Sherrilyn Kenyon - Silent Truth

“I changed their minds, or rather you did.”

“Me? What’d I do?”

“You don’t remember your blood pressure dropping?”

She lifted her hand and rubbed her head, reorienting herself. “I gave blood, then the nurse gave me crackers and juice… that’s all I remember.”

Hunter studied her a minute. “I toured the facility with Dr. Hart, then went to dinner. By the time I finally got him to bring me back I convinced him to let me say hello to you. We were coming down the hall when the medical team rushed into your room.”

“Why?”

Hunter’s throat moved with a swallow. “Your blood pressure dropped until you flatlined.”

Oh, shit. “You’re kidding.” She’d been touched at seeing the flash of worry in his face, but now his flinty eyes hardened.

“No. I’m not kidding.” His gaze wavered with something dark and frightening when he spoke just above a whisper. “I’m getting you out of here. Now.”

“No!” She started to talk, then glanced around, up at the ceiling, then at him.

He nodded, catching her concern about being heard, and swung around beside her. She scooted over to make room. Before he sat back, he lifted her into his arms, careful of the wire running to the machine.

Her head spun at the change, but she gripped his muscled arms for stability. She wanted to sink into his warmth, to savor the way he held her close, but he’d set the rules for this engagement before they entered Kore.

Hunter didn’t trust her. At all.

She was determined to earn that trust, but carefully.

Leaning toward him, she kept her voice down to shield what she said. “They haven’t run any tests on me yet so we still have time. You might be able to forget about what you need from Kore, but I’m not leaving until I have my mother’s records. We had an agreement.”

He put his hand on the back of her head and held her closer, cheek to cheek. “Not if you’re in danger. I never meant for you to be harmed.”

Warmth curled in her heart at that, but he hadn’t said he believed her innocent of any wrongdoing. He hadn’t said she mattered, only that he felt guilty over what happened to her.

Suffering guilt did not equal caring for her.

Or trusting her.

Hunter wouldn’t intentionally hurt a woman, but he’d made it clear she was on her own once this was over. His tune hadn’t changed. She’d maintain a working relationship with him and ensure he followed through on his part. “This is our only chance at this database, so let’s stick to our deal.”

He held her a minute, then sighed. “Let’s make this fast.”

“How are we going to access their system?”

“I saw how to do it after watching them work on you earlier. Before you almost… before they threw me out.”

His hands had tightened on her waist when he’d said “work on you earlier.” She dug back into her memory and stalled again at the juice and crackers. Had something in the juice made her sick?

Had someone tried to kill her? That scared her to her toes, but she was too close to leave without her mother’s information.

“What about a computer?” she whispered, and inhaled the scent of warm male. She’d have known his scent if she was blindfolded and had to pick him out of a hundred men. If she closed her eyes she could shut out the world and still smell the lingering scent of their intimacy from this morning.

She already missed that intimacy. How had things gone so incredibly bad in a few hours?

“I’ve got a computer,” he whispered. “There’s a port next to your bed they used to access your files when you got sick. I haven’t found anything to indicate there’s a video feed from this room so if we keep our voices down we should be fine.” Lowering her gently to the pillow, he pulled out the black unit that looked like an iPhone.

His thumbs moved as fast as a sewing machine needle running wide open, tapping the face of his gadget. From a pocket inside his suit, he produced a thin wire with an odd three-sided plug like some sort of universal attachment, which he used to connect his black electronic unit to the wall port.

When he leaned down toward her face, she had the quick hope he was going to kiss her.

But he moved his mouth to her ear. “I lifted the nurse’s entry code with this unit when she hooked up a mobile computer to access the database.” Pausing, he reached over to a unit that reminded her of the finger probe the medical staff used on her mother they had told Abbie was a pulse oximeter. Hunter explained, “When I put your finger in this sleeve, I’ll click an activation button on the program that tells this unit to take your fingerprint and prick the tip for a blood sample. I’ll use a different finger. Took like thirty seconds to get your records when she did it.”

“Wow, that’s quick.”

“Good thing, or-” His jaw flexed. He pressed his forehead softly against hers as if he needed a minute, then drew a deep breath and continued typing.

She felt a tiny prick at the tip of her finger.

He studied the small monitor, then said, “We’re in.”

“Can you-”

He nodded. “Your mom first. I have her name and social.”

“How?”

“Got it at the medical center today.”

While she’d been wrapped up in family issues, Hunter had been doing his covert thing. But then he’d been trained by someone to do this kind of work. Snooping and suspicion was part of him, something he couldn’t turn off.

He read silently, thumbing the display. His mouth pulled to one side in thought. “There’s nothing here but just what Kore told you originally. Standard testing, blood donations.” He looked at her. “No treatments.”

“Can I see?” She expected him to deny her request based on their lack of time.

He handed her his electronic unit. “It’s a touch screen.”

Just when she was afraid he’d snuff out the smoldering embers of affection in her heart before this was over, he stoked the heat into a dancing flame again. “Thanks.”

She fumbled with the touch screen at first, noticing how he patiently waited without trying to hurry her along. Didn’t take long to see that he’d told her the truth. She searched the file tabs and opened the one for family history.

She found a subfile listed as Genetic Extensions and clicked on it, reading quickly. She stopped. “No way.”

“What’s wrong?” He put his arm around her and leaned close. The motion was so filled with concern she forgave him some of the pain he’d caused her.

“My biological father is listed,” she told him quietly.

“You didn’t know who he was?”

“No. And I didn’t know I had a brother either.” She glanced at Hunter, sure he saw the shock and disappointment she reeled from. Why hadn’t her mother mentioned an older brother?

Hunter reached up and traced a finger along her face. “When your mother’s better she’ll explain.”

Abbie nodded and forced the knot in her throat down so she could talk. “Her son, I mean my brother, has Mom’s same blood type, right down to being RH negative. Mine is RH positive. Dr. Tatum said if he could find a larger supply of blood than what Kore banked of my mother’s he could replace hers with clean blood over several treatments, but she might still need a liver transplant if we didn’t figure this out soon enough. Her son could be her savior.”

But what about the other hundred questions to do with a brother Abbie had never known about? Had her mother given up that child? Had her mother seen her son since giving birth two years before Abbie was born? Had her biological father been so dangerous he wouldn’t allow his child’s own mother to see him?

“Let me download all her files and you can read them at length later on,” Hunter suggested.