Trouble with Nathan

by Anna J. Stewart

  “Where do you call home?” he asked as they took a seat. She stretched out her legs, the grey tweed slacks she wore accentuating their seductive length.

  “Wherever the next job takes me.” She popped the lid off her cup. “I keep a small studio apartment in Sacramento and another in New York where TransUnited’s home office is. But I wouldn’t call it home.”

  “Ah, a gypsy.” He shifted and draped his arm over the back of the bench so he could look at her. “You like it?”

  She hesitated, her smile faltering as she ducked her head. “It has its moments.”

  Every word he pulled out of her he pocketed for future use. Given his family’s future was at stake, he’d use whatever—and whoever—he needed to protect his family. Finding out what she knew—even what she might suspect—could be an invaluable weapon in his arsenal. If he could convince her his father was innocent of stealing the crown, surely the Lantano Valley authorities would fall in line and back off completely. If he happened to manage to throw her off the Nemesis trail, all the better. “There’s nothing wrong with being a nomad.”

  “I’m betting it’s not a life you’d choose,” she said into her cup.

  “No.” The morning air felt good in his lungs, a healthy reminder that despite stressors and circumstance, every day was something to embrace. “No, I belong here. Lantano Valley is a part of me. I love it, love the people. The atmosphere. It’s big, but not so big I feel lost. Besides, it’s where my family is.”

  “There’s something to be said for being lost.” She shrugged, inclined her head. “Disappearing isn’t always a bad thing. Being anonymous.”

  Interesting comment. Spoken like someone who hadn’t been surrounded with family from day one. “Hard to form relationships when you’re anonymous.”

  “No.” Laurel sighed. “It’s hard to form attachments. Relationships are another matter.”

  “Sounds lonely,” Nathan said, resisting the urge to catch a strand of her hair between his fingers and confirm his suspicions. Sable.

  “Since when is sex lonely?”

  He sputtered, caught off guard by her blunt statement, and then laughed when he saw the amused glint in her eye. She was teasing him? Okay, he could play that game. “I suppose that would depend on who you were having sex with.”

  “Hmmm. Yes.” Her gaze slid slowly away from his, drawing him deeper into fascination. “I suppose it would.”

  “Laurel—” His mouth had gone dry.

  “Uncle Nathan!”

  The high-pitched voice exploded from down the path and Nathan looked over his shoulder as two nearly identical boys raced toward him. Squealing, their little legs pumped back and forth and their rich mocha skin glistened in the morning sun. Each held a small wooden sword, no doubt bought at Lantano Valley’s annual Renaissance faire last weekend.

  “For the record.” Nathan leaned close to Laurel’s ear and whispered, “you wouldn’t feel lonely for one second with me. Hey, guys!” He pushed himself up and crouched down just in time. “Ugh!” Nathan flung his arms out and fell back on the thick grass, his arms suddenly full of squirming six-year-olds as Cedric and Aiden Williams landed on top of him. “I give up! I surrender,” Nathan cried, trying not to laugh as two pairs of chocolate brown eyes narrowed down at him. Laurel notwithstanding, seeing these two was just the distraction he needed; a reminder that when all was said and done, this was what he was protecting: his family.

  Cedric and Aiden shifted and planted their butts solidly on his chest, arms crossed as if defending a pass. Nathan couldn’t help but think of Brandon Monroe and how much the effects of the little boy’s death lingered. Life was too short. He glanced over at Laurel, who looked as if she had to force a smile in response.

  “Guys, I can’t breathe.” Nathan laughed.

  “You are our prisoner!” Cedric cried, holding his arms up above his head in triumph.

  “Defeated!” Aiden countered as he waved his makeshift sword low across Nathan’s face. Nathan grabbed the wooden blade between two hands and shoved himself up, toppling the boys onto the ground in a fit of giggles as he got to his feet and brushed himself off.

  “I’m coming!” Kelley Black scooted down the path, dark blue pants, red shirt, and gold belt looped around her waist, the black wig rescued from the Halloween bin at the discount store in town hung cockeyed on her head. Gold bracelets sparkled as she streaked toward them, causing Cedric and Aiden to run off squealing before she launched herself into the air.

