Trouble Under Venus Read online

  Back Cover Copy

  For some love lasts a long time, for others a lifetime. Can theirs outlast space-time?

  Randi’s summer vacation plans? Attending Professor Sudo’s Time Travel Academy so she can blast back to 1980 Miami and figure out where her father disappeared to. She’s the head of her class until hottie Mitch arrives disguised as a geeky geologist and totally messes up her meditation. Goodbye Soulful in Sedona, hello Yearning in Yoga. So long solo time-travel, hello pushy partner--who happens to be a buff tri-athlete, a sympathetic listener, and an ace FBI agent on a top-secret mission. With his help, she’ll conga her way into the Cuban mafia, try not to destroy the delicate fabric of the space-time continuum, dodge a few bullets, and solve The Mystery of the Missing Dad. And maybe fall just a little in love…

  A new adventure in women’s fiction, with a heroine who boldly goes where no chick has gone before, tons of danger and intrigue, a roller-discoing Granny, life and death betrayal, steamy Miami nights and one hot FBI agent.

  Highlight

  Dear Journal,

  Note to self: Do not get involved with this man! A troublesome guy is the reason you’re here in the first place! Did you learn nothing from your mother’s experience with your father? Hmm?

  In theory, you could safely have a no-strings fling for the first time ever.

  Hello? To self: For all you know, that guy could be seriously dangerous, or a wanted criminal at the very least.

  Puh-leeze! How could he be working for the government and get in this program if he is a wanted criminal? Your father is likely a wanted criminal in 1980. Who are you to judge? Have you forgotten Mitch’s washboard abs?

  To wild self: The guy sports the fake tan of an 80’s bodybuilder and wears glasses we both know he doesn’t need. He’s lying about his career and probably self-absorbed, as much time as he spends on his body. And obviously a player, baby. Those smooth moves he used on you? Been done hundreds of times before. By him.

  Boring old divorcee, better-safe-than-sorry self: I want him. It’s been eight months since my last non-self-administered orgasm. Hello? Are you going to give me the silent treatment now?

  Trouble Under Venus

  978-161650-117-4

  Copyright © 2009, Autumn Piper

  Edited by Mary A. Murray

  Book design by Brian Hunter

  Cover Art by Renee Rocco

  First Lyrical Press, Inc. electronic publication: February, 2010

  Lyrical Press, Incorporated

  17 Ludlow Street

  Staten Island, New York 10312

  http://www.lyricalpress.com

  eBooks are not transferable. All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission.

  PUBLISHER'S NOTE:

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

  Published in the United States of America by Lyrical Press, Incorporated

  Table of Contents

  Back Cover Copy

  Highlight

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  About Autumn Piper

  More From Lyrical Press

  Dedication

  To my Mom, for always being there, and for giving me all the answers she had.

  Thanks to my lovely critique partners: Felicity Kates, Sutton Fox, Jasmine Black, Maya Blake, and Kimberly Brody. You gals are indisputably the best. And Mary Murray, thanks again for another marvelous edit!

  Amanda, friend and reader extraordinaire, thanks again.

  Dennis— you’ve forever intrigued me, recently inspired me, and will likely elude me always. Maybe some mysteries aren’t meant to be solved.

  Chapter 1

  Dear Journal,

  They all think I’ve lost my mind.

  It’s not like they haven’t had time to accept my decision to join Professor Sudo as one of the first civilian time travelers. After all, it’s been almost a year since my winning essay secured me one of the four spots. And it’s been over six months since David filed for divorce because I insisted on going forward with this ‘hare-brained’ idea.

  Mom positively did not believe I was going until yesterday when she came over and saw my packed bags. Even this morning when she called, she sounded surprised to hear I’d really arrived in Sedona and stayed the night in the Feng Shui Inn.

  Well, I can’t blame her for being upset. She’s insecure about me traveling back to 1980 to find my father, who was forced to marry her because of an unplanned pregnancy. It was surely no picnic for her, being moved from her little hometown in Colorado to the rushing metropolis of Miami. From her accounts, he spent most of his time running around, partying, and leaving her home alone. No wonder when she flew home for an uncle’s funeral right before my birth, she opted to stay. A few months after their divorce was finalized, he disappeared for good. Guess that makes him the Extreme Absent Parent.

  After all these years wondering where he went, Grandma hiring PI after PI who could not find him, speculations that his ties to the Cuban Mafia were his ultimate demise…well, I just need to know. I have to know. How can I possibly start a family of my own if I don’t know my father? Sure, other people do it all the time, but I am not ‘other people’. I can’t add my own branch to a family tree when half the trunk broke off and disappeared into thin air! David can’t understand. He’s got the picture perfect family—or so he thinks. He didn’t grow up with a giant question mark in his scrapbook.

