The Immortal Hunter(43)

"Didn't...?" Dani stared at him with incomprehension, and then a new horror began to rise in her eyes as she realized the state of things. "You've lost her."

Decker winced, but said quickly, "We'll find her."

She didn't look as if she believed that was likely, and then sighed and glanced around. "I need to call my parents. They'll be worried sick."

"It's all right. Lucian sent a couple men over to take care of them last night," Decker told her, and her eyes widened with alarm.

"Take care of them how?"

Dani asked the question as if suspecting their people might have gone and shot them down like dogs in the street or something. The reaction irritated the hell out of him. "They just eased their minds and made them think that you and Stephanie stopped in Toronto for a couple days to see the sights and visit Wonderland. It was so they wouldn't worry. If you call them, you'll just upset and confuse them. They're happy and calm right now." And not likely to call in the mortal police and blow this up into a "situation," he thought, but didn't say that out loud.

Dani stared at him for several moments, looking uncertain, and then shook her head and said dully, "You should have woken me."

"There was no need. You couldn't do anything to help either situation."

"I could have helped look for Stephanie," she argued. "Another set of eyes wouldn't have hurt. Besides," Dani added, getting upset again. "None of you even know what she looks like."

"Every man has a picture of her," he assured her solemnly.

That made her frown. "Where did you get a picture of her?"

Decker hesitated, knowing she wasn't going to like this, but finally admitted, "From your memories."

"What?" She gasped.

"We got a photo from your parents too," he added quickly. "But those are posed and often don't look much like the person, and the images of her in your memory are better. They're more recent and natural and told us what she's wearing too."

"You mean to say you let a bunch of your men poke around inside my head?" Dani breathed with a horror that suggested it was tantamount to rape, and Decker understood her feeling. Lord knew what they might have inadvertently seen while in her thoughts. Lucian had ordered them to stick to her most recent surface memories, and Decker trusted the enforcers he worked with to have done so. However, a lot of those memories included him, and one of them was something he would have preferred to keep private, that being the incident in the back of the SUV.

Decker would never tell Dani, but he was pretty sure it no longer was private. He hadn't asked any of them, but judging by the low whistles and looks cast his way by a couple of the enforcers and volunteers as they'd finished reading her thoughts, pretty much everyone had been witness to it.

"It was necessary," he said now, forcing those thoughts aside. "We had to have a clear and recent image of both Stephanie and the rogue who took her. I only caught a glimpse of them as they escaped. You know and have a lot of clear visual images of Stephanie and the rogue who took her. Now they know exactly who and what they're looking for, and they've been out all night searching for them."

Her shoulders and head drooped with defeat, and Dani stared down at her hands briefly, apparently accepting the necessity, and then she raised her head. "They were searching all night, but is there anyone out there now looking for them? Probably not, right?" she answered herself. "You guys have to avoid the sun."

"We have specially coated windows on the SUVs. Most of the men are still out there looking. I was too until-" Decker's head swiveled to look for a clock, but the room was barren of all but the mattress and box spring on the floor. That would change soon enough, but for now... He reached for his watch, which lay on the floor beside his jeans, and grimaced when he saw the time. "A half hour ago. I came back because I thought you might wake soon and wanted to tell you what had happened. When I learned you were still sleeping, I decided to crash until you woke up."

"Well, I'm awake now. Let's go."

"Right." Decker sighed wearily.

"I'll drive and you can sleep. I'll wake you if I find-" Dani stopped suddenly and said, "Nicholas."

"What about him?" he asked with a frown.

"Has he called? Did he lose them too? Has he called?" she repeated impatiently.

"No. We haven't heard from him," Decker answered.

Dani bit her lip and then asked abruptly, "Where's my cell phone?"

"Still in my jeans. Wh-" The word ended on a surprised "oomph" as she suddenly shifted to her hands and knees to climb across him to get to his jeans beside the bed. Decker would have stopped her, but got distracted by her derriere, which was suddenly in front of his face as she bent over him, her knees on one side of his thighs, one hand on the other, bearing her weight, as she reached for the pile of his clothes.

It was a very nice derriere, Decker decided as it waved around in front of his face, swaying a bit as she patted his jeans for the lump that would be her phone.

"Aha!" Dani's derriere suddenly dropped out of his line of vision as she straightened, cell phone in hand. Decker sighed with disappointment. It had been a rather pleasant view and he'd been tempted to grab it again as he had in the SUV and-