“Why we gotta go?”
“Which one of us has the bad ears here? You or me? I told you. The line to the john’s taking too long.”
“Your point?”
“Do I really gotta spell it out?”
“Fuck, Al. I can’t take you anywhere. We just got here.”
“Don’t ‘fuck, Al’ me, kid. We’ve been here for over an hour.”
I glanced backwards at the bevy of beautiful women on the dance floor. I hadn’t even gotten started yet. I was still waiting for my first three drinks to kick in and give me rhythm. “An hour? That’s nothing.”
“An hour in a bar is like dog years to a hooker. Trust me, it’s plenty.”
My eyes widened and I glanced down at Valentina. “Did you seriously just say that, Al?”
“I did. Now can we go?”
I cleared my throat. “Hey, Al. I’d like you to meet my friend, Valentina.”
Valentina’s right brow rose, but she extended her hand to Al.
Oblivious to the fact that her hand had just been cradling my boys, he took it and gave it a polite shake. “It’s nice to meet you, Valentina.”
“Valentina’s a hooker, Al.”
He cupped his ear. “A what?”
I leaned closer and hollered, “A hooker.”
Al’s brows lifted up towards his bald head, lifting the bags beneath his eyes and making his watery blue-green eyes more pronounced as he looked her up and down. “I’ll be honest. That doesn’t surprise me.”
Valentina didn’t even pretend to look offended. She leaned in a little closer to me. “I’m sorry. Who is this man?”
I tipped my head towards Al. “My better half.”
She quirked a smile. “You are kidding.”
I grinned cheekily.
Al’s head gestured towards the door. “Come on, Drunk. We’re leaving. I need to make. Those taquitos you forced me to eat aren’t sitting right with me.”
Al started towards the exit, but my hand shot out to grab his arm. “You’re not even gonna say goodbye to our new friend?”
He nodded amicably to the bombshell clinging to my side. “It’s been a remarkable pleasure, Valentina.” Then he turned his narrowed eyes on me. “Now let’s go, kid. I gotta take the kids to the pool.”
When he’d disappeared into the crowd, Valentina looked up at me curiously. “He is your grandfather or something?”
“Nah. My wingman.”
“He’s fun,” she said dryly.
I tried to pry myself out of her viselike grip. “He’s a cool cat. He’s just not used to leaving the resort. Especially after the sun goes down.”
“Resort?”
“The Seacoast Majestic. That’s where I do security.”
“Oh, so you live on the island?”
“I do now.” I didn’t think she needed to hear the whole story of how I’d come to move here from the States. I was over all of that. I was an official Paradise Isle resident now. For better or worse.
She curled into me again and purred, “Niiiice.”
I chuckled while trying to escape again, but shaking Valentina was like trying to flick a booger off your finger. “Sorry, Valentina. I gotta go before Al deuces in the resort rental and we get our driving privileges revoked.”
“How about a raincheck?”
I glanced back at the bartender again. He’d moved on to a group of college-aged girls down the bar and wasn’t watching me and Valentina anymore. I shrugged. Just like I’d bought Valentina a drink so as not to offend her, I decided to agree on a raincheck for the same reason. Hell, she didn’t need to know I had no intention on cashing it. “Sure, a raincheck would be great.”
Magically, she plucked a business card out of her cleavage and handed it to me.
“Valentina Carrizo, Professional Escort.” I looked up at her in surprise. Though I knew prostitution was legal on the island, this was my first experience with it being so blatant. I smiled at her. “You have fucking business cards?”
“In case you ever need a date to the ball, but the fucking part is extra,” she said, giggling.
“Next ball I go to, I’ll look you up.”
“Promise?”
I grinned. “You have my word.” Valentina grabbed my face and kissed me on the lips then. It was pretty PG and not anything I would’ve been embarrassed for my mother to have seen, but somehow it made me uncomfortable. I pulled my head back and cleared my throat. “It was nice to meet you Valentina.”
As I started to walk away, she called out to me. “Hey. What’s your real name?”
“Drunk.”
“It’s really Drunk?”
“Sure is.”
She smiled at me. “Well, it was nice to meet you, Drunk.”
Outside, Al waited for me in the resort car that Artie Balladares, the owner of the Seacoast Majestic, had let us borrow. It wasn’t the first time we’d been loaned the car, and it always came with the stipulation that Al had to be present when it was used, and I had to be the one driving. I wasn’t sure if that was Artie’s way of making sure Al was always entertained or if it was his way of making sure I always had a chaperone.
I crawled into the driver’s seat. “Jeez, Al. I barely got a chance to look around.”
But Al wasn’t one to be sidetracked. “What took you so long? Those taquitos bought my stomach a one-way ticket to Shitsville.”
“Hey, man, I’m sorry. You didn’t have to eat ’em. I mean, you know what they say. ‘Greasy in, easy out.’”
“You said you ordered them for the table, Drunk. I was being polite.”
“In that case, you get two gold stars. You were extra polite.”
