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“He created a virus that could be weaponized, and as a weapon it would be more devastating than the A-bomb.”

She shut the water off, dried her hands with a towel and met his eyes in the mirror. “He would never be involved in anything like that.”

“He was involved in something just like that. He must have changed his mind right at the end. Maybe he finally understood what the repercussions could be. He took all his notes, removed the hard drives from the computers he used at the University lab and vanished from the face of the earth. Problem was, he was sloppy. He told someone.”

“Who?”

He shook his head. “Don’t know. But the information was leaked and now every two-bit despot and terrorist leader in the world is itching to get their hands on this thing.”

Clutching the towel in her hands, she turned to face him. “And which two-bit despot or terrorist leader sent you?”

He blinked. Her voice was stronger now. Her eyes had gone as cold and hard as eyes that big and brown could get, he figured. “The good guys," he said. “Anything more than that is classified.”

“Then so is anything I might know.”

He rose slowly from the chair, recognizing a standoff when he saw one. He hadn’t expected it. Seemed there was some toughness in her after all. Buried … deeply buried. But there. The path to her steel lay in her old man. Say something bad about Elliot Stoltz, and arouse his daughter's anger.

“I can’t tell you.”

“Then you might as well leave.”

He smiled just a little, knowing he had her beat. “And what do you plan to do with those two downstairs, Dr. Stoltz, or the backup crew who are probably on their way right now?”

“Nothing. I’m leaving, too. If I didn’t learn another thing from my father, I learned how to disappear.”

Now that was more in keeping with his initial impression of her. To scurry away into the woods. To burrow into a den somewhere in the forest with the other wild things.

“I found you,” he told her. “They found you. They’ll find you again.”

“I’ll run again.”

“That’s no way to live.”

“That’s my problem, isn’t it?”

She was tougher than she looked. She wouldn’t tell him. He could read that much in her eyes. He battled a grudging admiration for her.

“All right,” he said slowly. “I’ll tell you this much. The people I work for want to get their hands on this thing, but not to use as a weapon. They want it so they can develop the antidote. Once they do that, they’ll make sure every trace of the virus is destroyed.”

“If you believe that,” she said, “then you’re way too naive to be in the job you’re in, whatever it is.” She stepped closer, staring so deeply into his eyes that he felt her digging into his soul. “If they’re going to destroy every trace of it as you claim, then why would they need an antidote?”

“Just in case they missed something. A note, a vial, a sample.”

She stared at him so hard it felt like she was trying to see inside him, maybe trying to decide whether he could be trusted.

“Look, I’ve got one goal. To stop this weapon from falling into the hands of someone like Putin or Kim Jong Il or the effing Saudis.”

“How do I know I can believe you?”

“You don’t.”

She stood there a moment, deep in thought. Finally she shook her head. “It’s all a mistake, anyway. There is no killer virus. My father was a great man. His work has saved countless lives. He would never create something like that.”

“He not only would, he did.”

“No, he didn’t. I’ll never believe it. He would have told me.” She let her voice trail off, uncertainty clouding her eyes.

“Would he?”

Her chin came up, and her gaze met his. “He couldn’t have done what you say he did.”

“Okay. I say he did it, and you say he didn’t. There’s only one way to prove which of us is right.”

She closed her eyes, clenched jaw. “I have to process this. I need time to think?—”

“There is no time to think, Doc. I’m not lying when I say more men like those two downstairs will be showing up soon. And they’ll do everything they said they’d do to you and then some.”

Her eyes opened and she faced him. He thought maybe she’d come to a decision.

“My father didn’t work the entire time we were here. He didn’t bring a computer. Nothing from the lab. There’s nothing here.”

He found he could read her like a book. Her expressions were transparent. And he believed her. “There was a safe deposit box receipt in his papers. Could there be anything there?”

“If there were anything to find, it would more likely be there than here.” She averted her eyes a little bit.

He nodded slowly. “You’re sure there are no notes here in the house?”

“I’m sure.” He turned her chin so he could watch her face as she spoke. She frowned, but met his gaze head on. “I went through everything after he passed. There were no research notes, no formulae, nothing like that.”

Just a mystery safe deposit box. It wasn’t much, but it was something. “I want the name of the bank. And then I want the key.”

