Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Phoebe
T he thing about being on holiday is that you never seem to need as much sleep as you do back home.
After making my way to my bed not long after Henry had gone on his oddly timed run, I crashed hard, dreaming of nothing, grateful for the silence of my mind.
I was the first to wake sometime later, the sting of the night before quickly reminding me that I was not, in fact, a big drinker, even though I’d tried like hell to act like one in front of the others.
Eventually, Bailey and Rhea surfaced and dragged me out of our apartment and back around the pool.
Today, we were a lot less enthusiastic than the day before, but it didn’t take long for our talk to turn to the previous night.
I kept my eyes closed, in my usual position on the sun loungers between the girls while they discussed Jace and Andy with each other.
“Just admit that you like him,” Rhea said with a sigh. “You don’t play hard to get, Bailey. You never have.”
“All I’m saying is we’re on day two. I’m not putting all my eggs into one basket just yet,” Bailey responded.
“I don’t think it’s your eggs he’s after,” Rhea said with a chuckle. “Just the thing that leads to them.”
“Ew, Rhea.”
“So gross,” I muttered quietly.
“And what about you, Rhea?” Bailey asked. “Jace would have held your hand and pissed circles around you all night if you’d let him.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Jace said from somewhere above me, and when I slowly peeled my eyes open behind my sunglasses, I saw him standing over Bailey’s bed. “Pissing in public isn’t really my go to move when I’m trying to seduce a woman.”
Rhea groaned and pressed her palm to her forehead.
“Sorry, Jace,” Bailey said in a very un-Bailey-like manner. “Just trying to wind Rhea up. Nothing personal.”
“Give me some credit. I’m not that sensitive.” He perched down on the flat end of Rhea’s bed before offering her a subtle wink put out there to deliver a million different messages. From the way she tried to hold back her smile, I’d say a few of them hit their mark.
“See, Bails,” Rhea said, clearing her throat. “Not everyone is sensitive like you.”
“That’s my cue,” I said, pushing up from my lounger and feeling a wave of dizziness taking over when the head rush hit, but I managed to stand firm. “Before you two can start arguing, I’m going to find a bottle of water for this pounding head of mine.”
“Just head to the pool bar,” Rhea said, scowling at me in confusion.
“When I said I needed water, I meant I needed a walk… away from you two old women.”
“Hey!” they both cried in unison.
“There’s that small mini market just next door,” Jace told me. “We went in there yesterday. It’s pretty good.”
“Thanks, Jace. Anyone want anything while I’m gone?”
Of course, they did. I wasn’t getting out of it that easily, and so I picked up my beach bag, slipped on my favourite pair of cut off shorts, and headed to the mini market with their orders, keeping my sunglasses firmly in place over my hungover eyes.
I’d never been a good hungover person. I rarely drank as heavily back home.
But we weren’t home now, and I’d sworn to myself to live a lot more and worry a lot less while here, so if I woke up with a hangover every morning for the next two weeks, so be it.
I’d just have to find a way to make them less painful along the way.
It was nothing an ice-cold bottle of Fanta couldn’t fix.
A few minutes later, I found the mini market Jace mentioned and stepped inside, looking around like I’d never seen food on shelves or bottled water before.
I wandered down the aisles, collecting the Lays crisps and European chocolate snacks the girls had asked for, placing them in my basket.
I made my way to the fridge to stare at all the cold bottles of lemon Fanta that looked like actual heaven dripping with condensation.
Lemon Fanta on holiday had always been my weakness, so I reached in to grab two bottles…
when I felt something tugging manically at the beach bag on my shoulder.
Confused, I turned to see a teenage boy of no more than thirteen looking at me with bright, wide eyes, his fingers wrapped around my purse, now in his hands rather than inside my bag where I’d left it.
Both of us stood frozen in shock, when suddenly, he turned and ran as though the Devil himself was hot on his heels.
It took a moment for it to dawn on me…
Was I being… mugged?
On holiday…
While wearing flip flops !
“Hey, woah! Stop!” I yelled, dropping my basket with an almighty clang before chasing after him in my ridiculous choice of footwear that offered me no traction whatsoever. “Get back here, you little shit. That’s my money!”
I ran as fast as I possibly could, my beach bag bashing against my side as I held onto it for dear life, knowing the odds weren’t in my favour at catching up to this bastard rug rat.
Before long, the boy flew out of the store, really taking off, his speed ridiculous compared to mine, probably thanks to his long, gangly legs and well-worn trainers.
I had no chance of catching him, and my heart sank.
I kept running, but the distance between us grew, and my heart plummeted into the depths of my stomach as all hopes of a good vacation disappeared up that hill in that little thief’s hand.
My strides slowed, and I opened my mouth to give him one last plea to return my belongings, when I heard a deep, agitated, grunted, “Fuck” from somewhere close by that definitely didn’t come from me.
A grunted “Fuck” I instantly recognised belonged to him .
Henry.
It all happened in a flash. I caught sight of him for only a split second before his lithe body charged past me in nothing but his black swim shorts, heading straight for the young kid who had my purse clutched in his hand.
Henry ran like he’d been built for speed, gaining on the thief as though it was of little effort to him.
I came to a slow stop and watched as Henry swung his arm around the kid’s neck, bringing him down into a headlock with an ease that didn’t seem natural.
