“Good name.” She gave him a half smile. “You could be a movie star with a name like that. Or a porn star by the looks of you.” She winked at him and he smiled to himself. “And the name of your company?”
“Bear Natural Honey.” He patted his jeans and brought out a business card. “I usually keep a few of these on me.”
He handed it to her and she looked it over. Professionally made, well designed. Impressive. There was his name and his title, quality control.
“Quality control?” she asked.
“I make sure all our products are the highest quality possible through testing and industry standards.”
She nodded. “And can you tell me what it is you do here on the grounds?”
“We make honey. We have the bee hives and a processing center. Recently, we’ve started branching out to soaps and other skin care products. We pack it and ship it from here, too. Our offices are here. What’s this story about, exactly?”
She leaned in closer. “Well, I’ll tell you because you seem like such a decent guy. My boss thinks there’s illegal things happening up here. Now, I personally don’t believe him. But, I think this story is a good way to get out the truth and clear your name.”
He nodded slowly. “Well, there’s certainly nothing illegal going on. We have lots of employees that make the honey. Slade does the paperwork and Dax helps him and does sales. Our products are sold in local markets all over the Ozark area.”
“Great. Do you have any samples? I’d love to include a review in my story. You know, to help you out.” She winked at him again.
“Sure. How about a tour? That way you can see for yourself that everything is on the up and up.”
Her eyes widened. She hadn’t even had to talk him into it. “That would be lovely.”If they were making moonshine, it would be in big stills. Not so easy to hide. She’d look for any room that might contain such equipment. Maybe it was stored in part of the warehouse. Could those stills blow up like meth labs did? She’d have to check on that. If that was the case, they’d put them in the warehouse and probably not in the house.
She stood, glanced down to make sure the little green light was still on on her digital recorder, and followed him out of the room.
They didn’t spend much time in the kitchen or bathroom. These were basic rooms and she saw nothing much of interest there. In the office, though, he took her in and started explaining.
“This is where Slade and Daxton mostly work.” He gestured to the two desks. “They do all the paperwork here. Inventory, ordering of supplies, payroll, taxes.” He indicated several thick binders as he spoke.
There was one labeled “taxes,” but what did that mean? Its existence wasn’t proof. Was there anyway she could explore this room without him around?
“No reason to think anything illegal is happening. We have all the paperwork right here.”
She nodded. “I see that.”
He took her out through the back door and into the large processing facility. She looked around carefully. Never knew when you might discover a health code violation or some employee situation run amok. She kept her eyes peeled for anything that would make a good story.
As they walked, though, nothing seemed to be out of place. Maybe they were all straight and legal. Well, that wouldn’t make a great story. What angle could she take? Lonely men find love in the Ozarks? Honey attracts local ladies? Ugg. Those headlines bored even her. And if only two had girlfriends between them, was it even true?
Maybe there was a hardship story she hadn’t explored. Local men team up to make their dreams come true? Unlikely businessmen turn bees into fortunes? Maybe. It was unusual to find a group of five men living together and running a business.
“That’s basically it,” Amir said, gesturing to the grounds around him.
“Could we maybe go back inside to talk more?”
“Umm, sure, I guess. Did you still have questions?”
“I have nothing but questions.”
They went back inside and returned to the living room.
“I want to find the best angle for this story,” she said. “Can you tell me about how you got started?”
“Okay. I guess it started with Slade. He wanted to have a business, and he was always intrigued by bees and honey, so he and Beck—he’s one of our primary beekeepers, him and his brother, Knox—they researched bees and honey production. Seemed like a good fit. They brought on Knox and then found me and Daxton. We’d been friends for a long time, so it seemed natural to go into business together. Then, we started making money and it became a bigger production. We added the facility and started spreading out.”
“Wow, that’s fascinating.” She scribbled notes quickly. Lifelong friends, went into business together and found success. That could be a good story. “What made you want to live together?”
He shrugged. “Convenience. When we started looking for land for the facility, we found this place. It had been some sort of farm and the building housed chickens I think. The house was here and it was big enough. None of us were tied down with families or anything and we were pretty young. We figured, since we were working together and had to be here so much anyway, it made sense.”
