The Playboy's Fugitive Bride (24 page)

She’d almost peed herself when she’d emerged from the ladies’ room to find Massimo waiting for her, but it turned out to be a stroke of luck and played out well in her favor.

Soon Massimo would soon be a distant memory, Nia thought as the limo came to a stop in the lighted courtyard and John got out to open the door for her.

Nia pressed down on the gas pedal as she drove along Route 80.  She was the only motorist on the road, which suited her fine.  All she had to do now was get to the beat-up car she’d purchased today, transfer her luggage and take off down the highway to Manchester.

She hoped to be miles away from Granite Falls by the time Massimo got home from his meeting and discovered his fiancée and his two million dollars had flown the coop.

It was such a relief when she’d gotten to the mansion to find that Azi was out for the evening.  With no one to deter her, Nia had packed as quickly as possible, stuffing all the clothes she’d brought to Granite Falls along with some that Massimo had bought her into two large suitcases she’d found in one of the empty bedrooms.  Among those she left was the red dress he’d forced her to wear last night, but at the last minute she’d grabbed the ugly gray one he’d tricked her into buying and tossed it into the suitcase just before closing it.  She’d keep it as a memento of their feud and the fact that she’d won.

A smile of victory parted Nia’s lips as she imagined the look of utter bewilderment on Massimo’s face when he walked into the master suite to find his bed and her closet empty.  She wished…

Nia glanced in her rearview mirror and frowned.  A cruiser with flashing lights was barreling toward her.  She glanced at her speedometer and hastily eased up off the gas.  She was going ten miles over the posted speed limit, and was still the only car on the road.  Surely, he wasn’t stopping her for such a trivial traffic violation.  People sped along this road all the time.  Even Massimo and his driver were in the habit of going well over the speed limit, and the law didn’t seem to care until tonight.

With the cruiser practically riding her tail, Nia slowed way down and pulled to the side of the road.  This was her first traffic violation.  She hoped the officer would take that into consideration and let her off with a warning.   She rolled down her window as the burly frame of the officer approached her car.  “Good evening, Officer—” She squinted up at his badge.  “Jordan.”

“Registration and license, please,” he demanded in a dry tone.

A thick fog hovered at the cave of his mouth where his warm breath and the cold night air collided.  He was a veteran cop, probably in his early fifties, and displayed the no-nonsense air of authority that came with time and experience on the police force.  “What’s the problem, Officer?”  Nia asked in a calm voice as she tried to hide her intimidation.

“You were speeding, Ma’am.”

She blinked as the bright beam of his flashlight hit her face.  “I didn’t realize I was speeding.”  Nia had heard somewhere that when a cop stopped you, you should never admit to anything.  Innocent until proven guilty was the good old American way, and until this cop showed her the reading on his radar, she’d swear she was driving under the speed limit.

Officer Jordan shifted the stream of light from her face to the backseat, bobbing it around as if he was looking for something.  “Registration and license, please,” he reiterated, and brought the beam back to her face.

So he was going to be a hard-ass.  With a sigh of frustration, Nia reached into the glove compartment and pulled out the registration then she rummaged through her purse and fished out her license.  She handed them over.  Maybe when he saw the names Andretti and Sylk, he’d realize she was Massimo’s fiancée, apologize profusely for his blunder, and send her on her way.  For once, Nia was happy Massimo had publicly linked her name with his.

This was clearly not her night, Nia thought as the officer frowned at the documents, placed his hand on the handle of his pistol and stepped back.  “Miss Sylk, I’m going to have to ask you to step out of the car.” 

Icy fear twisted around Nia’s heart.  Had her past finally caught up to her?  Had her many years on the run come to an end?  Her mind flashed back almost five years ago to the day in Philadelphia when her neighbors had told her that a strange man had been asking questions about her.  Certain it was Maine’s social services on her tail, she’d packed up Aaron, run to New York, and changed their names.

“Ma’am, please get out of the car.”

Nia swallowed the lump in her throat.  “Why?  What did I do?”

“You’ve committed a crime.”

A crime?
 
