Refusing to meet his eyes, she kept her gaze fixed on the wounds. Maybe it was cowardly, but she told herself she was a nurse and she needed to make certain the laceration was cleaned properly. “Very shallow. Same with your arm. But I’m very serious about the antibiotics. No doubt the blade of the knife contained bacteria.” She hoped it didn’t contain poison for their sakes.
She smiled at Wayne cheerfully as she sat back on her heels. “You’re good to go.” Meaning they could leave her suite.
“Do you want a drink, Rainier? Rainier clearly is a friend of Sam’s as well, and you’ll be meeting him soon enough at the wedding, Vienna,” Zale informed her. “He’s under cover as Wayne Forsyne.”
She put her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to know anything more. You two are obviously working on something important, and I don’t need to know anything about it.”
Zale ignored her and went to the bar, turning to raise an eyebrow at his friend.
Rainier sat up. “Nice to meet you as me, Vienna. Zale has assured me you know better than to break confidentiality.” There was warning in his voice.
“I take it you’re not seventy. I’d already guessed that. You don’t walk with your cane correctly.” She stood up and went to the master bedroom to change into actual clothes. Having no underwear around Zale made her feel vulnerable.
“You want a drink, Vienna?” Zale called out.
“No, thanks.” She needed her wits about her. Dressing hastily in leggings and a favorite comfortable sweater, she unwrapped her hair and brushed it out, leaving it down to air dry. She wasn’t going to try to make herself look good for Zale. If anything, she wanted him to ignore her, just as he’d done these last few months.
Zale and his colleague had made themselves right at home, sitting in the living room, Rainier going through the menu. He looked up when she entered. “You sure are a beautiful woman,” he reiterated. He sounded like he was stating a fact rather than flirting with her. He just looked her over and then was back to looking at the menu. “You hungry?” he added. Even the voice was different, sounding much younger.
“Yes.” Vienna went to stand beside his chair, looking down at the menu. “I was about to order room service when you were announcing yourselves. Do you think you were followed?”
“No one can get up to this floor. In any case, Zale wounded all three assailants.”
She didn’t look at Zale but continued to peer at the menu as though she were really studying it. Three attackers. He’d managed to block the initial attack from Rainier, keeping him from getting killed, and then took on all three.
“Won’t they go to a hospital and report that they were attacked by the two of you? There must be security cameras outside of the hotel.” She took the menu right out of Rainier’s hands.
“I jammed the cameras for a moment,” Rainier admitted, “but the fight was over in under eight seconds. Zale wounded all three of them. They don’t think the wounds are bad enough to seek help, but that’s classic textbook. They’ll bleed out slowly without even being aware they’re going to die. They’re heading to a safe place to lick their wounds, but it will be too late for them.”
Rainier sounded very satisfied. Vienna couldn’t blame him. If someone came out of the bushes and attacked her to kill her, she would want them just as dead. She wasn’t a forgive-and-forget kind of girl. That was one of the reasons she wasn’t going to look at Zale. No matter what, she wasn’t falling into any traps—if he even thought about going there again.
“You’ve looked at that menu long enough to memorize it, Vienna,” Zale said, using his purring, commanding voice after Rainier gave her his order. “Hand it over.” He didn’t come to her. He stayed across the room in one of the two-person cuddle chairs.
A red flag went up instantly. She thought about sailing the menu toward him, hoping to hit him right in his hard head. That wouldn’t go along with the “calm, didn’t give a damn that he’d left her and never contacted her again” fa?ade.
“Sure. I do think I’ve memorized it.” She shared a little laugh with Rainier and then walked slowly across the wide expanse of the room to Zale. Before she reached him, she held out the menu. “I’ll call it in for everyone. That way they’ll only hear my voice.”
Thankfully, Rainier responded, giving her the opportunity to turn back toward him.
“That’s a good idea. We’ll hide out in another room when room service gets here.”