“You bet your asses it’s me, motherfuckers!”
They set him back on his feet at the bar and then start yelling as they push an enormous glass of beer to him, and they yell at him, with triple cadence as their fists bump the granite, “Re-ming-ton! Re-ming-ton! Re-ming-ton!”
“Cool down, guys,” Pete says as he approaches, trying to calm things down.
“Who the f**k is this nerd?” one bearded guy says, and Remy grabs him and shoves him up against the wall as easily as if he weighed no more than a premature baby.
“He’s my bro, you toad. Show some f**king respect.”
“Calm down, dude, I was only asking!”
Remy drops him to the ground and goes back to fix our tequilas.
I know he’s going to come back to me with more shots, but people keep detaining him, and my stomach is making noises. I can’t feel my tongue, and I’m pretty sure I need to puke.
Covering my mouth, I rush to the bathroom of the smallest but closest bedroom, and ignore the couple making out on the bed as I charge into the bathroom, slam and lock the door, then drop at the side of the toilet, grab my hair and barely manage to lift the lid as I puke my guts out.
Five minutes later I’m still at it, gasping as I begin to have a private pity party with myself. Right here in the bathroom.
God. My stomach. My poor liver. Poor me. I’m so frickin’ glad I did track in my teenage years instead of te-kill-ya! I can’t even believe Melanie likes to do this. I groan in misery as the nausea comes back up my throat again. I hang my head into the toilet once more and convulse as everything rips out of me.
When I think I’m done, everything is a blur and I’m still dizzy. I wash my mouth and search for my vitamins in the stuff I’d left in this room’s bath in case I’d rather not share a bathroom with Remington, which seems like a great plan now that I might be spending all night puking. I grab a red-colored B complex and vitamin C mix and pop one in, and I figure I should start hydrating myself, but I feel lazy to go get some water, so instead I flush the toilet a third time, close the top, and lean my forehead on it in case I get nauseous again. I grab my phone and text Mel;
Fel like [email protected] Drunk as a firkin don%ky! but Im gunna furck Remy if i survve th8 teqila!
Then I think I even doze off.
When I come to, my temples throb, and the noise outside in the presidential suite is deafening. I have the good sense to wash my mouth and calm down the tangles in my hair and wash my hands, then I peer out into the room and the lovers are gone, so I pad out into the living room toward the noise. No. Not noise. The pandemonium.
Blinking, I absorb the scene before me with disbelieving eyes. I don’t know what’s happened, but something. Definitely. Has. Happened. Feathers from torn pillows are littered everywhere. Glass crunches under my feet as I walk. People are shoving against each other, somehow drunk and panicked as they try to save themselves from something. Then I see him.
Remington “Riptide” Tate, the sexiest man alive, is tossing anything in his path and yelling at the top of his lungs, “What the f**k did you tell her about me? Where the f**k is she?” while Pete is jacketless, and tieless, and desperate to calm him down. Remy flings a crystal decanter into the wall with a fantastic crash, and people scream both in fear and laughter, while Riley is busy ushering them out the open suite doors.
My drunkenness instantly fades, or at least it drops down about fifty percent, and I am almost fully sober from the shock. I jump into action and start shoving all the bodies I come into contact with toward the door, “Out, out, out!” I scream like a banshee.
Remy hears my voice, and whips around and sees me. His eyes flash with something feral as he tosses the lamp he has in his hands and sends it crashing with a big explosion of glass behind him, then he starts for me. But Pete grabs him back, pulling desperately at his arm. “See, dude? She signed a contract, remember? You don’t need to destroy the hotel, man.” As Remington stares into my eyes with an expression of pure raw pain, Pete rams something into his neck and his eyelids flutter.
His head slumps forward, and I freeze in complete and total horror. Clouds of confusion impede any rational thought as I try to process the fact that Pete, gentle Pete, just shot something up Remy’s jugular.
Riley continues shoving people out the room as Remy slumps down and Pete struggles to prop him up against the nearest wall. When we manage to get the last person out, Riley drapes one of Remy’s arms around his neck, while the other goes around Pete. His feet are dragging beneath his body as they start hauling him to the master bedroom, and when I hear his beautifully male voice speak, he sounds not only drunk now, but super drugged, his timbre low and barely intelligible.
“Don't let her see.”
“We won’t, Rem.”
His head hangs forward as if he has no strength to support it. “Just don’t let her see.”
“Yeah, man, got it.”
Icy dread spreads along my insides as I move dazedly, like a sleepwalker, and follow them to the door. I stay at the threshold, torn between going after him and my utter confusion of what’s going on and my OCD which just begs me to start cleaning all this damned mess, and also the tequila shots which still make me feel like a donkey. “What’s wrong with him?” I ask Pete as they both come out. Riley heads out to the living room phone.
“He’s fine, just a little low.” Pete grabs the doorknob to close the door.
And suddenly I’m concerned out of my ever-loving mind and hold onto Pete’s arm like a lifeline. “Don’t pull this shit on me. What doesn’t he want me to see?”