“But you’re not related? Not even fraternity brothers or something like that?”
“I think Slade was in a frat. Dax, maybe, but I don’t know because we didn’t go to school together. Beck and Knox didn’t go at all, but they’re related. Brothers, like I said.”
“Right.” She nodded. “And none of you are… lovers?”
He pulled his eyebrows down and leaned back an inch. “No.”
“Never know.” She winked. “All these men, living together. Nothing wrong with a little action after work.”
He took in a deep breath. “Well, no. We’re all straight.”
She nodded and jotted this down. So it was a bachelor house. “None of you are married now?”
“No. A few serious relationships, maybe. Like I said, Knox’s girlfriend Jasmine lives here. But Beck just broke up with someone and Slade and I are single.”
“The eternal bachelors?”
“I sure hope not. I’d like to have a family one day.”
She caught his eye and gave him a genuine smile. He’d make some beautiful babies, that was for sure. And a smart businessman, too? He was a good catch. Maybe she’d even consider casting her own line out. Her earlier idea of sleeping with him to get closer and get insider information wasn’t out of the question. Or maybe she’d just sleep with him for fun. Either way. She couldn’t go wrong.
She decided it was worth a shot. “Would you maybe want to go out for coffee sometime?” She smiled at him again, her heart fluttering slightly as he considered.
Then he broke into a smile. “Are you going to write about that, too?”
“Not unless the coffee suddenly explodes and you jump in to save me and put out the flames.”
He chuckled. “Let’s hope that doesn’t happen. Coffee. When?”
“When are you free? Later this week?”
“Sure. You have my card. Let’s make it Friday. Call me with a time.”
“Okay. I will.” She smiled again and stood, smoothing her skirt down. “Thank you so much for your time, Amir. Can’t wait for Friday.”
He walked her to the door and stood there, watching her drive away.“How’s that story on the Ozark moonshiners?” Davis asked Thursday morning.
Kora sighed. “Well, if you mean the story about the charming businessmen living together like brothers to run their dream business of making and selling honey and honey-related products, it’s going great. Finding nothing illegal, though.”
“Gotta be something.”
“I’m still on it. Having coffee tomorrow with one of the men. But, I’ve toured their place. There’s nothing there. No place to hide a whole distillery, at least.”
He knocked on her desk. Why did he always do that?
“Keep on it. I have faith in you.”
That Friday,
she sat across from Amir in a local coffee shop. She watched him pull a small bottle of honey from his pocket to put in his coffee.
“Are you just that sweet that you carry honey on you?” she asked, smiling at him over her cup.
He laughed. “I guess I’m slightly biased. I like our stuff the best. And I never drink coffee without honey, so I have no choice but to supply my own.”
“Or convince the owners of the shop to only have Bear Natural Honey available for their customers.”
“Now that,” he said, pointing at her, “is exactly why I’m in quality control and not sales. That’s something Dax would think of. I should suggest that, actually. Even if we gave them honey or gave them a deep discount. It’d be like giving out free samples.”
“Exactly.”
He took his phone out from his pocket. “Excuse me one second. I want to text this to Dax. He’s better at doing the actual talking.”
She waited until he put the phone away. “You seem pretty smooth with words yourself.”
“Do I? Years of my father’s coaching, I suppose.”
“Did you grow up in this country?”
He took a sip of coffee and nodded. “I did. My parents came from Iran years before I was born. But that didn’t stop my father from putting me through the best schools and making sure I knew all about my middle eastern heritage.”
“That’s important, don’t you think?”
“Oh yes, absolutely. Until they expected me to live as they wanted instead of living my own life. If it were up to them, I would have been married years ago to the woman they chose and working with my father in his accounting firm.”
“But you didn’t want to do that?”
“I’m not into numbers like that. Though, his firm does do a lot of our accounting. You should call him, maybe. For your story. He could validate our numbers.”
“That might not be a bad idea. But you know”—she leaned forward, closer to him—“it’s the stories of illegal stuff that really sell.”
“Sorry I can’t help you there.”
“You don’t happen to have any honey rivals or anything?”
“Oh sure, there’s always competition in business.”
