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“Affirmative. Look, we’ll get you out ASAP, but you’re gonna have to wait out the weather. It’ll get worse before it gets better, and you know the choppers can’t fly in this crap. Get to that house. To get inside—”

“Don’t tell me. There’s a Welcome mat with a key underneath.”

“Close enough. There’s a keypad. Battery operated. The code is one-two-six-four-seven. Got it?”

“One-two-six-four-seven.”

“There’s an alarm system, also battery operated, as well video cams and monitors.”

“Also on battery?”

“Yeah. The cams are everywhere. So are the monitors. Did I mention there’s also a generator in the utility room?”

“Did you mention what it is you’re smoking to come up with all this?”

“The tech guy gave us the details and the Wilde dude says the techie’s word is always good.”

“Let’s hope so.”

“Affirmative on that, Akecheta. Good luck. And out.”

“Out,” Tanner said, and turned to Alessandra.

She was soaked. Her hair hung down her back in wet spirals; the T-shirt clung to her breasts, revealing their rounded shape as well as the delicate pucker of her nipples.

Venus, rising from the sea.

And this wasn’t the time for poetic musings.

Between the wind and the rain, the temperature had dropped a significant number of degrees. Sure, this was a rainforest, but hypothermia, generally thought of as a problem only in cold climates, was a real possibility.

Tanner yanked his own shirt over his head and wrapped it around Alessandra’s shoulders.

She tried to push it away.

“You need it. You’ll be cold.”

“Ill be fine.”

“Tanner…”

“Bellini.” Deftly, her brought the slee

ves together and knotted them over her breasts. “How else am I gonna show off my manly physique?”

She laughed, just as he’d intended. Smiling, he stroked her wet hair back from her face. “We have to move. We have maybe half a mile to go and then, Chay says, we’ll see a house.”

“A real house? Four walls? A roof?”

“That’s the claim. One of your brothers arranged for us to use it. It belongs to one of his clients.”

“Which brother? Luca? Matteo?”

“A guy named Travis.”

She smiled. “Ah. Yes. If anybody knows someone with a house down here, it would be Travis.” Her smile faded. “They know? My family knows what’s happened to me?”

“So it would seem.”