Jeanne Louise peered out the window past him to the SUVs. They looked empty. She bit her lip and then leaned in front of Paul to let her gaze inspect his yard and house. She watched silently for a moment and then straightened abruptly when she saw movement inside through the front window.
“Go back the way we came,” she said firmly, settling back in her seat, her brain racing.
Paul hesitated, but then shifted into reverse and backed out of the driveway to head back up the road the way they’d come. When he reached the corner, he simply asked, “Which way?”
Jeanne Louise pulled herself from trying to figure out how they’d found her so quickly to consider the question. Finally, she sighed, “I don’t know. Just take a right for now.”
He turned right, and started up this new street, but glanced at her in question. “The SUVs?” Paul asked and when she hesitated over answering, he said, “I didn’t notice them at first, but there were two of them. Black with black windows. I’ve seen them at Argeneau Enterprises.”
“They’re what the Enforcers drive, the equivalent of our police force,” she explained quietly. “They must have figured out you have me and came looking for us.”
Paul hesitated, but then said, “I was very careful.”
Jeanne Louise considered that claim briefly and then queried, “You were in my car when I got in?”
He nodded.
“When did you get in?” she asked.
“About two minutes before you got in. I rode to Argeneau’s in the trunk of Lester’s car. A coworker,” Paul explained. “He didn’t know. I waited in the trunk all night, then slid out and got in your car just before you got to it.”
“They would have seen that on the parking garage cameras,” Jeanne Louise pointed out.
“Yeah, but all that would do is lead them to Lester, and he had no idea I was in his trunk. He couldn’t point them my way.”
“Maybe they recognized you,” she suggested.
“I was wearing all black and a balaclava. There was nothing to recognize,” he assured her, and she recalled the dark shape rising in the rearview mirror. A mere silhouette of a person.
Jeanne Louise was silent for a minute and then asked, “What did you do with my car?”
“I’d parked my car at the back of a grocery store parking lot near Lester’s apartment building. I drove your car back there, moved you to my car and left your car there, then brought you home.”
“Did you check to see if there were security cameras in the parking lot?”
He hesitated. “I didn’t see any. But even if there was one that I didn’t see, I doubt they’ve found your car yet. It’s a big busy grocery store and it hasn’t even been twenty-four hours yet.”
Jeanne Louise blew her breath out on a sigh. “If security saw you get in my car and me drive away with you, someone would have been sent to check on me. When I didn’t show up at my place they would have started looking for me. There’s a tracker in my car. Uncle Lucian made all of us put trackers in our cars.”
“So they would have found your car pretty quick,” Paul said with a grimace, and then shook his head. “Still, I did look to be sure there weren’t any cameras in the parking lot. And I was wearing gloves when I drove your car, so no fingerprints. How could they have traced it back to me?”
She shook her head, and then asked, “Was I in the front seat or back of your vehicle? I mean, was I visible?”
“Front seat,” he answered. “I strapped you into the front passenger seat. After spending the night in the trunk of a car I didn’t want to put you there, and in the front seat it just looked like you were asleep. I figured a woman sleeping in the front seat would be less noteworthy than a woman passed out in the backseat.”
Jeanne Louise nodded wearily. “That’s probably how then. All they had to do was check any nearby traffic cameras for the time period when you would have reached and left the grocery store parking lot from Argeneaus. If there was even one that caught you driving by with me in the passenger seat they’d have gotten your license plate number from it.” She shrugged. It was the only thing that made sense. His car had been caught on camera with her unconscious in the front seat. They’d checked the license plate and traced it back to Paul.
She supposed they had just been lucky that it had taken this long for them to be tracked down. Had the immortal Enforcers arrived at the house before they’d left for Chuck E. Cheese’s, or even after they’d returned . . . Jeanne Louise grimaced at the thought. Had that happened, Paul would probably be locked up in a cell at the Enforcer house right now while her uncle decided what to do with him. She’d like to think Uncle Lucian would try to help her claim her life mate, but he was a bit of a stickler about certain things . . . like kidnapping an immortal with the intention of forcing them to turn a mortal. Yeah, that so wasn’t going to go over well.
“I’m guessing we can’t go home,” Paul said quietly.
“Not unless you want to be taken into custody and locked up,” she said on a sigh.
He nodded, his expression solemn. “So a hotel?”
Jeanne Louise sank back in her seat and rubbed her forehead wearily. The renewed tension had brought the fading headache back. It shouldn’t. The nanos weren’t eradicating it for her as they normally would. It didn’t take a great deal of thinking to figure out why. She’d only had the one pint of blood in almost twenty-four hours, but the nanos had been working hard, first to remove the effects of the tranquilizer he’d given her, and then to ease her own pain as she’d suffered with Livy. She was probably in need of another good three pints of blood at that point. Low on the life-giving substance, the nanos were picking and choosing what to deal with and apparently a little tension headache wasn’t on the top of their priority list.
“You’re pale still. You need blood, don’t you?” Paul asked quietly.