Page 107 of Reset

“I think there were more bodies too,” Ryan said. “One of the tunnels that we didn’t take was stinking of decomp. And there were more rooms sealed up behind a cave-in. The place was wired for video, and someone had installed motion sensor lighting in the part of the tunnel that was sealed off to us. There was some brand new welding on an old gate to keep the victims from opening it.”

“Cameras?” Elle leaned forward.

“They were using a Wi-Fi system that fed into a wired-in relay. I couldn’t get to that though, or I’d have tried to hack it.”

“But if we get back down there, I could use the system to trace who was running it.” Elle looked thoughtful as Sarah shuddered at the mere mention of going anywhere near those tunnels ever again.

“Can you find your way back to the area with the bodies?” Lake asked.

“Yeah.” Putting his empty plate on the table, Ryan sat back in the sofa. “But we’d have to go the long way—which means crawling through tiny tunnels and swimming under rock. I couldn’t get past that gate, so I don’t know how to access it from the other side. If we take the right tools with us, we can dismantle it and see where it leads, which will make things easier when we bring the authorities in. Otherwise, they’d have to swim through the tunnels too.”

Sarah shuddered at the memory of being in the water, making Ryan zero in on her.

“We’re done here,” he told his team. “We’ll talk tomorrow. Which room is ours?”

As Julia told him where to go, Sarah felt herself shutting down. There was no more energy left. Not for talking, or being polite, or even eating. She wasn’t even sure she’d be able to shower before she fell asleep. All she wanted to do was crawl into a proper bed and sleep forever.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Their room was beautiful. Light, airy, and clean. It also wasn’t a room—it was an apartment. There was a sitting area, complete with sofa, chairs, and footstools. A coffee table held platters of snacks and drinks in buckets full of ice. The bed was vast, with a canopy you could draw around it to make your own little world. And the windows had a view out over the Seine and the Eiffel Tower.

“Not sure you’re up to a bath tonight.” Ryan led her into a bathroom that was as big as the ground floor of her house. “You’ll only fall asleep, and I don’t think I have the energy to carry you to bed.”

Although she gazed longingly at the massive tub, she had to agree. “Shower it is.”

After Ryan turned on the shower heads—yes, there were more than one—he gazed around the room. “It looks like Louis the Sixteenth puked up in here. Is there ever a reason for decorative columns?”

There was no stopping the giggles that erupted, even though they sounded a little on the delirious side.

“Oh, you’re beyond exhausted.” He stalked toward her and started unbuttoning the rag that used to be a blouse.

“Um, what are you doing?” Sarah watched his fingers deftly deal with the buttons.

“Helping. The faster we shower, the quicker we get to bed.”

She held the sides of her blouse together. “We’re not showering together.”

How he managed to look both sexy and cute at the same time, she didn’t know. “Stats, this isn’t the time to be shy. You can barely stand on your own, and I’m genuinely worried you’ll fall asleep as soon as the warm water hits you. This is purely about showering. We’ll save the good stuff for when we’re both awake enough to appreciate it.”

She still didn’t let go of her shirt. “I can shower on my own.” Maybe…

“You can’t be self-conscious,” said the man who looked like he’d stepped off the cover of a fitness magazine. “I’ve been all over your body.”

“Yes, in pitch darkness.” Where he couldn’t see her little pouch of a stomach, or the stretchmarks on her boobs, or the cellulite on her thighs.

“I would offer to turn the light out, but I think we’ve both had enough of the dark. How about I close my eyes instead?”

“Promise?”

“No, Stats, I can’t promise.” He seemed amused.

“Then what’s the point of offering?”

“What was it you called me? Oh yeah, stop being a big sissy and get in the shower.” He pulled his ripped shirt over his head and tossed it in the corner of the floor.

There were scratches and bruises marring his perfect torso. It was as though someone had vandalized a Michelangelo, and it physically hurt her to see them there.

“You’re right. I’m being a big sissy. Worse, I’m being irrational.” She gathered her courage and tossed the blouse on top of his T-shirt.