  Nathan caught her easily, swinging her onto his shoulder as she righted her wig and grinned. “Saved you!”

  Nathan hefted her higher, relieved to feel that the little girl was finally putting some weight back onto her tiny frame. “At some point is Wonder Woman going to get tired of saving me?” Nathan asked with a heavy sigh as he headed back to the bench.

  “Nu-uh. Wonder Woman always saves the man. Girl power, right?” She flexed her arm à la Popeye after a can full of spinach as Nathan propped her on his lap. “Gage said if I’m really good that maybe I can start watching Buffy. How cool would that be?”

  “So cool.” The thought of little Kelley racing around the three-story Victorian house with a wooden stake in her hand gave him the chills. Maybe he and Gage needed to have a chat about that. “Kelley, this is my friend, Laurel. Laurel, this is one of my sister Morgan’s foster children, Kelley Black. Those other two are Cedric and Aiden.”

  “Hi!” Kelley held out her hand which Laurel stared at for a long moment before accepting.

  “Hello.”

  “You’re pretty.” Kelley angled her head and scooted forward on Nathan’s legs. “Are you Uncle Nathan’s girlfriend?”

  “No, she’s not, Little Miss Nosy.” Nathan shot an apologetic glance in Laurel’s direction but he didn’t think she noticed with the way she was gathering up her purse and getting to her feet. “Did you fly here in your invisible plane or did Angela bring you?” Nathan asked as he stood as well, hefting Kelley onto his hip.

  “Gage brought us. Something about us driving Angela and Morgan nuts. Nico’s baking at home today so we needed to be out from underfoot.”

  “I see.” Nathan caught sight of Gage Juliano, his sister’s fiancé, corralling Cedric and Aiden toward the playground. “Laurel, hang on a minute.”

  “No, um.” She tucked her hair behind her ear, shaking her head as if trying to clear her thoughts. For all the confidence she exuded, he didn’t expect her to look at the kids as if a bomb had gone off in her face. Whatever mask she’d been wearing had slipped. “No, you have your family here now. I don’t want to get in the way.”

  “You’re not in the way.” Her shift in attitude confused and concerned him. “Come meet Gage and the boys.” He held out his hand.

  “No, it’s okay, really. I’ll see you around town, I’m sure. Nice to meet you, Kelley.” Nathan watched her scramble away, her heels clicking double time as she disappeared down the path they’d walked not so long ago.

  “Did I say something bad?” Kelley asked.

  “Of course you didn’t,” Nathan said, wondering the same thing himself.

  “She looked sad. Why would she be sad, Nathan? She’s so pretty.”

  “Everyone’s sad about something sometimes. Even pretty ladies.” And in his experience, especially pretty ladies who weren’t quite what they seemed. One second he thought he understood her, the next it was as if she wasn’t sure she understood herself. Part of him wanted to go after her, to delve deeper, but he couldn’t afford to be distracted. His focus had to stay clearly on his family. But that didn’t mean he didn’t wonder what had sent Laurel scurrying away like that.

  Kelley planted her hands on his cheeks and squished his mouth. “Even you?”

  “Even me,” he managed as his face began to ache. “But never around you. Playground time, right?”

  “Right!” Kelley
wiggled out of his arms, landed on the ground and took off like a bullet toward Gage and the twins, Nathan trailing after.

  “So who was the woman?” Gage Juliano took a long drink out of his silver travel mug, keeping one eye on the twins who were battling it out on a makeshift drawbridge and the other on Kelley who was wrist-deep in morning-damp sand. Had he a third eye, Nathan was certain it would have been pinned squarely on him.

  “Laurel Scott,” he said.

  “The insurance investigator from TransUnited?” Gage stretched out his legs and slouched on the bench, looking far more content than a man engaged to Nathan’s Energizer Bunny of a little sister ought to.

  “Is there anything you don’t know?”

