by Lyn Brittan
He should be on a plane flying somewhere over Kansas by now. He’d been busted. Maybe. Ava had sounded too frantic to be angry. With her closest friend on a mission in Macedonia, Pierce had to be in the far back section of her mind. Or, possibly Ava was quietly plotting his demise.
He wouldn’t know until he got back to the base.
While Melody chatted on about different types of chocolate, he was coming up with a plausible...truth. Lying to his boss wasn’t an option. If even lightly investigated, which was very likely at this point, the details of his trip would be impossible to hide. So, what to say then? An innocent woman needed his help? True. He had to mention the struggle on the street with the thieves. It certainly bolstered his cause. Did he go so far as to mention the Olmec artifact?
Eh.
Lying for duty? Sure. Lying for friends? Easy. Lying to friends and bosses? A little harder, bordering on impossible. He’d have to carefully truth his way into their good graces. So, yes that meant the artifact and coming clean about everything, including his affection for Melody.
The sooner they solved her problems, the sooner he solved his. And the sooner he solved his problems, the sooner he could take her out for a proper date.
“Tell me what you know about the chocolate facility.”
Melody blinked and put down her phone. “Well, don’t think factory. Think a series of small patches of land connected to a larger facility. Noah works in the main house. The different aspects of the business branch out from that one building. Land-wise, each plot is owned or leased by another family. On their own, they wouldn’t make much. By bundling the shipments, they increase their selling power, drop-shipping costs and I still get a good deal. It was perfect.”
“Until it wasn’t.”
“Basically.” She propped her sandaled feet on the dashboard and cupped her chin. “The pictures don’t do this place justice. All of these rolling hills...the air. It’s perfect out here. When the business starts turning a more consistent profit, I need to come back.”
“Make it a thing.”
“A thing?”
He threw another shrug and a wink. “Yeah. Once you’re super rich, bring your mom and sister down here once or twice a year. Partly for a vacation, but mostly to connect with your farmers. Isn’t that the problem now? You don’t know what’s happening on-site? That’s not a knock, by the way.”
“To be fair to me...and let’s be fair to me—”
“Of course,” he added with a half bow.
“Mama’s the checkout lady, my sister’s the baker and I’m the chocolatier, along with being the chief finance officer, chief business executive, marketing department, website manager and the woman who flung the paintbrush when the chair railings needed touching up. Translation, it’ll be a while before any fun trips to Mexico happen.”
“Maybe not. If this guy’s skimming money off the top, that stops today. That’s a start. Far be it from me to tell you how to run your business, but if you need help with—”
With a headshake and snapping fingers, she cut him off. “I know what needs to be done. Have you ever started a business? Owned your own private practice?”
“Nope.”
“Let me be first to tell you, it is what it is. These are standard growing pains for any small business. If it were easy, everyone would do it. It’s not even that it’s hard most times. If I had 36 hours in the day, or a clone, I’d be light-years ahead. What makes it bearable is knowing that every other businessperson goes through this too. I’ve gotta earn my stripes. I’m not scared of them. Just sucks sometimes.”
“No, Ms. Melody, I don’t think you’re scared of much,” he said, still eager to do his part to lighten her burden.
The village was one of those blink-and-you-miss-it places, but on the other side of it, the road narrowed to a pair of trails about a truck axle wide. “Remember how I got out of the jeep at the last place and walked up to where I needed to be?”
Melody looked back at him like a twelve-year-old being sold on Santa Claus. “It worked out so well then. Plan B?”
“It’s a good Plan A when it works.”
“Are you serious?”
He sure as hell was. She had it in her head that they needed pictures of something. Wrong. Also, any place worthy of picture taking was likely to be occupied. “We need data. Therefore—”
“You need me in there. You don’t know what you’re looking for. How do you know what is and isn’t supposed to be there?”
“Well, I—”
“And you’ve missed one pretty big clue,” she said, arms crossed and looking a little too Mussolini at the balcony.
He hadn’t missed a damned thing. A set of tire tracks maybe from a couple of small cars. Cigarette butts and candy wrappers lined the road, but they were old and faded. “This used to be a pedestrian walkway but people stopped coming this way. Though, not all them. Just those who would walk. Farmers, laborers, but not the big wigs. Maybe two or three months back.”
“You’re almost right,” she said.
“Almost? Okay, Murder She Wrote, let’s hear it.”
She closed her eyes and leaned back into the seat. “It’s going to feel so good to throw something back in your face again. Again,” she added, with a one-two punch above her head.
“Oh, God.”
“Look at this beautiful view. All these lovely cacao trees. You can smell the cocoa on the breeze. Take a good deep breath.”
“You’re cute when you’re cocky, but your point?”
“See those orangey-yellow football-looking things? Those are the pods that hold the cacao. The tree has two seasons per year. From now until the end of the month, this land should be filled with harvesters. If they’re not here, then there’s no work here.”
“You said that you worked with individual families. Why can’t they sell to someone else?”
“Like who? Aside from the groups we worked with, every other producer around here comes from old Spanish families. They’ve got a lock on the market. No way they’re risking their bottom line to work with these guys. Well, that’s one possibility off the list. I kinda thought Noah was selling the cacao to someone else. Turns out, he’s not selling it at all.”
