Always a Thief

by Kay Hooper

“Damn you,” she muttered, hardly aware of speaking aloud. “Don't you die on me, Quinn. Damn you, don't die.”

  Those absurdly long lashes of his lifted and, even now, a gleam of amusement lurked in the darkened green eyes. “If you're going to swear at me,” he said in a voice little more than a whisper, “then . . . at least use my first name.”

  “I don't know it,” she snapped, holding on to her ferocity because she suspected it was the only thing that kept her from falling apart.

  “Alex,” he murmured with the ghost of a laugh.

  Morgan didn't feel any sense of triumph at all, even though she was certain he wasn't lying to her. Alex was his name, his real name, and that knowledge put her several jumps ahead of just about everybody who was chasing Quinn. But she didn't feel any elation because he'd trusted her with the information. She was very much afraid that it might well be along the lines of a deathbed confession. Her voice held steady and grim.

  “You die on me, Alex, and I'll hunt your ghost to the ends of the earth.”

  His eyes closed, but a faint chuckle escaped him. “I can save you . . . the search. You're quite . . . likely to find me . . . in the neighborhood . . . of perdition's flame . . . Morgana.”

  She tasted blood and realized she'd bitten her bottom lip. “I have to get a doctor for you—”

  “No. The police. I can't . . . let them put me away . . . not now . . . I'm too close.”

  She didn't know what he was talking about. “Listen to me. You're in shock. You've lost a lot of blood. You have a bullet in you, and it has to come out.” When his eyes opened again, she was even more alarmed by the feverish glitter stirring there. Quickly, she said, “Max. I'll call Max. He'll be able to get a doctor here quietly, without the police having to know.”

  It didn't strike her until much later how wonderfully ironic her solution was: a wounded cat burglar bleeding in her living room, and the only man who might be able to help him was the man who owned a priceless collection that would soon bait a trap designed to catch that cat burglar.

  Ironic? It was insane.

  Quinn looked at her for a long minute, and then a sigh escaped him. Relief, acceptance, regret, or something else—she wasn't sure what it was. But the smile that briefly curved his lips was a strange one, twisted with something other than pain.

  “All right. Call him.”

  Despite the fact that it was the middle of the night, Max answered his private phone line in a clear, calm voice and listened to Morgan's hasty explanation without interruption. When she was through, he simply said, “I'm on my way,” and she found herself listening to a dial tone.

  Quinn seemed to be unconscious, but he was still breathing. She tucked the blanket more securely around him and went back to her bedroom to quickly strip off her sleepshirt and scramble into jeans and a sweater. Then she returned to kneel beside him. Her fingers trembled as she stroked his thick golden hair and then his cool, damp cheek.

  “If you die I'll never forgive you,” she whispered. He might have heard her, or he might have been too deeply unconscious to hear anything, but his head moved just a bit as if he wanted to press himself more firmly to her touch.

  It was ten interminable minutes before she heard a quick, soft knock at her door and went to let Max in. She had turned on more lamps, so he was able to see Quinn clearly the moment he stepped into her apartment.

  “The doctor should be here any minute,” Max told her, shrugging off his jacket and tossing it over the couch before moving quickly toward Quinn. “How is he?”

  “The same.” She followed and knelt on one side of the unconscious man while Max knelt on the other. His long, powerful fingers checked the pulse, and then he eased the blanket back and looked under the cloths with which she had covered the wound. His hard face rarely showed emotion of any kind no matter what he may have been feeling, and his voice remained dispassionate.

  “Nasty. But not fatal, I think.”

  If a doctor had said the same thing, Morgan probably would have doubted him, but she had known Max long enough to have implicit faith in his judgments. The cold tightness of fear eased inside her, and she felt herself slump a little. “He—he looks so pale.”

  “Loss of blood.” Max replaced the cloths and drew the blanket back up to Quinn's throat with a curiously gentle touch. “And shock. The human body tends to resent a bullet.”

  “It's still in him.”

