Whispered Lies

SIXTEEN

I’D LIKE OUR meal sent up to the room at eight thirty,” Gabrielle told Pierre, who’d written the order on a notepad as she’d dictated. She kept her step brisk, her heels snapping against the hard floors on her way back to her room.

“Oui. Will there be anything else for this evening?”

“No, thank you.” She checked her watch. That would give her and Carlos a little over an hour when no one should bother them. She glanced back at her bodyguard, whose hard expression hadn’t changed since walking out of the room seven hours ago.

What was going on behind those bloody sunshades?

At the last hallway leading to her room, Pierre peeled off in a different direction.

Carlos reached the door first, punching in the code, then let her step inside. “Stay here while I check everything.”

Did he really think someone would be lurking inside? She waited until he stepped out of the bedroom and crooked a finger for her to come to him.

She walked forward, but he stepped back into the bedroom before she reached him. When she got inside, he pulled her close to him. Gabrielle slapped both hands on his chest and shoved her face up into his.

“Not until we talk,” she warned, disgusted that every nerve in her body had just jumped into high gear, ready to let him get away with kissing her again.

To get away with a lot more.

She had some pride left. No more hot kisses until he explained why he’d stopped the last time.

The only reason she could figure was that he got caught up in the moment, but wasn’t interested in anything sexual with her. That possibility stung almost as bad as having him yell at her to put clothes on in the cabin.

He didn’t find her physically attractive.

Carlos didn’t say a word, but he didn’t intimidate her either. He’d never harm her, physically. She knew that with a certainty she’d never felt about any other man, which weighed heavily in his favor when it came to kissing him.

They had been halfway to the part where they fell into bed together. She hadn’t dated a man in forever, and sex had become a distant memory.

But she wanted him to feel the same heat for her.

Her moral compass spun out of control over the idea of sleeping with a man she didn’t know anything about, whom he worked for, where he came from, or what would happen once this was over. But she’d married a man she knew all that about only to be treated like a bank account with legs. Roberto had used her in more ways than one, leaving her emotionally bankrupt.

Just once, she’d like to experience true passion.

But she and Carlos only had an hour, so she didn’t have time for a discussion. She had to get down to business.

“We have to hurry,” she started in a hushed voice.

“About that kiss-,” he murmured. Was that guilt rippling through his voice?

“We don’t have time for that right now.” She almost smiled at his confusion. “First, I have to take this panic button off. When I stepped near a communication console, it buzzed and everyone looked up. I don’t know why it happened. Next, I got into Amelia’s records. She’s expected back, at least on paper. I found the plans for this compound in the archives and the floor her room is on.”

Understanding dawned in his eyes. “Stick the panic button in my bag. Put on soft-soled shoes. Tell me you’re taking a nap and don’t want to be bothered. Speak loud enough to be heard in the living room and use that snobby tone again.”

Snobby? She curled her lip in what she hoped was a feral look.

His eyes crinkled, but he didn’t laugh. “I’m not criticizing. I was impressed.”

Her insides melted over the compliment. She backed out of his arms and quietly pulled her sneakers from the suitcase. Once she had those on, she took a fortifying breath before speaking loud enough for anyone listening to hear.

“Jet lag is catching up to me. I need a nap and I don’t want to be disturbed.”

Carlos walked out into the living room so she followed him. He closed the bedroom door with a solid thump, then pulled her over to the powder room and closed that door softly once they were both inside.

“This room is safe. What about the plans?” he asked.

“When the IT center was built, the engineers needed the plans so they could run additional power and so forth. I recall a worker talking about how they couldn’t set a beam in one spot because of the underground tunnels. So I dug around for the plans today and found how the wires had been run underground between this building and student housing for women. I think they took the easy way and ran the wiring through the tunnels.”

“Okay, so what does that do for us?”

She cocked her head in a smug angle. “While you were looking all hot and dangerous outside the glass window to the IT center, I was locating Amelia’s room and creating a loop for the security cameras we’d pass. She’s in the high-priority residence area, same section where Linette and I stayed. If we’re quick, we can check out the room to see if she’s coming back, but they’ll become suspicious if the camera loops run too long. We may see some students since this is mealtime, but once they shut the building for the night, security walks the halls.”

“Will you be able to tell if anything looks wrong about the room?”

“Yes. When Linette left without notice, her half of our room was clean within a day. If Amelia is gone against her will, I’m thinking at least one-half of the room will be spotless.”

