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Corinne sat on one of the two double beds in the New Orleans hotel room, clicking from channel to channel on the television remote control. The activity had kept her mind occupied for a little while, kept her from prowling the confines of her small quarters like a caged cat. But the novelty of so much chatter and noise, all the vivid images flashing by onscreen with just a push of a button, had long since worn off.
She glanced at Hunter, who'd seemed to grow more distant, more silently aloof, with every passing minute since the sun had set. He had spoken to Gideon on his cell phone about an hour ago, discussing Hunter's intended plan for locating and infiltrating Henry Vachon's known properties in the area. When he found Vachon, he would remove him to an isolated location and interrogate him for information on Dragos. He only needed to uncover Vachon's current whereabouts and break in without getting caught or killed in the process. It all sounded very bold, extremely dangerous.
She turned off the television, leaving the remote on the bed as she got up to look at the marked-up map that was spread out on the sofa table across the room. Hunter had since discarded the paper map in favor of the electronic one on his cell phone.
She studied the circled areas where the Order believed Vachon's properties were situated. During the flight from Detroit and the time she'd spent sequestered in the hotel room awaiting nightfall with Hunter, Corinne had been puzzling out a way to find Henry Vachon on her own and plead her case to him about getting back her son.
If she let Hunter find him first, Vachon was as good as dead. But if she could somehow intercept that meeting, bargain for Vachon's mercy with whatever meager means she had left, perhaps there was a chance she might find her child. It worried her, the thought of putting herself back within the reach of one of Dragos's loyal followers. But then, if Henry Vachon had indeed been present the night she was abducted, then she had already seen his worst. She had faced his depraved cruelty once and survived; she would face him and Dragos both all over again if it might lead her to her son.
It was a desperate plan. A foolish one, which could be tantamount to suicide. But she was desperate. And she was willing to risk everything she had on the hope of reuniting with her boy.
She glanced at Hunter, standing near the glass sliding doors, his big body silhouetted by the moonlight and the glow of streetlamps on the boulevard below. Music hummed in the air outside the hotel, the soft wail of a saxophone, someone playing the blues. She drifted toward the glass too, drawn as always to the soothing sounds of poetry conveyed in notes and chords. She listened for a while, watching the old man on the opposite corner of the street play his battered brass horn with all the passion of someone less than half his age.
"When will you leave to begin looking for Vachon?"
Hunter lifted his head and met her glance. "As soon as possible. Gideon is searching for records on Vachon's properties, old building plans, security schematics, things that will assist with my reconnaissance. If he is able to turn up any useful data within the hour, he will call me with it."
"And if he doesn't find anything to help you?"
"Then I will proceed without it."
Corinne nodded, unsurprised by his frank reply. He didn't seem like someone who would let obstacles stand in his way, even if it meant stealing into an enemy's camp with nothing more than his wits and whatever weapons he happened to have on his body. "Do you think Vachon will tell you where Dragos is?"
Hunter's face was grimly confident. "If he knows, he will tell me."
She didn't want to guess how he would go about making sure of that. Nor could she hold his piercing gaze for longer than a moment when he was standing just a couple of feet away from her.
Being this close to him, feeling the palpable weight of his golden stare, only reminded her of how startled she'd been to find him watching her while she'd bathed that afternoon. She'd been more than startled. She had been astonished - utterly shocked by the heat that had smoldered in his otherwise inscrutable stare. A rush of warmth raced through her when she relived it now, all the worse when there was no door to close between them. She should have been affronted that he'd seen her, if not afraid. Then, like now, Hunter's gaze unsettled her. Not from the fear she expected she should feel but from her own sense of awareness. The stoic warrior hadn't looked at her as some object he needed to protect or pity, but as a woman.
At least, until he'd seen her scars.
The outward evidence of what she'd endured was ugly enough, but the more terrible wounds she bore inside. There was still a raw and wounded part of her that hadn't come out of Dragos's nightmarish prison, a part of her that might never make it out to the daylight. She'd left so much of herself behind in those dank laboratory cells, she wasn't sure she'd ever be whole again.
It was that part of her that had seized up at the idea of being shut in such a small space as the hotel room's tiny bathroom. She'd left only the smallest gap in the door, just enough to reassure herself that she could see beyond the small enclosure, that she had the power to walk out at any time. That she wasn't locked in or helpless, waiting for her next round of torture by the one who held the key.
Even now, just thinking about confined spaces and barred doors seemed to make the four walls contract inward on her. Pulse quickening, throat clenching up in the rising swell of her anxiety, Corinne turned to face the wide sliding door that looked out over the city from the small balcony. She put her hands out, palms pressed against the cool glass as she simply focused on breathing and tried to will her heart to calm.
It wasn't enough.
"What's wrong?" Hunter asked, frowning as she sucked in a couple of quick, hitching breaths. "Are you ill?"
"Air," she gasped. "I need a ... air - "
She fumbled with the mechanism on the glass door, finally yanking it open and all but stumbling out to the balcony. Hunter was right beside her as she clung to the wrought-iron railing and drew in gulp after gulp of the cleansing, open night air. She felt his presence like a wall of heat at her side, the large shape of him looming close, watching her in silent concern.
"I'm okay," she murmured, everything still spinning around her, lungs still caught in a vise. "It's nothing ...
I'm all right."
He reached out and took her chin gently in his hand, turning her face toward him in the dark. His scowl was deeper now, those probing golden eyes searching beneath the furrowed line of his brow. "You are not well."
"I'm fine. I needed some fresh air, that's all." She drew back slightly and he let his hand fall away. The warmth of his touch lingered. She could feel the broad lines of his fingers ghosted on her skin as she exhaled a shaky breath.
He stared at her, watching her tremble even though it was barely cold in the sultry New Orleans night. "You're not well," he said again. His voice was softer this time, but no less firm.
"Your body needs more rest. You need nourishment."
His gaze went to her mouth as he spoke. It lingered there, putting a new kind of clamor in her veins.
