Ice Blue - Anne Stuart [16]
“The two men in the limo died in the crash—they never saw me. And I got you out of your house without anyone noticing.” That was highly unlikely if they’d been the ones who’d tried to drown her, but he was counting on her being too worn-out to put things together. By the time she was more rested he’d come up with a plausible answer. In the meantime he needed to stash her someplace safe where he didn’t have to think about her, and the small bungalow he rented inside the grounds of the hotel was as good a place as any.
“Besides, Little Tokyo is much too obvious a place to hide someone with a connection to a Japanese cultural treasure. It’s the last place they’d think to look, and no one’s going to know you’re there.”
She said nothing, simply nodded and leaned back in the leather seat. He expected her passivity was only going to last so long. He’d better be ready to move when she started asking the unanswerable questions.
The Matsura Hotel was a Los Angeles landmark. The entry was through a security laden torii gate; the landscaping was minimalist and yet preserving of everyone’s privacy. He made his unwitting hostage duck down when he drove past the security cameras, but once he’d parked the car behind the bungalow, no one had any chance of seeing her. He ushered her into the two-room building, trying not to think about how he was going to get her out again.
She stood in the middle of the living room, and he could see the raw edges of shock begin to close in on her. He wasn’t in the mood for noisy tears or awkward questions, so he simply took her arm and led her into the bedroom, ignoring her panicked start when he touched her. “You need to sleep,” he said.
She looked at him, the wary expression in her eyes like that of a cornered fox. Pretty blue eyes, he thought absently. She was past words, but he knew what she was thinking.
“I’ll be in the living room. I can sleep on the couch, but I’ll wake up if I hear even the slightest noise. You’ll be safe.” For now.
She still didn’t move, and he took her shoulders and turned her toward the bed. He didn’t want to start undressing her—she’d probably jump to the wrong conclusion and that would only make things more difficult. He had no interest in her soft, curvy body or her lush, vulnerable mouth. He just needed her to go to sleep and let him think.
“Yes,” she said in a rusty voice, reaching for the hem of the black sweatshirt he’d grabbed for her. It was huge—he assumed it had probably belonged to a former boyfriend, even though their intel had only come up with one, years prior—and she started pulling it over her head. The T-shirt came with it, which was his signal to leave before she was standing there in her underwear, with that same dazed look on her face.
“Call me if you need anything,” he said, getting the hell out of the room and closing the door before she could respond.
He stretched out on the sofa, closing his eyes and wishing to Christ he could afford to have something to drink. It had been a rough twenty-four hours, but he couldn’t take even the slightest of chances, not when things were so fucked. When this was over he could down a whole bottle of single malt Scotch, his drug of choice. And he suspected that was exactly what he was going to want to do.
He was going to have to face Madame Lambert sooner or later. He’d been ignoring her messages on his übermobile phone, but he couldn’t put it off for much longer. She was going to want to know why Summer Hawthorne wasn’t dead yet, and she wasn’t likely to accept any excuses. Nothing ever touched Isobel Lambert, marred the perfection of her beautiful face or clear, emotionless eyes. She was the epitome of what they all strived for—ruthless practicality and no weakness. She would have put a samurai to shame.
Taka wasn’t sure if it was wisdom or weakness that had stopped him tonight. He could hear Summer coughing behind the door to the bedroom. She’d swallowed more water in the hot tub than he’d thought, but he couldn’t very well have taken the time