Chapter 5: Liquid Truths
The gin was a bitter anchor, but the shot Cora handed her was gasoline. Sammy threw it back, the clear liquor scorching a path down her throat that cleared the phantom taste of the stranger. “VIP,” Lindi announced, hooking her arm through Sammy’s. “My feet are killing me and I need to hear myself think.”
They pushed through a heavy curtain into a different world. The cacophony of the main floor dulled to a deep, felt-through-the-floor thump. The air was cooler, laced with the smell of aged leather and expensive perfume. Low, blood-red lighting pooled around deep booths and low tables, casting long, distorted shadows from the people scattered like dolls in the semi-dark.
They claimed a corner booth shrouded in deeper shadow, sinking into plush velvet that sighed under their weight. The relative quiet was a shock to the system. Shantel sprawled, kicking off a shoe. Cora arranged the empty shot glasses into a neat line on the table, a tiny barricade.
Lindi leaned forward, her smudged makeup making her eyes look huge. “Okay, spill. The intense dude with the sleeves looked like he wanted to eat you alive. Why aren’t you still out there letting him?” She took a slow sip of water, watching Sammy over the rim. “And is Caleb still blowing you up? Dude needs a hobby.”
Sammy pulled her phone out, the screen blazing in the dark booth. She set it face-up on the table. It was a silent, poisonous thing. “I don’t think it is Caleb,” she said, the words feeling too loud in the hushed space.
Shantel snorted. “What? Who else would be psycho enough to stalk-text you all night? It’s classic older brother nonsense.”
“The messages don’t feel like him,” Sammy insisted, a cold certainty settling in her gut. “He’s annoying, not… surgical.”
“So text him and ask,” Shantel said with a shrug, tracing a finger through the condensation on her glass. “Put the poor guy out of his misery. Or better yet, call him. Let him hear how not-scared you are.”
Sammy stared at the phone. The idea of hearing Caleb’s voice, his predictable, grating concern, was suddenly appealing. A tether to normalcy. She tapped his name and put the phone to her ear, ignoring the sudden tightness in her chest.
It rang five times before he picked up. The background noise was a chaotic, beautiful mess—a fuzzy guitar riff, a muffled voice counting in, the click-hiss of a recording booth. “Sammy?” Caleb’s voice was tense, distracted. “What’s up? You okay?”
“I’m at Blood,” she said, trying to sound breezy and failing. The noise from the club seeped through the curtain. “Some… random number is texting me. Weird stuff. You doing that to be an asshole?”
A pause. More studio noise. “What? No. I’m at The Vault, we’re tracking guitars for the new Demolition album. I’ve been in this booth for three hours.” His voice shifted, the distraction sharpening into focus. “What kind of weird stuff?”
“Just… creepy. Knowing things.” She couldn’t bring herself to say He said the guy tasted like cheap beer and regret.
“Sammy.” Caleb’s tone was all business now. The big brother voice. “Why aren’t you home? It’s two in the morning.”
“I’m a big girl, Caleb.”
“Not when some fucker is texting you from a blocked number, you’re not.” She heard him mutter something away from the phone, then his voice came back clearer, harder. “Listen, I’m buried here. We’re on the clock with these musicians. I can’t leave.”
“I didn’t ask you to—”
“You need to call Rebel.”
The name hung in the air of the VIP lounge like a physical object. Sammy’s breath caught. Lindi’s eyes widened across the table.
“What? No,” Sammy said, too quickly.
“Yes,” Caleb insisted, his voice crackling with studio static. “He’s the tech guy. He’s got that creepy military-grade shit on his phone. He can trace a squirrel through concrete. He’ll know what to do.”
“I’m not calling Rebel,” Sammy whispered, her knuckles white on the phone. The thought of his low, calm voice on the line, knowing she was scared, knowing she was in a club having just kissed a stranger to spite him… it was a special kind of hell.
“You don’t have to,” Caleb said, the finality in his voice turning her blood cold. “I’m calling him. Right now. He’ll track the number. And he’ll come get you.”
“Caleb, don’t you dare—”
“Go wait outside, by the main entrance. Somewhere bright. Don’t talk to anyone else.” A sheet of sound, a wailing guitar solo, drowned him out for a second. “Sammy, I’m serious. Let Rebel handle it. He’s better at this than I am.”
The line went dead.
Sammy pulled the phone away from her ear and stared at it. The screen glowed back, inert and accusing. The quiet of the VIP lounge seemed to compress around her, the red light feeling less like ambiance and more like a warning.
“Well?” Lindi asked, her voice barely a breath.
Sammy looked up, meeting the eyes of her friends—Lindi’s eager concern, Shantel’s intrigued curiosity, Cora’s steady, watchful calm. “Caleb’s calling Rebel,” she said, the words tasting like ash. “Rebel’s coming to get me.”
Lindi’s face broke into a radiant, triumphant grin, while Shantel clapped her hands together with a gleeful shush. "Finally," Lindi whispered, her eyes sparkling with vicarious victory, "you get your alone time with your long-time secret love without Caleb being around to cock-block."
The words "cock-block" made her flushed. A hot, creeping wave of humiliation traveled from her neck to her cheeks. She was grateful for the dim, red light.
