Free Reinstated Bond by Holley Trent

CHAPTER ONE
    "Come on, Nicola. I don't want to be here any more than
you want me to be. I took the file because I'm going to be a lot more gentle with
Marilyn than Jeff or Lee would be. Just consider this a favor to her."
Carter Aiken ran his palm over the day's worth of auburn stubble on his jaw and
gave the green-eyed bruja what he hoped was a look of contrition.
    Nicola folded her arms over her chest. A muscle in her jaw
twitched as she locked her unflinching gaze on him. "Right. A favor ."
She mumbled something guttural in Spanish.
    He took a tiny step back and braced himself.
    Nothing happened.
    He blew out a breath and shifted his weight.
    Nicola Skinner had been murmuring oaths at him for a decade,
and the rumor around Chowan County was that she was some kind of witch. She'd
always hated him, and him standing there in her laundry room's doorway wearing
a bond enforcement badge probably didn't improve their relationship any. He was
trying to snatch her daughter. His ex.
    "My family left El Salvador to get away from people like
you."
    "Oh, come off it, Nicola. I'm just doing my job. I'm not
picking on her. Marilyn missed an important court date and now the judge thinks
she's a flight risk. Her bond got yanked. You were the cosignatory. You should
care."
    Nicola mumbled some more, and he could feel his brows arching
up to his hairline. Back in high school when he and Marilyn had been an item,
Marilyn had always told him to ignore her mother. That she was just
overprotective because of her own tumultuous childhood and that she didn't mean
him any real harm.
    He wasn't so sure. Like most people living in the rural county,
she probably had a shotgun propped up next to the door. Nicola's husband Harold
was a long-haul trucker and frequently away from home. Harold would have made
sure she kept it handy and that she knew how to use it.
    Carter took another step backward.
    "She's not here," she repeated, leaning against the
washing machine and cocking her blonde head to the side as she squinted up at
him.
    Get
a grip, Aiken. She's five feet tall and over fifty.
    "I'm sorry to sound skeptical, Mrs. Skinner," he
said, straightening up and puffing out his broad chest, "but I'm sure you
understand why I need to take a look around. Her car is here and this is the
boondocks. It's not like she's going to take off on foot down the
highway."
    A wicked smile spread across her face. There was a loud creak
at the far end of the ranch house followed by a slam, then a thud as something
hit the ground. When Carter turned his head to the left, he saw a tan blur with
dark wild hair and a shapely pair of stems darting into the neighboring
cornfield.
    "Fuck."
    *
    Marilyn had been hiding out in the stalks as a stalling tactic
since she was a child trying to flee bedtime. The field was actually owned by a
farmer who lived down the road, but she was so lithe and careful gliding
through the rows of tall cow corn, she rarely ever snapped a stem. The farmer
never had been one to plant densely. Once she got inside and disappeared into
the middle of the field, it was nearly impossible to catch up to her.
    She sat there in the stalks until dusk at which point she
carefully stood and wiped the loamy soil off the seat of her short-shorts.
Visibility was growing poor and the last thing she wanted was to have to be
taken to the county hospital for snakebite treatment when she was trying her
damndest to avoid arrest.
    She was innocent, but because everyone in Chowan County knew
everyone else, she doubted she'd be afforded a fair, unbiased trial. She'd
asked her lawyer to request a venue change but it had been denied and the judge
had flat-out asserted that she was paranoid. Add that to her list of supposed crimes. The
reason she was arrested in the first place was because her last boyfriend's
house burned down. "Foul play," they'd said, and pointed to her
because it had been a bad break-up.
    She hadn't even cared for her ex all that much, and the straw
that