In any case, since Lydia rarely drank anymore, she was maybe a glass and a half away from a buzz strong enough to drive away her melancholy for a few hours. Or so she hoped. Considering how damn horny booze got her, a man in her bed for some wildly casual sex would have completed that picture nicely. But despite all the beach bodies on display around her, the beachfront party pad hadn’t come pre-stocked with hot guys. Finding one out on the boardwalk would involve a certain amount of social acumen she just didn’t have in her. So, the poor fugitive would just have to drown her sorrows alone, until the morning dawned and it was time to resume her regularly scheduled freaking out and trying to decide what to do about the evidence she had on Andrew.
The open bottle of good stuff called to her from the kitchen counter, and she headed back inside. It might not be a solution, but even a temporary reprieve from the drastic plunge her life had taken sounded good at the moment. Comforting. And now that she’d observed the tradition of offering the first drink to the drink, she intended to take every bit of what little comfort she could find.
* * * * *
Weekend parking near the Venice Beach waterfront was a bitch and a half, and Nate swore viciously as he circled the neighborhood. He’d been at it for twenty minutes and couldn’t find a thing closer than three blocks from his destination. Oh, it was tempting to double park while he did the job, but something told him to play it more low key.
He spied a tight, but doable spot not two buildings from the address, and his hopes shot up. A tiny Mazda convertible whipped into the vacancy, and laughing bikini babes tumbled out of it.
Nate felt a surge of road rage. “Damn it!”
Maybe he was just grouchy after a long drive with a mere two hours’ sleep since discovering Lydia’s whereabouts. Or maybe he was on edge because he was about to walk into a capture situation without the reassuring weight of his sidearm or a team watching his back. But he’d sworn to do this job without either, and that was what he intended to do.
After settling on a paid parking garage up the street, he pulled in and stretched his cramped muscles as he got out of the car. The smell of city with a vague hint of ocean met his nostrils as he pulled on the suit jacket he’d carefully laid out in the backseat. He stuffed a pair of handcuffs and his badge into the coat pocket.
A cool sea breeze wafted through the garage, mussing the hair he was trying to run a comb through. After grabbing the duffel and the bunch of balloons he’d picked up to lend an authentic touch to his ploy, he locked the car and made his way through the dimly lit structure.
Assuming his address information was correct, and there was no reason to think otherwise, he’d have Lydia in hand within the hour. He had every confidence that his ploy would get him in her front door. Getting out again with a captive who would likely be less than cooperative wasn’t nearly as fun a thought. He’d have to cart her all the way back here, possibly with her making a scene. There was the occasional concerned citizen who mistook a bounty hunt for a kidnapping. He’d followed procedure and notified local law enforcement of his intent to capture, so he was covered should a question arise about him taking custody of a woman against her will. Assuming he had a chance to produce his badge and authorization before some excitable, would-be hero intervened by waving around his constitutionally guaranteed right to bear arms.
He sighed as he thought of the bikini-babe sports car. Yes, a nice, cozy parking spot right by the seashell-pink apartment building would have been far preferable. Still, it wasn’t as if he’d never had to park creatively to avoid detection before. He’d manage somehow.
The wind caught hold of his balloons, and they led the way up the street. Maybe buying them had been overkill, but a woman hiding out alone wasn’t likely going to throw open her door for a strange guy, not even one claiming to be a stripper. And after his impromptu research, he realized he wasn’t willing to go the distance with his disguise.
At a quick motel stop on the way for a shower, catnap and marathon hand job, his Google crash course on male strippers had been quite the eye-opener. For one thing, those guys shaved their body hair from neck to nuts and beyond, something he had no intention of doing for a simple capture. And in the absence of any other convincing props, a guy in a suit read more to him like FBI than bump-and-grind. So balloons it was.
Not shaving wouldn’t really matter, anyway. Since he was in a business suit, she wouldn’t be seeing much of his body. The idea was to pose as a stripper convincingly enough for her to let him in the door, not to actually whirl his shirt over his head and leg hump a bond jumper. Not even one who looked as sexy and vulnerable in a mug shot as Lydia did.