The kid tried to scuffle out of Henry’s hold, but if anything, he only seemed to trap himself into a tighter embrace every time he twisted or turned in the wrong direction.
Henry looked ready to slaughter a minor, and my heart raced with a fear that didn’t entirely belong to me or my concern for my own wellbeing.
Without thought, I began to jog over to them, struggling to catch my breath as they sawed in and out of me as a reminder that cardio and I had been estranged a few months too many.
Henry had the kid’s sweat-soaked T-shirt fisted in his hand, and he pulled him closer as he glared down at him with a look that spoke of nothing but murder.
“I-I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” the boy stuttered in his local accent.
“You’re about to be even sorrier,” Henry growled, lifting him up until he hovered on his tiptoes, grazing the road beneath him. “Make a hobby of stealing from pretty women, do you, kid?”
“N-no, sir. I… I…”
“Have a death wish?”
“I…”
“Consider me your genie, boy.”
“Henry, stop,” I panted, placing a hand on his tensed arm, only for him to turn his glare on me before he flinched at the contact. His dark eyes stared into mine, and despite the good looks I couldn’t get out of my brain, the danger in his gaze terrified me.
He looked ready to commit murder on me, too. An assassin of the night that shouldn’t have been present in the day.
“Don’t do anything you’ll regret,” I pleaded softly.
The boy continued to ramble as though we weren’t there, but Henry’s attention was locked on my face before his gaze slowly drifted down to my hand on his arm.
That point of contact suddenly burned, as though his acknowledgement of it somehow brought it to life. Clearing my throat, I peeled my hand away and took a step back, creating some distance.
“I-I mean no harm,” the boy said, but Henry ignored him, unable to look away from me.
“Did this little shit hurt you?” he asked, full of intensity.
“I… No. Nothing like that. He just… He stole from me. That’s it.”
“You sure?”
I nodded, swallowing down the desire to ask why he cared.
Henry studied my face a second longer before he gave me a single, curt nod and handed me my purse from the one that wasn’t holding the thief.
“Here,” he grunted. “Yours.”
“Thank you.” I took it from him. “Really. I don’t know what I’d have done if he’d gotten away with it.”
Another nod from Henry, then he turned back to the kid. “I think you owe the lady an apology, don’t you?”
The boy, with his jet-black hair and sad green eyes, looked at me, nodding. “I’m so sorry. I won’t do it again. I promise,” he said in a rush, clearly terrified of the man-giant who looked ready to squash him like a bug.
I’d been about to ask the boy how often he stole from tourists like me, but Henry had already turned him in his grip to march him straight past me back to the mini market, grumbling under his breath as he went, “Damn right, you won’t do it again. The police will make sure of that.”
I turned to follow them, realising we’d drawn quite a crowd outside the store now. A lady, who I assumed to be the owner of the mini market, stood on the pathway with her arms folded, shaking her head as if she wasn’t at all surprised to see the boy in Henry’s grip.
She threw her hands in the air and started shouting at him in Greek. Even though I didn’t understand a word she said, I understood enough to know that the kid probably feared her more than he feared Henry, even though Henry looked ready to chew him up and spit him out without even breaking a sweat.
“Again, Peter? Really?” the woman cried in English. “Your mama will murder you this time.”
“Not if I do first.” Henry practically threw the boy at the woman. “I suggest you call the police if he can’t seem to stop himself from attacking innocent women, otherwise he might find himself all out of luck the next time it happens. Especially if he’s stupid enough to do it in front of me.”
The woman offered more assurances, then sent Peter into her shop with a slap to the back of his head before she ran inside the mini market, coming back out only moments later with the basket of shopping I’d dropped on the floor, holding it out to me.
“Please… take this. My apologies on behalf of Peter. I’ll make sure he’s dealt with.”
“Oh, no, no. Honestly, you don’t have to do that,” I said. “It’s not your fault he?—”
Henry cut me off, taking the basket from the woman as though he’d been put in charge of this entire situation.
He mumbled a small grunt of thanks to her before he peeled one strap of my beach bag off my shoulder and began dropping the items from the basket inside my bag, leaving me to stare up at him with a slack jaw.
His fingertips grazed my skin, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand to attention, and I prayed for the goosebumps to stay away.
He plucked my purse out of my hand and dropped that into the bag, too, before he found the zip and pulled it closed with a sharp jolt, then placed the strap back over my shoulder, like the touch of his fingers against my skin didn’t affect him one bit.
His eyes rose to meet mine. “Your bag has a zip. Use it.”
When he turned away and handed the empty basket back to the woman, I found myself blinking several times to try and understand what the hell had just happened.
How had he managed to turn me speechless with just a few words?
Before I could find the use of my voice, Henry nodded to the woman again to dismiss her, then turned to grab me by the elbow to guide me away from the mini market and back to the hotel like he owned me.
The worst thing about it?
I let him.
I let him hold onto me and take me where he wanted us to go without asking a single question about his intentions.
We were far too close as we stepped back through the gates of the complex and found ourselves alone on a quiet pathway, surrounded by nothing but green trees, white buildings, bright pink flowers, and the sound of my beating heart trying to burst its way through my chest.
Then he stopped and turned to face me.