  “I know. Lucky for him that it is. If it had gone straight through him, he probably would have bled to death by now.” Max looked at her for a moment, then said, “I think he'd be more comfortable off the floor.”

  “If we can get him to my bed—”

  “You go get the bed ready. I'll bring him.”

  Quinn was by no means a small man, and unconscious he was a deadweight, but Max was unusually large and unusually powerful, and he seemed to feel little strain as he carried the thief into Morgan's bedroom and eased him down on the bed. Morgan helped pull his soft-soled boots off, then eyed the remainder of his lean, black-clad form hesitantly.

  “Maybe I'd better do the rest,” Max said.

  She nodded and backed toward the door. “Maybe you'd better. I'll—go make some coffee.”

  She had just filled her coffeemaker and turned it on when the doctor arrived. He was a middle-aged man, with steady eyes and a soft voice, and seemed quite matter-of-fact about having been pulled from his bed to secretly treat a gunshot wound. If Max said it was the right thing to do, he told her comfortably, then that was all he needed to know.

  Someone else with implicit faith in Max's judgment, it seemed.

  Morgan pointed the way to the bedroom but retreated to the kitchen herself. She didn't know how much more she could take but was fairly sure her fortitude would crumble if she had to watch a bullet being extracted from Quinn.

  She could hear the low voices of the doctor and Max, and once a faint groan caused her to bite down hard on a knuckle. She turned the television on to CNN but remained in the kitchen and was working on her second cup of coffee by the time Max came out of the bedroom a few minutes later.

  “The bullet's out,” he reported quietly. “It went in at an angle, apparently, so it was more difficult to get at than it would have been otherwise. But if it hadn't entered the way it did, it probably would have killed him.”

  Morgan poured him a cup of coffee and gestured toward the cream and sugar on the counter, then said rather jerkily, “I heard him— Did he—”

  “He came to in the middle of it,” Max explained. “It wasn't very pleasant for him, I'm afraid. But he doesn't want anything for pain, and he's still conscious.”

  “He'll be all right?”

  “Looks like it.” Max sipped his coffee, then added with a hint of dryness, “So you'll have a wounded cat burglar in your bed for a few days.”

  It occurred to Morgan that Max had been amazingly incurious about all this, and she felt heat rise in her face. Clearing her throat, she murmured, “I . . . uh . . . sort of ran into him a few times, and he . . . more or less . . . saved my life. Twice, probably.”

  “Did he?”

  She nodded. “So I owe him. Giving up my bed for a few days isn't much of a price to pay.”

  Max was watching her steadily. “No, if he saved your life I'd say it was a bargain.”

  “You won't—” She cleared her throat again, and said with difficulty, “I overheard something I probably shouldn't have at the museum, Max. The night you got back to town after your honeymoon.”

  “I thought you might have.” He smiled slightly. “I saw your name in the museum's security log when I signed out, Morgan. I had a hunch you'd overheard Jared and me talking and had figured out what we were planning.”

  “Yeah, well . . . after Quinn saved my life, I . . . warned him. About Mysteries Past being bait for a trap.”

  “I see.”

  “I'm sorry, Max, but—”

  “It's all right,” he soothed, but before he could say more, the doctor emer
ged from the bedroom with positive news.

  “Constitution of an ox,” he said, gratefully accepting the coffee Morgan offered. “And an unusually high tolerance for pain. He's also a quick healer, unless I miss my guess. Probably be on his feet in a day or two.” He looked at Max and added, “He wants to see you, and I doubt he'll rest until he does.”

  Max set his cup on the counter, gave Morgan a slight, reassuring smile, and left the kitchen as the doctor was beginning to give her brisk instructions on how to care for the patient during the coming days.

  When he entered the lamplit bedroom, Max stood for a silent moment studying Quinn. His upper body was slightly raised on two pillows, the covers drawn just above his waist so that much of his broad chest and the heavily bandaged shoulder was clearly visible. His eyes were closed, but they opened as Max looked at him, clear and alert despite the pain he was undoubtedly in.

