Nature’s Bounty
J. Rose Allister
When Nature Antillean, aka Nate the Crate, poses as a male stripper to arrest a sexy-as-hell fugitive, he has no intention of taking his disguise all the way—until he meets her. Lydia Franklin is more than eager to take her gorgeous strip-o-gram for a wild ride, considering how desperately life on the run sucks. The resulting encounter is explosive, but ends with Lydia handcuffed and Nate honor-bound to take her to jail. The fireworks aren’t over yet, however, for Nate discovers he’s now a victim of the same setup that got Lydia accused of a crime she didn’t commit.
With both of them declared fugitives, Nate must work with the woman he swore to bring to justice in order to defeat the plot and reclaim their lives. His hot body and stellar moves give Lydia plenty of motivation for teaming up in more ways than one, but she knows that the criminal he hopes to protect her from is one she must face—alone.
A Romantica® contemporary erotic romance from Ellora’s Cave
Nature’s Bounty
J. Rose Allister
Chapter One
Sitting on her suitcase did nothing to help Lydia jam in the rest of the belongings she had hoped to fit inside.
“You’re not listening to me, Ly,” Valerie said over the cell phone while Lydia bounced up and down on the case lying on her bed. “And don’t say ‘mm-hm’. I hate it when you pretend to be listening when you’re really ignoring me.”
The latch on her case still refused to close. “Then you should know better than to talk to me when I’m busy trying to leave town.”
“This isn’t funny.”
“I’m not laughing. And I really should get going.”
“Listen to me. You can’t up and leave this way. Running is the absolute worst thing you can do right now.”
“Actually, going to jail would be the worst thing. I’m not going to stick around while my boss slides me into a six-by-six cell. I’ll spend the next ten years with some tattooed bitch who wants to be my husband.”
“You don’t know that’s going to happen.”
“You’re right, because I’m getting out of here until I figure out a way out of this. Look, if it’s the bail money you helped front for me, I told you I’d pay you back.”
“It’s not the money! I’m worried for you. As soon as you don’t show up for your court appearance, they’ll think you’re guilty. Then it won’t matter if you’re innocent or not.”
Lydia hopped off her uncooperative suitcase with a sigh and started yanking clothes out of it. “What do you mean ‘if’ I’m innocent? I was framed.”
“Sorry. I mean they won’t care that you are innocent. Running is as good as saying you did it.”
“I didn’t steal a damn thing from FTI aside from an occasional pencil over the years. But no one’s going to believe me, Val. Not when Andrew’s covered all his bases.”
“They’ll catch you eventually. There’s no way you can get out of facing that day in court.”
“And before I have that day, I want to turn this around where it belongs.”
With that, Lydia sank down on her bed and ran a hand through her hair. She glanced around her room, which resembled the aftermath of a hurricane. Clothes, shoes and underwear had been thrown every which way while she decided what to leave behind and what to take for her new life on the run. Now there was a fashion collection she’d never seen hit the runway.
“For the well-dressed fugitive,” she muttered, holding up her white slacks. “A stunning piece that will take you straight from the bail bond office to a long road trip.”
“What was that?” Valerie asked.
“Nothing. So, will it be okay for Angel to hang out with you a while longer?”
“The beast can stay as long as necessary.” There was a pause. “She misses you, you know. Sometimes she wanders from room to room, meowing as if she’s calling for you.”
Maybe it was stupid to let that be the thing that undid her, but Lydia’s eyes watered up nonetheless. The tears blurred her view of the room she’d just redecorated in creams and powder blue. Had she known she was about to be slapped with a phony embezzlement charge, she could have saved the money to help bankroll her escape plan.
“You’re just trying to hit me in the soft spot,” she said shakily. “The only time that black ball of fluff ever meows for me is when I’m dishing up her dinner.”
“Don’t go, Lydia.” Valerie’s voice had softened to a gentle pleading. “Come over and visit the beast. You haven’t seen her since you got arrested. We’ll sit and talk this through. There’s got to be a better way.”
“You know there isn’t.” She stood. “I’m going, and I’m staying away until I’m one hundred percent certain I can prove my innocence. Then I want to see that son of a bitch pay for making me take his fall.”
She wandered to the closet, where she kicked off her heels and rummaged for a pair of flats. They would be easier for the long drive across state lines. A few of them, considering her rapidly unfolding plan.
There was a pause on the other end of the line. “Do you need money?”
An odd laugh bubbled out of her. “That’s an ironic question, considering the nice chunk Andrew conveniently transferred to my bank account. I can’t touch any of it, of course.”
“Hence why I’m asking. They froze you out, didn’t they?”
“Yes, but remember who you’re talking to.” She tiptoed up and grabbed the hatbox off her closet shelf. She tugged off the lid and was reassured to see a few tightly rubber-banded rolls of bills. “You know I keep an emergency stash.”
“True. You’ve always been paranoid about losing access to money in the bank. I guess you were right all along.”
Lydia started stuffing money into her green leather shoulder bag. “I figured it would be a major power outage or zombie apocalypse, not because I had to go on the lam.”
“So there’s absolutely no way I can talk you out of this?”
