Always a Thief

by Kay Hooper

  “Yes,” Quinn replied. “Yes, I do.”

  During the next few days, Morgan was uncharacteristically tranquil—particularly since she woke up each morning with a passionate cat burglar in her bed. Not that she was calm then, because her need for Quinn seemed only to grow stronger with every day that passed, but when she reluctantly left him asleep in her bed and went to the museum later each morning, she wrapped serenity around her like a shell.

  If any of the others realized that behind her smile and thoughtful eyes a very sharp and observant mind was working, no one said anything about it. Storm teased her about Alex's effect on her, and both Max and Wolfe made rather surprised comments about her newfound composure and the lack of chatter around the museum, but if Alex thought there was anything different about her he hadn't mentioned it.

  That was fine with Morgan. She didn't try to hide the fact that she was in love with Alex; she merely remained calm about it. Almost fatalistic, in fact. What would be, would be.

  It was, of course, a deceptive appearance.

  He came to the museum every day to pick her up—sometimes for lunch, but always by closing time—and they'd spend the remainder of the evening together, until he had to leave to become Quinn. He was always there when she woke in the morning, but he kept his suite at the Imperial and returned there at least once every day. He didn't suggest moving in with her, and Morgan didn't bring up the subject.

  She teased him until he began teaching her how to pick a lock, though he claimed he was doing it only to impress her with the level of skill required. (She was impressed.) And, as always, they talked. Morgan didn't ask him too many questions, but she chose those she did ask carefully and timed them with even more caution. And it might have been because he was increasingly tense about the trap—or sting—but Quinn didn't seem to notice that she was gathering bits of information in a discreet but methodical way.

  By Thursday, Morgan thought she had figured out at least part of what was happening—and why. If she was right, she also thought she had at last pinpointed the core motivation of Quinn/Alex Brandon, the inner force that propelled him through life and shaped so many of his choices and decisions.

  Once she did that, he stopped being either Alex or Quinn to her; she no longer referred to him by name in the third person when they talked about either of his personas. She thought she understood the man he was now, and Alex had finally become as real to her as Quinn had always been.

  She had also reached the conclusion that her beloved was in hot water up to his neck—and not only with Nightshade. He was carefully avoiding being alone with either Max or Wolfe, and when Jared appeared at the museum rather suddenly that afternoon just after Alex arrived, it was painfully obvious that there was a very real tension between the brothers.

  Morgan stood in the lobby just outside the hallway of offices and watched thoughtfully as Alex spoke to Max near the guards' desk while, a few feet from them, Jared and Wolfe talked. All four men looked unusually serious—not to say grim—and Morgan had the oddest feeling. It was as if her mind was yelling at her that there was danger here, right in front of her, if she'd only see. . . .

  Then her gaze tracked past them as a movement caught her eye, and she watched as Leo strolled down the stairs. He'd been up at the exhibit, she knew; he visited about every other day, as regular as clockwork. He called out something to Max, casually lifted a hand in farewell, and left the museum without, apparently, noticing her scrutiny.

  “Morgan, have you— Sorry. Didn't mean to make you jump.”

  She turned to find Ken Dugan standing in the hallway, and managed a smile. “It's all right, Ken. I've just got a lot on my mind. What did you want to ask me?”

  As usual, the curator was faintly harassed. “Didn't you draw up a list of repair people we could safely call for work while the exhibit's in place? People you've cleared?”

  “Yes,” she answered slowly. “Why?”

  “The air-conditioning system. Morgan, haven't you noticed how damned hot it is in here?”

  Since she usually felt feverish if Alex was anywhere near her, Morgan honestly hadn't noticed. But now that Ken mentioned it, she thought it was a bit stuffy, even in the vast, open lobby. “I guess it is, at that.”

  “I think the thermostat must be stuck,” Ken told her. “And since the system's practically as old as the building, I think we'd better have it checked out pronto.”

  Morgan glanced at her watch and frowned. “I'll go make some calls—but I doubt we'll be able to get anyone out here until tomorrow, Ken. We'll probably have to shut the air-conditioning system off until then.”

  Ken nodded but didn't look happy. “Yes, I suppose that would be best. The weather outside is mild enough, and all the display cases have their own separate temperature-control systems, so we should be all right. Dammit—every museum in the area seems to be having electronic problems of one kind or another.”

  “Gremlins,” Morgan suggested, about half serious.

  He agreed with a sigh, then said, “I'll tell Max and Wolfe, just to be on the safe side.”

  Morgan returned to her office and made the necessary calls, both surprised and pleased when the second repairman she called cheerfully agreed to come within the hour. It would be time-and-a-half, of course, but if the museum didn't mind that . . .

  She ruthlessly committed the museum's resources and told the man to come, and after she'd hung up, she sat there looking down at her clipboard with a frown. The Lucite clipboard with its thick sheaf of papers was more or less Morgan's lifeline, containing virtually every bit of information she needed to oversee the exhibit. There was a floor plan of the exhibit wing; design specifications for the display cases holding the Bannister collection; a copy of the insurance inventory of the collection; a long list of people cleared to perform various repairs in the museum should those be needed—and other things.