  Curiously, he didn't look incongruous in Morgan's bed. She hadn't gone overboard with frills in decorating her bedroom, since she wasn't a frilly woman, but it was quite definitely a feminine room; despite that, Quinn seemed to fit among the floral sheets and ruffled pillow shams without sacrificing any of his maleness. It was an interesting trait.

  After a minute or so, Max reached behind him to push the door shut. Quinn watched silently as the big, dark man moved gracefully over to the window and stood looking out on the dimly lighted street below.

  “I gather Morgan doesn't know,” he said quietly.

  “No, she doesn't,” Quinn responded, his voice subtly different from the careless one Morgan was accustomed to hearing.

  “What kind of game are you playing with her?” Max asked, still without turning.

  There had been no particular inflection in that deep voice, but Quinn shifted restlessly on the bed nonetheless, grimacing slightly as his wound throbbed a protest. “You must know it isn't a game.” There was an inflection in his voice: defensive, maybe even defiant. “I don't have the time or the emotional energy for games.”

  “Then keep her out of it.” This time, the tone was Max Bannister's boardroom voice, the sound of an authority rarely challenged and even more rarely defeated. But a quiet challenge came from the bed.

  “I can't,” Quinn said.

  Max stiffened just a little. “In some ways, Morgan's fragile. And she always roots for the underdog. You could break her heart.” His voice was flat.

  Quinn said even more quietly, “I think she might break mine.”

  “Stop it. Now, before . . . either of you has to pay too high a price.”

  “You think I haven't tried?” Quinn laughed, a low, harsh sound. “I have.” He cleared his throat, and went on with a stony control that did nothing to diminish the meaning of what he was saying. “I've tried to stay away from her. You'll never know how hard I've tried. I don't even remember deciding to come here tonight. I just . . . came. To her. If I was going to die, I needed—I had to be with her.”

  Max turned then, leaning against the window frame, and the defeat was in his voice. “It's a hell of a mess, Alex.”

  Quinn's long fingers tightened their grip on the covers drawn up to his waist, and his mouth twisted as he met that steady, curiously compassionate gaze. “I know,” he said.

  Morgan had begun to worry when Max still hadn't left the bedroom after more than half an hour. The doctor had gone, leaving her with instructions, antibiotics and pills for pain, and a list of supplies she'd need to care for the patient, and all she could do was pace the living room and eye that closed bedroom door nervously every time she passed the hallway. She couldn't hear a thing; what was going on in there?

  It was nearly dawn, well after five o'clock, when Max finally came out. As usual, he didn't show whatever he was feeling, but she thought he was a bit tired.

  “How is he?” she asked somewhat warily.

  “Ready to sleep, I think.”

  Morgan was nearly dying of curiosity, but before she could ask why Quinn had wanted to see him, a sharp knock at her door distracted her. “Who could that be? The doctor coming back for something?”

  “No, I don't think so.” Max went to open the door, and Jared Chavalier strode in.

  Morgan moved almost instinctively to put herself between Jared and the door of her bedroom, but her eyes went to Max, and it was to him her thin question was directed.

  “How could you—”

  “It's all right, Morgan,” he said quietly with a reassuring smile. “Trust me.”

  Before she could respond, Jared's low, angry voice drew her attention. He looked a bit pale—probably, she thought, from fury, since his eyes blazed with it.

  “Has anything changed from what you told me on the phone?” he asked Max.

  “No,” Max replied. “Serious, but not fatal. He'll be all right in a few days.”

  Jared laughed shortly. “I might have known—he has more lives than ten cats.”

  Still calm, Max said, “You'll want to talk to him. He got close this time. Too close. He believes that's why he was shot.”

  Morgan stepped away from the hall and into the living room as she realized there was no threat to Quinn from the Interpol agent, her bewilderment growing. “I don't understand,” she said to Max. “What's going on?”

  Max replied, “The exhibit is bait for a cat burglar, Morgan, but it isn't Quinn. He's working with Interpol to help catch another thief.”

  CHAPTER

  TWO

  Slowly, she began to smile. “How about that.”

