Always a Thief

by Kay Hooper

  “What about tonight?”

  “That hadn't happened yet, so don't use it as an excuse.”

  He almost—but not quite—laughed. It was actually more a sound of despair.

  “All right, but even then it's been obvious all along that you're too impulsive for your own good. And I could hardly count on my good sense where you're concerned; I knew that I wouldn't be able to stay away from you. Seeing you openly as Alex Brandon seemed the best way. But it meant Nightshade would have to know I was interested in you, and his awareness of that was enough of a risk. I didn't want you getting involved with my—my nighttime activities. So I thought that being Alex during the day and being openly interested in you would both make you seem unthreatening to Nightshade and distract your attention from what I was doing at night.”

  Morgan blinked. There were several things bothering her about all that, but one realization was uppermost in her mind. “Wait a minute. Are you saying that you went public just because of me? It wasn't part of your plan to find Nightshade?”

  “I'd already found Nightshade,” he admitted reluctantly. “And for God's sake, don't tell Jared—he'd shoot me.”

  She felt a bit dazed. “You had already found Nightshade. And being Alex won't help lure him into the trap?”

  “As a matter of fact, being Alex was one of those improvised turns I mentioned—and it's complicated the situation in more ways than I want to discuss.”

  Morgan stared at him. Almost idly, she said, “You know, if I find out your name isn't really Alex, I'll—”

  He didn't wait to hear what she'd do. “I give you my word of honor that my mother named me Alexander. Satisfied?”

  “On that point. But I'm very puzzled about the rest of this,” she admitted. “And I've got this weird feeling that you've distracted me again.”

  Gravely, he said, “We always seem to cover a remarkable amount of ground when we talk, don't we?”

  “Seems like. But it always comes back to this. What's between us.”

  “Morgana, if you want to continue to be aloof in public—”

  “No, I don't mean public. I mean private. I mean this, between us. The reason you're distracted, the reason I'm distracted. What we both keep dancing around. What are we going to do about this, Alex?”

  After a moment, he said slowly, “It would be a bad idea, you know that. Without trust between lovers—”

  She was mildly incredulous. “Trust? Alex, stop and think a minute. I am a sensible, rational, law-abiding woman who never so much as cheated on a parking meter before I met you. So what happened the night we met? I lied to the police when I didn't tell them you stole that dagger. And what happened the night those thugs grabbed you? Not only did I risk life and limb to try to help you, but then I more or less betrayed my good friend and employer, Max—I thought—by warning you that Mysteries Past was a trap. And I didn't call the cops when you lay bleeding on my floor. Does any of this suggest something to you? Like maybe that I seem to have a certain lack of good judgment where you're concerned?”

  His eyes were even more vivid than usual, and his mouth curved in a slight smile. “But do you trust me?”

  Morgan sighed and abandoned her last shred of dignity. “I love you, and that'll have to be good enough.”

  She had the satisfaction of knowing she had surprised him at least, but she couldn't read anything else in his suddenly still face and brilliant eyes.

  “Say that again,” he murmured.

  “I love you.” She said it quietly and without drama, but with utter certainty. “I've known that for weeks.”

  CHAPTER

  ELEVEN

  “It isn't safe to love me,” he said.

  “Do you think that matters?”

  “Morgana, I don't want to be something you regret.”

  “You won't be. I promise you, Alex. You won't be.”

  Quinn leaned forward slowly, releasing her hands so that his arms could encircle her, pulling her toward him as his head bent and his warm, hard mouth found hers. Morgan made a little sound, much as she had when he'd picked her up, and her arms slid up around his neck eagerly. She could no more temper her instant, fiery response to him than she could voluntarily stop the runaway beating of her heart.

  Her body seemed attuned to him, to his touch, in a way she'd never felt before. It was nothing so simple as passion; what he ignited in her was a craving so elemental and absolute it was akin to the need of her body for sustenance. She had the dim realization that some part of her would starve to death without him.

  He lifted his head at last and looked at her with eyes so dark there was only a hint of green visible. Huskily, he said, “I promised myself I wouldn't let anything . . . irrevocable happen between us until I could be completely honest with you. Until you could know the truth, all the truth. Morgana—”

  She slid her fingers into his thick golden hair and pulled him down so that she could kiss him, and against his mouth she murmured, “Alex, I want you—and that's the only truth I care about right now.”

  Quinn hesitated for another moment, his entire body tense, but then he made a rough sound and kissed her hungrily. His hands moved down her back, probing through the material of her sweatshirt, while the tip of his tongue teased the sensitive inner surface of her lips. Morgan heard herself utter another of those primitive little whimpers, wordless but urgent with wanting, and then all her senses went haywire.

  Just like before, the relentless need Morgan felt for him was stunning—but this time she was aware that he was every bit as involved in what was happening as she was. He wasn't holding back, wasn't detached, and wasn't trying to distract her. And he didn't have to try to make her want him.

  Morgan hadn't intended this to happen tonight, she really hadn't, but the only emotional hesitation she felt about it was a need to be reassured that he wouldn't walk away from her as he had before. “Stay with me,” she invited unsteadily when his lips trailed across her cheek and traced her jawline. “Stay with me tonight.”

