To The Lions - 02 (10 page)

He
turned and walked to the southwest.
 
Lloret’s castle, flaming tangerine in the morning sunrise, loomed before
him, guarding the crescent beach just like Tossa’s, both built on the elevated
stone headland.
 
The sun was battling the
cottony gray clouds for air superiority, enjoying an eastern breakthrough as rich
morning light filtered from the castle to where Gage walked.
 
Being here, back in Europe, with thousands of
dollars to his name and an attractive, mysterious girl in his bed assaulted
Gage with a sudden balminess of tranquility.
 

Water
surrounded Gage’s ankles as he walked, continuing to categorize his questions
but doing so without much fervor.
 
Because, despite the feelings of goodwill, he knew there was no way in
cold hell he was accepting the inane proposition from Navarro.
 
Perhaps he could help in some other way,
something he would be pleased to provide.
 
And hopefully Navarro would compensate him handsomely for it.

But
Gage Hartline was not voluntarily sending himself to prison.
 

Chapter Six

The
hotel room was empty.
 
Gage stood in the
doorway, eyeing the unmade bed.
 
Down the
hallway, the maid’s cart could be heard creaking along.
 
In the other direction, a door opened and
shut, followed by the sounds of a man and a woman.
 
They passed by, a young tourist couple,
laughing as they spoke Dutch about their beach day and all it would hold.

But
Justina, Gage’s Polish fancy, was gone.

Damn
.

He
stepped into the unlocked room, pushing the door shut behind him.
 
She had slid the balcony door closed, the
still of the room trapping her sweet scent.
 
Gage breathed it in deeply, laying back on the bed and resting his hands
behind his head as he stared at the dingy ceiling that had once been white.
 
Whatever thought process he’d had going was shattered
now, his mind awash in the memory of the Polish woman he had shared his sleep
with.
 
Like so many who’ve lived under
loose captivity, probably knowing nothing else, institutionalized in essence,
she’d almost certainly fled back to her captors.
 
Gage could only imagine the retribution she
would receive—or maybe was receiving at this very moment—for the humiliation he
had caused the night before.

Closing
his eyes, he shook his head back and forth—he would not go back to the Eastern
Bloc again.
 
She’d made her decision and
his going back would invite real trouble for all involved.

Damn.
 
Damn.
 
Damn.

As
he was biting his inner cheek to the point of drawing blood, he heard a
metallic click.
 
The door opened.

Justina
.

“Going
back to sleep?” she asked, crossing her arms and giving him an impish smile.

“Where
were you?”

“Breakfast.
 
I was hungry and they were getting ready to stop
serving.”
 
She tapped the sign on the
back of the door, smiling as she said, “See…it says right here in Spanish and
English, breakfast is served from…”

Gage
propped up on his elbows, captivated by her vision.
 
He’d only seen her at night and in the dark
of the Eastern Bloc.
 
There was something
about her, an imperfection that set her apart from the porcelain doll women who
made millions by modeling.
 
And whatever
that imperfection was, though he couldn’t put a finger on it, made her more
beautiful, more real in his eyes.
 
He was
completely taken with her and he sounded like a schoolboy as he stammered, “I
th-th-thought you had to show a key to be allowed entry to breakfast.”

“I
told the man I was with you in this room,” she replied, sitting next to Gage on
the bed.
 
“He let me eat and it was
probably the best meal I’ve had since I’ve been in Lloret.”
 
Justina lowered herself beside him and, like
the night before, she and Gage lay very close.
 
After a fifteen minute stretch of quiet, Gage spoke.

“I’ve
got something very important to do today, and a big decision to make.”

“What
is it?”

“I
can’t really say.”

“In
Lloret?”

“No.”

“Can
I come with you?”

He
shook his head.
 
“I have to go alone.”

He
felt her tense.
 
“Where will you go?”

“I’m
not sure yet.”

“When?”

“Later
this afternoon.”

“Leave
for good?”

“No,”
he answered, patting her hand.
 
“Just for
a while—probably just a few hours.”

“After
that?”

Gage
glanced at her.
 
“I’ll come back to
you.
 
Maybe we can have dinner, tonight.”

She
ran her hand through his hair, in the same way she’d done the day before, when
instructed by her Russian “boss”.
 
But
this time she looked upon Gage with warmth, the way a man enjoys being viewed,
making his chest swell to the point of separating cartilage.
 

After
another gulf in the conversation, Justina said, “I cannot thank you
enough.
 
Yes, I’m still scared about what
I will do, and how I will get home, but I am like a bird freed from a
cage.
 
It feels good, despite all the
questions I have inside.”

“Well,
relax,” Gage said in a reassuring tone.
 
“I’ve got a little money to get by for a while.
 
Let’s just enjoy our day.”

“I
don’t want your money.
 
That’s not why I
asked you to help me.”

“I
know that,” Gage replied.
 
“Again, just
for today, let’s not think about things.”

“But
you said you have a big decision to make today.”

“I
can set it aside until I have to leave.
 
There are things about the decision that I don’t know yet.”
 
He rolled over to face her.
 
“A fun day.
 
Deal?”

She
smiled at him.
 
“Let’s go to the beach.”

“The
beach?”

“Yes.”
 
Her face ignited with whimsy as she bounced
from the bed, clasping her hands in front of her.
 
“Let’s do like all these rich people do and
go to the beach and eat lunch at a seaside café and sun ourselves and play in the
water and look at other people and admire the pretty ones and make faces at the
ones that should be wearing more clothes.
 
I’ve come here for four years and have never
had a single day at the beach.”
 
She
leaned forward, grasping him and shaking him as she sang, “Please!
 
Please!
 