  Jared looked at her and, harshly, said, “Don't get any fool romantic notions about nobility into your head. Quinn's helping us to keep his own ass out of jail—and that's it. If we hadn't caught up with him, he'd still be looting Europe.”

  Morgan met that angry glare for a long moment, her smile fading. Then, speaking pointedly to Max, she said, “I'll go and make some fresh coffee.”

  “Thank you,” Max said. When she was out of the room, he looked at the other man. “Was that necessary?”

  Jared shrugged, scowling. He kept his voice low, but the anger remained. “Don't tell me you want her to fall for a thief. Aside from the fact that he's about as stable as nitro and damned likely to end up in prison or executed—not to mention shot by someone with a better aim—he's just perfect for her. Hell, Max, you know he'll drift right out of her life the minute this is finished—if not sooner.”

  “Maybe not,” Max said quietly. “He was hurt bad last night. Bleeding, in shock. He didn't come to me for help, and he didn't come to you. He came here. To Morgan. He doesn't remember consciously making that decision.”

  “Then,” Jared said crudely, “all his brains are below his belt.”

  “I hope you know better than that.”

  After a moment, Jared's eyes fell. “All right, maybe I do,” he said. “But I thought I knew him ten years ago, and I was sure as hell wrong about that.”

  Max sat down on the arm of a chair near Jared and looked at him steadily. “What makes you more angry—that he became a thief, or that he didn't confide in you about it?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “Of course it does. If you're angry at what he chose to do with his life, that's concern for him. If you're angry because he didn't tell you, that's your bruised ego.”

  “Ego, hell. I'm a cop, Max, an officer in an international police organization. So how do you think I felt to find out that my brother was the crafty thief who had topped our most-wanted list for the better part of ten years?”

  Morgan came back into the room just in time to hear that astonishing information and was so startled she spoke without thinking. “Brother? You mean, you and Quinn are—”

  He looked at her with those pale, angry eyes, and for the first time she saw an elusive resemblance between his handsome features and Quinn's. “Yes, we're brothers,” he confirmed flatly. “Do us all a favor and forget you know that.”

  She didn't get angry at him in return, because she was both perceptive enough to see the anxiety
underneath his simmering fury and shrewd enough to have a fair idea of what a difficult position Jared must have found himself in when the infamous Quinn turned out to be his own flesh and blood. There was, clearly, reason enough for him to be a trifle put out.

  “Consider it forgotten,” she murmured.

  Jared didn't look as if he believed her but directed his question to Max. “Is he awake?”

  “He was a few minutes ago.”

  “Then I'd better talk to him.”

  “Max, you said he was ready to sleep. Can't it wait until later?” Morgan protested.

  “No,” Jared told her briefly, and headed for the bedroom with a determined stride.

  Morgan stared after him for a moment, then looked at Max. “Don't you think you'd better go in there too? Jared has blood in his eye, and Quinn's lost too much of his own to be able to defend himself.”

  “You're probably right.” Max was frowning slightly, but he didn't waste any time in following Jared.

  It was after eight o'clock that morning before Max and Jared emerged from the bedroom.

  “Wolfe'll have a fit when he finds out what happened,” Jared muttered gloomily, his anger apparently gone but his mood not much improved.

  “I'll handle Wolfe,” Max told him.

  “Good. He's still pissed at me.”

  “Why should he have a fit?” Morgan asked curiously. “Good lord, does he know Quinn too? I mean really know him, the way you two do?”

  “Ask Quinn,” Jared growled, and stalked from her apartment.

  Morgan was feeling her virtually sleepless and very eventful night by then, a state not helped by numerous cups of coffee, and nearly wailed at Max, “And all this time I felt guilty because I knew him!”

  One of his rare smiles swept across Max's hard face. “Morgan, since Alex is asleep and will probably sleep for hours, why don't you stretch out on your couch and take a nap. I think you need one.”

  That suggestion held too much appeal for her to argue, and it wasn't until she'd closed the door behind Max, briefly checked on her sleeping patient, and curled up on the couch with a pillow and blanket that something occurred to her.