  “Are you sure, sweetheart?” he demanded hoarsely, drawing away just far enough to make her look at him. His handsome face was taut, his features drawn with a sharpened look of hunger. “I didn't come here prepared for this.”

  She understood what he was saying, but since she'd never been able to be practical about him anyway, Morgan didn't see any reason to break with tradition at this late date. “I'm sure. I want you to stay.”

  Quinn looked at her for a moment longer, then kissed her again, more deeply still, almost as if that alone were an act of possession. It sent her senses spinning once more, stealing her breath and increasing the feverish heat of her desire until Morgan wasn't thinking about anything except how he made her feel. Then he was shifting his hold on her, lifting her, and she realized he was carrying her as easily as he had before.

  Since he'd spent several days there, he was familiar with her apartment and was able to find his way to her bedroom almost blindly. She blinked up at him a bit dazedly when he set her on her feet beside the bed.

  He framed her face in his hands and looked down at her with an odd intensity, as if memorizing her features, his own still strained. “That first night in the museum,” he murmured, “when you looked up at me with your cat's eyes, so indignant to find yourself in the company of a thief, I knew this would happen. Even then, I knew.”

  She managed a smile. “All I knew was how much you annoyed me. And how empty that room seemed when you left.”

  His thumb brushed her bottom lip in a rhythmic little caress. “I didn't go far that night. I watched the police come, and when they brought you back here I followed them.”

  “You did?”

  “Mmm. And I was at the museum during the day a couple of times after that. So I could see you.”

  “Before I knew what you looked like . . . but I had that feeling you were somewhere around.”

  “Something else I didn't bargain on. This connection between us.”

  “What happened
tonight on the fire escape—you didn't hear anything to alert you, did you? You felt it.”

  “You were in trouble,” he murmured. “Someone was trying to hurt you. That's what I felt.”

  Morgan tried to steady her breathing. “Do you believe in fate, Alex?”

  “I do now,” he said, and his mouth was hard on hers, the pent-up need of weeks fire inside him.

  Inside her.

  She pushed the hem of his sweater up blindly because she had to touch his skin, half opening her eyes when he let go of her long enough to yank the garment off and toss it aside. Her eyes went immediately to his left shoulder, and her fingers gently touched the scar there. He'd been right, she realized; he did heal quickly. It was difficult to believe he'd been shot just a few weeks before.

  But the scar was a reminder, a sign of the danger of what he was doing. Were there more scars, other marks of violence and risk on his body? On his soul?

  “Morgan?”

  She looked up at him, knowing that he felt her instant's hesitation, that he understood the reason behind it. Just the way he would understand if she stopped this here and now.

  Her arms slid up around his neck and she pressed her body against his. “What are you waiting for?” she murmured.

  “You. I've always been waiting for you.” His arms tightened around her, and when his mouth touched hers again the moment for stopping vanished as though it had never been.

  Morgan made a soft, disgruntled sound when he jostled her a bit while he was getting them under the covers, but she didn't open her eyes even when he chuckled. She felt utterly limp and sated, and when he pulled her close to his side again once they were both under the covers, she pillowed her head on his shoulder with a sigh of pure bliss.

  “Morgana?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Am I forgiven?”

  She still didn't want to open her eyes, but she was very much awake even though dawn wasn't too far off. After a moment, she said, “Don't spread the word around, but I can't stay mad at you no matter what you do.”

  His arm tightened around her, and one hand began smoothing her long hair. “I know you aren't still mad—but am I forgiven?”

  Morgan lifted her head then and looked down at him. He was serious, she realized. She pushed herself up on one elbow to see him better, and answered seriously. “You're forgiven. But don't ever do that to me again, Alex. I think I can stand being lied to easier than being manipulated.”

  He was still toying with her hair, and a slight frown drew his brows together. Softly, he said, “I don't want to lie to you.”

  “No—but you aren't ready to tell me the whole truth.” She gave him a rueful smile.

  “I have my reasons, sweetheart. I think they're good reasons. Can you accept that?”

  She hesitated. “I want to. But it's driving me crazy wondering how many lies you've told me. Can you at least promise that you'll tell me the truth eventually?”

  Quinn nodded immediately. “Once the trap is sprung, I swear I'll tell you everything.”

  “Then I'll accept that.” She kept her voice light. “Just . . . don't lie about this, all right? About us. I don't want any bedroom promises, Alex.”

  His hand slid to the nape of her neck, and he pulled her down far enough to kiss her slowly. Against her mouth, he murmured, “No bedroom promises.”

  Morgan had thought herself exhausted, but as his warm mouth moved against hers, she felt a surge of energy—and desire. Quinn seemed equally refreshed; his kisses deepened into hunger, and then he was pressing her back against the pillows and pushing the covers back so he could see her.

  For a moment—even after all that had gone before—Morgan felt a little shy. The way he was looking at her, so direct and intent, was a bit unnerving. But then he leaned down to press a soft kiss on her stomach, then another and another in a slow trail up between her breasts, and his low words added a sensual vibration and another kind of seduction to the caresses.

