Black Ice - Anne Stuart [57]
“With us?”
He cocked his head, looking at her. “I have a tendency to finish what I started. You’ve missed one plane, but I’ll get you out on the next one, if I have to knock you out, tie you up and ship you in a trunk.”
She reached out to turn on the light beside her bed, but he stopped her, his hand catching her wrist, and she jerked back, knocking the lamp over as she did so.
“We don’t need lights,” he said. “That was the one smart thing you did, leaving the lights off when you came back. When they come for you a little darkness won’t stop them, but you were wise not to draw undue attention to yourself.”
“Maybe I just turned off the lights when I went to bed?”
“I was here before you arrived looking like the little match girl. I decided a few hours’ sleep wouldn’t do you any harm. But you stole my coat—I’ve been freezing.”
“Tough,” she said. She didn’t ask where he’d been, what he’d seen. There was nothing she could do about it at this point, but if he’d been watching her as she bathed, as she hacked off her hair and examined the marks on her body she wouldn’t be happy. Better not to know.
He’d helped himself to her wine—the bottle and a glass sat on the floor beside him. She had no idea how long he’d been there, how long she’d been sleeping.
“Why did you change your mind?” she asked abruptly. She pulled the covers up to her chest and slid away from him to sit in the corner. And then she realized her fingers were clutching his coat, and she dropped it.
“Changed my mind?” he repeated.
“About me. I had a lot of time with Monsieur Hakim, and he enjoys talking while he hurts people. If it hadn’t been for you he wouldn’t have known I’d been looking on the Internet. He wouldn’t have thought I was anything other than what I am.”
“Anything other than what you are? And what’s that?” He didn’t wait for her answer. “Once Hakim decided not to trust you there was nothing I could do to stop it. Showing him your clumsy tracks through the computer only sped things up.”
“So what made you change your mind and come to save me?”
“I didn’t.”
She was cold, so cold, but she didn’t reach for his coat. “Then why were you there? Had you just come to watch?”
He shrugged. “I was surprised you were still alive. Hakim must have been enjoying himself more than usual, to have barely touched you.”
“Barely touched me?” Her voice rose, and he moved so fast he was a blur in the darkness, his hand over her mouth, silencing her as he held her against the wall. He’d held her against another wall, not that long ago, and she wondered what he was going to do.
“Don’t raise your voice,” he said, his eyes staring into hers in the darkness. So close. “Try not to be as stupid as your behavior suggests.”
He moved his hand away and she was silent, looking up at him. Waiting for him to touch her. He was going to kiss her, and she wasn’t sure what she was going to do about it.
But he didn’t. He moved away, sitting back on the floor several feet away. “I came to find Hakim about another matter, saw you were still alive, and on a whim I killed him.”
“On a whim?”
He shrugged, so very French, and yet she didn’t believe he was French. “Part of my own death wish, I expect. I’m living on borrowed time as it is, and taking you out of that place only made things move a little faster. God knows when you walked out today I should have just let you go, but you annoyed me. If I’m going to that much trouble you might at least do as I say.”
“I was never very obedient. I wouldn’t be here in Paris if I wasn’t accustomed to doing what I want.”
“I don’t give a damn what you want. You’re going back home to the States and you’re staying there. You understand me?”
At that point there was nothing she wanted more, but some inner devil prompted her to object. “And if I refuse?”
“Then I’ll cut your throat and leave you here. It seems a shame, since I’ve already gone to so much trouble. That stuff I put on your wounds