Hidden Steel by Doranna Durgin Page B

roach motel, and put the brakes on. Or tried to. She wasn’t having any of it, and she seemed to know how to shift his weight just so until he found himself moving right along. The ease with which she did it made him realize all over again that there was more to her than it seemed … and that he’d really taken a hit this evening. Lucky to still be on his feet.
    Foolish to have gotten into that kind of trouble in the first place.
    It was how his brother had died.
    “I am sure,” she said, undiverted by his hesitations. “Memories, I don’t have. But reactions … those are there.”
    He pulled back again as they reached the Star Motel— rates by the week, by the hour —and this time she let him go. Of course he staggered; of course she righted him. And she said, “This is it. You lost your chance for your own nice soft bed when you walked away from the mini cop-shop. Now I’m not giving you the choice—you’re not staying out here all night, and don’t even try to convince me you’ll make it back to the cop shop.” She opened the dingy door and gave him what was probably a gentle shove; he made it inside just in time to grab himself upright at the nearby stair railing, and then gave up and sat on the stairs.
    Mickey made quick negotiations for a room, paid in mugger cash, and returned to Steve with a key flashing in her hand. “Here we go,” she said.
    Right. Here we go. Steve had no idea just where they were headed … but he was beginning to think that if anyone could get there, it would be Mickey.
    With or without anyone’s help.

    * * * * *

    Mickey rinsed out the dingy washcloth and squeezed it until runnels of pink water made their way down the sink. “Ought to be in the ER,” she said to him through the open bathroom door. In truth, open was the only way it came, as the warped door refused to move from its permanently ajar position. “Or an all-night clinic.”
    “You knew this place was here?” he asked.
    “I seem to have.” She returned to sit at the side of the bed—a twin bed, not at all happy to hold the weight of two. He sat propped against the headboard, one arm protecting his ribs and a hand exploring the side of his head. She gently slapped it away, separating the wet waves behind his ear to get another look at the cut there. “It’s hard to tell what I know. Sometimes I don’t realize it until afterward. And sometimes I get these …” she trailed off, no longer seeing his hair or his blood, but the now-familiar image of Naia, accompanied by that now-familiar wave of urgency. Do you have something I want? Are you someone I want? Am I using you? Do I care about you?
    A little of both, she thought. There was more to that urgency than calculated goal. There was caring … there was familiarity and responsibility.
    And as memories went, it was the clearest thing she had. The only thing she had. If she couldn’t find Naia, she’d find the people who had drugged her—who had put her in this state, fumbling around San Jose in confusion, not sure if she was the hunted or the hunter.
    Steve’s voice grabbed her out of that potentially endless reverie. “You okay?”
    She refocused on him. He was close—closer than she’d expected. He’d leaned forward, she realized—but he was sore and tired and it showed in his eyes, and he didn’t stay there long. Not once he saw he had her attention.
    Poor guy. He’d only wanted to help. It was what he did, obviously enough. Helped those who struggled against what fate had dealt them …helped those like his brother who didn’t have any true hope. So of course he’d gathered her up when she’d come staggering into his gym. Of course he’d found it no surprise that she’d fainted at his feet. She sighed, and dabbed the dried blood on his neck. Stubborn thing, dried blood. It found every crack and crevice of skin.
    Dried blood, a dead woman on the floor and partially covered with a lemon yellow raincoat. Expensive London Fog raincoat, not