“Good idea. Nice job.”

“Thanks.” She preened inside and started to reach for the handle when he said, “Hot and dangerous?”

Gabrielle cut her eyes up at him. “Like you weren’t playing up the sexy bodyguard bit to the hilt for the females ogling you?”

“Just doing my job.” His eyes crinkled with humor that downplayed the stern frown he gave her, then his face turned all serious. “Tell me how we get to the tunnel.”

She explained the back way to the stairs and the room where the access point to the tunnel should be if it was still there.

“What about the code to our door?” he asked.

She smiled. “I’ve set it so we can bypass security by keying in a secondary code that will not show up on their panel. But the original code will still go through if someone tries to come in.”

“I’ll leave a set of eyes to catch anyone who might try, but I doubt they’ll bother Mademoiselle Tynte Saxe.” He winked and her blood pressure spiked. “The minute we step out of here, don’t say a word and do everything I tell you to do.”

“Like that ever changes?”

Carlos ignored Gabrielle’s jab and took her hand, opening the door, then leading her into the living room, where he positioned her next to the exit door. He didn’t like her ditching the panic button, but they didn’t need to draw attention either. He was not letting her out of arm’s reach from here on out, which would be an issue later tonight, but he’d face that then.

Opening the glass doors to the patio where the wind was blowing, he placed an open magazine next to the glass figurine where the bug was planted. The pages fluttered intermittently from the breeze.

He placed his psuedo-iPod on the top of a cabinet with a laser beam set to trigger the video recorder in the unit if the door opened.

At the door to the hallway, he entered the secondary code, then pulled her out behind him. Carlos kept a steady pace, moving them down the hall silent as a shadow. The door to the stairs creaked, but no one appeared in the thirty seconds he waited, so they descended three floors down to the basement. Carlos flipped on a small LED light and let Gabrielle lead him to a room that smelled as damp and musty as it looked.

“It should be on this wall.” Her whisper echoed and she froze.

“No one should hear anything down here unless there’s a bug, and they have no reason to put one in this spot. Stand still while I check.” He shone the light across the wall, running his hands over the stones. No obvious breaks. Cobwebs reached across the walls with wispy fingers, tying several weathered trunks to a long cabinet that hit Carlos chest high. He carefully moved the trunks, checking behind them. Nothing. The cabinet weighed as much as a full refrigerator. He gripped the side at the back and put everything he had behind, pulling it away from the wall.

“There’s a panel,” Gabrielle whispered, softer this time.

He put a foot against the wall for leverage and strained every muscle to widen the gap to three feet. Enough for them to squeeze into the opening.

Four tarnished brass pins held the panel on the wall. He unscrewed the pins, then put the panel on the cabinet and forced his body through the angle into the dark hole. Reaching a hand behind him, he waved her forward.

She touched his fingers, letting him know she was there.

He pinched the LED light and stood up, banging his head on the hard ceiling. He held back the curse he wanted to yell and caught her by the shoulder before she made the same mistake. “Don’t stand up too quick.”

Wasted effort since she was able to stand without touching the ceiling.

“Must have been a damn small bunch of warriors living here back when,” he muttered, drawing her along behind him.

Gabrielle whispered about the two turns they had to find to reach the student housing. Her slender hand was cold in his, gripping his fingers with all her strength.

He towed her along, wanting to chuckle at the fast flip in personality. She was a study in contradictions. One minute she was quiet and flush with embarrassment, then the next she was taking him to task over not finishing the kiss.

She had to think she’d done something wrong. He owed her an explanation or at least an apology for being a jerk.

Or a kiss. He wouldn’t mind owing her a kiss if not for it sending the wrong message and crossing all over the lines of a mission. He’d never had this issue with a prisoner, and never with any one woman.

But all he had to do was hear her voice or get a whiff of her perfume or the smell of her shampoo and he wanted her.

“This is where it should be,” she murmured when they reached the middle of a long passage with no doors.

At the next corner, Carlos saw a dust of light breaking through from above.

“There it is.” He let go of her hand and shone his light up the opening that rose eight feet above them. Long fingers of light pierced through a grate at the top. Rows of spikes had been driven into the wall at one-foot intervals from the grate, forming a ladder that ran down to waist-high above the ground.

He pulled her close. “I can’t put you up there first since I don’t know what’s on the other side.”

