Free Stealing Phin by Avery Hale Page B

the temperature. I’m so glad you got to sample the local talent!”
    Her words caused the memories of what had happened with Byron to spill over the dam of denial I had built up in my mind.
    As I pulled my pillow over my face in shame, the door opened and Estevan entered.
    “Did I hear someone say she likes to sample local talent? I bring you hot Costa Rican coffee and sweet bread from the most talented baker in La Fortuna.” He handed us both a to-go cup of the rich smelling liquid and a roll that was still warm from the oven.
    As I gratefully sipped the smooth coffee, I couldn’t help but develop a soft spot for Estevan. Coffee couldn’t put back together my sorry wreck of a life, but it could at least ease my pounding headache a bit. Plus, his timing was impeccable.
    I watched Dez and Estevan canoodle on her bed. She talking dirty to him in English, and he talking dirty to her in Spanish while they shared a piece of sweet bread. It was the closest I’d ever seen Dez come to intimacy—without the exchange of bodily fluids, that is.
    Maybe Carlito had been right—Costa Rica has a way of seeping into your system. Everything about it, from the heat of the air that carried the scent of the lush rainforest into your bedroom to the impossibly bright splashes of color in the flowers to the sense of excitement at being in an exotic place—was enough to put a hopeless romantic in danger of falling in love every other minute.
    But sure enough, as my headache eased, my heart began to ache. Guilt over what I did with Byron tormented me until I could no longer stand it. That wasn’t me. I didn’t know what had come over me, and it made me feel ashamed, embarrassed, and frightened. It was so outside of what was normal for me that it made me feel as if I didn’t know who I was anymore.
    My grip tightened around the paper cup in my hands, as I made a resolution. It was time that I take control over my life again. I reached deep inside to draw on those old parts of me that I knew were still in there somewhere. The old Phin wouldn’t just sit around and let this feeling eat her alive. No. She would pick herself up and do something about it.
    Filled with determination and renewed strength, I got out of bed and pulled on a pair of shorts.
    Dez looked up from rubbing noses with Estevan. “Where are you going?”
    “To make things right again,” I said, grabbing my wallet. Before she could quiz me more, I walked out the door.
     
     

CONSCIENCE CLEARING
     
     
     
    Jesus, relax, Phin. I halted my tense, stiff-legged march and took a few deep breaths before continuing down the path to Room 203—Byron’s room.
    After I’d purchased a new phone card from the gift shop, I’d used the payphone outside the front office to call and leave a message on Douglas’s cell that I wanted to talk things over with him and to call me back as soon as he could. Then, I inquired at the front desk about which room was Byron’s.
    “We hung out at the Lava Lounge last night, and he left his wallet behind,” I’d fibbed. The front desk girl had known without having to check which room he was in. I’d ignored the teeny tiny pang of jealousy triggered by my automatic assumptions about how or why she knew his room number by heart, and I promptly set on to accomplish my next task…before my brave front faded away.
    Too quickly, I arrived at his door. Feeling my resolve dissipating as my nerves began to fray, I clenched my teeth and knocked before I gave into the urge to abort the mission.
    I think I must’ve held my breath during the twenty seconds it took for him to come to the door felt because as soon as he opened it, I exhaled a huge volume of air.
    Unfortunately, a stream of verbal diarrhea came out with it.
    “I need to talk to you about last night because I can’t stop thinking about it, and it was a terrible thing to do, well for me but probably not for you, and if I don’t say what I have to say then I just might self-explode