The Immortal Hunter(63)

Groaning, Dani shook her head and pulled away from him.

Decker frowned and raised an eyebrow in question.

"It might be better if I went with Sam after all," she said, flushing.

Decker looked disappointed, but nodded and said easily, "Okay. I'll catch up in a couple minutes."

Smiling with relief that he wasn't angry, she started to lean up to give him a quick kiss and then caught herself and shook her head. "Better not."

Decker chuckled and then bent to press a kiss to her forehead before turning her by one shoulder and giving her a gentle push in the direction Sam had taken. "Go on... Before I decide to try to change your mind."

Dani headed out of the store, glancing over her shoulder as she went. Her eyes traveled down his body as he turned to speak to the store clerk. Decker really was a fine figure of a man. Not as strapping as his uncle, who looked like he wielded broadswords for a living. Decker was leaner, but muscular for all that, she thought, recalling running her hands over his rippling stomach and wide chest. And he was super strong. Good Lord, she wouldn't have believed some of the positions they'd explored that afternoon were even physically possible... and they wouldn't have been for anyone but Superman. And Decker, she thought on a smile, finally turning her head away once he was out of view... just in time to see the wide chest she was crashing into.

"Sorry," she apologized, and tried to step around the man, but he'd caught her by the arms and held her in place. Dani lifted her head then, her smile dying as she stared into the face looking down at her and breathed in horror, "You."

"Thanks." Decker slipped a tip into the store clerk's hand and sent him on his way with the two now-empty carts. He didn't bother to watch him go, but turned back to close the rear passenger door and the trunk. Decker then hit the button on the remote to lock Sam's car and headed for the nearest entrance to go find the women in the grocery store.

Sam was in the dairy aisle, reading the back of a yogurt cup. He had no idea why. The woman didn't need to worry about her weight; she was tall and Twiggy thin.

Sam glanced his way, her eyebrows rising when she spotted him. Setting the yogurt in the cart, she smiled and commented, "Well, that was certainly quicker than I expected."

Decker shrugged as she turned back to the yogurt shelf, not sure why she'd think it would take long, but asked, "Where is Dani?"

Sam turned back with confusion. "She went with you."

"No, she changed her mind and decided to shop with you while I took care of getting the other stuff to the car. She left right behind you," he added, and then frowned and asked, "Are you saying she hasn't got here yet?"

"No." Sam bit her lip. "Maybe she just stopped to get something on the way."

"She can't. She doesn't have a purse." Decker glanced worriedly around, hoping to see her rushing toward them.

"Where could she be then?" Sam asked, sounding bewildered.

Cursing, Decker turned and started back the way he'd come, glancing up each aisle he passed, but she was down none of those. Sam had been chasing around behind him with the cart, but paused when he did and suggested, "Maybe she went to the car."

"I told you, she was coming to shop with you," he said impatiently.

"I know," she said soothingly. "But she doesn't know this mall and it's big and somewhat confusing. Maybe she got turned around, couldn't find the grocery store, and went to see if you were still at the car."

Decker considered that briefly, and then said, "I'll go check. You stay here in case she finds her way here."

The moment Sam nodded agreement, he hurried off. He rushed through the halls, scanning the crowds he passed for Dani as he made his way out to Sam's car.

Decker could tell before he reached it that it was empty, but approached anyway to peer inside in case he'd not locked the doors as he'd thought and she'd crawled inside and fallen asleep.

No such luck. Straightening, he swiveled his head left and right, checking the parking lot to see if she was approaching, and then pulled out his phone and called Sam's cell phone number.

"Is she there?" he asked the moment she answered.

"No," Sam said almost apologetically and then asked, "What do we do? Should I call Mortimer?"

Decker stood still for a moment, experiencing the panic trying to break free inside him and then said, "No. We'll search the mall ourselves first."

He closed the phone without saying good-bye, his eyes scanning the parking lot once more, and then he started back toward the building. They would find her, Decker assured himself as he walked. They had to. He couldn't lose Dani now.

"There he goes: your hero."

Dani ignored that comment from the man in the driver's seat beside her, her attention instead on Decker as she watched him walk away. She wished she could throw open the pickup door and scream, wished she could move at all really, but the ugly bastard next to her had her firmly under his control. At least physically; he was leaving her to her own thoughts, though.

He was probably listening to them, Dani thought bitterly. It hadn't escaped her notice that he had seemed to be enjoying her terror when he and the others had kidnapped her and Stephanie up north, and he'd seemed equally entertained by it as he'd made her walk out here to this beat-up old brown pickup truck. Dani was sure the people they'd passed hadn't noticed a thing amiss, none of them could have known that she was screaming with terror inside her head.