The Venturesome Race

Chapter Eight:

MATEO WILLIAMS POV –

When she took my hand and stood up, I couldn’t help the smile that appeared on my face. I don’t know why but I had expected her to decline. Instead we strolled arm in arm, around the little city in India. All the colours and smells that seemed to be everywhere made it picturesque. I looked down at her and I was awestruck once again by her natural beauty. Her rose golden skin with a slight pink tint paired magically with her auburn hair. I found myself mesmerised by the way she squinted her gorgeous ice blue eyes and bit on the right side of her bottom lip when she was thinking. All too soon we had walked the entirety of this small section of Jabalpur, and were now standing back at the park our little roam had started in. We hadn’t spoke on our walk aside for a few words at the beginning and I was glad for it. I didn’t like deceiving her, but bad things happened to agents who failed at their jobs. After saying goodbye to the most beautiful creature I had ever seen I decided to ring Jun. He picked up on the third ring.

“What ever happened to ‘I’ll bring him right back’” He asked in a mock sweet voice.

“Nothing, do me a favour?” I replied trying to calm myself down from his s**t imitation of Brynn.

“What kind of favour?” He sounded intrigued which wasn’t exactly a good thing.

“I’m headed back to the village, when I get back tell me everything you found out about our competition. I’d like to be prepared if we run into each other again.” I spat out feigning disinterest before hanging up. I couldn’t help the fact that I wanted to know everything about this woman. She had burned herself into my mind in a mere matter of hours. I don’t know why I had hugged her, I just needed to feel her in my arms and by god she fit perfectly. Like we were made to go together.

I had expected the lavender scent that follows her to be overpowering by it wasn’t. It was just strong enough to fill my senses but not enough to choke me. Subtle and tantalizing. I knew it was a mistake to bury my face into her hair and inhale that toxically moreish fragrance, but I did it anyway. That seemed to be the final straw. She withdrew herself from my grasp and I suddenly felt colder and more alone that I ever had.

The rest of the day dragged by at a snail’s pace, rather annoyingly. My night was the same as the night before, dinner in the room with Jun while he told me everything he had managed to learn about Brynn. He had learned barely anything aside from the basics, stuff they tell most agents that have had an encounter with her.

She is currently 26 years old; her birthday is the end of June.

She was born in England and has a residence there, as well as 3 other homes in separate countries.

She is an only child. No known relatives that we can find.

 The only bits the company currently knew about her. Although one thing Jun had found that was new to me was an accident, she was in.

“Okay so, the whole details are missing. I only managed to scrape together bits and pieces.” Jun spoke softly, he was sitting across for me and leaned closer, elbows resting on his knees.

“It was over a year ago I think, somewhere in the Minho Region. The exact location is a bit fuzzy, but I managed to find an account of a woman being treated in a small hospital before being relocated to one of the best in Portugal.” He paused and looked me in the eye before handing me a piece of paper. Looking down at the thin sheet he had given me I noticed it was a doctor's patient form but most of the words had been blacked out, you could only make out a few lines of a patient description along with a couple of the injuries she suffered. From the description I could tell it was her.

“When she arrived at the smaller hospital, she was closer to dead than alive. In and out of consciousness and suffering from severe dehydration. It noted she had several broken bones and a concussion. It had been estimated that she had an accident about 39 hours before she was found. Everything else was a blank.” He said with clear discomfort.

“Anything else?” I ask trying to calm myself from the agitation I could feel bubbling up in my stomach.

“No, nothing else. I couldn’t even scrub the records to see what her injuries were; besides the ones I mentioned a moment ago. Sorry.” He resolved, standing to his feet and patting my back a couple of times before heading off to his own room.

No matter how hard I tried I just couldn’t stop my mind from thinking of new questions. Why was she alone when she almost died and how had everything been scrubbed from the official records so haphazardly? What kind of pains had she endured, not just that once but in her lifetime and why was I so eager to know?

The fact that I cared so much about why and what had happened to her was starting to make me nervous. She was technically the enemy and if it came down to it, there is an incredibly good chance that I would have to fight her. So why did I feel so protective of her and why does the thought of being against her cause such an ache.

Even under normal circumstances it would be odd. I only met her 2 days ago and we have had limited interactions so what was it that I could feel pulling me towards her so strongly. With a million unanswerable questions floating around in my mind I fell into the silent embrace that only sleep could offer hoping tomorrow I would be able to find her and maybe get a couple of the answers I needed.