She frowned as if searching her mind again.

Then she turned and left the room. Romano followed her down the hall, into a bedroom that had to be hers.

The rumpled bed, the cat peering out from underneath it.

She yanked open a dresser drawer, took out a pair of jeans and bent to step into them, tugging them on under the nightgown, snapping, zipping, and making him feel a stir he had no business feeling.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Getting dressed. I’ll give you the key and then I’m leaving. All right?” She didn’t wait for an answer. She dug through the dresser again, emerging this time with a shirt. Turning her back, she tugged the nightgown off over her head.

Romano stood like his feet had grown roots, staring at the length of her bare arms, the curve of her spine, the soft, smooth roundness of her shoulders.

With great effort, he averted his eyes and tried to focus on something else besides her. The fireplace on one wall, not burning. The neat stack of kindling and wood on the grate, ready for the touch of a match. The brass log holder, filled with fragrant, seasoned cherry wood.

“You’ll leave me alone?” she asked. “You promise? If there’s anything to be found, it will be in that safe deposit box. And whatever you do find, it’s only going to prove that you’re wrong.”

He looked at her again. She was buttoning the pretty white blouse. Thank God for small favors.

He went silent at the sound of tires crunching gravel, cussed himself for not grabbing that receipt from the old man’s room. First National Bank, New York, New York, that much he remembered. Which branch? What was the box number?

He looked to the hall, wondering if he could dash back down to her father’s room and grab that receipt. “We’re out of time,” he said in answer to his own internal question.

She looked up quickly, and all her courage dissolved before his eyes. Her fear returned. “You’re coming with me, you understand? If you want to survive this, don’t argue about it. Now get the damned key and let’s get out of here.”

She looked defeated. Like he’d just let all the air out of her balloon.

it would have been laughable if the situation hadn’t been so deadly.

Turning, she dumped a jewelry box onto her dresser, pawing through a small mountain of trinkets.

He saw the key as she dug it out of the mess, and before he’d even extended his hand for it, she’d tucked it into her jeans pocket.

The sound of doors slamming on the vehicle out front came loud and clear.

“Oh, God,” she whispered. But she never stopped moving.

She swooped down on a pair of sneakers that had been hiding under the bed, stuffed her feet into them.

She was shaking again, breathing hard. She snatched the pill bottle from the dresser where she’d dropped it, crammed it into a handbag that she clutched it in a white-knuckled grip.

“Is there a back door?" Romano whispered harshly.

“We’d have to go back downstairs.”

He lunged for the window, shoved it open and stuck his head out. “No fire escape? Nothing?”

“How many log cabins have you seen with fire escapes attached?” She looked terrified when the front door opened audibly below. Then she blinked. “There are rope ladders in every bedroom.” She opened the closet and hauled a flimsy-looking rope ladder from an upper shelf.

Romano took the bundle from her, anchored the two end hooks on the window ledge and let the rest fall free.

“Come on,” he whispered harshly. “Hurry. Get out there.”

“I don’t want to leave my cat!”

“You’ll leave him on angel wings with a harp in your hands if you don’t get your ass in gear!”

She sent a desperate glance toward the bed, where the cat had been only seconds ago, but the beast had gone into hiding. She shook her head, staring at the open window, then at him.

Romano heard heavy footfalls on the stairs. Lexi bit her lip and awkwardly, she climbed through the window and made her way down the ladder.

It was not Lexi Stoltz climbing down that rope ladder in the middle of the night while killers invaded her home. The woman she’d believed herself to be would have been hiding under the bed with Jax.

But something had happened to her up there, something she hadn’t been aware could happen.

She’d suddenly stepped out of herself, and stood calmly, watching events unfold like she was watching a scary movie.

And something else had taken over. Something stronger and braver than she’d ever believed lived in her.

She didn’t recognize that thing. It was like an alien presence, summoned to life by a strong pair of hands gripping her shoulders, and by blue-black eyes boring into hers.

The confident, capable, kick-ass-and-take-names stranger had roused some new, unfamiliar part of her to life.

She didn’t know how, but she was grateful enough that she almost felt guilty for lying to him about the safe-deposit box.