“Go ahead. I can get up the ladder by myself.”

“Okay, I’ll wave you up as soon as it’s clear. Keep this.” He handed her the light and reached two rungs up so he could catch his foot on the last one, then started climbing. When he reached the grate, it appeared to open into a storage room with hot-water heaters and cleaning equipment.

He used one hand to push up on the grate, holding himself to the ladder with the other. He put his shoulder into inching the heavy metal to the side. It slid on a track.

That was the good news.

The bad news was a squeak caused by friction at one point.

He listened. No footsteps came running. Once the grate was open far enough he climbed through and turned to wave a hand at Gabrielle. All he could see was a black hole until his light flashed twice. Smart woman.

A scuffling noise was followed by a feminine grunt, then her face appeared. He took her arm and helped her onto the floor, then to her feet. She immediately started dusting off her pants. Every bit the lady until she realized he was waiting.

“Oh.” She glanced around. “We go up the stairs.”

“Tell me now what the upper-floor layout is before we get there so we won’t have to talk.”

She explained, using her hands. “Amelia’s room is 210. If nothing has changed, everyone should be in their room or at the meal hall, because we were never allowed to linger in the hallways. But we might run into someone coming or going.”

“We’ll deal with that if it happens.” Carlos took her hand and led the way. When he pulled open the wooden exit door to the second floor, the hinges whined.

She held her breath, then shoved up close to see past his shoulder. A metal door twenty feet away on his right closed off the hallway, with an alarm-code panel on the side. A sign above stated no access.

Gabrielle whispered, “That’s the staff quarters and security entrance for this building. Go left to the first turn, take a right, and 210 should be halfway down on your left.”

He nodded and eased into the hallway, where hand-blown glass sconces lit the passageway, painted a dusty rose and white. Each door was still marked with metal numbers in gold. She stayed close behind Carlos, careful not to make a sound. When they turned the corner, a door shut with a click in the hallway.

Her whole body shook with the fear of getting caught. On some buried level, she was still the frightened teen who never broke a rule or took a risk while here. She’d never wanted to be taken to the “special building” at the back of the property. The place she’d once thought was for exceptional students until a rumor floated around of someone screaming out a window.

Could have been a fabricated rumor just to scare students, but she hadn’t risked finding out.

Carlos reached back, taking her hand as if he’d sensed the terror she felt and knew the simple touch would ease her fears. He moved forward, forcing her from her spot. At the door to Amelia’s room, he listened, then tapped his knuckles lightly. No answer. He slipped something from his pocket.

Feeling clingy all of a sudden, she released his hands so he was free to jimmy the lock while watching both ways. He opened the door and she followed him into the room.

The room hadn’t changed much other than newer floral brocade linens, the priceless French Provençal antiques still elegant and feminine. Clothes were tossed across one bed just as she and Linette had done on weekends, though they’d kept the room neat all week. Nostalgia flowed over her in slow waves, reminding her of happy nights sharing dreams and sad times once Linette disappeared.

Carlos moved around the room silent as a ghost.

Both of these beds and dressers had photos, books, nail polish, hairbrushes, and other items scattered about. If one bed was Amelia’s, the school still expected her to return.

A humming noise drew her attention to the loo. The fan was on, which meant…

Carlos stepped backward just as the commode flushed.

She cringed at the noise.

He had her out in the hallway in half a second. The sound of the bathroom door opening and shutting came through the wood separating them. They barely got out fast enough.

Carlos took a step the way they had come when a door to another room between them and the turn for the stairwell opened.

A young woman with long, silky brown hair backed out of the room, closing the door behind her. She fiddled with the lock.

Something whispered from Carlos’s lips that Gabrielle bet was a curse. If they went the other way, the student might report strangers in the hall and LaCrosse would immediately know who they were by the description.

If they walked forward, they’d have to interact, and any lie might hang Gabrielle if the student told someone.

She clenched Carlos’s hand, fighting a panic attack. Didn’t take a genius to figure the probability of escaping without notice was too small to calculate.

What would LaCrosse do if he heard about this?

Sweat trickled down her collar.

Carlos started forward, pulling her with him. Her heart bounced in her chest. What was he going to do?

When they were within ten feet of the girl, she must have heard them approaching. She swung around with a wide-eyed look that washed away when surprise burst across her face.

“Gabrielle, what are you doing here?”