She moves back into her seat. Thinks for a minute.
“I'm hungry,” she says. “I forgot to eat lunch.”
I see my out.
“Well, if you're planning on hitting the beach, you really need to wait until after you go swimming to eat.”
Yes! This is what Saint Ceepak would do: he'd lecture this Nympho of the Highways about stomach cramps. He'd do his duty and obey the Scout Law: to help other people at all times; to keep himself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.
Morally straight.
That's the part I need to concentrate on right now.
“What's your name, anyway?” she asks.
“Danny. Danny Boyle. How about you?”
“Stacey.”
“Stacey what?”
“Just Stacey for now, okay?”
“Sure. Stacey.”
“A nice, cold brew would be totally awesome.”
“Yes, it would. But are you anywhere even close to twenty-one?”
She leans forward in her seat. I glance over just to make sure there's no tongue aiming at my ear.
“Do I look twenty-one?”
She looks like trouble, is what she looks like. I'm starting to wonder if I should take this girl back to the mainland. Maybe Avondale. Trenton. Edison. Sea Haven, after all, is the only Jersey township I'm sworn to protect.
Instead, I make a right turn and we head to The Sand Bar.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The Sand Bar is a vinyl-sided three-story building on the bay side of the island, with three levels of party decks under blue canopies out back.
I figure I'll take Stacey inside and feed her-buy her a burger, maybe some curly fries-but no beer. Then I'll call Ceepak. Ask him what to do.
After we're parked, Stacey reaches into the back to unzip her backpack and pull out “something a little nicer” to wear for dinner. Good thing, since she's dangerously close to violating the eatery's longstanding “NO SHIRT, NO SHOES, NO SERVICE” edict in her bra-and-combat-shorts ensemble.
“Where's my top?”
Finding it seems to require wiggling her bottom a lot. I decide it's time for me to step away from the vehicle, as we say on the job.
I check out the restaurant's upper deck, where my buds usually hang.
Jess sees me, waves down.
“Hey!” he hollers. “Where you been?”
“Traffic.”
“Too bad. Aubrey had to split. What took you so long?”
As if on cue, Stacey climbs out of the car. She's wrapping on this prairie skirt and adjusting a turquoise tube top. It fits her like a sausage skin.
Jess leans back and shoots me a double thumbs up.
He gives me a
As Stacey walks toward me, the tube top is straining to keep everything in place. I try not to pay attention to the struggle.
“Where's the little girls’ room?” she asks, giving me a bored look. Now that we're here maybe she's thinking it's not her kind of scene.
“Go to the bar and make a left.”
She puts her hands on her hips, leans back, checks out the upper deck. “Those your friends?”
I see that Olivia has joined Jess at the railing. They're both cradling longneck Buds. Watching us.
“Yeah.”
“Cool. I'll meet you guys upstairs.”
“Where'd you find her?” Olivia asks.
There's no bullshitting Olivia. She's way too smart. She's goes to med school up in New Brunswick and comes home in the summer to earn money for the stuff all her scholarships don't cover. And Olivia's pretty intense. I guess that's why she and Jess are such a good combo. He's totally mellow-works as a house painter when he's not too busy goofing off or surfing.
“She was hitchhiking,” I say. “Causing a traffic jam near the causeway.”
Jess nods. “So you took prudent police action, right?”
“I figured I needed to take her someplace safe. Yes.”
“Sure,” says Jess. “Someplace safe. Like a seaside bar. Good call. It's like a convent in here.”
“This is only temporary,” I say. “I'm calling Ceepak. We'll try and find her a bed….”
Jess raises an eyebrow.
I fling an onion ring, nail him on the nose.
Olivia shakes her head, takes a pull on her beer. Jess and I reach for the onion rings. We're all sharing a basket before we decide what we actually want to eat.
“So,” she asks, “you think your friend got lost trying to find the bathroom?”
I check my watch. She's right. Stacey should have joined us half a bottle ago.
“I'll be back.” I head downstairs.
The place is packed. Lots of guys and girls making a mosh pit around the bar. Lots of noise. Music. The bleeps and bloops of electronic pinball machines.
I don't see Stacey.
I check the hallway outside the restrooms.
“Excuse me,” I shout to the girl at the head of the line. There's bass-thumping music blasting out of the concert-sized speakers suspended from the ceiling. “Are you waiting for a redhead to come out?”
She looks puzzled.
“What?”
“The girl who's in there-is she a redhead?”
“No. Blonde.” Now she grins. “You like redheads?” She steps into a dusty beam of light.
She's a redhead. She's also extremely drunk.
“I'm looking for my sister,” I lie.
“Too bad.”
The music breaks into a fuzz-box guitar solo that growls enough to cover my exit. I head back into the bar. No Stacey. Frustrated, I decide to head through the crowd and make my way outside.
I see more people clustered just beyond the door, smoking cigarettes and laughing.
Then I see my Jeep.
Both doors are wide open.
I hustle over. The Hello Kitty backpack is gone. The papers and crap I stow up under my sun visor are scattered all over the driver's seat. Looks like everything is still there except, of course, the twenty-dollar bill I keep hidden for emergencies.
Next, I check the cup holder. My coins have been cleaned out, too. At least she left me my Dunkin’ Donuts coffee mug. At least I no longer have to search the yellow pages for the local Runaway Teen Shelter.
My cell phone-which, thank God, I had tucked into my shorts before heading into The Sand Bar-chirps. I
