A little past midnight, when the club had thinned out some and even those unemployed were considering going home, Harley made one last trip to the bathroom before they left. The lights had gone out in the long hallway. It was pretty dim except for the glow from the bar and an exit sign, but she had already made a few trips and figured she could find it even in the dark.
One glance in the mottled bathroom mirror was enough to convince her that four beers were past her limit; she looked like something out of Fright Night, with her hair in wispy spikes on one side, limp on the other. And she had what she referred to as Christmas Eyes, green orbs surrounded by bloodshot red. Yep. Time to call it a night.
Just as she was getting her jeans pulled back up and tucking the ends of her tee shirt into the waistband, the bathroom light went out. "Hey! I'm still in here!"
Man, these guys closed early. Most bars stayed open until two, the cutoff time for serving alcohol. Muttering to herself, she fumbled with the latch on the stall door, then eased out and felt her way along the tiled wall. She bumped into the sink and ricocheted off the opposite wall, swearing loudly as she careened toward the door. She felt like a pool ball. That thought made her giggle.
"Six-ball in the corner pocket," she sang out as she wrenched open the bathroom door, and ran right into a solid wall of muscle. Before she had time to apologize, a smelly bag was yanked over her head and her arms were pinned in a viselike grip as she was dragged a few feet down the hallway and out into the alley. She knew that last only because she felt a warm breeze on her bare arms and heard the noisy rattle of the central air unit that cooled the club. There was something else, too--a car motor close by. It sounded like it had bad gas, the pistons knocking loudly.
Whoever had her meant to put her in that car, and she was just as determined not to go as he was to force her into it. It was a fierce struggle. Somehow, Harley got her legs up, bent, and one foot braced on each side of the open door, resisting his efforts to wedge her inside. Breathing hard, he swore at her in an unfamiliar language that didn't need an interpreter to understand, then grabbed at her legs. To do that, he had to release one of her arms. She made instant use of that flaw in his plan, and blindly grabbed for a handful of his clothes to pull him off-balance.
Fortunately, she'd grabbed a handful of his anatomy that effected her immediate release. He made a high-pitched sound like a loose fan belt and dropped her, and she gave a hard twist of her wrist just for good measure. His family jewels were probably missing a few stones by now, she figured as she crawled away and stumbled to her feet, ripping the bag from her head to yell for help.
That was when someone smacked her on the side of the head and she saw stars explode in front of her eyes. A veritable meteor shower of them. She hit the ground in the alley hard, felt her palms scrape on asphalt, and heard bells ringing and drums thumping loudly.
Music? How lovely ... Unable to move, she just lay there staring up at the stars rotating in the sky like pinwheels.
Then someone bent over her, squeezing her cheeks together and peering into her eyes. "Hey, are you all right? Talk to me, honey. Focus ... that's right, both eyes looking in the same direction at once, now."
A face slowly came into focus. She blinked. Diana Ross? "Why'd you break up the Supremes?"
Diana laughed and said to someone else nearby, "She's coming around. She's just not making much sense yet."
"Trust me, she doesn't make much sense when she hasn't been hit in the head," a familiar voice said. "I've never met anyone who can't even go to the bathroom without getting into some kind of trouble."
That would be Morgan, Harley thought hazily. He sounds upset.
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