Magnificent Ruin (Everlasting Series Book 2) (4 page)

“Hey,” Adrian says. I don’t know how he just materialized out of thin air but I’m glad he did.

Behind him, Sophia trails in, keeping her eyes down as if in a trance. “Hi, Taylor,” she says, happy to see me.

“Hey guys, glad to see you,” I say, relieved I don’t have to think about Tomas’s behavior for the moment.

“Nice running in you,” Adrian says.

“Into,” I correct him.

“What?”

“Running into you is how we say it.”

“Ah,” he says, laughing. “You have to give me English lessons.”

“Hey, man,” Tomas says, punching Adrian’s shoulder. “What’s shakin’?”

Sophia barely registers on Tomas’s radar, much to her disappointment.

“Always in the action,” Adrian says, winking at Tomas.

“Just doing what’s expected of me, bro,” Tomas says before taking Jeanine’s hand to go. At the last moment, he decides to wave
hello
at Sophia.

Sophia eyes Jeanine bitterly as she and Tomas head for the bar.

“Everyone but me,” Sophia says, unable to control her impulses.

“Forget about him,” I say. “You’ll never get him to be with you, Sophia. He’s not the kind of man for serious things. In his way, he’s protecting you.”

“Is he protecting you, too?” she says with a tone in her voice I don’t appreciate at all. I can’t help but wonder though—could she be right? He does seem to be overprotective and always keeps an eye on me.

Adrian steps in, taking my hand. “Let’s dance, yes?”

Knowing the last thing I need is one more round of dancing, I accept anyway because, honestly, what are the alternatives? Besides, Adrian is no stranger and Tomas won’t try to scare him away.

We hit the dance floor and a few seconds later I get a feeling of déjà vu as I spot Tomas walking over to us. Halfway through he changes his mind and grabs a random girl before he plants a kiss on her lips.

A guy who seems to be her boyfriend jumps on Tomas trying to throw a punch at him which Tomas ducks easily. I get a burning feeling above my temples. What is it that makes him so stupidly aggressive tonight? Tomas is many things but an idiot he is not.

A moment later, two bouncers show up and drag Tomas away from the girl and her jealous Greek lover and toward the door.

It would serve him right if they threw his ass out but I can’t help it. I run after him only to hear him mocking the bouncers.

“I’m sorry about this,” I tell the bouncers. “My friend has had one too many drinks. I’ll take him home.”

“What?” Tomas protests. “I’m not going anywhere.”

One look at him and I know he’s serious about this. He’ll never agree to leave voluntarily.

“We’ll keep an eye on him,” I say, pointing at Adrian and Sophia.

“You keep him on a leash,” one of the bouncers says, releasing Tomas from his grasp. “Next time we’re calling the police.”

“Oh, fuck you, call them now. I demand that you call the police so they know how you manhandle paying customers.”

Is he out of his mind? I throw a pleading look at Adrian who finally decides to help out. He starts talking to the bouncers in Greek and somehow convinces them to let things be.

“What were you doing telling them to call the police?” I tell Tomas as soon as the bouncers are gone. “And what happened to your eye candy, Jeanine? Where has she gone? Back to the genius factory?”

“So you were listening in,” Tomas says with his usual grin, sounding one hundred percent sober all of a sudden.

“Yeah, what was that?” Adrian says.

Tomas keeps his eyes on mine, paying no attention to Adrian or Sophia or the entire club for that matter. His gaze is so intense, it makes me quite uncomfortable. “Excuse us,” he says, taking me by the hand and leading me to the dance floor.

“What’s going on?” I say, totally mystified.

His face goes dark and his grip on my hand gets tighter. “He’s here,” he says. “I was right.”

“Who’s here?”

Tomas drops my hand and folds his arm around mine. “Act casual. We’re being shadowed,” he says.

“We what?”

“It’s me they’re after, not you.”

“Oh, okay. That makes it all right then.”

I try not to take him seriously but his face is dead serious and taut with tension. He draws me closer to him to whisper, “If I’m right and they have sent someone after me, you have to run if he corners us. Run and don’t look back.”

An icy chill cuts through me. Questions just start flying out of my mouth in rapid succession. “What game is this, Tomas? Where am I supposed to run to? How is that person going to corner us? And, most importantly, what have you done?”

“Just promise,” he says. “Don’t try to help me. Just run.”

“What have you done?”

“We can’t get to the car,” Tomas says. “They’ll expect that. But we have to get out of here, quickly.”

Fear and fury mix inside me. Whether he’s sincere or making this whole thing up to mess with my head, he’s completely ruined my trust in him. One thing’s for sure, he’s not drunk. All his previous heinous behavior was nothing but a show.

“Where could we even go? Won’t they come to the house?” I say, hardly able to believe my own words.

“No,” he says. “I gave them a false address, one I used to have before. It’s a long story and the less you know the better. Now come with me.”

“Why do I have to run? They’re not after me.”

“I can’t risk leaving you behind. They probably saw us come in together. If I go, they might take you to extract information. It’s better that we both disappear.”

