He wasn’t much on tea in general, but when in Rome...
He poured a cup and reached for the milk and sugar.
He was more relieved than he wanted to admit to see her smile as she watched him.
“What?” he asked.
“Are you twelve?”
Sugar cube number four plopped in the dark liquid. “I’m a growing lad.”
She laughed, and just like that some of the cloud dissipated.
“You still mad at me?” he asked.
She eyed him from over the rim of her cup. “I wasn’t mad—” Seeing his expression, she stopped. “Okay, maybe I was a little mad, but I know I don’t have a right to be. You’ve done more than I had any right to expect. I should be thanking you for helping me get away. I don’t know why those two men were looking for me, but I can’t imagine it was for anything good.” She looked in his eyes. “I was scared.”
For good reason. But he wasn’t going to tell her his suspicions. He didn’t want to make her any more freaked out than she already was.
Uncomfortable with her gratitude, he shrugged it off and then shook his head thoughtfully. “What I don’t understand is how they found us so fast.”
“Luck?”
“I don’t believe in luck. Luck is—”
“What happens when preparation meets opportunity,” she interrupted. At his look of surprise, she gave him a wry smile. “I’ve heard it before.”
He wasn’t going to ask, assuming it was her father.
Surprisingly the tea was relaxing; it helped him clear his head a little. “The easiest way to track someone is through the phone, but I took care of that.”
She shot him a glare. “You sure did. Do you know how weird it is not to be able to text or check...”
Her voice let off, and he saw something in her face. “What?”
She bit her bottom lip, looking at him uncertainly. “I checked my e-mail at the library.”
•••
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. Annie stared at him pleadingly. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think...”
It never occurred to her (a) that someone would be monitoring her e-mail account, and (b) that they would be able to track her location from it. This wasn’t her world. She was ascientist, not law enforcement—or on the other side of the law, for that matter.
“You think that is how they found us so quickly?” she asked.
“Yep.”
One-word answers and granite-hard expressions weren’t good signs. She held out an olive branch. “I guess you were right about my cell phone.”
Pause. Hard look. Another “Yep.”
This really wasn’t good. She knew he was furious and doing his best not to lash out at her. He had to be. But he was controlling himself. She should be glad, but she wasn’t. It was discombobulating.
“Go ahead,” she said. “Give it to me. Tell me I’m an idiot. I deserve it.”
She could tell from the anger in his eyes that he wanted to. “What else did you do other than check e-mail?”
“Nothing. There was something I wanted to look up on the Internet, but I was only on for a few minutes.” All of a sudden she remembered something. “I had a message from my bank that someone had tried to access my account, so I changed the password. I thought it might be Julien, but I guess that doesn’t matter anymore.”
