rather than angry. “Oh, damn, you’re right. You know, in New Orleans the bars don’t even have locks on the doors because they never close.”

I didn’t know if that was true or not, but it didn’t matter. It distracted them enough, telling their own stories of decadence and flexing their beer-holding biceps, to give me time to regroup. After a few moments, I went on speaking as if I hadn’t noticed the conversation had continued without me.

“And I was looking forward to hitting the beach afterwards. God, I love to swim naked in the ocean at night. The warm water on your skin in the cool breeze, waves trying to knock you over in the dark … And all the things you can’t see in the water, touching you …”

Eyes closed, I tried to make my weaving both drunken and suggestive without being overtly either. My beer migrated from my hand to a nearby table and I straightened suddenly, grabbing Renee with both arms.

“Oh my God, Renee—we should totally do it! We can be in Carrabelle in no time, or better yet, St. George. Come on, I’ll drive. I just bought a little Miata—” blatantly untrue, but it was the only two-seater convertible I could think of on short notice, “—and I’m dying to try it out. What better place to take the top down than on 98?”

U.S. 98 runs along the coast south of Tallahassee from Alligator Point to the St. George Island Bridge at Eastpoint and beyond. The narrow two-lane road is bracketed by gradually disappearing longleaf pines and increasing numbers of vacation rentals, but there’s still a nice view of the Gulf and bays, with long stretches of shallow water broken only by relics of long- and recently-gone piers and the occasional fisherman in rubber waders. I was so caught up in the fantasy, I could smell the salt in the air and see the moon reflecting off the glassy water. That is, until a hand squeezing my elbow hard enough to bruise brought me back to the sad funk of Cooper’s.

Instinct held my tongue. My head came to the man’s chest, and it wasn’t a pretty sight, his T-shirt stained and chest hair attempting to escape from the holes that speckled it like fat freckles.

“Easy there, Tex,” I said, turning to stroke his arm with my right hand until he released my other elbow. His forearm was tough-skinned, like the pad of a dog’s foot. It was the alpha Jowls; I should have known. “Unfortunately, someone of your considerable dimensions is not gonna fit in my tiny little car.”

I traced his arm from wrist to elbow one last time before casually reaching for the beer I’d left on the table. “But you can meet us there. We need someone to watch us while we swim, someone to protect us from sharks and the rest of the wildlife.”

The lipless line of his face was still rigid; I’d rather take my chances with the sharks. I tilted my head, looking at the dirtball with my eyes high beneath the lids, and tried not to shudder. When I spoke, my voice was breathy with a slight whine.

“Don’t you want to watch us? I thought all men liked to watch.”

His expression didn’t change. I thought I’d lost my touch, but a quick glance at his buddies told me I hadn’t. Mouths open slightly, they were clearly expecting to see more than swimming, but Jowls was the one calling the shots. The area where his lips should have been wrinkled into a lumpier shape as he looked me over from head to toe. He nodded to the other men, and one moved toward Renee. I doubt she’d heard a word we’d said. She was leaning against a chair for support, eyes on the floor, possibly picking her vomit target.

Jowls grabbed my elbow again, hard, and began propelling me toward the door. “That sounds like a good idea, but I think you’re both gonna ride with us. There’s plenty of room, and you’re really in no condition to drive.”

“That’s very sweet of you, but—”

“I insist.”

The fingers of my left hand were going numb. He was hurting my arm, and he knew it. The bartender was nowhere to be seen, and I couldn’t count on any of the stragglers for assistance. The way Jowls was manhandling me, he’d have no qualms about actually striking me. With a hundred-plus pounds of weight advantage, one good shot and I’d be down for the count. I adjusted my hand on the neck of my beer bottle.

Like any bar worth drinking in, Cooper’s had the occasional wet spot on the hardwood floor. I planted my foot in the middle of a big one, pushing forward and at an angle to ensure a good slide. Using my momentum and weight to turn counterclockwise, I twisted away from Jowls and out of his grip while swinging around to face him. As I went down, I swung my beer bottle as hard as I could to crack Jowls in the kneecap. The sound of glass on bone was almost as satisfying as his subsequent scream of pain, and nearly drowned out the hard thump of my own ass hitting the floor. Nearly.

Jowls jerked the injured knee up fast just as his other foot hit the wet spot. The same physics that had brought me down worked its magic on him. His good leg flew up in the air, kicked me in the temple and knocked my hat off. I rolled over on my hands and knees, waiting for my sight to clear and the world to stop spinning. Of course the asshole would be wearing boots. Never trust a man who wears boots to a bar in the Florida summer.

I pulled my hat on gingerly when I could see again. Jowls was still on his back, but I heard a shuddering gasp as he sucked wind. No time to lose. I crawled to my feet and found Renee giggling at Jowls. Not very compassionate of her, but we weren’t sticking around long enough for her lack of discretion to become an issue. I grabbed her wrist.

“Let’s go, Renee.”

She stood, rooted to the spot, and her eyes started to glaze again. The rest of the peanut gallery hadn’t moved, but when I spoke, their eyes gained the focus Renee’s lacked. Definitely no time to lose.

“C’mon, Renee, let’s go!” I gave her arm a jerk and pulled her toward the door.

“All right, already—take it easy,” Renee said in a petulant voice, feet shuffling along behind me as quickly as they were able.

Jowls finally filled his lungs enough to speak. And yell. “Don’t just stand there, help me up! And you—”

The last part was directed at my back because I wasn’t about to turn around. “You—come back here, you stupid, clumsy b***h!”

Yeah, like that would happen. At least he still thought I was clumsy, not wily. Wily Sydney. So wily that Renee nearly took both of us down when she tripped over the threshold on the way out the door. My back twinged as I caught myself on the steps. Renee giggled again, and I gave her a dirty look.

“Aren’t they coming with us?” she asked.

“Not if I can help it. Move!”