Page 4 of Touchdown

And why wouldn't you bring this up before we left the house?

“You're asking me to guess?” Noah didn't need to wait for me to reply. “There's probably an alarm to go with the security uploads. So immediately. They already know we're trying something. Right now, they're meeting somewhere to decide how to react.”

It wouldn't be a long meeting. They'd already have a plan in place for that contingency. You don't have to play football to know that much about strategy.

He saw something in my face that made him step back. A twig crunched under his bare foot.

“That's what we want, you know,” he said. “They're gonna need to send a boat if we're gonna get off this island.”

“I trusted you,” I said. “This isn't the plan.”

“And you've got a better one?” He lifted his chin. Folded his arms over his chest. Noah could look cute when he was being defiant.

Suddenly, I was so not in the mood for cute.

Chapter 3

Had we ever been a team? Or had we always, always been playing for opposite sides?

“I trusted you,” I repeated. “And, all this time, you've been hoping to draw in the bad guys?”

Noah's shoulders slumped a little. “We should keep moving. We can talk about this when we know more about the landscape.”

“I'm not hiking one more step until I get a better answer.”

He sighed. “Slate, I'm not sure I have a better answer.”

“I've noticed.” My right fist balled of its own accord. I didn't raise it, but I did step in closer.

This time, Noah didn't step back. He stood unflinching as I got right in his face. If anything, he looked calm and even pleased. As if he welcomed this moment of confrontation.

The slumped shoulders had gone away, and the folded arms had unfolded. His hands hung loose and open at his sides.

His only defense was his direct gaze.

Damn him for knowing it was enough.

This close, eye to eye, toes almost touching, he met my gaze and refused to blink. It wasn't defiance looking back at me now. It was openness.

I forced my fist to unclench as I gazed hard into his waiting eyes. “Who's keeping us here, Noah? Isn't it time you told me?”

“I have no way of knowing that.” No eyeblink away. No light flush at cheek or neck.

He was either telling the truth, or he was a world-class liar who was wasting himself all these miles away from the poker circuit.

“You know stuff,” I said. “You knew we were being held in a short-term rental but we weren't being filmed for a porno.”

“I knew we weren't being filmed because I did the same search you did when they first dropped me here.” There was no quiver of stress in his voice. “If I'd been here longer, I would have searched the forest. But I didn't have time to explore before they brought you in. This situation is as strange to me as it is to you.”

“Were the other places like this?”

He snorted. “Not hardly.”

Had he been hurt? Tortured? Turned?

“They were lockups,” he said. “A cot, a spigot, and a bucket.”

My heart twisted. I hated to think of him being held in those conditions. If he had betrayed me, he'd had his reasons. He was a captive too—had been a captive much longer.

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