“I could have Jonas send us some food from the hotel,” he said as though reading her thoughts.
Her thoughts, or the growling of her belly.
“’Kay,” she mumbled.
“You have to move, mate.” He chuckled beneath her.
“Why? Phone’s by the bed. Use it.”
“Sorry, baby, that line’s not near secure enough to suit me.” A quick kiss to her lips and he was rolling with her.
Depositing her to her back, Stygian lifted himself from the bed and padded naked into the other room.
Liza stayed where she was. Her legs were still jelly. She swore she’d fall flat on her face if she had to actually walk.
“We have to return to the hotel.”
It was the harshness in Stygian’s voice that had her turning to her back and staring up at him with a frown.
“What?”
“Get dressed. Gideon Cross was sighted at a service station just outside Window Rock an hour ago and he was asking about you and Claire. There’s no time left, Liza. We have to move.”
“How do you know that?” Gripping the quilt to her br**sts, she stared back at him, apprehension beginning to churn through her. “Why would he let himself be seen?”
“I don’t know why,” he growled. “Ashley and Emma sighted him and called in. By the time they turned around, he was speeding away on a trail bike and hit the desert. They lost him from there.”
He was asking about her and Claire?
Liza could feel herself shaking from the inside out. Feel a sudden terror racing through her.
She could feel, sense some knowledge rising inside her. There was something she needed to tell him, but as quickly as the thought flashed across her mind, it was gone again.
Where was that internal distance that had been so easy to find earlier?
Where was that ability to retreat? To hide from the sudden, bone-chilling fear and the flash of a face?
But it wasn’t a mature male with a Bengal’s slash across his face. It wasn’t demonic yellow eyes glistening with rage as in the pictures Jonas Wyatt had shown her.
No. It was a young man. In such pain, so fierce and so determined to help them—
Liza stumbled from the bed, suddenly sick to her stomach, capping her hand over her mouth, terrified she would lose her pride and the lunch she had eaten earlier right there on the floor.
She wanted to hide.
She wanted to go away.
Oh God.
Oh God, she had to go away.
She had to escape and there was only one way to do it. There was only one place to hide. There was only that place so deep within herself that there was no chance of danger—
“Liza, stop. You’re safe. Listen to me, baby, you’re safe.”
Stygian had her. His hands were wrapped around her upper arms, holding her to her feet, his voice was calm, firm, insistent, holding her to the present when all she wanted to do was sink as deep inside herself as possible.
“You’re safe,” he said again. “You have time for a quick shower. Dog and his team are moving in and they’ll escort us to the hotel, along with Flint and Rule, where Claire and the team sent to collect her will meet us. Everything’s fine.”