Gabby cleared her throat and jumped to her feet. She turned as though looking behind her and discreetly swiped her tears away, and then reached down a hand for Olivia. “No, stupid. I was crying because you’re wearing my favorite bikini. It’s ruined now. Forget it. Let’s go.”
Olivia looked down at the black and white suit, now black and white with red splatters of her own blood dotting it. Emma shook her head at Gabby, seeing right past her charade. Gabby was trying to save face.
Olivia accepted the hands of her sisters, wobbling a bit when she was on her feet, and offered Gabby a short apology. “Sorry. I’ll replace it,” she mumbled.
“Damn right you will. Come on. We need to take care of that cut on your head.”
The girls hurried off the beach toward their room.
The man who’d been in the room next to them passed by in the hall. He was dragging a rolling suitcase and had a carry-on case slung over his shoulder. This guy had an old classic car, and they’d passed him several times on the way to the beach, arriving within minutes of each other. He obviously was coming from the same area that they had. She couldn’t remember where they’d started seeing him on the road, but they’d definitely passed each other several times in the last few hours of travel. Gabby and the girls had been surprised when they saw his car parked next to them in the parking deck. It was an even bigger coincidence when he was assigned a room on the same hallway as theirs. But they hadn’t spoken to him at all before now, not wanting to get his hopes up—they were all married after all—and he didn’t look like the type of guy to just have a friendly conversation with.
Later, the girls had seen lots of classic cars cruising the main strip, and heard that there was a show going on. Probably a hundred or more were at the beach right now.
The man’s hands were full and he had his keys in his mouth as he rolled past them. He looked fifty—trying to be forty—exhausted, sweaty, red-faced and breathing hard. He gave them a brisk nod and kept walking.
“Wait!” yelled Gabby.
The man turned around.
“Where are you going? Do you have gas?”
“Shhh!” The man looked around to see who had heard her and then dropped his suitcase to give the ladies his full attention. After looking them over from head to toe, he smiled, patting his thinning-hair in place and tugging the wrinkles out of his Tommy Bahama tropical orange with green palm trees shirt. A tacky gold chain lay nestled on a bed of too-much-too-gray-chest-hair. He gave them a million-dollar smile—or at least a few grand, seeing as how his fake teeth looked like a pack of perfect bleached-chiclets against his leathery-dark tan. “Yeah, I do now. I’m not leaving my girl here. I’m driving her home. She’s a classic 1970 Plymouth Roadrunner. Top of the line. She won some awards at the show here. Want to walk out and look at her before I take off?” He beamed, waiting for their oohs and awws.
Gabby rolled her eyes. Looks like they had a real ladies man on their hands. “I don’t really care what kind of car it is. We need a ride home. Where you headed?”
Ladies-Man grabbed his things and started walking backward. “Nope. I can’t be giving everyone a ride. I’ve spent the last eight hours buying gas one can at a time. Didn’t find enough so I had to crawl under a few cars and siphon it out with a screwdriver and an oil pan. Had to funnel it into cans, and had to walk and carry it back myself. Spent the last of my cash and nearly broke my back, too. But I’ve got plenty now to get me home and I’m not making any detours. I’m outta here.”
“Wait!” Olivia said. She hurried to him, throwing a mean look at Gabby from over her shoulder. “I’m sorry, my sister is snappy. She’s dehydrated and hungry. The thing is, I’ve been hurt.” She rubbed her head to show him, not aware that her injury was painfully obvious already. “We really need to get home. You said you used the last of your cash? We’ve got cash. We can pay.”
“I don’t want cash. I was glad to get rid of most of my own.” He laughed. “Those suckers don’t know in a few days, cash will be worthless. That gas was worth a hundred times what I paid for it, and I paid out the ass.”
“What will you take in exchange for a ride then? How can we pay?”
Ladies-Man gave her another reptilian smile, his eyes wandering down. “Well, if you need a ride that bad—”
“—we don’t. Forget it!” Gabby snapped and pushed her way in front of Olivia.
He shrugged and turned to walk away again, the leer sliding from his face.
“No, wait,” Olivia said. “My watch. It’s a Rolex. It’s got to be worth a fortune in gold and silver alone. And it has diamonds on the face. You can use it to trade.”
Ladies-Man held out his hand. Olivia hurried to take it off. She held it up to him. He reached for it but Gabby reached in and snatched it away. “You can have it when you get us home.”
Ladies-Man thought a moment while he looked over the girls one by one, moving his eyes quickly away from Gabby’s venomous stare and back to Olivia and Emma, who were both staring at him in desperate hope. “Alright. I’m going as far as McBee, South Carolina. Don’t know where you’re going, but I’ll drop you off there. That’s about a hundred miles. That’s the only deal I’m making—and it’s in exchange for the watch.”
Gabby walked the other way. “No, thanks. That’s only halfway home. Not worth it. We’ll find someone else who’ll give us a ride, and won’t make us pay for it with a fifteen-thousand-dollar watch—or anything else,” she snapped.
“Fifteen-thousand-dollar watch?” Ladies-Man asked. “Look, we got off on the wrong foot. I’m Larry.” He gestured stupidly to himself. Like who the hell else would be Larry? “I’ll take you ladies all the way home in exchange for the watch but I’ll need enough gas to get back home myself. Do you think you can do that? It might mean siphoning any gas you have in any of your husbands or family or friends’ cars, deal?” he asked as he looked at their ring fingers, all which were adorned with wedding rings.
“Yes,” Emma and Olivia both happily said in unison.
Gabby rolled her eyes.
Olivia was overjoyed. “Of course! My husband keeps a lot of gas stored. He’s a prep—”
“—a puppy groomer, she meant to say. She fumbles her words sometimes,” Gabby interrupted. “Olivia’s husband does mobile dog grooming so he probably has a tank full of gas and I doubt he’s working. He’s probably too worried about us.”
Olivia gave Gabby a what-the-tarnation-are-you-talking-about-look, until suddenly her eyebrows raised and her eyes widened. “Yes, puppy groomer is what I meant to say. I’m sure the van is topped off. My husband always fills it up before coming home. When are we leaving?”
“Twenty minutes. And no suitcases. My trunk is full of gas. You can hold a bag in your lap. I’ll meet you in the parking deck. Look for a—”
“—we know what your car looks like. We passed you on the way here,” Gabby interrupted.
“Oh. Well then. Twenty minutes.” He hurried away.
“We’ve got to take our suitcases. Gabby, you think you can make him change his mind?” Olivia asked.
“No. And we don’t want to be stuck out on the road with no gas. We’ll just grab your bug-out bags from your car after we grab a few things from the room.” She pushed the door open to their room. “Anyone got some sort of bag we can put some things in here?”
Olivia groaned. “My beach bag! I left it out on the beach. And it’s got my phone in it.”
Gabby shook her head. “Too late. No time.”