I’ll bet he knows how to avoid police.A warm flush of embarrassment crept to her cheeks.He seemed so competent, so endlessly efficient.
She was still brooding when Delgado came back and opened her car door.“I had to get us one room,” he said, and offered his hand.“There’s two beds, though.”
She nodded, sliding her feet out of the car.It felt good to stretch, good to get out of the blasted car.Chill night air washed over her, and she suddenly wished for a coat.
He kept talking.“It’ll be warmer inside.Let’s get you under cover, you can take a shower or something.Hot bath.We’ll get room service.There’s a laundromat attached—see, over there—so we can get your clothes washed.How about that?”
“I just want to sleep,” Her throat hurt.The soda she’d had at lunchtime had stung as it went down.
“Okay.”He guided her to the rear of the car and opened the trunk.She started to shiver.Halloween’s coming.It made tears rise to her eyes again.Dad had loved to feed trick-or-treaters.He stocked candy all year and gave it out by the double handful.
She blinked back the tears and swallowed them.Denied them.
When Delgado opened the hotel room door, she saw deep maroon carpeting and a mirror.An awful tasteless painting of a mallard hung over the small table between the beds.“A security nightmare.But it’s okay for now.Look, do you want to take a shower or something?A bath?”
She went to the bed farthest from the door, stripped back the covers and kicked off the sandals.She dropped into the bed’s embrace, then yanked the covers up and spent a few moments wriggling out of the borrowed jeans.Then she turned over, kicking the jeans out from under the covers, and picked up a pillow, jamming it over her head as she curled away from the light.
Delgado moved around for a while.“I’m turning the dampers on, Rowan.It’ll feel a little strange.”Something electric hummed into life, and Rowan felt the same awful feeling of nakedness that she’d felt at the Victorian house.He retreated into the bathroom and came out after a brief time.Plastic rustled—he was getting the new clothes out.
After another while of hearing him move, he sighed.“I’m going to put this stuff in the washer.It feels awful to wear clothes when they haven’t been washed.”
She didn’t say anything.
He left the room, and Rowan curled even tighter around the hard knot of misery in her chest.Before she fell asleep, she had one more logical, terrifying thought.
If they’re chasing us and they corner us, it might not be a bad idea for him to leave me on my own so he can escape.Or if there’s a chance of them catching me, what’s to say he won’t kill me to keep me out of their hands?He could convince himself that’s the best thing to do for me, and he’s efficient enough to do it.
Ridiculous.He’d come this far with her, hadn’t he?
Rowan fell into a thin troubled sleep before he came back.
CHAPTERNINETEEN
The dampers were almost overloaded,even while she slept.Until she learned how to keep herself shielded, a tracker would have no problem latching on.Even a low-grade dowser might be able to find her.
How had she survived with no training, no shielding?And how had she escaped notice for this long?
Delgado crouched beside the bed, watching her face as she breathed deeply, her lips slightly parted and her cheeks flushed.She still wore his sweater, one arm tucked underneath her pillow, the other flung out, her hand resting on the white sheet.
He rested his own fingers on the sheet, wondering if he dared to touch her.Would she wake up?
If she did…
His fingers hovered so close to hers, he could feel the heat of her skin.
She was exhausted.Shocked, numb.He didn’t blame her.A real kick to the gut to have her entire world yanked away in the space of twelve hours.Delgado was just lucky she hadn’t decided he was the enemy.She might have tried to escape and been scooped up by the cops—and Sigma would extradite her, pretty as you please.She wouldn’t even know she’d been caught until it was too late.And then he’d have to go into an installation and find her, probably, and that might kill him.
Just a little push.Just to keep her here.What do you say, Del?Just a small one.
If he did, and she realized…
No.He couldn’t.
The temptation was well-nigh irresistible.
He touched her.
Her skin was soft, and her breathing didn’t alter.But the electric feel of her raced up his arm, down his chest, and wrapped his body in soft heat.His pulse pounded in his ears.