“Not unless you’re the cops calling to say this was all just a big misunderstanding.”
Lydia heard a heavy sigh. “When will you leave?”
“As soon as I’m finished packing, probably. Oh, and I won’t have this number for much longer. I’m going to make a detour and ditch this cell phone with the GPS on.”
“You’re starting to sound like a wizened criminal now. It’s scaring me.”
“I’m scaring myself. But this is the number I put on my bond paperwork, and once they know I’ve skipped out, I’m betting they can trace it. So I’ll make it that much harder for them by pointing them in the wrong direction.”
Now Valerie was starting to sound a little panicked. “But how will I know you’re okay if I can’t call you?”
“I’ll get one of those prepaid phones and call you when I’m situated. And I’m not going to tell you where I’m going, either. The less you know, the better off you’ll be if anyone asks.” She hesitated. “And they probably will. I’m really sorry about that, Val. I hate the thought of you getting grilled because of me.”
The other woman snorted. “They can torture me and I won’t talk. But I already know where you’re going. There’s only one logical place. Just do me a favor when you get there.”
“Anything, unless you’re going to tell me to turn myself in.”
“Grab the bottle at the back of the top shelf. It’s the good stuff. Open it on your birthday.”
Her birthday. Hell, with everything going on, she’d almost forgotten it was next week.
“I will,” Lydia said. “And the first drink goes in the drink for those who can’t be there with us. I mean me.”
“Damn right. Pour that first glass right into the Pacific, Ly. In memory of much better times.”
“It’ll
be really weird staying at the old place alone.”
“I know. And don’t worry about Angel or me. We’ll both be fine.”
They clicked off the call, and Lydia walked to the window. Her eyes scanned the lush, mountainous Colorado landscape that was currently painted in dusky shades of twilight. “I will miss this view,” she said.
She wasn’t exactly going to a slum, but it wouldn’t be home. How long would she have to stay on the run? Would she have a home to come back to? A sofa to curl up on with the cat who was probably wondering what the hell happened to its owner?
Things would work out somehow. They had to. But first, she had to get some distance from this place and think of a plan. Before Andrew played any more wild cards against her rapidly unraveling life.
Just the thought of how he’d violated her quiet, unassuming existence sent her to the bathroom, where she stripped down and flipped on the shower. She’d already bathed the second she’d returned from the dingy, nasty jail. Nevertheless, she twisted her hair into a bun and stepped under the hot spray. One more for the road to wash away the past few days.
While she showered, she went over every detail of her plan again. The detour down to New Mexico was regrettable, since she’d rather make a beeline straight through to California. Still, better to put in the extra effort to throw authorities off her scent. She would deliberately rent a motel room in New Mexico with her credit card and ditch the cell phone in the vicinity. The trail would end there. Afterward, she would have to live off her wits and sparing amounts of cash.
“Damn you, Andrew Waller, you fucking prick,” she said as she climbed out and toweled herself dry.
He thought he’d won, punishing her for having the nerve to discover his scheme. But she still had a trick up her sleeve, one that was inside the manila envelope that had been the first thing she’d packed. Once she was out of Colorado, her first stop would be to make copies of the documents Andrew may or may not have realized she’d taken. One copy would get stashed in New Mexico, another somewhere closer to her destination. The originals she’d keep with her while she decided how to use them.
“So that’s it, then,” she said to her weary but determined reflection in the mirror when she finished scrubbing herself raw a short while later. “You can do this. You can beat the bastard at his own game without spending one more night in a stinking jail.”
Standing there naked, she broke down in tears. After allowing herself a good cry, she found her way to her bed and curled up in her fluffy blue robe. She needed to get started, she knew. But she’d allow herself a few hours to indulge in her new pillow-top mattress and soft sheets. Before first light, she would be on the road.
She would be a fugitive.
* * * * *
Five more minutes. Then Nate would have to decide how he wanted to play this.
He scanned the room again while he sat at the bar, his attention focused on the front door and one of the bright-red booths in the back. The place was considered upscale, with a bar that was polished to a bright gleam and modern art on the walls that seemed to be a giant step up from the typical paint-by-numbers or neon-sign fare of other establishments. The clientele dressed and smelled better than a lot of the dives Nate had cased too. Still, even with shinier packaging, the place was what it was—a place for folks to unwind, escape from their lives, or hook up with other lonely souls looking to unwind or escape from their lives.
He’d been told the woman he sought stopped in at the Red Apple Lounge every weeknight at six, and she sat in the same booth. Even better, the woman he was truly after sometimes met her there. But that would be too much to hope for, the way his luck had been running. This was strictly a fact-finding mission, the kind that either netted feast or famine and typically the latter. Questioning friends, relatives and known associates of a bond jumper often earned him hostility, denial and bullshit, but sometimes he managed to find someone the jumper had pissed off along their road to crime. They were all too happy to spill whatever they could in order to get even. On the other hand, those who’d been fucked over had often been cut out of the loop, so their information was not always up to date.
Which type this Valerie Ariman would turn out to be was anyone’s guess.
A grizzled voice cut into his thoughts. “Nate? Nature fucking Antillean. I don’t believe it.”