  “No bedroom promises—just the truth. Have you any idea what you do to me? What you've been doing to me since the night I reached out and caught you? There hasn't been a day you haven't been on my mind, and the nights . . . the nights. The nights never seemed long before, but now they do, long and cold.”

  “Even this night?” she asked huskily.

  “No.” He lifted his head and looked down at her with darkening eyes. “Not this night.”

  Morgan had had no idea that she was even capable of such a swift and total response, but she soared toward the brink so quickly it was like yielding to an elemental force. He was inside her, filling her, and her newly awakened body was electrified by the sensations.

  “You're beautiful,” he said huskily, his eyes narrowed on her taut face. “Especially like this, so alive, wanting me.”

  She couldn't have said anything to that if her life had depended on it. The coiling tension inside her held her in a blissful state of pleasure so acute it bordered on pain, and she couldn't even catch her breath enough to moan.

  Quinn's eyes narrowed even more as he slowly, torturously began to move, subtle undulations becoming deep, lazy thrusts, and Morgan couldn't bear it another second. It felt as if every nerve ending she possessed throbbed in rhythmic surges of pleasure, and her wild cry was caught in his mouth as he kissed her fiercely.

  He followed her over the brink, his powerful body shuddering and a hoarse sound wrenched from him, and this time, sated and utterly drained, they both slept.

  The sky was just beginning to lighten toward gray when Quinn slipped from the bed, careful not to wake Morgan, and went to gaze out the bedroom window. As Morgan had noted, he was accustomed to working nights, and it had reached a point where he found it difficult to sleep when it was dark.

  If this kept up much longer, he reflected wryly, he really would turn into a vampire.

  He stood there at the window, looking out on the quiet street in front of this apartment building, acutely aware of the soft breathing of the woman in the bed behind him. How to keep her safe? That was his greatest worry now. He had tried not to let her see how shaken he'd been over what happened on the fire escape, but the truth was that every time he thought of the danger she'd been in it was like a knife in his heart.

  Had it been Nightshade? Or someone else?

  Who had been the real target tonight, him—or Morgan?

  That was the question he couldn't answer, whether Morgan's attacker had grabbed her only because she'd been in the way or because she had been the real target all along. That was the question that left him cold. Because if she had been the target, he could think of only two reasons why: Someone wanted to get their hands on the director of the Mysteries Past exhibit, or someone knew or had guessed how important she was to a thief named Quinn.

  And now what? He was running out of time, dammit, he could feel it. After tonight, he was going to be walking a high wire without a net, and he wasn't sure he could maintain his balance. Not now. Not anymore.

  He was no longer on that high wire alone.

  “Alex?”

  He turned immediately, crossing the dim room to return to the bed. Sliding under the covers, he pulled her into his arms and held her without force, fighting the instincts urging him to hold her with all his strength. “Sorry I woke you,” he murmured.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked softly, her warm body pressed to his.

  “No, sweetheart, nothing's wrong,” he lied. “Go back to sleep.”

  Within minutes, he knew she had, her breath soft against his skin. Very gently, careful not to wake her, he stroked her back, enjoying the satiny feel of her skin and the radiant warmth of her body.

  She loved him. That was what she'd said, and said with quiet conviction. Knowing him for a liar and a thief, she loved him. It was remarkable. She was remarkable.

  Staring up at the lightening ceiling of her bedroom, Quinn wondered if Morgan would love him when she knew the truth.

  “I thought you weren't supposed to work wee
kends,” Jared said as he came into the computer room.

  Sipping her third cup of coffee that morning, Storm shrugged and said, “Wolfe and I are both too restless to stay home with all this going on. The exhibit, the trap, this mysterious other player in the game. We both came in hours ago.”

  “Where is Wolfe?”

  “If he's not prowling around the exhibit, he's down in the basement. Prowling around.”

  “The police searched the basement.”

  “Yeah, but we all know it's a huge space. And since he's spent months finding all the corners and hidey-holes—even down there—he won't feel at ease until he's finished his own search.”

  Jared grunted and sat down in her visitor's chair.

  She eyed him. “You look beat. Long night?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I thought Alex was taking the midnight-to- dawn duty.”

  Jared explained briefly what had happened the night before, including the phone call from Keane.

  “Morgan's all right?”

  “According to Alex, yeah. At the moment, I'm more concerned by what the M.E. found in Jane Doe's body.”

  “Spider venom. Black widow spider venom. Have you run that little detail through NCIC?”

  He nodded. “No matches. Far as the Crime Information Center is concerned, finding spider venom of any kind in an already dead murder victim isn't part of any active killer's M.O. Or any inactive killer's, for that matter.”

  “I guess you checked with Interpol?”

  “Yeah, same results.”

  Storm leaned back in her chair and propped her boots on the desk. “I'm still stuck wondering why all the signposts. They've gotta be leading us somewhere, but you'd think it would be away from the museum instead of to it. I mean, there are other valuables in the city, but nothing so well protected that a thief would need to go to all this trouble to distract us from them. The Bannister collection has to be a prime target. So why keep leading us back here?”