When she pulled up at a bus station, he parked and dashed inside the adjacent mini-mart for a caffeine boost and another disposable phone. This one was a cheap flip job with no bells and whistles, but he wanted it on hand just in case.
He was back behind the wheel by the time Lydia emerged, clutching a manila envelope and a coffee to go. This was it. Nate wasn’t entirely sure where she had arranged to meet the guy who had put a major cramp in Nate’s life as well as hers, but he was fairly certain the meeting wouldn’t take place in Arizona. They were most likely headed back to some point between here and the place where this odyssey had all begun. What the hell he would do, exactly, once he followed her there was another story. He had no weapon, save the screwdriver, no fun little spy gadgets, and little idea as to what kind of muscle the guy had on hand.
Maybe Lydia was right about working a deal to make all this go away, but Nate doubted it. As she got on the highway, he stayed a couple of cars behind and spent a good half hour spitting out profanities while he fought to open the ass-cheap cell phone package and get the thing working. Another ten minutes was spent trying to pull the number he needed from his memory.
Several wrong numbers later, he heard a suspicious and familiar, “Yeah?”
“Benny, it’s me. Nate.”
“Nate? Is that you? Fuck, boy, word has it that you’ve landed yourself in ten kinds of shit.”
“Twelve kinds. That’s why I’m calling.” He blew out a breath. “I hate to ask, but I need someone to watch my back while I’m watching someone else’s. I need your help. A shitload of it.”
Chapter Five
Lydia got out in front of the address she’d been given and closed her car door. Nate’s car door, rather. Another wave of guilt washed on top of her anxiety. As she looked at the building jutting up against the night sky, she wondered what Nate was doing right then. He would be long out of the handcuffs by now. If nothing else, the maid would have come by and discovered him. If he’d been smart, he’d stayed put at the motel to lie low until this was all over. She hoped he was doing exactly that, and that he wasn’t hating her too much in the process.
No doubt he was pissed as hell at her for stealing from him, but she had every intention of giving him the car back after this was done. Hopefully he realized she had no choice, and that she had to do this without him. If Nate had come along loaded for bear, Andrew would know they’d teamed up. He might be a lot less likely to make a deal with her if he knew she’d already told others the truth.
The office building was abandoned, but it wasn’t locked. She clutched the envelope in her hand as she entered, wondering why it hadn’t dawned on her to bring a flashlight. It was pitch black inside.
Blinking furiously against the darkness, she took a few tentative steps on shaky legs. A bright beam of light pierced the night, hitting her square in the face.
“That’s far enough,” a man said, and she knew the voice all too well. “Did you bring what I want?”
“You can see I have it in my hand,” she said, squinting her eyes against the glare. Trying to peer past the flashlight beam did no good. Everything else was still shrouded.
“Then let’s take our meeting somewhere with a little better lighting, shall we?”
Her arms were grabbed suddenly by men who appeared on either side of her. They “escorted” her along the path where their own wildly bobbing flashlight beams were trained. A door popped open, and ambient light from a single lamp spilled from the room. Lydia was taken inside, where Andrew sat on the edge of a small desk that the banker’s lamp was on. The room had little else in the way of office decor except for an unused waste bin and papers strewn everywhere. There weren’t even any chairs.
The men stood on either side of her and she glanced at them. They weren’t the same goons who had broken into her Venice hideaway, and she wasn’t certain whether she was relieved or disturbed by that fact. She was in no hurry to see those two again, but the question of how many brutes Andrew had on the bad-guy payroll sat heavily on her.
“Check her,” Andrew said.
Both men turned, and one grabbed the envelope and held her arms behind her back while the other ran his hands over her.
“Hey!” she shouted when he literally squeezed each breast, hefting and prodding into her cleavage. “Hey! What the hell is this about? Can’t you guys get a real date?”
“Relax,” Andrew said. “I’m just making sure we can talk freely. I’m sure you had something similar done when you were booked into jail.”
With that, her shirt was yanked up, and her bikini top was searched inside and out. For a final insult, one of the men stuffed his hand down her pants. She struggled and spit curse words at him.
“Don’t fight him,” Andrew said. “Unlike my other friends, these men are gentlemen. They won’t pull out their weapons unless they have to. Let’s not make it necessary.”
She gritted her teeth while the guy proceeded to very intimately, though roughly, probe her entire crack from her clit to her ass. When he pulled away, there was a sick gleam of satisfaction on the asshole’s face.
“Yeah, a real fucking gentleman,” she said. She yanked her arm hard, and the other man let go.
“Sorry that was necessary,” Andrew said, “but things with you haven’t exactly gone as expected.”
She snorted. “Yeah, well, working at your company didn’t quite line up with my five-year plan either.”
“I have to say, your little jaunt to California came as quite a surprise.” He nodded to the guy with the envelope, who stepped forward and handed it over. “That wasn’t part of the plan at all. I’m afraid you made matters a lot worse for yourself.”
“You’re the one who made matters worse for me,” she said as he opened the envelope.