“It’s not like that,” Sammy hissed, but the protest was weak, swallowed by the velvet booth. Her heart was a frantic bird against her ribs. Rebel was coming. Here. Now.
The reality of it detonated in her nervous system. She was always nervous around him. That low, steady voice of his did something to her equilibrium, made her feel nineteen again and clutching a tattoo machine with trembling hands. She liked him way too much, a stupid, secret, years-deep ache she carried like a stone. She knew he would never like her back. Not in that way.
"He rides that black and green Kawasaki Ninja H2R," Cora said quietly, stating a logistical fact that felt like a death sentence.
Sammy closed her eyes. The room spun slightly from the gin and the shots. She was too drunk for that bike. It was a vicious piece of engineering, a predator he commanded with unsettling ease. And she would need to hold onto him. The thought of touching him, of wrapping her arms around his waist and pressing against his back for stability, was so enticing it felt like a physical pain.
"It's a death trap," Shantel said, but she was grinning. "And you get to cling to him like a scared koala. This is better than my wildest hopes."
"You're not helping," Sammy muttered, digging her fingers into the plush velvet seat.
"My dude's gonna be your knight on a shiny, very fast steed," Lindi sighed, faux-romantic, fluttering her lashes. "Sweep you away from the evil trolls texting you. It's perfect."
A new, sharper fear cut through the haze of her crush. The texts. The feeling of being watched. Rebel wasn't just coming for a personal fantasy; he was coming because Caleb had told him she was in potential danger. The context was all wrong. She felt exposed, stupid.
Her phone lit up on the table. Not a text. An incoming call. The screen simply read: REBEL.
The air left her lungs. The phone buzzed against the glass tabletop, a angry insect. Her friends fell silent, watching.
She picked it up. Her thumb hovered. "Do I answer?"
"Yes, you absolutely answer," Lindi breathed, scooting closer.
Sammy slid her thumb across the screen and brought the phone to her ear. "Hello?" Her voice came out thin, reedy.
"Samantha." His voice was exactly as she remembered, a low, calm baritone that somehow cut through the residual thump of the club's bass through the curtain. It held no trace of sleep. "Caleb called. You're still at Blood?"
"Yeah." She swallowed. "The VIP lounge."
"Are you safe right now? Are you with people?"
"I'm with Lindi, Cora, Shantel."
"Good. Stay with them. I'm ten minutes out." There was a brief pause, the faint sound of a powerful engine turning over in the background. A shiver ran through her. He was already on the bike. "Walk to the main entrance and wait inside, under the lights. Don't go outside alone. Can you do that?"
"Yes." The word was a whisper.
"I'll see you soon." The line went dead. He didn't say goodbye.
Sammy lowered the phone. The calm, tactical authority in his voice had a strange effect. It cut through some of the drunken panic and replaced it with a clean, cold fear. This was real.
"He's coming," she said, stating the obvious.
Lindi whooped softly, squeezing her shoulder. "See? Crisis handled. By your future boyfriend."
"He's not my—" Sammy began, but she was already sliding out of the booth. Her legs felt unsteady. "I have to go wait. He said inside, by the entrance."
"We'll come with you," Cora said, already gathering her things, her watchful eyes scanning the shadowy corners of the lounge as they stood.
The walk back through the club felt like moving through glue. The music was too loud, the lights too harsh. Every unfamiliar male face seemed to look at her a beat too long. She kept her arms crossed tightly over her chest, the clutch with the poisoned phone feeling like it was burning a hole against her side.
They pushed through the heavy front doors, back into the relative quiet of the entrance foyer. The bouncer gave them a nod. They stood under the harsh industrial lights near the doors, a small island of women in a sea of coming and going nightlife.
The ten minutes felt like an hour. Sammy's mind raced. What would she say? How would she explain the texts? The thought of sitting behind him on that bike, her body forced into intimacy by necessity, was agony.
Then, she heard it. A distinctive, snarling whine that cut through the hum of traffic and the dull bass from the club. It grew louder, a approaching scream of machinery that made people on the sidewalk turn their heads.
A black and green Kawasaki Ninja H2R slid to the curb like a shadow coming to life. It gleamed under the streetlights, all aggressive angles and whispered violence. The engine dropped to a menacing, bubbling idle.
Rebel killed the engine. The sudden silence was deafening.
He swung a long leg off the bike and stood, removing his helmet. His dark hair, in its wolf-cut style, was slightly flattened. He wore a simple black leather jacket over a grey t-shirt, dark jeans, and heavy boots. The jagged silver rings on his fingers caught the light as he tucked the helmet under his arm.
His eyes found hers immediately, scanning her, then the group, then the environment around the entrance in one swift, assessing glance. He looked completely out of place amidst the club's glittering chaos—a solid, grounded thing in the flux.
"Hey," he said, walking toward them. His gaze held hers, and the world narrowed to that point of contact. "You alright?"
She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. She just nodded, her throat tight.
He stopped a few feet away, close enough that she could smell the night air on his jacket, a faint hint of leather and ozone. He didn't look at her friends. His focus was absolute, and it felt like being pinned under a soft, warm light. "Show me the texts when we get home.”