Kidnapping? 
Was there a statute of limitation on kidnaping in Maine?  That’s something she hadn’t checked into. 
False identification? 
Had they finally connected Nia Sylk with Shaina Norwood?  Had she opened Pandora’s box when she applied for a passport in her real name?  “Wha… what kind of crime did I allegedly commit, Officer?” she asked in a shaky voice. 

“Grand theft auto.”

Nia’s eyes popped wide.  “What?”

“This vehicle was reported stolen a short while ago.”

“By whom?”
As if she didn’t know
.  “Who reported it stolen?” she asked, needing confirmation.

“Massimo Andretti, the owner, Ma’am.”

“I’m the owner!  He bought it for me!”  She knew what her declarations implied about her relationship with Massimo, but that was the least of her worries at the moment.

“That may well be the case, Ma’am, but until you produce a document that shows you own this vehicle, I’m going to have to place you under arrest.  So, I will ask again, nicely.  Would you please step out of the car, Miss Sylk?”  His eyes were an icy gray, his thin lips clamped tight.

Nia’s fear exploded into fury.  She yanked the door open and jumped out.  She hadn’t taken the time to change and shivered as the frigid night air crawled beneath her coat, penetrated the thin material of her dinner dress, and wrapped about her like a frosty blanket.

Officer Jordan unsnapped his cuffs from his duty belt.  “Turn around and place your hands behind your back.”

Resisting arrest, whether or not it was warranted was not a smart thing to do.  It was a misdemeanor and although it carried a less severe penalty than a felony, Nia could not afford the mountain of problems that would ensue after such an offense.  As much as she hated it, it was better she played this Massimo’s way.  He was ruthless, and probably very pissed off that she’d tried to deceive him, steal from him.  He was going to teach her a lesson.

Not knowing if this arrest was bogus or real, Nia turned around, placed her hands behind her back, and cringed when the cold metal of the handcuffs snapped around her wrists.

Officer Jordan read her her Miranda Rights then led her to his cruiser.

From the back seat, Nia watched him stroll back to the Mercedes and pop the trunk.  He was bent over it for several moments before he straightened up and began talking on his radio.

He’d found her briefcase with her two million dollars.  She could not explain that away without incriminating herself, admitting that she’d offered Massimo Andretti sex for four million dollars, when all she was really doing was conning him out of two.  None of it sounded good.

Nia wished she’d asked for a bank check instead of cash.

Was that why he hadn’t made love to her tonight—so he could come off as the victim who hadn’t fully participated in her indecent plot?  Damn him! 

Nia had no idea if it was fear, anger, disgust, or just plain spite that forced the bile up her esophagus and into her mouth.  But she nonetheless felt a rush of powerful relief as she bent forward and emptied her stomach on the floor of the cruiser.

Let Massimo Andretti clean that up.

* * *

“You have a visitor, Miss Sylk.”

“I bet I do.”  Nia rose from the narrow cot in the eight-by-four cell in which she’d been locked for the past two hours or so.  She swore Jabari’s cage was a lot roomier than her cell.  Being locked up, having your privileges taken away and placed in someone else’s control was no way to live.  As Nia had sat on the cot, she’d come to realize that life on the run was just as much a prison as the bars that limited her physical movements.

They’d given her the customary one phone call, and she’d wasted it on the only person who could get her out of this mess—the very man who’d gotten her into it.

Again
.

He’d promised to come right over and bail her out.

The last time an Andretti had made a promise to a Norwood, she’d lost her father.

What was it going to cost her this time?  She prayed to God that it wasn’t her brother.

She stared at the ruddy-faced officer as he unlocked her cell—the only one of the eight that was occupied.  She followed him along a corridor and around a corner, grateful that at least they hadn’t handcuffed her again.  They passed the room where he had fingerprinted her and lined her up for her mug shots.  Afterwards, he’d taken her to a multi-stall bathroom so she could wash the stench of vomit from her body.

Once alone, Nia had taken a quick cramped shower in a stall as big as a locker, then pulled out the gray dress from the top of her suitcase and put it on.  She was wearing the second of the two dresses she’d sworn she’d not be in Granite Falls long enough to wear.

