Hunt Me (Love Thieves #3) (21 page)

“Listening?”

“Can we call a moratorium to the games, Anya? Your Louis is out there.”

Fuck! Louis is here?
She didn’t check the clutch purse in her hand. The weight of the idol dragged on her with every breath she inhaled. Fear pounded in her ears, the throbbing memory of betrayal and hate congealing her blood.

Her history with Louis du Monde, complicated by half-truths, innuendos, and outright deception, tightened the noose. She’d taken advantage of his interest in her to access a secure facility once. The man rarely forgot unfulfilled promises. Unlike Max, he never appeared amused or intrigued, only vengeful. He also had a reputation for being a thug with a pedigree. Blue blood didn’t make his bite any less vicious. She really needed another way out of this room.

“Well…interesting.”

“What?” She’d nearly forgotten her erstwhile captor and current obstacle.

“You’re an amazingly adept liar. But I don’t think you can fake the damsel in distress vibe without a grain or two of reality.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She dismissed the cold fingers of unease probing along her spine.

He canted his head, his fathomless gaze boring into her. “You’re not here with Louis.”

Years of discipline and control couldn’t arrest her flinch at his name.

“No, I’m not here with Louis.” She studied the book-lined walls. She glanced upward. Air ducts fed into the room. She spotted the vent above one of the bookshelves.

She could make it, if she lost the shoes.

Three hundred dollar red satin Badgely Mischka pumps.
Her inner Vidal cringed.

But she
could
do it.

“Is Louis looking for you?” His voice changed, the accent softening from the rolling syllables he favored when he spoke French to the harder, clipped vowels of his British upbringing.

“I really hope not. But whether he is or not, I would prefer he did not find me here.” An understatement, but she gave up the charade of trying to seduce Max or letting him seduce her. She needed to move now. Returning the idol might not be an option. She needed to cut her losses and just go.

How did she get into this mess? Every encounter with Louis ended in disaster. Max’s distaste for the man was the only reason she’d trotted the arrogant French count out as a distraction.

“Anya.” He caught her arm, drawing her back to the present. “You were serious about wanting to return the idol earlier?”

“Yes.”

“But you
stole
it.”

She went silent. Let him think what he would. She couldn’t reveal her purpose here any more than she could expect him to believe it. Her work with the International Art and Antiquities Recovery agency began with a binding contract. She’d agreed to follow their rules. They gave her all the excitement she could crave and an outlet for her impulses, but her parents had taught her never to make a promise she couldn’t keep.

Honor should not come at so high a price.

But if it were easy, it wouldn’t be honor, would it?

Raising her chin, she met his scrutiny, unflinching. “I will not sleep with you for your help.”

He hissed out a breath between his teeth, frustration edging through the civil veneer he wore. “You are a vexing woman.”

She shouldn’t have smiled, but the way he said
vexing
made her belly flutter. Not the most obvious choice of words to hear from the man who danced with her, pursued her, and seemed very intent upon bedding her. She wasn’t sure where his determination came from, and, right now, she didn’t care.

Needing his help and a willingness to owe a favor differed from selling her body.

I’m not a whore
.

When she would have spoken, he pressed a finger to her lips. The scent of his skin brought the simmering in her belly into full flame. Turning him down would be so much easier if he didn’t turn her on,
dammit
. The way his finger brushed along her lip invited her to say yes to whatever he proposed.

Mistake!

Her inner voice shrieked. She liked to think of the sound as the conscience drilled into her by her very conservative parents. Her liberal attitudes and outlandish choices often left her Midwest parents at a loss.

“Truth?” Max spoke again, gritting the word out as though it cost him to say.

“All right. One truth.”

“Do you really want to return the Buddha to the vault?” Why the hell else would she have approached him? Then again, he was here for the same reason as she. He wanted the statue. Right?

“Yes.”

He went still. She tried to imagine the thoughts going through his mind. A muscle ticked in his jaw. A vein throbbed in his forehead. God he wore frustrated well.

Down girl,
she reminded herself.
Job first.

“All right.
We
will return the Buddha.”

At what cost? “For?”

“Pardon?” He raised his brows.

“You’ll help me for what?”

“It’s free of charge, this time.” The tension relaxed out of him, and she dug her fingernails into her palms to fight the urge to touch his soft smile. His thumb continued to glide over her lower lip.

He hypnotized her like this—watching her, relaxed and satisfied with the nebulous promise of pleasure.

“I don’t think there will be a next time,” she said, brushing the pad of his thumb with the tip of her tongue.

Her inner voice shrilled, and she could barely repress the groan, savoring the hint of salt and male.

“All in good time,
chérie
. Stay a moment. I will see if your Louis is…near.” The way he said the words indicated a level of distaste she shared, but he took his hands away, leaving her strangely bereft.

Anya closed her eyes, and inhaled deeply. The vibrantly sexual and raw hint of his masculinity assaulted her senses. No one should smell so good.

Mistake!

“Oh shut it,” she murmured to herself.

“Pardon?” He stood scant inches away from her, all sexy and tantalizing.

“Nothing. Is it clear?”

He went perfectly still and looked for the entire world like he would kiss her. If he did, she wasn’t going to stop him this time. Her pulse raced in anticipation.

“
Oui, chérie
. It is clear. We shall return the idol.” He took a half step back, puncturing the intimacy and offered her his arm.

Her anticipation for the kiss crashed.
Fickle much?
she demanded of herself. This was what she wanted. Return the Buddha. Get out of the pinch. Avoid losing her job, her credibility, and her freedom.

So, why the hell am I disappointed he capitulated so easily?