He wraps an arm around my waist and we make for the restrooms. The whole time we’re acting like we’re enjoying each other’s company, laughing and whispering things in our ears, with my words sounding like *&%$# and &^$#*&@.

When we get to the restrooms, Tomas turns to the left and we end up in a small hallway and a locked door which he opens with a key he produces. Surprises never stop coming with this man. My mind’s on overload but I decide not to say anything until we’re safe.

We walk out the back door, past a symphony of wind chimes echoing the night ocean breeze.

“Shouldn’t we run?” I ask.

“No, act normal,” he says, putting his right arm around my shoulders and squeezing me. “We don’t want to alarm anyone.”

We walk through narrow cobblestone streets with small yards and balconies hanging above, Bougainvillea bushes with red and purple flowers decorating gates and entrances.

A few ancient ladies sit on chairs outside their homes talking the night and all its terrors away. Their gaze keeps following us as we go past them, waving, until we turn a corner and disappear from their sight.

“They’re mighty interested in us,” I say. “Almost as if they know we’re being pursued like petty criminals.”

“They’re interested in anything that breathes. Old people are not choosy. They glimpse into lives like vampires. Strangers keep their spirit alive.”

I look at him with a broad smile. “I didn’t think you a philosopher.”

“That’s because I’m not. And thanks for not being mad.”

“Are you fucking crazy? I’m furious.”

He nods, an amused expression bleeds onto his face. “C’mon, Taylor, admit it. You like the adrenaline rush.”

“Adrenaline rush? What are we, ten? All we’ve done so far is disturb a peaceful night for a few old ladies in flower dresses.”

We come upon an empty square with two
kafeneia
, the traditional Greek coffeehouses where men gather to play backgammon, discuss politics and drink their boiled coffee.

Tomas and I sit at an empty metallic table painted blue. We sit silent for a while, appreciating the quiet night.

“It seems I was wrong,” Tomas says finally. “If they wanted to find us, they’d have found us by now. Wrong alarm. The goon wasn’t there for me.”

“What was the point of running then?”

“Off the top of my head? It feels good to live in danger.”

I roll my eyes, fully aware that the best thing I can do is not feed his ego. “Don’t you think you owe me an explanation?” I say, not really expecting one.

“One of my classic moves. I got on someone’s nerves. The wrong person, a person powerful enough to send me a rough message. Luckily, he’s leaving the island tomorrow so we won’t have to worry about him anymore. We’ll go to a hotel tonight, just in case.”

“You keep saying
we
. I want out of this whole
we
thing. From now on there’s
you
and then there’s
me
. Your dirty business is your own.”

“As you wish,” he says quietly. “Maybe
we
should go.”

“You’re so daft,” I say, but as we get up, he puts an arm around my waist and pulls me close to him, so close I can count all the sculpted, powerful muscles under his shirt one by one.

Real adrenaline rushes though my veins now, making my heart pump faster and harder. If he kissed me, I’d kiss him back without a second thought.

“I say
we
because I feel close to you, Taylor,” he says. “I haven’t felt that close to anyone in a really long time. Don’t mistake my callousness for indifference. I care about you more than I can tell you. It scares me.”

“Um,” I say before I lose the ability to speak. I fight not to read into his confession. He must mean he cares about me as a friend.
Right?

“Let’s go,” he says, letting go of me.

As we enter the hotel lobby and Tomas gives fake names to the receptionist along with a fat tip, I can’t deny the fact that I do get excited by the danger he brings into my life. Bad boys forever haunt me.

Chapter 6

F
or all the state of the art amenities in the house, there’s not a decent, simple bathtub. I don’t mind it usually as I’ve gotten used to taking lukewarm showers and letting the water run cold for the last twenty seconds or so to revive my dormant skin, but the aromatherapy junkie in me requires a bubble bath today.

I take a curious look at the half-sized bathtub next to the shower. Someone tried to save space by installing this weird looking baby bathtub, half of which is elevated to create a sort of a seat. If you take the sitting position that is proposed, you can actually fit in just fine, but how can a bubble bath be relaxing if you cannot stretch your legs?

I decide to give it a shot anyway. It’s been a long time since I enjoyed my essential oils and salts in a lengthy, revitalizing bath. I let the hot water run as I throw my favorite rose oil and magnesium salts in the weird chair-tub to create a fragrant steam.

I don’t even wait for the water to fill the tub before I step in. I close my eyes as I soak myself in the frothy water, trying to reconcile myself with the idea that I miss Tomas like hell. The bastard left the day after our unpredicted adventure when we had to run away from the Rumba night club and ended up in a hotel room, in different beds and fully clothed. I spent the whole night counting sheep, worried I might have one of those dreams again where he climbs on my bed and makes love to me despite my anemic protests.

The following morning he gave me the lame excuse of needing to do some research and work on his screenplay right before he told me he’d be gone for a few days. I could have drilled him a little bit to get some real answers but decided against it. Tomas would never tell me what he doesn’t want me to know, plus, what would I do if it turned out that what he needed was time away from me? I’ve been terribly whiny, annoying and moody lately and I’m fully aware of that fact.