Her master scheme was falling apart right in front of her and she was powerless to do anything about it.

Nia sighed as a feeling of hopelessness descended on her.  They’d taken her luggage, her money, the Andretti family jewelry she’d been wearing and that damned engagement ring she’d forgotten to take off before she fled.  As far as she was concerned, the four cops who made up the entire Granite Falls Police Department were in cahoots with Massimo Andretti.

She was the outsider who’d fallen victim to a twisted plot.

She wasn’t even a person anymore.   She was now number 315678.

The boy-officer led her down a short flight of stairs, into a shorter, but wider hallway, and stopped at the first door on the right.  “Your visitor is waiting inside,” he said, and hastily sped back the way they had come.

Nia glanced around the brightly lit hallway with two holding benches and a water cooler lining one wall, while an oversized bulletin board with an array of three-by-five cards, colorful Post-it notes, and additional bulletins lined the other wall.  The other three doors were closed and seemed unoccupied, casting a feeling of pessimism in the air.  If this was New York, she was certain the interrogation rooms would be crowded with criminals and cops trying to squeeze the truth of them.  The front lobby and the holding cells would be crawling with newly arrested perpetrators, waiting their turn to be questioned.  Tonight, she was the only perpetrator on the block in this quiet, mountain town.

For the first time since she left New York, Nia missed the din of the big city.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to shake off the gloom in the air.  She still had some fight left.  She placed her hand on the doorknob, and debated whether she should confront Massimo or just turn around and go back to her cell, call a public defender and let him try to get the bogus charges dropped so she could make it to New York to pay Eddie.  She didn’t care what happened after that.  At least the threats to her and Aaron’s lives would be gone.

But if Massimo had gone to such lengths to keep her in town, she knew she wasn’t going anywhere until he got what he wanted.  Whatever that was.

She peered through the narrow pane of glass in the door.  Massimo was seated behind a table with his smartphone glued to his ear and his head bent over some papers sprawled across the top of the table.  A large white envelope and a brown folder sat on the end of the table closest to the door.

He was conducting business as usual as if he hadn’t a care in the world, and he’d obviously taken the time to go home and change, she thought, her gaze washing over his magnificent body, dressed in a dark green sweater and a dark pair of slacks.  She studied the side of his face and swallowed at the faint shadow of a beard dusting his jawline and chin.  Her knees grew weak at the memory of pressing up against his hard frame in the limousine, of his hands roaming along her body, cupping her breast.

A weak sigh escaped Nia, and furious at the arousal in her treacherous body, she opened the door, stepped inside, and closed it with a resounding slam.  His head jerked up and he immediately stood to his feet when he saw her.  He ended his call and dropped his phone on the stack of papers, then had the audacity to throw her a handsomely devilish smile—the smile of sweet victory, made more provocative by his five o’clock shadow.

“Why?”  Nia glared at him, unable to believe he was the same man in whose arms she’d experienced such a mind-blowing orgasm only hours ago.  The memories sickened her.

“You think I was just going to let you waltz off into the sunset with two million of my dollars, Nia?  I was suspicious of you the moment you offered to sell me your virginity.  I was convinced of your devious plot when you asked that we wait before making love, and for half the money up front.”

“I figured you would have your suspicions and honestly, I never really expected that you’d go along with it.  So why?”

“For several reasons.  First of all, I was curious why a beautiful young woman would offer to sell her virginity to a total stranger for four million dollars.  What kind of trouble are you in, Nia?  Why do you want that money so badly?”

“It’s none of your damn business.  Explaining why I need the money wasn’t part of the negotiations.”

He uttered a dry laugh.  “Neither was you bailing halfway through the deal.  Nobody plays me and walks away to brag about it,” he stated in a lethal tone.  “Nobody!”

Nia thrust her hands on her hips as rage mounted inside her.  What are you going to do, Massimo?  What do you rich and powerful people do when peons cross you?  You’re going to break some of my bones?  You’re going to threaten my family?  Too bad for you, I have none,” she hastily added at the quickening in his posture.  “What?  What are you going to do?” she taunted him.