  Gage smirked. “It helps to still have connections on the force. Bouncer took some time off work at the cold case unit yesterday to help Gina and Drew set up a new wireless system in the house. She mentioned Jackson paid a visit to the commissioner yesterday morning and he ended up in interrogation.”

  Any hope for a tension-free morning vanished in the wake of Gage’s statement, but Nathan kept his cool. He had to. His future brother-in-law was the best bullshit detector on the west coast, which had made the last few months all the more hazardous when it came to conversations with the former cop. The cop who had, at one time, been in charge of the Nemesis case.

  “Yeah, I was going to talk to you guys about that.” Nathan clasped his hands between his knees and stared at a beetle meandering around cracks in the sidewalk.

  “Before or after Jackson pled guilty to being Nemesis?”

  Son of a . . . “It wasn’t going to come to that,” Nathan said, but he wasn’t entirely convinced. “This has taken me by surprise, too. Look, Dad’s been under a lot of pressure—”

  Gage turned his head and with one steely blue-eyed look, silenced Nathan’s lie. “Contrary to how I felt when I woke up this morning, I am not an idiot, Nathan. And I’ll thank you very much to stop treating me like one.”

  “Okay.” Nathan nodded and, taking a deep breath, drew himself up straight. “Okay, yeah. Some of the things we need to do might not be as up to snuff as one might expect given his, our, standing in the community.”

  “Sweet Jesus, I can see you mutating into a politician before my eyes.” Gage glanced back at the kids before refocusing his attention on Nathan. “You don’t want to tell me what’s really going on, that’s fine. But you and I both know keeping anything about your father’s well-being, not to mention the family’s reputation, from Morgan is an effort in futility. Page three of the Times was a gift.”

  “You saw the article?”

  “Of course I saw it, and as one older brother to another, I won’t regale you with what I had to do to distract your sister from reading the paper this morning.”

  Nathan winced and felt a little sick. “I appreciate that.”

  “It’s only a matter of time before Morgan gets wind of this. You’d better be ready with a plausible explanation when the time comes.”

  “I’m working on one,” Nathan said. “We all are.”

  “Which answers my other question about Sheila and Malcolm.” Gage scrubbed a hand over his eyes. “Honest to God, Nathan, get this settled and get it settled fast. I won’t have whatever the hell you all have been wreaking putting Morgan’s life’s work at risk any more than you already have. Losing the center would kill her. A family scandal that ruins the foundation will as well, but that won’t be anything compared to what could happen if she loses the kids.”

  “Loses the kids? How . . .” Nathan turned his gaze to the squealing, happy children flipping around on the monkey bars as fast as his stomach rolled. Morgan’s lifelong dedication to helping sick children had spilled into the foster care system. Over the years she’d taken in a number of seriously ill kids, co-fostering them with Nico and Angela Fiorelli, an older couple who resided in the large onetime fixer-upper house Morgan owned. “What do you mean if she loses—”

  “Morgan and I filed paperwork last week to adopt Kelley, Aiden, and Cedric.” Gage took another drink, glancing at the aforementioned trio racing around the padded playground, leaping and jumping onto the scaffold as effortlessly as lemurs in a zoo. The air in Nathan’s lungs turned into flame as Gage said, “My folks have offered to finance the Fiorelli’s own bakery connected to J & J Markets. Angela and Nico are ready to enjoy their retirement, and after the last few years they deserve it. The adoption is going to take a while with all the red tape and home visits. Nothing will be final until after your sister finally marries me. For now, Nico and Angela will continue to care for Lydia.” Gage took a deep breath and glanced away. “For however long she has left.”

  Nathan’s mind erupted with images of the beautiful young Hispanic girl who had lived with Morgan and the Fiorellis for nearly four years. “She’s gotten that bad?”

  “The tumor’s growing again. After losing Brandon earlier this year . . .” Gage’s voice trailed off. “Morgan’s taking Lydia down to Los Angeles for additional tests and to consult with a new specialist. We’re hoping she might get into a trial but her condition is pretty advanced. We don’t want to put her through anything that’s only going to cause her more pain.”

