NaturesBounty (8 page)

“Twice,” he repeated. “Once here and once so I could clock
that goon back at your place.”

“You’re forgetting when I bared my breasts for
you
.
If I hadn’t done that, I’m betting you’d have had me cuffed and out the door
without a clue that those idiots were planning to jump us on the road. Might
not have gone so well.”

“I suppose that’s a fair point.” His smile sobered, and he
reached over to take her hand. “It’ll be okay, Lydia. We
will
find a way
to dig out of this hole. Trust me.”

She just nodded, gaping at him in silence. There was
something far more intimate in the way he touched her hand than the kisses they
had just indulged. She laced her fingers through his, and they stayed that way
while he drove them back to the highway and for a good while beyond.

Somewhere between California and Arizona, she came to a
decision.

Nate had put himself out there for her, fighting off the men
he could have simply handed her to. Because of his heroics, he was in almost as
much trouble as she was. She couldn’t allow that. His idea about using the
evidence in court to gain her the upper hand was noble, but naïve. Andrew would
find a way to cover his bases by the time it came down to it. She couldn’t take
the risk. She had to play this game the hard way.

Despite Nate’s warnings that they should stick together, she
knew she had to do the opposite. Once they made it to Flagstaff and she caught
a few hours’ sleep, she would have to slip out and finish this alone.

* * * * *

Nate woke up to the tickle of a woman’s hair trailing over
his bare stomach. A hand that was not his own was exploring the hard, throbbing
ridge inside his pants. He had been sleeping on his back with one arm flung
over his head and the other curved protectively around the woman who was no
longer sleeping peacefully at his side.

The naughty seductress was back in force.

Lydia had pushed herself up on one arm, and she was leaning
over him while she stroked his hard cock. When he stirred, she raised her head
and gave him a guilty smile.

“I’m sorry,” she said, sounding no more remorseful than the
last time she’d apologized while he had an erection. “I swore to myself I
wasn’t going to do this. I was lying here watching you sleep, and I couldn’t
help myself. All I could do was stare at your chest. It’s your own fault, you
know, for not having a shirt on.”

“Now you know how I felt the first few hours we were
together,” he said thickly. He rubbed sleep from his eyes, but when he went to
lower his other arm, it wouldn’t budge.

He flinched and jerked his head up to find his wrist was
cuffed to one of the spindles on the wooden headboard.

“What the hell is this?” he asked, tugging on the cuffs.

“Now you know how
I
felt the first few hours we were
together. Some of it, anyway.”

“You stole my cuffs while I was sleeping.”

“Relax, Nate.” She winked at him and began pulling down his
unzipped trousers. “You like kinky sex, don’t deny it. Or else that whole
little scene back at the beach house would never have happened.”

He liked kinky sex just fine. But his fantasies about her
and handcuffs hadn’t involved him being the one bound up. Maybe it wasn’t so
bad, though. His dick sure wasn’t complaining. It jumped out and hit his belly
stiffly when she tugged off his pants. And he still had one hand free, at
least, in order to take advantage of the fact that he wasn’t the only one who
no longer had any clothes on.

Lydia climbed on top of him without a stitch on. As
unbelievably beautiful as she’d looked splayed out naked on the dining table,
straddling him with her hair hanging down to partially obscure the gleam in her
eyes turned her into a wicked goddess. Every curve and dip beckoned, driving
him instantly insane.

She had his wallet in her hand, and it occurred to him that
in another setting, the overall picture would be a lot more disturbing. But he
knew what she had in mind.

“One left,” she said, tearing the foil packet with her teeth
the way he’d done the night before.

“I knew there was something I forgot to pick up when we were
out shopping,” he said and groaned out loud when she touched him to roll on the
rubber.

He’d obviously slept through some interesting foreplay,
because neither Lydia nor his pulsing cock seemed to need any warming up. She
raised her ass up and sat down on him slowly, and he watched his dick disappear
inch by inch inside her trimmed, already primed pussy. Her nipples were stiff
and pink, and her body went rigid while she speared herself on him.