Please! A day at the beach!
 
A day
at the beach!”

Gage
couldn’t help but laugh.

“It’s
a date, yes?” she asked.

Who
could say no?

They
went downstairs together.
 
Gage gave
Justina money to find swimsuits and towels.
 
After paying for an extra night, just to have the benefit of the room
for the afternoon, he used the phone in an adjacent hotel to call Valentin on
the number Navarro had provided.

His
meeting at Navarro’s casita was set for six-thirty in the evening.
 
Gage would meet Valentin at six.

And,
as it now seemed, he would arrive with a fresh suntan.

* * *

For
three hours on the sun-drenched beach, Gage Hartline was twenty years old
again.
 
Crossing his mind, however, were
Justina’s former employers.
 
He had no
appetite to run across a group of pissed-off, armed Russians, especially when
he was only equipped with swim trunks and sunblock.
 
When he asked her if they would look for her,
Justina told him that the crowded beach was the best place for them to be.
 
She was adamant that, despite her absence, everyone
involved with Eastern Bloc was either sleeping or preparing for their day.
 
And the last place they would ever look for
their runaway Pole would be the main stretch of Lloret de Mar beach—if they even
looked at all.

Gage
and Justina chose a spot in the center of the action.
 
The temperatures in late May were typically
mild and sometimes cool.
 
But on this
day, like an unexpected gift, the temperature had soared to nearly 30 degrees
Celsius, mid-80s in Fahrenheit, bringing out oodles of tourists and a great
many locals.
 

The
beach was splashed with color from bathing suits, towels, coolers, toys, beach
balls, and rental equipment.
 
A parasail
carried two shrieking tourists out every fifteen minutes, always drawing oohs
and ahs from the crowd upon launch, and the occasional sharp cries when the
tourists landed a tad hard in the sand.

Summer
had arrived.

Once
they’d had lunch, Justina took Gage by the hand and led him into the chilly water.
 
They splashed and romped in the waves, with
Gage quickly determining his new friend was a competent swimmer.

“How
did you learn to swim so well?” he asked.

“We
grew up near a lake.
 
The water was cold
but since we grew up poor, the lake was free entertainment.”
 
Justina winced as she touched the gash on his
elbow.

“What
happened here?”

“I
cut myself at a gas station in Texas.”

“Does
it hurt?”

“Not
as much as what I cut it on.”

Shrugging,
she moved in front of him.
 
“Throw me.”

“Throw
you?”

“Can
you do it?”

Gage
took a great breath, squatting under the water after a wave passed.
 
Digging his feet into the sand, he motioned
her over.
 
Justina backed her rear end
into his hands and, with a hydraulic burst, Gage launched from the
Mediterranean floor, sending her into a three-quarter forward somersault.
 
She came up coughing and laughing and, after many
more tries, they perfected the technique, managing to give her a full flip out
of the water time and time again.
 
With
Gage eventually exhausted they moved beyond the waves, finding a sandbar that
allowed them to stand shoulder-deep in the water, well out beyond most of the
swimmers.

“I’m
beat,” Gage said, taking a great breath.

“Are
you saying I’m fat?”

“No,
I’m just getting old.”

“You’re
far from old,” she said, rubbing his shoulder as the water lapped against
it.
 
“What’s the meaning of your tattoo?”
she asked.
  
It was his sole tattoo, the
image of Themis, Greek goddess of justice, depicted with an arming sword in one
hand and scales in another.

“Just
something my friends and I decorated ourselves with back when I was in the
military.”

“Scales
and a sword?” she asked, continuing to trace her finger on his skin.

“Justice
can occur in many forms,” Gage answered, trying to sound mild about it.
 
“What about you?”

“What
about me?” she asked.

“Any
tattoos?”

“Not
yet,” she laughed.
 
Then she asked, “Why
did you change the subject?”

“That
tattoo represents a part of me that I would never change, but the memories are
not all good.
 
Make sense?”

“More
than you know.”
 

Suddenly,
she playfully clawed at his torso, lowering her head partially into the sea,
viewing him through slit eyes.
 
She prowled
side to side like a crocodile and he could tell by the lines of her face that
she was smiling below the turquoise seawater.
 
Suddenly she lurched forward, grasping his shoulders and locking her
legs around him.

Their
kiss was instinctual.

Gage
placed his arms around her back, holding her tightly, opening his mouth and
enjoying the moment for what it was.
 
As
they kissed, moving their heads side to side, he parried a sharp attack of Monika-related
sadness by reminding himself that he was completely justified in an innocent
kiss.
 

When
their coupling resolved itself he continued to hold her close and asked her a
question that had been bugging him since he’d first met her:

“Do
they abuse you?”

“
Przepraszam?
” she asked, cocking her
head in a manner that told him that “przepraszam” meant “excuse me?”

“The
Russians…do they abuse you?”

“No,”
she replied.
 
“We come here voluntarily.”

“Not
just physically…”
 
He chewed on his lower
lip.
 
“Do they require that you…”

“Have
sex with them?” she asked eyes wide.

“Yes,
that.”

She
shook her head emphatically.
 
“I wouldn’t
come here if they did.
 
Thankfully, they
think we are trash.
 
The Russians have so
much money that they only date the tourist girls and never,
ever
a Pole.”

“I
don’t mean ‘date’.
 
I mean, do they ever
just use you to, you know…complete their temporary urges?”

“No.
 
I tell you the truth.
 
I have to take off my top at Eastern Bloc and
let fat ugly men grab me and rub me, but that is the worst.”
 
She unlocked her legs and stood on her
own.
 
“It’s bad, but not
so
bad, and I did come here
voluntarily.
 
I didn’t have to come back.”