Nate turned and saw Benny Shatofski grinning his trademark grin. “Last I checked, my middle name was Jason, not Fucking.” Nate stuck out his hand in greeting.
Benny shook the offered hand. “Then I guess times have changed, stud. Too bad.”
Benny wasn’t much taller standing up than Nate was sitting down, but to be fair, Nate was currently boosted up on a bar stool. Benny’s wiry hair was grayer and his leathery skin more wrinkled than the last time Nate had seen him, but he still had the same hawk eyes and the gold tooth in front, a memento after a skip had knocked his out.
“How’s it hanging, Benny?”
“Long and strong, same as always.” Benny plopped onto the stool beside Nate, a move that effectively cutoff his view of the rear booth. “I was just talking to Joe about you the other day.”
Nate glanced at the door again. Three minutes. “And saying nothing good, I suppose.”
“I was saying I hadn’t seen Nate the Crate in ages. Heard you left the game.”
Nate met the older man’s eyes. “You heard right.”
“Yeah? So why does my gut tell me you’re working right now? Or do old habits just die hard?”
“Some old habits can get people killed.”
“The way I heard it, what happened wasn’t your fault.”
Already, the conversation was twisting his gut. He took a sip of his beer to settle it. “I’m sure that was a great comfort to the victim’s family.”
Benny ordered a long neck and pulled off his black leather gloves. “We don’t exactly sell daisies at the airport, you know. You ask me, all the pretty names they use for us these days are a bunch of shit. Bond enforcement, surety agents, bail fugitive investigators.” He snorted. “It all sounds so professional, doesn’t it? When you and I both know the truth.”
“Which is?”
“You can’t sugar coat what we do. We’re bounty hunters. We collar bad guys for money. Oh, it might not be quite the same as the Old West with six-shooters and wanted posters, but we’re not as far off that dusty trail as some like to think.”
“Your point being?”
“In a job like this, shit happens. Someone’s eventually going to get hurt. I’m not saying it isn’t fucked and sucked, but it’s a risk we take.”
“The risk I signed up for involved my own neck or maybe the occasional neck of a criminal. Not an innocent bystander.”
“You didn’t pull the trigger. Don’t let that shit eat at you, or you can’t do the job.”
“I’m not doing the job anymore.” In theory.
Benny cocked his head at him. “Okay, fine. You’re not on the job. Then would you mind telling me why you’ve had your radar dialed up to a hundred while you’ve been scanning the joint?”
Nate leaned his forearms on the bar. “So maybe Asa talked me into one last favor. One. Then I’m out.”
A flash of gold accompanied Benny’s grin. “Of course he did.”
“I only agreed because my cut of the bond will be big enough to see me through figuring out the next chapter of my life.”
Benny grunted. “Big bonds mean big crime.Which means big danger.”
“Nope, strictly white collar. Some chick got caught ripping off her boss, then skipped out on a two-fifty bond.”
“Ouch. A quarter-mil must have had Asa spitting bullets.”
“And worse. In any case, she hasn’t done a half-bad job of covering her tracks.”
Benny arched a shaggy eyebrow. “You sound impressed rather than annoyed. Pros always give me gas.”
“She’s no pro. Still, her credit card trail dead-ended, so now I’m canvassing known associates.” Nate stra
ightened up when a brunette with an upswept hairdo and a tight skirt swished her way over to the booth in the rear. “One of whom just showed up.”
“You know the bitch has probably left the country. By now she’s sipping Mai Tais on a beach in Cabo.”
Nate watched the woman, who appeared to be strung as tight as a piano wire, chew nervously on a manicured thumbnail while she pressed her cell phone to her ear. She spoke in hushed, worried tones.
Benny slid a glance over where Nate was looking. “You want some backup? Women are trouble in high heels. And you’ve got the wild look of a man who hasn’t been laid in far too long.”
Didn’t he know it.
“No thanks, Benny. I think my luck might be about to change.”
“Watch your ass.”
Nate grabbed his beer and sauntered casually to the next booth over. When she sat with her back to him in the adjoining seat, he almost wanted to cheer. Personally, he’d have opted to sit facing the door so guys like him couldn’t get the drop.
A drink server wearing a bowtie and half-apron strode up and greeted the woman by name. Valerie ordered the house special, an apple martini, while Nate slid noiselessly into the seat behind her. The server left to put in her order, and she went back to her call. Meanwhile, Nate punched up a few buttons on his own cell phone and set it close enough to her to record the conversation he hoped might involve a certain missing bail skip.
He wasn’t disappointed.
He twisted around enough to notice Valerie shrug off her coat, and her perfume wafted over the back of the booth while he did his best to appear to the casual observer that he was innocently sipping his beer, not stalking the woman whose conversation he was eavesdropping on.
“No,” Valerie was saying to her caller. “No one has contacted me about you yet. It’s making me nervous. Although I suppose I should be grateful.”
Bingo, he thought. He slipped a hand inside his sport jacket and pulled out a small notepad and pen.
While Valerie listened to a response he couldn’t make out, he flipped open the pad and jotted down the date, time and location.
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