He gazed at her in near disbelief when she began fucking
him. Such beauty and animalistic, pornographic need didn’t exist in women
outside the triple-X-rated movies, did it? Maybe he was just dreaming. Maybe he
was still back in the other motel room, the one where he’d only fantasized
about doing the hot woman he was hunting down.

She pressed her hips against his pelvis and began to rock,
and she let out a moan that stood the hair on his arms straight up. Jesus, the
woman could turn him on like no other. He reached for her with his free hand,
and she bent down obligingly so he could grab a luscious, round tit and give it
a squeeze.

“What is it about you that turns me into an insanely horny
woman?” she asked, opening her mouth in a silent gasp when he pinched her hard
nipple.

“Maybe the same thing that has me throwing every warning
about trouble in high heels out the window.”

His frustration mounted as the restraint on his other wrist
kept him from pleasuring her other breast. Or gripping both her hips while she
rode him. Or better yet, flipping her over and plunging into her with her legs
draped on his shoulders. Still, he shoved his hips upward hard to meet hers,
grunting with each thrust until he felt his balls begin pulling tight to his
body.

“Nate,” she said, riding him faster. “I have a confession to
make.”

“Now?”

“You’re the best I’ve ever had.”

“Stop talking and fuck me harder, woman,” he said with a
wicked smile, remembering her words to him when she’d been the one on her back.
“Let me feel your nails on the chest you were busy staring at while I slept.”

She dug in immediately, and he tensed with the exquisite
pain-pleasure of her raking his skin. She pinched his nipples hard, then
twisted them while she started picking up her entire torso and slamming her ass
against him violently. Her tits practically jolted off her body as she fucked
him wild, and he knew he was going to explode before she could come.

“Easy, baby,” he told her through clenched teeth. “The idea
is to use me to get yourself off
before
you kill me.”

Lydia froze and gave a yell, and he realized she’d already
gotten there. His toes curled as he took hold of her thigh and let go, joining
her in a real gut-wrenching orgasm that seemed to blow off more than just
sexual steam. For a moment, he was free of the whole bullshit scene. There was
no fear that a battering ram would crash through the door at any moment, and
men shouting and waving guns would pile in while he was shoved onto his face
and handcuffed. In climax, it was just the two of them, a pair of sexually
compatible adults who were free to indulge any passion they wanted.

When his consciousness floated down to the bed a short time
later, it wasn’t only to discover good sex couldn’t actually repair the hole
fate had just ripped through his life. Lydia was already off him and tugging on
the jeans that had given him an instant erection in the middle of a store. She
put them on commando style, dropping her bikini bottoms on his bare,
still-throbbing crotch.

“I’m not wearing those,” he said, trying to scoot himself
upright.

“I should hope not. Consider them a little memento of the
occasion.”

“Can I have the handcuff key now, please?” he asked while
she pulled on her shirt and flipped her hair out of the back.

She put her shoes on without a word.

“Very funny,” he said. “Be a good girl, Ly, and take off the
cuffs so I can shower.”

She whirled on him. “How do you know that nickname?”

“I heard it when I was eavesdropping on your call with
Valerie the day she hired the stripper.” On the drive to Flagstaff, he had
already told her how Valerie had inadvertently provided him with everything he
needed to know about where Lydia was, as well as giving him the stripper idea.

She actually looked stricken at that. “Oh.” There was a
pause. “So there was actually a stripper.”

“I told you there was. Is that disappointment I hear?”

When she grabbed for the jacket he’d bought her, he frowned.
“What are you doing?”

She pulled on the ski coat and turned, and this time, the
guilt in her face and her voice were quite real. “I’m really sorry, Nate. I
planned to be gone before you woke up.” She gazed at his body longingly. “I
just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t leave without fucking you one more time.”

Now he was pulling hard on his wrist. “Leave? What the hell
are you talking about? I thought we agreed we need to stay together?”

She shook her head and went to the door. “I can’t let you be
involved. It wouldn’t be right.”

“I already am involved. You leaving now won’t change that.”

