They came to the mouth of an underground garage, and she was snatched almost off her feet. He started running with her, and she found herself winding down the many levels into a plummeting spiral. Down and down they went, and she felt her legs go, her head faint, her stomach churning with a nausea that reminded her at once of her Chagas’. Back into the underworld, she thought, literally. Another man was propped against a car in semidarkness, and she thought briefly of crying for help until she realized cruelly he was there waiting for them both. She was bundled a little awkwardly into the backseat of a smart, dark blue car, with beautiful tan leather upholstery. Her assailant slid in beside her and shoved her head down on the backseat. The other man hastened them away. Two of them! She felt sick, weak, and frightened. Her mind raced at the sordid possibilities. She realized absurdly how lucky she’d been never to have experienced any serious sexual threat before—considering how often she’d had to travel alone to strange places. To survive any kind of sexual attack, you ought to stay as calm and collected as possible, she conjectured. Use your brain, Lucy: you’ve always been told you have a good one. How you behave might dictate whether you live or die. The chilling thought suddenly possessed her mind that the labyrinth might well prove her omega, if she got things wrong now. So she went limp and breathed slowly, making a prayer of the sound of Alex’s voice. She hung on to the ecstasy she’d felt in the labyrinth, the oneness with him, the senses in her heart.

“SIÂN, I’M IN TROUBLE. CAN YOU HELP?” HIS VOICE HAD AN URGENCY AT odds with the man she knew.

“Just say how, Alex.”

At an express pace he explained about Lucy in Chartres: he’d called the French authorities, reported her last moves, and warned them she’d had transplant surgery.

They’d moved quickly enough to locate her cell phone near the cathedral and called him straight back to inform him. Someone had rifled through her things in the hotel room, they said. He was frantic, not knowing her whereabouts, and if possible even more alarmed about her missing her medication and her health generally. Taking her immunosuppressants on time wasn’t negotiable. He must get a flight now. Could she stay with Max?

“I’d be happy to, Alex.”

“Is it a terrible time to ask?”

“Not at all. We were on our way out to dinner. Unimportant after what you’ve just told me. Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be with you.”