Page 25 of Hunted

She said nothing for a long time.

“Thank you,” he said at length.

When she finally spoke again, her voice was almost normal. “What happens now?”

He sighed. “I’ve been thinking on that. They know where the safe deposit box is. Saw that receipt, same as I did.”

“They don’t have the key, though,” she said. It lacked conviction.

“Neither do we. I dropped it through the storm grate in the parking lot the second I felt his gun barrel against my neck.”

“On purpose?” He nodded and she frowned even harder. “Why? Why throw it away after you went to so much trouble to take it from me?”

He looked at her quickly, trying to read the emotion in her eyes. She was still showing mostly fear, though, and it camouflaged everything else. He was impressed all over again that she’d managed to save their asses while being scared half out of her mind.

“I apologize for kissing you like that. White was watching. I could feel him, and I didn’t want him to see me take the key from you. It … was the first thing that popped into my head.”

Yeah, right. If he was honest, he’d admit kissing Lexi like that had popped into his head several times since they’d been thrown together. But he’d never imagined her response would be pure, mind-blowing desire. Hell, he hadn’t imagined what her response would be, because he’d had no intention of giving in to the urge.

She’d turned to liquid fire in his arms, and he’d almost forgotten all about White and vengeance and finding the formula and saving the world. When she’d moaned in a deep, throaty voice, and opened her mouth to him, and raked his hair with her fingers …

“Don’t ever do it again,” she said softly, her voice somehow strong as steel despite its underlying waver.

And for some reason, that offended him. “Yeah, I could tell you really hated it.”

Her eyes widened and she stared at him as if he’d turned into a spitting cobra. Hell, he kind of had. “All right, I won’t lay a hand on you. Feel better?”

She looked away, staring straight ahead. “Why did you throw the key away?”

“To keep him from getting it. Not that it matters now. White knows where that box is, and hell itself won’t stop him. Even if we manage to get there first, he’ll be there, waiting. They’ll take us out the second we step out of the building.”

“Then … then it’s over? We’ve lost?”

“Not by a long shot. I’m good at what I do. One of the best. I’ve just gotta figure out how I can get to the safe deposit box first, and do it without getting my head blown off. Simple.”

He looked at her, and he knew the second he saw her face that there was more. Something she hadn’t told him. Guilt clouded her brown eyes, and she gnawed her lower lip.

“What?”

She cleared her throat. “I can’t let you risk getting shot when …”

“When …?”

“There is no safe deposit box in New York."

“What the hell do you mean? I saw the receipt.”

“There was once, but I closed it after my father died.”

Chapter Seven

Romano swore until he ran out of breath, then he inhaled and started over. There was an exit ramp and he took it, crossing three lanes in the process and causing other drivers to spike their brakes and shake their fists. Then he came to a stop on the shoulder in a cloud of dust. “How the hell can there not be a safe-deposit box, Lexi?”

She met his eyes, showing her backbone again. Until recently, he hadn’t seen a sign of it. But she’d been playing him.

“There was one once. Just like I said, in New York. I didn’t see any point in keeping it open when I had no plans to ever go back there.”

The question that sprang to the tip of his tongue was why not. But he bit it back. It didn’t matter what her reasons were. He didn’t give a damn why a talented young doctor would want to hide herself away in the mountains alone and never emerge into the daylight again. All that mattered was finding this damned formula before White did. And then killing the bastard.

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