  Dennis Keenan has got to be out there somewhere. Maybe he went into Witness Protection. Of course there’s a chance something happened to him. I mean, back in ’80, birth and death records weren’t as universally accessible as they are now. If he turned up dead as some John Doe, his dental records could be buried in the back of a dusty county building waiting to be scanned and computerized. In my heart of hearts, I don’t believe he’s dead. But I really need to know. Nobody has found so much as a trail, other than his last known conversation with a friend when he said he was leaving Miami and heading to San Francisco.

  Traveling back to a time before he went missing seems the most logical way to solve the m
ystery.

  Most people think I’m nuts because I’m willing to be one of the pioneer time travelers. Well, hell. Most people haven’t base jumped or sky dived or even gone rock climbing, for God’s sake. They act like I haven’t considered the risks. Of course I have. I just think in this case, the reward far outweighs any risk. Hey, somebody’s got to be the first to do it, right? America was built on the pioneer spirit, but now nobody wants to be the guinea pig—aside from the three thousand of us who answered Sudo’s ad in the paper and wrote an essay.

  Besides, in another six weeks when school starts up for the fall, I’ll be the coolest teacher in the district. Maybe in the state!

  The Inn is nice, got that calming Asian influence going on. Mr. and Mrs. Sudo own it, though I suspect she runs it while he’s traipsing around harnessing the electromagnetic power of Earth’s energy vortexes and writing scientific papers. Of course it’s approximately a million degrees Fahrenheit here—but what could I expect from Arizona in July?

  We have our first yoga session early tomorrow morning. I wonder if the other three travelers have been practicing, too? Hard to tell with those two old ladies, Althea and Rhona. They both seemed eccentric at the press conference in January. And then there’s Lonnie. My student teacher kept referring to him as “that tall drink of water Texan”. He is good eye candy I suppose, if you’re into accents and big belt buckles.

  But hooking up with a man is not on the schedule for me. I’ve got a mission and a plan. And I intend to follow them.

  I’m going to meditate for a few minutes—star pupil always comes to class prepared, right?—and then call it a night.

  Excited,

  Randi

  * * * *

  A low-flying plane buzzed in closer, providing its occupants a better look at Sedona’s Boynton Canyon Vortex, and like so much muscle tension, the serenity of our early morning yoga session disappeared. The droning engine drowned out our yogi’s instructions.

  Still maintaining my down-dog position, I stared at the inverted image of a rock formation. Many planes and helicopters had been by during our two sessions the day before. I was learning to ignore them.

  “Pssst! Hey, Randi.”

  Maybe if I acted meditative, I could ignore Lonnie.

  “Randi! Hey, how come you didn’t answer your door last night? Thought we had a date.”

  Lonnie’s idea of a date was an invitation to join him in the pool after our evening session had ended and everyone else in the Feng Shui Inn had gone to bed. Over dinner, he’d flirted and charmed his way into conversation with me, obviously thinking I’d fawn over him like all the other women did.

  “Randi?”

  There’s no talking in yoga, Hoss!

  “I fell asleep with my iPod on.” I almost hissed. “My earphones must have blocked the sound.”

  “I tried callin’ your room too,” he whined.

  Ignoring his complaint, I stood upright and bent from my waist in time with our instructor.

  How could I be such a big deal to this guy? The two older women in our group seemed to think he was incredibly handsome and charming. He bragged about how prosperous his huge car dealership in Dallas was. His big muscly body and deep tan made it obvious he didn’t spend his days sitting in an office at that dealership. To top it all off, he was a smooth talker—he’d nearly conned me into that swim. After returning to my room, I’d come to my senses. This was no time in my life to be getting involved with a man. Any man.

  “One more breath,” Yogi purred. “In, let your body speak to you. Out. Hands to side, use your back to stand. Tada sana. Thank you. Tonight, we do two hours.”

  In front of me, Althea and Rhona moaned. Even for me, this was a ton of yoga. Professor Sudo required it, though. He’d stressed the importance of opening our chakras—certain ones in particular—to channel precious energy from the vortexes. When our bodies and minds were open and ready, he would help us travel through time.

  Dear Randi,

  Addressing these journal entries to “dear journal” seems weird. And since I’ll probably be the only one who ever reads this, I’ll address it to my future self. Today was my second day at Camp Time Travel, a.k.a. Professor Sudo’s prep course at the Feng Shui Inn in Sedona, Arizona. I forgot to write an entry yesterday. I was totally exhausted.