The man was probably selling something a lot more profitable under the cover of her business. Not a large-scale operation though. He and Melody couldn’t have driven up this close without red dots blinking on their shirts. It wasn’t adding up.
He wanted to go in and get it over with. He would have if he’d been on his own. To that point, there would be no it to discover without her. He checked the flight schedule on his phone. “If I ask you to stay behind, will you pretend that I’m an agent who knows what he’s doing?”
“Of course. That doesn’t mean I’m staying behind though. How will you know—”
“Right. How will I know what to look for,” he finished for her. “Figured as much. Let’s take cover in this tree line until we figure out what to do. I’m thinking, given your attitude, it’ll be easier to knock on the front door. We get the info we need and bounce. Our flight leaves at ten tomorrow morning.”
“That’s hella confident.”
True, but the reality was pretty freaking simple. Either he was very right or they were very, very dead.
Chapter Eleven
His confidence wasn’t as infectious as he’d planned. She was more nervous now than before and had the sweaty palms to show it.
Faking it until she made it, only made it so far.
While she paced, he checked weapons and reloaded magazines or clips or whatever they were called. Her ears rang in memory of the last gunfight. She wasn’t looking forward to another one. “Maybe we should call the authorities?”
His thumb pressed a final bullet into place, before picking up a gun with canisters on the side. “The time for cops was before I had a pilfered antique in my backpack.”
“Don’t remind me. But if you’re thinking Noah’s involved in some sort of drug operation
—”
“Those words did not leave my lips,” he said with a glance in her direction. “This drive up here was that test. A big grow operation would have unkindly turned us around. This is something small scale, assuming there’s anything at all. He might just be stealing from you. Probably is, in which case we get a confession, get your money and go home.”
Pierce was saying all the right things, but he’d just added a knife to a holster around his ankle. He had a gun on either side of his waist now, with a third on a rock between them. “Is that for me?” she asked. “Because I froze last time.”
His fist pounded a spot on the log next to him while he scooted over. “Sit. Your pacing is driving me nuts.” He laughed as she plopped down with all the petulance of a pouting child. “C’mon, Melody. I’m not looking for you to be James Bond when the guns come out. You kept us safe – me safe – and got us out of that. I trust you.”
She twisted her finger around tendrils of overgrown weeds. “Didn’t really have a choice.”
“That’s what I like about you. You act when the situation requires it. I don’t like the angry bits that come after it, but you’re there when it matters. Look, you could have easily stayed at home and licked your wounds. But you didn’t. You’re here.”
“I didn’t have a choice there either. Without that money, I lose three months’ payment on—”
He nudged his shoulder against hers. “That’s what I’m saying. You answer the call. I don’t expect you to stop doing that now. There’s a reason I’m not pushing you to stay in the car. You won’t. You can’t. My boss is all about putting people where they fit best...” Pierce grimaced, running his fingers through his hair before relaxing into a soft smile. “For instance, I’m a great doctor. Maybe without my knee injury, who knows where he would have put me. But this is my lot in life.”
“It’s not a bad life from what I see.”
“I’m starting to realize that. Maybe I needed this detour as much as you did.”
“How did you know you wanted to be you? The type of man you are today, I mean. I’m me because of my mother.”
Pierce’s nostrils flared and he let loose a chest emptying breath. “Same here, in a backwards sort of way. My parents are wealthy. They loved me – love me – but in their way, you know? What you have with your mom, I had with a couple of nannies. It’s not the same. When I was a kid, I was afraid of the dark. Terrified. Father wouldn’t let any of the staff come to help me. He wanted me to be a real man. I cried and screamed night after night.”
“That’s why you became a doctor. It’s why you’re here with me now. You saw that I needed help and you couldn’t leave me alone.” She shook her head and smiled. “Along the way, you’ve given me whole new definitions of truth and justice.”
“So I’m not a creepy, picture-taking thief anymore?”
“Meh.” She waved a flat hand from side to side. Despite the lift to his lips, Pierce’s jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed. He looked like she felt, sandwiched somewhere between resignation and acceptance. She dipped her knee against his. “Between you and me, I’m glad you’re a thieving agent, slash, doctor hero man. Plus, you’re still hot.”
His laugh was more of a huff of air, but it was so endearing that she leaned in, pressing her lips against his cheek. Pierce twisted until his mouth met hers.
The old her would have been casting judgments. But the old her hadn’t met a man like him before. Pierce was a walking contradiction, wrapped in the sweetest mix of masculine nerdiness.
“You’re beautiful, you know.”
She didn’t feel it, covered in dirt and sweat, and yet, the second he’d said it, she knew it to be true. He thumbed her cheek like a piece of fine porcelain...as if he treasured her every bit as much as his precious antiques.
Cobalt blue eyes stared back at her so intensely that she almost turned away. His presence transformed her by the second. Her skin prickled as his fingertips ran up her arms. Her nipples hardened when his lips dipped down to her neck.