“On the contrary. I was just trying to make an important point about the consequences of corporate snooping.” He peered inside the envelope and shook his head. “Oh dear. Yes, this little piece of paper would have been quite inconvenient to explain away.” He glanced at her. “You were supposed to sit in jail overnight until I could pay you a visit, explain how this was going to work, and then drop the charges when I was assured of your cooperation. Instead, you somehow managed to post bail despite a frozen bank account and then skipped out of state.” He waggled a finger at her.
“I always keep rainy-day money. You never know when some criminal is going to come along and spoil your parade.” She cocked her head. “Out of curiosity’s sake, just how were you going to say this would work before I ruined your little plan?”
He held up the envelope. “You were going to hand over the evidence you stole and go away quietly in exchange for me dropping the charges against you. Should at any point you decide to change your mind, you would go to jail for embezzling.”
“Which you yourself are actually guilty of.”
“But with all trails now conveniently pointed to you,” he said, lifting the envelope, “this was the only remaining evidence of any, shall we say, questionable bookkeeping with my name attached.”
He stood and straightened his suit jacket. “That deal is still on the table. We part ways professionally, of course, and in lieu of severance, you can keep twenty percent of the money that was funneled into your account to help sell your embezzlement. I’ll drop the charges against you. All I need is your silence and any copies you made of this bank statement.”
“I made two copies when I left town,” she said, nodding to the envelope. “Two copies are there. The original was in the beach house when your testosterone convention showed up, so I assume you already have that one.”
He gave her a tiny smile. “I do, in fact.” He tore the envelope in half and pulled a lighter from his chest pocket. He lit the corner of the papers and dropped the burning evidence into the metal waste bin nearby.
“Speaking of testosterone,” he added, watching the flames climb, “my associates were highly pissed off about the man who attacked them.”
Acrid smoke
curled up from the trash bin. “Attacked them? That’s a load of crap. He was defending us. I don’t suppose you plan on paying for the damage? That place is owned by someone dear to me. He said I could use it whenever I wanted, not trash the joint.”
“Consider it the price for doing business poorly.” He glanced over at the burning trash. The flames were higher, but still contained.
“I know you left with Nate Antillean,” he went on. “Do tell, where is he now?”
She lifted her chin. “I have no idea.”
“And yet you pulled up in front of this building in a car registered to him. The same car my guys followed to California.”
“Yeah, that.” She shrugged. “I sort of borrowed that car without permission after I escaped from him.”
He looked unconvinced. “Is that so?”
She glowered back at him. “Yeah, that’s so. Look, I wasn’t about to let that bounty hunter drag me back to jail, and I sure as hell didn’t want him to know about this little tea party of ours. So I left him handcuffed in a motel room two states away.”
“My, you really have taken to the criminal life, haven’t you?”
“I did what I had to in order to survive. Now, about this deal, does it include letting Nate off the hook as well? Just because I screwed him over doesn’t mean I want him declared a fugitive for helping me get away from your bastard henchmen.”
He shook his head. “I told you, this entire incident went way off the map. I can drop the original charges I arranged to have brought against you, but anything you or your friend did after that is totally out of my hands.”
“He’s not my friend. He’s just an asshole bounty hunter.” While she spat out the words, she really hoped her face looked stoic enough to be convincing.
“I understand my men waited quite some time outside your apartment for him to bring you out.” He paused. “After delivering balloons to you. Birthday gift?”
She felt her face go hot. “The idiot didn’t even have a gun. He wanted to use minimal force in my capture, so he waited until I opened the door for him and let my guard down. And after you, I’m sure you can understand how that took a while. I don’t trust men in suits.”
There was a look on his face that suggested he knew more about the ruse Nate used to get inside, but she held his steely, narrowed gaze steadily.
“Really brave of your muscle heads, by the way,” she went on, “charging in on an innocent woman and an unarmed man.”
“Not so unarmed, from the way I hear it.” He smiled slowly. “Or innocent.”
“Fine, whatever. Are you going to agree to this deal or not?”
“I told you, the deal’s still on the table.” He glanced at the burning bank statements. “As for the extras you’re trying to include, I’m afraid that’s impossible. I control FTI, not the entire police force.”
“And yet you somehow knew enough to have Nate followed. You must have some influence.”
He shrugged. “I may have found out that your bond agent is willing to do favors for the right price. I’m sure you can understand, what with his bonds running out on him. How’s a man to earn a living?”
“So you made him your bitch.”
“I merely made sure he chose the right man for the job of finding you, and he fed me certain information as to your whereabouts when it came along.”
Her heart pounded. So, Nate had been right. Asa had deliberately picked him to track her down because he knew Nate wouldn’t use a gun. He hadn’t, however, apparently counted on Nate being just as effective a fighter without one.
“Because you wanted to get to me first, obviously.”
“I wanted a chance to discuss my offer privately before you found your way back to jail.” He paused. “Something you seem intent on doing.”
She sniffed. “You stole from your own coffers, blamed it on the help, and then talked the law into helping you. Now you’ve screwed another guy’s future just for helping me. I’m hardly the bigger bad here.”