She nodded and glanced down at her recorder. The green light still blinked. Not that he was giving her anything good.
“So, what about you? Did you always want to be a reporter, or did your parents force you into it?”
“Reporting found me, I think. I started out writing stories about my stuffed animals when I was a kid and investigating anything that happened around the neighborhood. A house gets toilet papered, a car tire is slashed, a bike is stolen. But when the local paper did a story on me and all my little stories—I’d actually managed to give some valuable information to the police one time—that’s when I really fell in love and knew I had to become a reporter. The truth needs to be out there, you know? People deserve to know what’s going on around them.”
“You don’t believe in keeping any secrets?”
She shook her head. “Nope. Not if it concerns the community or could affect people.”
“That must be difficult.”
“What?”
“Getting people to give up all their secrets.”
She winked. “It’s not as hard as you think. Wouldn’t you want to tell me all your secrets?” she asked in a playfully flirty voice, then laughed.
“I don’t know.” He let his gaze roam over her. “Maybe.”
“So you do have secrets, then?”
“Just one.”Kora paced in her office, thinking. She hit play again on her recorder and listened to their conversation. The one about having secrets. He’d admitted to having a secret. That had to be something with the business. He was giving her a hint. The look in his eyes when he’d said it. Almost like he wished he could tell her.
She had to find out more, had to see what his secret was. Maybe if she snuck back to the house in the middle of the night, she could break into the facility and find something. Was there a basement in the building? Only one way to find out, right?
That night, she dressed all in black and tied her dark hair back into a ponytail. She had her phone charged, her pocket flashlight tucked away, and her recorder ready. She parked down the road a little ways and traipsed through the woods beside their driveway, staying in shadows and out of sight. Who knew what their schedule was or how late they stayed up? It was almost 2 a.m., but to someone running their own business, that was an early night if you had paperwork to do.
When she got closer, she saw that there were no lights on in the house. The facility, too, was dark. She crept closer and watched from the trees. There was a figure outside the processing facility. Was it one of the men?
As she watched, she thought the figure looked too small to be one of the men. She’d only met a few of them, but three of the five were huge and judging from the photo hanging on the wall, so were the other two.
Something about this didn’t seem right. The figure didn’t have a flashlight. What could he or she be doing without a flashlight out there, walking around the building? Then she saw something in the person’s hand. A bottle of some sort?
She pulled out her phone and started filming. It might be nothing, but if it was something, she wanted proof.
She was watching through the screen, squinting to try to make out what the person was doing when there was a bright flash of light. Then, there were flames.
The fire started small. Just a spot by the person’s feet, but it quickly spread. There was enough light now to see that the person was female. And she held a gas can. That’s what she’d been doing. Walking around, dousing the building with gas.
The flames spread along the line of gas. The woman took off running toward the woods. Then, something happened that Kora could not believe.
As she watched, she saw the five men run out of the house. All of them charged forward quickly, angry with rage, heading for the building. She saw Amir, shirtless, and admired his bare chest for a split second until it vanished. Almost all at once, the men leapt forward and became bears.
Their skin sprouted thick fur, their clothing fell to the ground in shreds, and they roared. She looked back at the girl who’d set the fire, horrified for a moment that she was about to be attacked by five bears, but then the girl, too, changed. She became a bear and took off running into the woods.
Soon, they were all out of sight. Kora sat there, stunned, for a long time. She still held the phone in case they’d come running back, but the flames grew and spread.
She should call someone. 911, the cops, anyone. But tell them what? That she’d just seen six people turn into bears and run into the woods? They’d think she was crazy. She stopped filming and went back to the start of the video.
There was the woman, walking around, pouring gas along the building. Then the flames, then the men, then the bears. She hadn’t imagined it. She hadn’t been seeing things. Amir, his friends, and this girl, all turned into huge black bears and ran off.
Part of her thought she’d wake up any minute. This had to be a dream because people didn’t turn into bears. They just didn’t. Plus, there was a building on fire in front of her and she wasn’t doing anything about it. She watched the flames, watched everything Amir and his friends had worked for go up in smoke.
Breakwater: Custer (BBW Bad Boy Space Bear Shifter Romance) Page 41