“Those men nearly shot you because of me. If we stay
together, you might get in harm’s way again.” She glanced at the floor. “I
couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you because of me.”

“A little late for that, wouldn’t you say?”

“I’m going to fix it. I have to see Andrew.”

“Why? No, Ly. Don’t.”

“That’s the only way to stop this. I know I can work a deal
with him. Then you’ll be free again, and hopefully I will too.”

She reached for the knob, and desperation reared up in him.
“Stop!” he called. “Do not go out that door. Let me help you, Lydia. Don’t do
something we’ll both regret.”

“Too late,” she whispered, and she pulled open the door.
Bright sunlight streamed in, meaning it was midmorning at least.

Lydia paused in the open doorway for a final look at him.
“God, I really wish we could have met under better circumstances. Stay safe,
Nature Antillean.”

Then she was gone.

“God damn it,” he said, shifting around to check the
handcuffs. They weren’t loose, but she had neglected to secure them on his arm
above the wrist bone.

Putting his thumb to his pinky, he used a twist and tug
motion. It took some doing, but he managed to slip off the cuff. Resisting the
urge to bolt after her stark naked, he grabbed his pants and barely tugged them
on before running barefoot out the door. Their room was on the second floor,
and by the time he hit the stair rail, he saw the taillights of his car headed
out the driveway.

“She’s stealing my fucking car,” he said, racing back to the
room with his pants still flapped open. “Miss I’m-not-a-lawbreaker just
committed grand theft auto.”

Which would be exactly what he would have to do in order to
stop her.

He took quick stock of what Lydia had and hadn’t taken.
She’d left with the new cell phone and some of the cash, not to mention the
contents of his trunk. But she hadn’t left him entirely destitute. She hadn’t
emptied all the cash from his wallet, and he still had a few of the prepaid
cards. One of them had already been used to secure the motel room, though.

Nate stuffed what he had into his jacket pocket, except for
the key to the room. He left that on the round table on his way out the door.
He wouldn’t be coming back.

Breaking into a car and hotwiring it was among his skill
sets, but he’d only done it on his own cars. He’d never swiped someone else’s.
Anger and guilt mixed in his gut as he picked out an older, nondescript car
that he was lucky enough to find had the back door unlocked.

“Add one more sin to the list of reasons why the cops want
you,” he muttered as he twisted wires together to spark the engine to life.

He squealed out of the parking lot, hanging a right in the
direction he’d seen her go. Why was she doing this? If she wanted to meet with
the asshole boss on the sly, there was no reason not to let Nate help. It would
have been much better to have him on her side. Not wanting him in danger was
noble, but it was a weak excuse. Danger was a been-there-done-that deal
already, and it had left him a wanted man. She was putting herself in a highly
unsafe situation by not having someone to watch her back.

Nate spotted his car a few blocks away, and he zoomed up to
follow her from a couple car lengths behind. She pulled off for gas, and he
considered confronting her then and there. He could re-cuff her and strap her
in for the ride, and then demand that she tell him where they were going. But
somehow, he knew she would find a way around accepting his help. He’d have to
give it to her without her knowing.

The Toyota he’d swiped had only a third of a tank of gas, so
he couldn’t follow her for long before fuel became a problem. Still, if his
instincts were right, she wouldn’t be headed out of town just yet. He knew what
her next stop would be after this.

She came out of the mini-mart with his new cell phone
pressed to her ear. She looked worried as she spoke, not to mention guilty as
hell. Her eyes flicked all around, as if she expected a SWAT team to jump her
at any moment. Or maybe for Nate to pop up.

Judging from the look on her face when she hung up, he had a
fair guess who she’d been talking to. She’d made contact with Andrew about a
deal. Nate slipped out of the stolen car while she was gassing up, and he kept
a low profile while he picked out a blue Neon.

The ignition cap was trickier on this model, and he was
still fucking with it when he saw Lydia hang up the pump nozzle and get in the
car.

“Shit,” he said while she pulled away. Maybe he should have
stowed away in the back while she’d gone inside.