Treasure Me
by Heather Long

Chapter One

A sharp crack snapped the silence in half. Sophie shoved her fist into her mouth, determined to strangle the scream clawing its way up from her belly. If it had only been just a sharp crack, she could have dismissed it. The museum’s basement was overpopulated with more artifacts than three lifetimes worth of curators had been able to catalog. The harsh snap could have been a displaced shelf, a fallen item, or even the old air recycling system kicking on.

The body crumpling to the floor shot down any other reasonable possibilities. Royce Hinkley, curator, art expert and head of the Seven Fates exhibit lay dead. His empty eyes stared across the open expanse between the stacks. Sophie tore her gaze away from him and turned it toward the hard metal support for the shelves housing minutiae from dozens of Egyptian excavations.

A shuffle step and the man with the gun stood between her and Professor Hinkley. Sophie shrank against the stacks, holding her breath. She prayed the shadowy depths of the archivists vault would hold her secret as deeply as it held the ancients’.

“
Non.
” The distinctly melodic French splashed the reality of the situation at her. “He was trying to double cross us. He did not have the Buddha.
Oui.
I will check in tonight.”

The Buddha.

Sophie flattened herself against the metal struts, her pulse hammering her into place. The man’s gun vanished, and he bent, seizing Professor Hinkley under the arms, and then hoisted him.

Dear God…he killed him already. What more could he want with him?

Professor Hinkley’s head flopped, bouncing like a bobblehead as his assailant balanced the corpse’s weight over his shoulders. Sophie swallowed back the gorge burning up her throat. He turned, heading away from the Egyptian stacks and toward the Mesopotamian. Sophie kept herself as still as possible, holding her breath until the last shuffling step faded away.

Only then did she look down at the Buddha peeking out from the bottom of the cart. The golden man seemed to be winking at her.

***

“Dr. Kingston, I believe you.” Detective Bryant leaned against the corner of the desk, staring down at her with sad brown eyes that told a tale of pity and patience. He wore an air of disappointment like a rumpled, stained tie discoloring his disposition. “I understand what you think you saw, and I appreciate that you took the time to report it. But our crime scene unit has been over the vault, we’ve talked to your coworkers, we’ve spoken to the director. Dr. Hinkley is on a leave of absence. He began it this morning.”

“Leave of absence?” Since when? Professor Hinkley had been excited about new possibilities for his Seven Fates exhibit. If he’d planned a sabbatical, he would have had to find coverage for his projects.

The detective shrugged. “We’re trying to contact him, but his sabbaticals seem to be something of a legend among your coworkers. No one else is reporting him missing, and, unless the lab turns up any trace evidence, I’m afraid there’s not much else we can do.”

Sophie opened her mouth, and then shut it again. The clock on the distant wall ticked past 8:00 p.m. Twelve hours since she’d seen the professor’s dead body. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw his head bounce as the shooter picked him up. She could hear the dulcet French intonation of the words as the man spoke into a phone.

She’d hidden in the stacks like a coward for more than thirty minutes before daring to make an escape and call the police. Despite arriving quickly, sweeping through the vaults, and inspecting the crime scene, they’d found nothing.

Not even blood.

It wasn’t possible.

She’d seen the professor shot. She’d watched him crumple to the ground. Sophie swallowed the gorge threatening her once more.

Could I have imagined it?

The thought pinged against her conscience. It simply wasn’t rational.

***

The six-floor climb had never seemed as long as it did tonight. Sophie’s legs burned with each floor, the fatigue dragging her under like a riptide off a summer beach. She’d declined the walk to the door from the detective, all too aware of the sympathetic glint in his gaze. She’d answered his questions for hours, but with no success. No body, no crime.

A bang behind her sent her pulse rabbiting. Sophie looked over her shoulder to see Mrs. Bruno tugging her over-packed, two-wheel shopping cart up the stairs, one thump at a time. Keys looped over her fingers, Sophie pivoted and darted down the steps to grab Mrs. Bruno’s cart before it overbalanced and carried the old woman and her groceries down the stairs.

“And where is your grandson?” she asked in lieu of a hello. Mrs. Bruno’s well-lined face wrinkled up into a smile.

“He had a hot date with Eppsie’s granddaughter!” She huffed a laugh, leaning against the wall to catch her breath before charging ahead. Freed of her burden, her fifth floor neighbor was quite spry.

Sophie put her back into it and tugged the shopping cart behind her. “I thought she was dating the Lemmons’ grandson.”

“Oh, she was.” Mrs. Bruno paused at the fourth floor to let Sophie catch up. “But he’s going off to college in California next year and told her they should date other people to experiment.”

Laughter burst the sick bubble of exhaustion souring Sophie’s stomach. “Seriously?”

“Seriously. So my grandson called me and said he’d asked her out and she said yes. He didn’t want to give her a chance to change her mind or for her stupid boyfriend to wise up.” Mrs. Bruno’s eyes twinkled cheerfully. “My grandson is smart, like his grandfather. You don’t hesitate when a lady says yes. You hesitate, you lose.”

“Well, I hope it works out for them.” They’d reached Mrs. Bruno’s floor, and Sophie tugged the cart over to her door. “Do you need some help putting groceries up?”

“No dear. You need to go upstairs, shower, freshen up, and take yourself out to Tony’s. Or you can head over to Popa’s by NYU to catch one of those professors.”

Sophie did not roll her eyes or snort. Mrs. Bruno meant well. She had been trying to fix Sophie up with a nice young man for eighteen months, ever since Sophie moved into the walk-up. Mrs. Bruno had lived here for forty years and often boasted 608 was the lucky number. She’d found a match for ten occupants. She planned to make Sophie number eleven.