The hot water is up to my neck now, so I turn the tap off. There’s a moment of total silence in my soul, a feeling of melancholy that stems from places I’d rather not explore. I taught myself long ago not to visit those forbidden places in my mind where all thoughts lead to self-pity about all that got broken in me when I was still a child. As crazy as it sounds, Tomas has been able to fill a void simply by being here, not judging and not expecting anything, and now that he’s gone, the void is ready to reclaim its place.

The fact that today happens to be his birthday doesn’t escape me. Nor does the fact he promised he’d take me to some mysterious place which he probably has forgotten all about.

A soft sigh escapes my lips as my fingers start playing with my nipples mindlessly. “No, Taylor,” I tell myself out loud, startled by my own instincts. “Don’t go there.”

I hear the words but my body has a mind of its own. Where’s the harm anyway? It’s not like I haven’t touched myself before.

The moment I give my fingers permission to travel south, images begin to form behind my closed eyelids. I won’t fight them. I can’t. I don’t want to. I picture Tomas’s firm pecs and his perfectly defined six-pack, feeling his strong arms around me. I have a glimpse of his dirty blond hair, wet with saltwater and sweat. I savor the delicious way the right corner of his mouth goes downward when he grins at me.

Now it’s his tongue pressing my hot button instead of my fingers, teasing it, biting it, sucking on it. My arousal is almost frightening. I can barely remember having experienced anything so brutal, so complete and so intense, just using my imagination. I fucking want him and I might as well admit it once and for all. I’m dangerously close to a ferocious release when someone knocks on the bathroom door. My mind freezes and I just about choke on the bubbles that enter my open mouth as I am forced to come back down to planet Earth.

“Who the hell?” I mumble, frustrated, when there’s a second knock.

Then comes the voice. “Taylor, are you in there?”

It’s him! It’s fucking him. Knocking on the door and calling my name right as I was about to come for him. A moment later and he would have heard me calling out
his
name. What the hell do I do now?

I feel my cheeks fluster as I respond with a weak, “Yes”.

“Hurry up,” he says. “We can’t be late.”

We can’t be late? I hate to break it to you, Mr. Heavenly Body, but you’re already late for the party.

I grumble and swear under my breath as I get out of the tub and under the shower to rinse the salts and oils off my skin. This whole situation I have going is so messed up I don’t even want to pretend to understand it.

Tomas is waiting for me all fresh and shiny on the porch with a glass of green juice in his hand.

“You look surprisingly healthy,” I say, brushing back my wet hair.

“My apologies for not being more sickly,” he says, languidly.

“I’ve always had this idea of writers being consumed by their own genius in combination with liberal amounts of alcohol.”

“This isn’t the fifties, sweetheart. And I’m not a real writer.”

“What are you exactly, Tomas?”

He takes his time before answering, checking his watch and gulping down the rest of his green drink. “I’ll tell you tonight,” he says. “Now go get ready for the evening. We have an hour’s drive ahead of us and it’s seven already.”

“Where are we going?” I say, having decided to act as if I’ve forgotten all about his invitation for the evening.

“It’s a surprise, remember?” he says, turning around to face me.

“What kind of a surprise?”

“All I can say is that you’ll love it. That and also wear a bikini underneath your clothes.”

Against my better judgment, I do as he says. Grace would have a good laugh if she knew how easy it is for Tomas to order me around.

When I walk into the living room half an hour later, all dressed up in white skinny jeans and a sleeveless silk floral blouse that falls gently around my hips, what I see on his face is pure astonishment.

“Sometimes I forget how good you look,” he says. “And it’s so effortless. There’s barely any makeup on you.”

He studies my face curiously, almost as if I were an animal at the zoo. The intensity of his gaze is so penetrating I begin to feel uncomfortable under his scrutiny.

“You’ve seen me before,” I say, walking past him. It’s hard to keep my composure when he’s staring at me like that.

“I swear every day you get more beautiful,” he says.

I look for signs of sarcasm in his voice but find none. “It’s your birthday,” I say, changing subjects. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Apparently, you found out anyway.”

I don’t have to look at him to know there’s probably a teasing smirk on his face. “Stop toying with me, Tomas. Why can’t you be straightforward ever?”

“What can I say, I’m not big on celebrations, especially birthdays. I definitely don’t expect any presents.”

“Good, cause you’re not getting any.”

“So now that we got that out of the way, do you think we can go?”

I shrug and let him lead the way to the car. He turns his face back a couple of times to make sure I’m following, almost as if he’s convinced I could run away. A thought enters my mind that we’re both playing a game and I don’t like my chances to win.

Tomas is a snake charmer, only he actually charms people. If I allowed him, he’d convince me of just about everything and I can’t forget that. My whole future might depend upon it.

“Are you at least going to tell me what area of the island we’re going to?” I say as soon as I’m seated next to him in the car.

“Nope,” he says, as the wheels screech on the paved street beneath us.

Typical.