Black Ice (Ice 1)

“I told you! I was taking my roommate’s place while she went off with her new boyfriend. I had no idea what kind of place it was, or what kind of sick creatures I was working for.”

“And no

w you know. Which is what makes you a liability. How do you happen to understand so many languages? Most American girls can barely manage to speak English.”

She shot him an angry look. She was so predictable, so easy to play. All he had to do was make a sweeping, disparaging remark about American women and she forgot all about her misery. He tended to like sophisticated, unpredictable women. But for some reason he liked her.

For a moment he thought she wouldn’t answer. “I have a natural talent for it,” she said, her voice strained as she tried to deal with the pain. “My parents sent me to a series of expensive private schools, and I started learning French in kindergarten.”

“That explains why your accent is so good. Where did the others come in?”

“School. I majored in modern languages at Mount Holyoke, and my parents traveled a lot. I can even converse in Latin.”

“Not a modern language. Lie back so I can work on your legs.”

She was putting too much energy into dealing with the pain—there was none left over to fight him. She lay back, pulling the sheet up over her. The legs weren’t as bad as the arms—Hakim had been working himself up to a proper climax and he hadn’t gotten there yet.

Bastien had been between her thighs not that long ago. She had long, beautifully shaped legs—he’d been too busy to appreciate them in her suite.

“I told you, I’m good at languages. I like all of them.”

“Then why do you have a shit job at a small-time publisher? Talents like yours could come in useful at any number of organizations.”

“I like my life. I’d rather translate children’s books than covert arms deals.”

He’d finished his ministrations, and he set the bottle and swab down on the floor, then moved onto the bed beside her, crouching over her. “And that’s exactly the thing you’re not supposed to say, my angel. You need to forget everything you saw during the past two days. These are dangerous people we’re dealing with, and you could identify most of them. You’re a smart woman, despite your stupid behavior, and if you set your mind to it you could probably decipher just what we were talking about in the meetings, now that you realize it’s not chickens and grain.”

She didn’t like him so close, leaning over her, she didn’t like looking up at him, even though he wasn’t touching her—he could see it very clearly. He didn’t care. “Forget everything, Chloe,” he said softly. “Or you might not live to regret it.”

11

Chloe stared up at him. She was lying flat on her back on his bed, wearing her underwear and a sheet, and she’d had sex with him less than twenty-four hours before. Hell, maybe less than twelve—she had no idea what time it was right then.

She also couldn’t bring herself to move, to reach up and shove him away. His dark, unreadable eyes were half-closed as he leaned over her, and for an insane moment she thought he was going to kiss her again.

But he didn’t. He levered himself up, away from her, seemingly finished with her. “I’m going to take a shower, then I’ll see what I can do about a passport for you.”

“I don’t need a new passport.”

He shook his head. “If you travel under your own name you’ll never make it home. I know what I’m doing, Chloe. Just do as I say and you might come out of this mess alive.”

She stared at him. “Who the hell are you?” she said. “What the hell are you?”

His faint smile revealed nothing. “I don’t think you need to know. Just try to sleep. You’re going to need your strength to heal properly.”

Doing what he said didn’t exactly appeal to her, but she was too worn out to fight him. The pain had subsided to a dull throb, encompassing every inch of her body, and at that moment sleep sounded much more important than the truth.

“All right,” she said grudgingly.

“What? You’re actually agreeing to something? I don’t believe it.”

“Go to hell,” she said, her voice barely audible.

“That’s more like it,” he murmured. “Try to sleep. You can insult me all over again when you wake up.”

She would have thought sleep would come immediately, but it was frustratingly resistant. It was cloudy outside—if she tried to reconstruct the last few hours she might be able to guess what time it was, but going back in time was the last thing she wanted to do. She didn’t want to think about anything that had happened yesterday, from the moment she’d gotten in the car with him. She didn’t want to remember those rough, powerful moments in her room, she didn’t want to relive the pain and terror and, most of all, she didn’t want to remember Gilles Hakim on top of her, his body a deadweight. Literally.

He’d been hurting her, planning to kill her, and she’d wanted him dead. She’d thought she was a pacifist, willing to die rather than hurt someone else, but when it came to a matter of her own life or death, all her noble sentiments were shot to shit. If she’d had a gun she would have killed Hakim herself, and enjoyed doing it.