She’d examined his beautiful body, scars and all, at the clinic before, but never in such an intimate way. She uncurled her hand and ran her palm up to his shoulder.
He sighed and halfway rolled onto his back, flinging his arm to the side where it rested across her hip.
She took his hand in hers and smoothed her fingertips over the rough spots where his fingers met his palm. They had to make this right. He could keep lowering his dosage, but an antidote would counteract the drug’s effects in his system. Arnoff had to have one somewhere.
“What time is it?”
His gruff voice startled her, and she dropped his hand. “Sorry.”
He shifted completely to his back and stretched his arms over his head. “For what?”
She held up her hands, spreading her fingers. “For mauling you in your sleep.”
He hitched up to his elbows. “If that was mauling, I’m all for it.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Okay.” He ran his tongue over his teeth. “Dry mouth, slight headache, but I still have my sanity—thanks to you.”
“All I did was give you a pill.” She tugged the hem of her T-shirt over her thighs.
“That’s all I needed.”
“You need that antidote.”
“Yeah, that too.”
She sat up and tilted her chin toward Dr. Arnoff’s laptop. “And we just might find the clues to that antidote in there.”
“I’m claiming the shower first, and then I’ll go out and pick up some breakfast. Bagels, coffee?”
“Anything like that.” Max had just put an end to her visions of lolling in bed with him while they discussed strategy. Who was she kidding? If he wanted her, he could’ve had her. She’d had her hands all over him. Wasn’t that obvious enough for him?
The slam of the bathroom door put a punctuation mark on her foolish imaginings.
She scooted off the bed and flipped the lid on the laptop. Sleep had recharged her brain if not the battery, and she had recalled several different letter, number and character combinations that Arnoff had written down using his wife’s name. She’d give those a try and then wait for the power cord.
She powered on the computer, checking the battery life. Looked as though they had about an hour—an hour to save a life.
She wrote down each password as she tried it and then squealed when she entered the fifth combination.
Max charged out of the bathroom, sluicing his long hair back from his face, his jeans hanging low on his hips. “Are you okay out here?”
“More than okay. I got the password.”
“I’m impressed, especially after the night you just had.”
The night she’d just had was her best in recent memory. “I recalled that he’d written down his wife’s name using different letters, numbers and characters. It just took a few tries, but we’re still going to need that power cord.”
“We can at least make a start.” He rubbed his knuckles across the dark stubble on his chin. “I was thinking in the shower, Ava.”
Her gaze flicked to his flat belly and back to his face. “I’m listening.”
“If we can’t locate any more blue pills or an antidote in the next few days, I want you gone.”
She tapped the computer’s keyboard. “We’re going to find something, Max. Dr. Arnoff may have been unethical, but he was brilliant. He wouldn’t have developed a drug like T-101 without an escape plan.”
“You find that escape plan while I go round up some breakfast.” He pulled a T-shirt over his head, strapped on his shoulder holster and shrugged into a jacket. He turned at the door. “Lock up behind me and don’t answer for anyone.”
She padded to the door after it closed and put the locks and chain in place. Then she picked up the pad of paper with the hotel logo on it and dragged the chair in front of the computer on the credenza.
She wrote down the names of all the folders on the desktop, arranged them in alphabetical order and double clicked on the first one.
She was into the third folder by the time Max returned with breakfast. She opened the door wide as he walked through with coffee in each hand and a white bag pinned to his side with his elbow.