“Let’s just go. I gotta find the nearest john.”
I pointed to the nudie bar next to the Blue Iguana, where we’d just been. “I bet Club Cobalt next door has a bathroom you could use.”
Al’s eyes widened. “Are you nuts? You don’t sit on a toilet seat in a place like that unless you wanna get pregnant, and I’m too weak to squat.”
“You’re also too old to get pregnant.”
Al pursed his lips. “Are you gonna start this car, or do I have to get out and push?”
“In your current condition, I advise against pushing. You’ll shit your shorts.”
Al shook his head. “I think it’s time you bought your own vehicle, kid. I can’t keep hauling you around like this.”
I tried to restrain my smile as I started the engine. “You can’t keep—” Steering the vehicle out of the parking lot and onto the main road, I shook my head. “Who’s hauling who around here?”
“Look, you’ve got the cash. How about I take you shopping for a new ride one day this week?”
I shrugged. The thought had crossed my mind a time or fifty. Only every time I wanted to run into town for something and had to ask Artie’s permission to use a resort car and then persuade Al to ride along. I’d tried to convince Artie to give me my own private business car, but he said he’d seen the bullet holes we’d gotten put into Gary Wheelan’s ride my first week on the island and he didn’t trust me to keep his small fleet of cars safe. They were for guests to be shuttled around in, not for my personal escapades.
“I’m not sure I wanna part with that kind of cash, Al.”
“You’re not exactly a pauper, kid. You can afford to spend a little of that money.”
“But it’s my nest egg.” Al was referring to the money I’d made solving a big theft my first week on the island. Even though I’d made off with nearly seven million bucks, I’d lost the majority of it in the fucking Atlantic—a ransom drop gone bad. And the small amount that we’d been able to fish out of the ocean had gone to pay for the damages to the Cruz brothers’ fleet of boats. In the end, I’d wound up with only the interest I’d earned on the money for the couple months that I’d had it. It wasn’t enough to live the rest of my life on, but with Al’s help, I’d invested it properly and it was already growing steadily. I really didn’t feel like touching it.
/>
“You need your own car, kid.” Al held up his hand and pointed at his little finger. “Besides. You owe me.”
“Oh, come on. You’re gonna bring that up?”
“The fact that you got my finger cut off? Yeah, I think I earned the right to bring that up a time or two a week for the rest of my life.”
“It’s not like I was the one that cut it off, Al.”
“Really? That’s how you’re gonna spin it?”
“Spin it? I’m not—look. I put it on ice for you, didn’t I? They sewed it back on. It hardly looks used. Well, except for all those wrinkles on it. But those are your fault, not mine.”
“Hardly looks used? I can’t bend it anymore, kid!”
I fought back a laugh. Watching Al drink a cup of coffee now was like having a tea party with the queen. I had to look away to convince my lips to cover my teeth again. When I had myself under control, I turned to Al.
“Fine. I’ll look at cars.”
Al’s head bobbed as if it was settled. “We’ll go see Steve Dillon this week. I think Artie knows the guy. He’ll give us a good deal.”
I glanced over at Al as I hit the main road that would take us back to the resort. “You’re kinda bossy, you know that?”
“Yeah, well, you’re pain in my ass.” He was quiet for a minute. “And you drive like an old woman.”
I pulled the car over at the first convenience store I could find. “Yeah, well, I took lessons from you.”
Also by Zane Mitchell
Drunk Driving is now available on Amazon!
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About Zane
I grew up on a sheep farm in the Midwest. I was an only child, raised on Indiana Jones, Star Wars, and the Dukes of Hazzard. My dad was a fresh-water fish biologist and worked on the Missouri River. My mom was a teacher when I was young, and then became the principal of my school around the time I started taking an interest in beer. My grandpa, much like Al in my Drunk in Paradise series, actually owned a Case IH dealership, and I thought the world of him and my grandma.
I've been married twice. I'd say the first was a mistake, but that marriage gave me my four kids. Marriage numero dos came with two pre-made kids. So yeah, we're paying for Christmas presents for six and college for three. So buy my next book, please. I'd say that was a joke, but jeez. College is expensive.
In a former life, I was a newspaper columnist, and I actually went to journalism school but eventually dropped out. I did go back to school and eventually got a teaching degree, but let's face facts. I sucked at being a teacher. I was just as much of a kid as the kids were.
The love of my life and I live in the Midwest. We go about our boring lives just like you do. We parent lots of teenagers and twenty-something-year-olds. We watch superhero movies and Dateline on TV. We're a little obsessive in our love for the Kansas City Chiefs. We take yearly visits to the Caribbean because hey, tax deductible. And now, I write books - sort of a life long dream, to be honest.
So thanks for reading. You have no idea how cool I think it is, that you picked my book out of all of the choices you had to read and you made it to the end. You rock. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.
Zane
Oh. P.S. I don’t do Tweets. Or Insta. I do have Facebook and a website. www.zanemitchell.com. You’re welcome to come over and hangout. BYOB.
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