Then the mortification set in. With her boulders, the lamest, brownest over-the-head bra was a necessity outside of special occasions. She hadn’t anticipated any such event when she’d hopped on the plane. What was happening was stupid and wild and yet, when he brought her chin up in silent question, she nodded immediately.
Pierce snapped her up, crushing her breasts between them. When he lifted her shirt over her head, her chest burned with humiliation. She wasn’t perfect or svelte by anyone’s measurement, except for maybe his. When she opened her eyes, he looked at her like a starved man. “You are perfection.”
He must have slept with a hundred other women in his life, but she kinda doubted he’d ever looked at them how he looked at her. How could he? After twenty-four hours, they’d done more together than people who’d been dating for years. Their situation was unique, to say the least.
It hit her then that he had seen all of her. He’d stitched her up and she hadn’t felt a thing. He’d been gentle in the worst of moments. Her last one-night stand had been over five years ago. She’d earned this one.
Pierce was smooth and hard in all the right places. And a magician too. One second she was up on a log, the next, he had her down, pinned to the earth with one hand while struggling to undo her grandma bra with the other. “This is some contraption you’ve got here.”
She snorted and slammed her eyes shut, laughing quietly through her mortification. “Let me. Are we pretending that you haven’t tackled it once already?”
“Shit.” He jumped up and pulled her into his lap. “Your shoulder—”
“Is fine. Not that I hate this position either.” She straddled him, wiggling down until he groaned against his throat.
“I kinda want to do a savage thing and rip this bra right off.”
“Not on this bumpy road. Can you...imagine...”
He didn’t look like he imagined anything. The second her breasts were free, his eyes locked on them. His hands followed and soon his lips, to her supreme delight.
Her world could be no more heavenly than this. Here she was, half naked, surrounded by the forests and warm cocoa scents that gave her life, with a man writhing beneath her who seemed to crumble at the sight of her.
“You sure, Melody?”
She grabbed hold of him, rigid between her legs and for the first time in ages, took something just for herself.
Chapter Twelve
Pierce buried the used condom and tossed the wrapper in the back of the jeep. There wasn’t much else back there, but he consolidated everything they might need into one bag. If a quick exit was required, he might only have a second to grab the antique that had started this magnificent mess.
He cared about the Olmec piece less and less by the second. He ran his thumb over the wrapped edges with the full knowledge that he’d rather be touching Melody.
Every few seconds, he’d turn to watch her dress. Her body was still flushed from their lovemaking. Hell, so was his. Just the thought of her was enough to tighten his belly and make his cock twitch again.
“You’re staring.”
“Can’t help it. I wasn’t too rough with you, yeah? Your shoulder? If you need more...it’s a cutting edge local nerve blocker, but—”
She zipped her pants and toed the log. “If I say yes, will you promise to do it again? After this patch of hair grows back, ya know.” While his face burned with legitimate regret, she wiggled her finger in the air. “Kidding. What are you doing over there? I wasn’t enough? Now you’re playing with your bag of tricks again?”
“Just checking supplies. Everything we need to survive is right in here.”
Leaning against the jeep, he held out his hands until she took them in hers. He drew her close, tasting her and reigniting a passion they didn’t have time to properly quench. “When this is over, we’re going to try that in a bed.”
“You were supposed to be my one-night stand,” she said with lips that brushed along the side of his neck. “Two n
ight, maybe.”
“We could shoot for more.” He backed away, knowing full well that if this continued, their window of opportunity would close.
While he had her here, he clipped an inner waist band holster and gun to her back. “If anything happens, don’t hesitate to use this. Grab the bag, get in the car and drive.”
“I don’t think it’ll come to that.” But she hadn’t looked at him when she’d said it. Maybe she was just starting to realize the level of danger her quest for justice had put her in. Hopefully, she was right. On the chance that she wasn’t, he wouldn’t leave her unprepared.
As before, they drove up the lane to the facility without interruption. Factory didn’t describe it. The grounds were too empty for that. This was Chernobyl, the morning after. Nothing here but three cars in an otherwise massive empty lot.
He made note of the tires. Fresh road sludge still clumped beneath the mud flaps. No heavy duty trucks around. This all lent creditability to the theory of corporate theft. Those guys were easy to deal with. A little strong-arming and they usually caved. “Ask for a review of the facility when we get inside.”
“I’d planned on it,” she said, eyes scanning the length of the complex. “This is creepy, right?”
“Everything’s creepy with you,” he said with a grin. He opened his mouth to add more, but a clanging door stilled all conversation.
“Noah,” Melody shouted with the best fake enthusiasm he’d seen in a while, then jumped out of the car.
This was the man she’d trusted with her money?
If there was one thing in the world Pierce hated, it was stereotypes. But this guy...
Pierce followed close behind as he sized Noah up. He’d envisioned Noah as...well...Noah, complete with a long beard and robe. That was dumb. This Noah was a freaking Nordic lumberjack without the plaid. He had muscles on muscles that dwarfed his other muscles.
“You went into business with the white Mr. T?”
She didn’t answer, aside from flicking her wrist behind her back. “Noah, meet Mr. Jones,” she said, throwing her thumb towards Pierce. “He’s an IRS investigator.”