He laughed. “I may have been the one diverting funds for personal use, but you were the one who went on to commit additional crimes. You and your bounty hunter.”
“Because you gave us no choice. So do we have a deal? Surely you can swing one more favor to make this all go away.”
He cocked his head at her. “Why does it matter to you whether he gets arrested? If he’s just some asshole bounty hunter, you should be happy to see him pay for trying to take you to jail.”
“I want to walk away with a clean conscience. The guy was just doing his job.”
“And then some.” He eyed her for a long moment before glancing up at his men. “Let’s double the guard outside, shall we? Just in case anyone happens to be skulking around doing their jobs.” He nodded to the guy on her right. “Check in with Art.”
The man got on his radio while the other one went out the door.
“I told you, he’s not here,” she said. “I stole his car and left him stranded in Arizona. He knows nothing about this meeting.”
“Are you sure about that?” Andrew asked.
“All clear,” came the return report on the radio.
She shot Andrew a smug look. “See? You’re wasting time. Let’s finish this deal and get the hell out of here. The sooner we ‘part ways professionally’, as you put it, the better I’ll like it.”
“Very well,” he said. “I’ll call the attorney first thing in the morning. The embezzlement charges will be dropped after my discovering that the entire incident was due to an unfortunate accounting error. Once your account is unfrozen, the money shifted there will be removed. Twenty percent will be diverted to you in a separate account as your fee for keeping quiet about the bank statement you stole.”
“And my other request?”
He shook his head. “There truly is nothing I can do about any other charges. You had no prior record, however. Get yourself a good lawyer. I’m sure he can talk the jail time down to a minimum.”
She curled her lip at him. “You just used ‘good’ and ‘lawyer’ in the same sentence. That’s funny.”
“It’s your own fault that you broke the law by running. If you’d have stayed put, this would all be behind us.”
So, she would still be a fugitive, and so would Nate. And if he was so inclined to press charges, she was a car thief as well.
“Fine,” she said.
The radio crackled to life. “I have movement out here,” said someone on the other end. The message was broken up by a weak signal, but then she heard, “Hey, you! Stop right there.”
The goon beside her flinched, but Andrew shook his head. “You stay here.” He shot Lydia a glance. “She supposedly escaped a bounty hunter. Keep an eye on her. Feel free to watch from the point of your gun if she does anything stupid.”
He stalked over and snatched the radio from the other man’s hand. “Five, what’s going on?”
Silence followed for a while before the answer came. “Negative. Some homeless drunk was trying to get in the back door.”
Andrew’s eyes narrowed as he regarded Lydia. “And does this drunk in any way fit the description of Nate Antillean?”
She stiffened. It couldn’t be. No way could he have gotten to her so fast. Even if he’d escaped the cuffs, how would he have been able to find her?
That’s when she thought of the smart phone tucked in her jacket pocket.
“Negative,” came the reply. “It’s some old, short guy who needs a bath in something other than booze.”
“Get rid of him. We’re almost ready to leave.”
He turned and headed for the smoldering trash bin. His back was still turned when the ceiling somehow caved in. Something large and dark dropped down behind the man guarding Lydia, and he was suddenly pushed to the floor. She jumped aside, startled and wide-eyed, at the sight of the gun that appeared beside her. Her hands flew up in automatic surrender, a pose she was becoming far too used to these days. While the commotion didn’t allow her to register the voi
ce shouting commands at Andrew, a glance upward along the gun arm showed her who was pointing it.
“Nate,” she whispered.
This was a very different man, however, from the one who had handed her balloons or even cuffed her back at the apartment. He had on his badge, along with a flak vest and a highly focused, determined expression that left no doubt that he meant deadly business.
Cops burst into the room in a scene similar to the one that had resulted in broken furniture and a mad dash down a fire escape back in Venice. Andrew’s hands were on his head as he sank to the paper-littered floor. Lydia did the same, but she wasn’t the focus of attention. One officer stood over her, his gun pointed at her head, while the rest dealt with her former employer.
Nate had used a nylon tie to cuff the man who’d all but finger-fucked Lydia, and he yanked the guy’s gun from a belt holster before sticking it away in his own waistband. He never looked her way as he jerked the man upright and led him out of her line of sight. No doubt he was thoroughly pissed at her for what she’d done to him. At least it appeared that he was working with the police, rather than running from them. Maybe that meant he wasn’t a fugitive anymore. At least one of them would have a life again. Considering her recent actions, he was the one most deserving of it.
“You lying little bitch,” Andrew said as his hands were zip-tied behind his back. “I thought you might have been trying to play me for a fool.” He jerked his head toward the waste bin. “But what you thought you had on me is gone now. As is your chance to make a deal.”
“I said I made two copies when I left town,” she said. “Which I did. I just forgot to mention the copies I made on the way back here.”
His nostrils flared as he was hauled to his feet. A cop was trying to read him Miranda rights, but he wasn’t listening. His eyes stared daggers at Lydia, who also stood.
“My lawyers will see to it those statements are seen as frauds you created to cover your ass. You’ve achieved nothing.”
NaturesBounty Page 9