  She was usually careful to leave the clipboard locked in her desk and locked in her office whenever she didn't have it, though she hadn't really thought about what information it could provide to someone else.

  As she gazed at it now, Morgan's uneasiness began to increase. The clipboard had been in Ken's office on Saturday, she remembered. It had been in Ken's office, where both he and Chloe had worked that day. Why had it been there? She'd forgotten to ask either Ken or Chloe, but now that she thought about it, she couldn't think of a reason why either of them would have needed any of this information. And . . . Ken had always been around whenever Alex was watching someone, she remembered.

  It seemed ridiculous to even consider—but when Alex had said that Nightshade couldn't go after the Bannister collection alone, he'd also said that one reason was because of a lack of electronic skill. What if there was another reason? What if Nightshade dared not use his own inside knowledge, his own security key card and alarm codes, to get at the exhibit in his own museum?

  God, how ironic that would be! To have such a prize underneath his very nose and know that if he touched it he risked the police being suspicious of it being an inside job. In that situation, Morgan could believe that the arrival of Quinn would be a godsend. To use that other skilled thief's knowledge, to let him find a way past the security—and take the blame for the resulting robbery.

  And what would be the risk for Nightshade? Quinn might know his identity, but Nightshade also knew who Quinn really was—and that mutual knowledge kept them both relatively safe from each other, at least as far as public disclosure was concerned.

  It was possible, Morgan thought. It was definitely possible. She couldn't imagine Ken gloating in secret over his cache of priceless objects, or holding a chloroform-soaked cloth over her face, or shooting Quinn as they both crept through the night—but then, she couldn't imagine it of Leo either. In fact, she couldn't imagine it of anyone she knew.

  After a while, she locked the clipboard up in her desk and left her office, locking the door behind her. She glanced across the hall into Ken's open office, and for a moment she di
dn't move a muscle. Then, slowly, she headed toward the lobby, pulling on her mask of tranquillity as she prepared to tell Ken that the repairman was on his way.

  She thought she'd be able to keep all her thoughts and speculations to herself. She hoped. But she couldn't help wondering if anyone else had noticed the drooping rose in a crystal bud vase on Ken's desk.

  It was only a little after eleven that night when Alex began dressing to leave her, after explaining that he had to return to his hotel briefly. Morgan lay and watched him dress, admiring and unself-conscious. She thought he was beautiful. She also thought he was wired, even after he'd expended a considerable amount of energy in their bed.

  “Is it tonight?” she asked quietly.

  He sat on the side of the bed and looked at her steadily. “I don't know, Morgana. Perhaps.”

  “If you knew, would you tell me?”

  He leaned over to kiss her. “Probably not,” he admitted with a slight smile. “There's no reason for you to worry, sweet. No reason at all.”

  Morgan eyed him. “I guess you heard me tell Ken that a repairman was coming for the air-conditioning system?”

  “I heard.”

  She was getting better at reading him, she decided; there had been a flicker of reaction in his green eyes. She was suddenly positive that something was going to happen tonight.

  “Alex—”

  He kissed her again, then rose quickly to his feet. “I'll be back by morning. Sleep well.”

  Morgan didn't reach to turn off the lamp on the nightstand, even though she was physically weary. Instead, she gazed at the doorway, acutely conscious of his absence, and tried to get her thoughts organized.

  Tonight. It was tonight. And, somehow, the air- conditioning system at the museum was important. Because it had malfunctioned? Because it had been repaired? She assumed it had, anyway; Ken and Wolfe had decided to remain at the museum until the repair work was finished. But if Ken was Nightshade . . .

  Morgan had the awful, clenched-stomach feeling that she was missing something, something vitally important. It had nagged at her since this afternoon, and now it was getting stronger, getting unbearable. What was it? It had started, she remembered, when she'd stood at the head of the hallway gazing across the lobby, suddenly and inexplicably conscious of danger, as if her instincts or her subconscious had been trying to warn her.

  What was it?

  She closed her eyes, concentrating, trying to re-create what she had seen in her mind. The men standing in the lobby. The guards at their desk. Leo coming down the stairs. Ken approaching behind her—had she sensed him nearing?

  She'd just been watching everybody, idly, not thinking about anything except how grim they looked. . . .

  It was then that the final piece of the puzzle dropped quietly into place, and Morgan sat up with a gasp. Well, for Christ's sake. Now it made sense, all the vague little things that had bothered her all along. Now she understood.

  But even as surprise and relief and annoyance chased one another through her mind, another and far more disquieting realization reared its head.

  If she had seen the truth, then it was always possible someone else had as well. The wrong someone. Because either of them had her knowledge, she thought. At least her knowledge and maybe more. All either of her suspects had to do was put a couple of things together, as she had, and look at the sum.

  One wrong trick of the light, and Nightshade would know without doubt that he was being lured into a trap.

  Morgan glanced at the clock on her nightstand even as she was bolting out of bed and hurrying to dress. Not yet midnight. Could she make it?

  She didn't have a cell-phone number for Alex, a belated realization that made her kick herself mentally. She tried calling Alex's hotel as she dressed, but there was no answer in his room, and when she got the desk clerk she was informed that Mr. Brandon had left for the evening.

