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look to Jasmine, his eyes filling with regret. “That was a mistake.”
    * * *
    Gabe watched as Jasmine wrapped her arms even tighter around herself and stared at a spot in front of her feet, all emotion sliding off her face.
    He wanted to know what happened to her after her brother had first gone into hiding, but Mandy had slumped over while they’d been talking, and that worried him. She didn’t seem fully aware of her surroundings anymore. They had to take care of Mandy before they could move out of here.
    He stepped forward. “We have to bring this girl’s fever down.”
    Jasmine looked at her sister then launched into action, shaking off whatever dark weight had been sitting on her shoulders. “There’s a tub in one of the other rooms. We could bring cold water up from downstairs.”
    “Do you have any buckets?”
    She hurried to the corner and pulled two five-gallon paint buckets she probably had picked up at a construction site.
    He took those from her. She grabbed a chipped pot from the windowsill and led the way.
    He could tell downstairs that the water to the building had been shut off at one point but someone, probably Jake before he’d been injured, had rigged it. He filled the buckets and she filled the pot, then they started up the stairs. The drug seemed to be wearing off. She no longer swayed with every step.
    “What happened back in the U.S. before you came here?” He wanted to help, but to do that, he needed to see the full picture.
    She wouldn’t look at him.
    He knew he should let it go, but something deep inside him demanded to know. He followed her into a smaller room and dumped the water into the tub, caught her by the arm as she turned to go back. “Jasmine?”
    She avoided his gaze, a haunted look coming onto her face. “When they couldn’t find Jake, they came after us to draw him out.”
    He waited, cold tension gathering in his stomach as he wished he knew what to do for her, what she needed from him. With the work he did, his relationships with women had been always superficial: quick and easy. But he wanted to give something more to this woman, something real, something she could hold on to.
    His jaw clenched with frustration. “Jasmine?”
    “Mandy had some emergency junior prom planning meeting, so she had to stay after school, thank God. I was home alone.” She swallowed hard.
    He put the empty buckets down and gathered her into his arms without giving her a chance to resist. “Who?”
    “I don’t know.” Her voice broke. “They took me and kept me tied up in a basement to draw Jake out.”
    No wonder she’d fought his restraints so violently. If he’d known— “I’m sorry.” He bent to rest his chin on the top of her head.
    And, little by little, she relaxed against him.
    He wanted to ask what they’d done to her, but he was afraid of hurting her by dragging up the past. So he simply held her until she pulled away.
    “Jake came. He got us out of the U.S.” She moved toward the door. “We better get Mandy.”
    He put two and two together halfway down the hallway. “These were the two civilians Jake killed in the U.S.?”
    His opinion of the man rose a couple of notches. So there was a good explanation for those kills. Of course, the death of that army captain still remained unexplained.
    The empty pot slipped out of her hand, her reflexes probably still not one hundred percent, and she bent to retrieve it. Her top rode up her hips, revealing a strip of skin. Two half-moon-shaped scars peeked out at Gabe.
    “Did you get hurt on the roof?” He winced, hoping he hadn’t been too rough on her when he’d brought her down.
    She yanked on her top to cover the spot. “Old stuff. It doesn’t matter.”
    He stilled. “Did those two men do this to you?”
    A grief-stricken expression came onto her face, making him wish he hadn’t asked. “Sorry.” He was such a damned idiot sometimes. “You don’t have to talk about it.”
    She drew a shaky breath. “I