  Today we had meditation practice and learned about the electro-magnetic energy in Sedona’s vortexes. We visited two of them, Bell Rock and Boynton Canyon. I can’t tell if I’m just brainwashed or I really do feel energized when standing there. It could be all the yoga. Even though I’ve been practicing it for months, it’s amazing what two days with an actual yogi have done for my form. I feel…fluid. Can actually touch my toes, for the first time ever. I make it a point to snag a back spot for my mat now, so Lonnie doesn’t look at my ass the entire time. That guy. I can’t figure out what it is about him I don’t like. Maybe I’m still sour over my divorce. Disillusioned. Or maybe it’s because he looked at me like I had a growth on my head when I knew the reason there’s only one fish in the tank downstairs. Just because I studied feng shui before coming here.

  He didn’t write his own essay for the contest. I’m sure of it. He’s traveling back in time to see his mom before she went in her coma. Sweet. So why don’t I like him? Because he’s a dunce?

  Someone just splashed in the pool outside. Hmm. Lonnie went into town with Rhona and Althea tonight. Are they back now? It is after eleven. I think I’ll sneak out on my balcony to take a look.

  I set my journal aside, switched off the lamp and as quietly as possible, opened my screened French door. If it was Lonnie in the pool and he heard me, he’d start pestering me to join him again. And if he was skinny-dipping with one of the older women, I didn’t want them to see me spying. Staying close to the wall between my patio and the next one, I stole to the railing.

  Out in the pool, a dark form took smooth, nearly silent strokes. Fast. Soft lights around the pool’s edge cast a glow in the rippling water. As he reached the end of the pool closest to me and performed a flawless flip to his back, the light caught his dark hair. Not Lonnie. And this body…well. The guy was a swimmer, all right. He had the shoulders to prove it. They rotated and pulled him to the other side of the pool in no time at all. He bumped the side and came back my way doing a crawl stroke.

  This time he paused at the edge, possibly to catch his breath. My own breath froze when he seemed to look my way. I didn’t breathe again until he resumed his back stroke.

  He swam for a long time, his movements in the water as graceful as any choreographed dance. Like his body was made for this activity. At last, ignoring the ladder, he pulled himself up at the edge of the pool. Whoa, then again, maybe that bod was made for something else! Perfect triangular torso, wide shoulders, narrow hips. A very small swimsuit, obviously made for a guy serious about water sports. He stretched, mopped his hair, and for some reason, looked at the towel afterward. Maybe he was checking for hair loss?

  Then he went still, and like he wore heat-seeking goggles, his gaze went to me. Straight to me. As if it were the most natural thing in the world for a strange woman to watch him swim, he raised his right hand and waved.

  With an audible choke, I shrunk back into the shadows until I bumped against my door, then slipped inside. Geez. How embarrassing. And who was he? A new guest? The Inn wasn’t exclusive to Sudo’s groups, other guests would be coming and going. I could only hope I would not be seeing this guy around.

  The patio gate of the room next to mine clinked open and closed. Oh, good Lord. That room had been vacant since my arrival the day before. Now I had a neighbor. Maybe fate would smile on me and it was coincidence, not the swimmer returning.

  The sound of the French screen door opening in the next unit came through my still-open door.

  Calm down. It could be someone else. Still, my heart pounded. It was past time for me to be in bed, but sleep would be slow coming after this excitement.

  I had to close my screen
to make sure no scorpions found their way in, and moved toward it. Too bad for me, I tripped over my laptop on the way. Landing with an “oomph” on the carpeted floor, I froze.

  “Do you always spy on people, or are you an insomniac?” A deep voice came from around the balcony wall.

  Standing and rubbing my shin, I was tempted to slam my door shut and take the coward’s way out.

  Whoever he was, he snickered at my silence.

  I would not be the object of his joke. “How did you see me?” My question came out more pouty than curious.

  Another chuckle. “You’re wearing white. Pretty easy to see in the dark.”

  True enough. My cotton eyelet shorts and top were new and quite white. “Oh.” Against my better judgment, I padded outside to the railing. “Sorry. I…thought you were someone else.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. I did think he was Lonnie at first.

  “No need to apologize. I never complain about a woman checking me out.”

  Oh, the nerve! “I was not checking you out! It’s practically the middle of the night and you were out there splashing like, like, like a pack of kids. I came out to investigate.”

  Laughter from next door. Self-confident laughter. “Whatever.”

  “What was that you were wearing, anyway? A Speedo? Aren’t those, like, totally out?”

  He only laughed more.

  I was in the process of coming up with a scathing remark when Lonnie came stumbling up to my patio.

  “Randi!” Without waiting for me to invite him, he opened the gate and walked in. “You’re still up.”

  He reeked of whiskey.

  “Oh God. Lonnie. Are you drunk?”

  “Sorta. You shoulda joined us at the bar.”

  I clucked my tongue, feeling like a mother hen. “Remember what Professor Sudo said? We’re not supposed to poison our bodies. Put toxins in them.”

  “Pfftht!” Lonnie answered, eliciting a chuckle from the eavesdropping neighbor. “Sometimes you just gotta cut loose, Randi.”