  Which told Morgan absolutely nothing. It was doubtful that Alex openly returned to his hotel after an evening out only to depart again dressed as a cat burglar. He probably had a quiet way in and out of the hotel and used that to come and go as Quinn.

  Morgan grabbed her cell phone, but it wasn't until she was in her car that she realized the battery was dead. Great, that was just great. The universe really did hate her.

  Where was Alex heading tonight? Which man was Nightshade?

  Morgan sat in her car and closed her eyes, trying to relax and let that extra sense open up, to feel Alex as she had so often been able to feel him, to sense where he was. If he was entirely focused on what he had to do tonight, not consciously blocking her, then—

  The certainty was abrupt, and so clear that it was almost an image in her mind.

  Morgan didn't waste any time marveling at how much stronger this odd sense of hers had grown since she and Alex had become lovers. There would be time later, she hoped, for that. She started her car and headed north.

  She had to make it. She had to.

  CHAPTER

  FIFTEEN

  The only reason she took the chance, Morgan explained later, was because she was reasonably familiar with the place. She even knew the security code for the garden gate, because she had fairly recently helped organize an outdoor benefit and he had the best garden in town.

  Of course, being Morgan, she didn't stop to think either that he might have changed the code (he hadn't) or that security for the house itself would doubtless be much tougher.

  In any case, her newly established lock-picking skills were not put to the test. She managed to make her way through the fog-enshrouded garden all the way to the terrace, but two steps from the French door that she knew led into the study, a pair of strong arms grabbed her and pulled her somewhat roughly away from the door and up against a very hard body.

  This is getting to be a habit, she decided as relief made her legs suddenly weak. She turned in his arms and threw her own up around his neck.

  Quinn held her for an instant, then yanked her arms down and softly, fiercely demanded, “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “That's a fine greeting,” she whispered in return.

  Unmasked but wearing the remainder of his cat-burglar costume, he scowled at her. “Morgana, dammit, you're supposed to be safely in bed.”

  “I had to come,” she insisted, still whispering. “Alex, I just figured out—”

  “Shhh!”

  He was so still and silent that Morgan could hear the dripping of the fog-wet ivy climbing the wall beside them. She couldn't hear anything from the house, but he must have, because the tension she could feel in him increased. Then his gloved hands lifted quickly to frame her face, and he gazed at her with such intensity that his green eyes were like a cat's in the dark, alight and vibrant.

  “Sweetheart, listen to me. There's no time—he'll be in the study in just a minute. I want you to stay here, right here, and don't move. Do you understand?”

  “But—”

  “Morgan, promise me. No matter what you see or hear, no matter what you think is happening in that room, you stay here and don't make a sound until you're absolutely sure he's gone. Promise.”

  “All right, I promise. But, Alex—”

  He kissed her, briefly but with such overwhelming hunger that she felt her knees buckle. “I love you,” he whispered against her lips.

  Morgan found herself leaning back among wet ivy, shaken and momentarily confused, wondering if she had really heard him say that. She fought to clear her mind, suddenly more afraid than she'd ever been before, because she had the cold idea that he wouldn't have said it unless he thought he might not get another chance.

  Her promise kept her silent, and by the time she could gather her thoughts, he had swiftly and skillfully opened the French doors and gone into the house. He'd left the door just barely ajar; she'd be able to hear what went on in the study. From her position she could see him as he moved draperies aside to the right of the door and reached up a gloved finger to punch numbers on a keypad.<
br />
  The security system, she realized vaguely. He knew the codes? Well, of course he did. He was Quinn.

  Then he moved away from the doors, and Morgan shifted around carefully until she could—just barely—see into the room. With the lamplight in there, and the darkness of the foggy terrace, she knew she was invisible to anyone in the room, but she was wary enough to keep her body back and just peer around the edge.

  Quinn, his expression perfectly calm and that inner tension she had felt completely hidden, was standing by a fireplace where a dying fire crackled softly. He was still wearing his gloves, and the black ski mask was tucked into his belt. He looked across the room when the hall door opened and another man walked in, and he said with faint impatience, “You're late. If your man did his job, all the guards in the museum should be passing out in another hour.”

  Morgan was a bit startled by his voice; it wasn't the one she was accustomed to hearing from him. Quicker, sharper, faintly accented, and subtly vicious, it was the voice of a man who could easily be a world-famous criminal.

  Leo Cassady, also dressed all in black, walked to his desk and bent forward to study a set of plans laid out there. His handsome face was hard and expressionless. “We have plenty of time,” he said flatly. “The gas cartridges are set to fire at one-thirty, and we can be at the museum long before then.”

  “I don't want to take any chances,” Quinn insisted. “We have to cut the power in case one of the guards realizes he's being gassed and gets to the alarm. Even though we've been tripping alarms and shorting out electrical systems all over the city for a week, that's no guarantee Ace will automatically assume there's another glitch in one of their systems.”

  So that's why so many museums have been having problems, Morgan realized.

  “We have plenty of time,” Leo repeated. Then, head still bent over the plans, he said, “Tell me something, Alex.”

  “If I can.”

  “Why don't you carry a gun?”