  “Yeah, no, I get it.” Nathan swallowed the softball lump in his throat. When Morgan started taking in foster children with serious illnesses and sponsoring a group home for them, Nathan hadn’t been surprised. His little sister was, in many ways, his hero. But that didn’t mean he liked the emotional toll it took on her—on all of them—when she lost one. Brandon Monroe’s death had come out of nowhere, an embolism that was the result of a massive experimental chemotherapy treatment for kidney cancer. But Lydia, at only ten, had been born with a voracious strain of AIDS that left the little girl confined to a wheelchair in recent months. Nathan had known for a while she was on borrowed time. Mostly Nathan was convinced it was Morgan’s stubbornness keeping the little girl alive. The last thing Morgan—or Gage—needed was to add Nemesis into the mix. Again. “What about Drew? Are you adopting him as well?”

  “We offered,” Gage said with a sly smile. “He’s the only one we talked to, actually. The other kids don’t know yet and we don’t want them to until it’s a done deal.”

  “What did Drew say?”

  “Typical Drew. He said we didn’t have to, that at seventeen he’s too old to be adopted, but he didn’t say no.”

  “Let me guess. Morgan’s already working on him.”

  “Poor kid doesn’t stand a chance,” Gage said. “It’s a tough age to accept that a family loves and wants you. I think he doesn’t want to believe. That way he doesn’t have to be disappointed when things don’t work out. Which brings me back to this mess you father’s confession has created.” For the first time since Nathan had known Gage, he understood why he’d lasted as long as he did as a cop. Steeled, determined, bordering on zealous, Nathan saw all the primal instincts of a lion protecting his pride on his friend’s face. “Morgan’s called in all the favors she can to expedite the adoption paperwork, but by no means is this a done deal. Especially if some police inquiry into the family gets in the way. Seeing the children’s potential grandfather being questioned for a string of felonies isn’t going to work in our favor.”

  “Of course it isn’t.” That weight of responsibility he’d shouldered yesterday threatened to cripple him. “Gage—”

  “No lies, Nathan. Not now,” Gage ordered. “One night, when we’ve all had too much to drink and it won’t feel like a punch to the gut, you will tell me the truth about everything. But for now, you get things in order. You and Sheila and Jackson and whoever else is involved, you get out from whatever mess this is and finish it. Once and for all. Because I’m not letting you take my family down with you. Kids!” Gage called as Nathan felt as if he’d been punched in the gut himself. “Let’s head home. Morgan’s making pancakes!”

  “Can Uncle Nathan co
me, too?” Cedric asked as he ran up to take Gage’s outstretched hand.

  “Not this time,” Gage said and pinned Nathan with a look so cool he was glad he was sitting down. “Uncle Nathan has work to do.”

  Chapter Five

  “Is there anything I can get you, Miss Scott?” One of the museum’s docents asked from the doorway as Laurel returned to her temporary, minuscule office on the second floor.

  “No, thanks, Millie,” Laurel said. “I’m fine. Just close the door behind you, will you? I have some phone calls I need to make.” She kept her pristine smile in place until the door shut. Only then did she drop into her chair and close her eyes, but all she could see were the faces of those beautiful children staring at Nathan in wide-eyed admiration. They may as well have had signs around their necks declaring them collateral damage.

  Letting Nathan slip past her defenses was one thing. It was necessary. It was her job. She’d tread carefully with the verbal bait, reminding herself with every word that the teasing banter and flirting was all part of the job. The job she needed to finish if she was going to have her own day in the park with Joey. Laurel’s heart twisted.

  She needed to draw him in; she had to have something, anything to report to Alastair, if for no other reason than to prove her continued loyalty, however coerced it might be.

  How had she neglected to accept the consequences of her actions? Cool detachment had gotten her this far, kept her sane. It would—it had to—see her through.

  But now she was coming face-to-face with the people her actions and decisions would affect, and it wasn’t as easy. Laurel pressed a hand against her chest as she drew in a shuddering breath. Watching him literally fall head over heels for his nephews and niece, hearing their infectious giggles and demands for playtime sent screams of deprivation echoing in her mind. What she wouldn’t give for five minutes in the park with Joey. Joey.