Stay the Night

Page 18

 

  He couldn't even go one night without a woman?

  Even as she thought that, Chris guessed the dark goddess wasn't a one-night companion Rob had picked up somewhere. Judging from her appearance, she probably didn't even know what the inside of a bar looked like. Rob had probably gone to her mansion and begged for an audience.

  Neither one of them had noticed Chris yet.

  Walking over and greeting them would be impolite, Chris decided. It would also be worth it, just to see the look on Rob's face when he tried to explain to his high-maintenance lady friend how he knew Chris—if he didn't pretend she was a complete stranger right off the bat. But she didn't want to meet his smoldering Mediterranean beauty—not now, not ever. She could happily go the rest of her life without ever knowing the woman's name.

  What if he's in a relationship with her? What if they're engaged, or married?

  Chris knew that a man who wanted sex more than a pure conscience would have no difficulty lying through his teeth to get it. Rob's penthouse apartment might be his little love nest away from home. But if he was regularly cheating on that woman, he was out of his mind.

  Chris saw Rob's head turning in her direction, and spun on her heel. Wildfire anger burned through her, scalding her from the inside out. This situation made it impossible to think or work rationally. She needed to take a few minutes and pull herself together before Rob brought over his beauty and tried to have another cozy chitchat with her.

  Did you use the same lines on her when you two met? Did you go to whatever snobby country club she belongs to and ask her to dance? Did you tell her that you wanted her more than you could say?

  This was unacceptable. She had a job to do; she couldn't let irrational, jealous rage distract her like this. She'd gone to bed with Rob an hour after she'd met him—what the guys in the Chicago office called pulling a four-one-niner. That gave her exactly zero right to be treated as anything else.

  "Dennis," she murmured, knowing her voice would be picked up by the microphone hidden behind the frame of the painting in front of her.

  "Yes, ma'am. "

  She pretended to wipe off some nonexistent dust from one scroll of the frame. "I've got to grab some aspirin. Let the others know I'm taking five. "

  "No problem. "

  Chris made her way to the manager's office, slipping inside and locking the door behind her. The state she was in shocked her. Her hands shook, her heart pounded, and she still couldn't catch her breath. Fortunately she wasn't wearing a sound transmitter, and Dennis hadn't bugged the managers office, so he wouldn't hear her hyperventilating.

  She took off her jacket, hanging it on the back of the door, and sat on the edge of one of the client chairs. She had five minutes to pull herself together, and she was going to need every second of it.

  Robin had watched Chris Renshaw pretending to be an art dealer for some time before she noticed him and the contessa from the other side of the gallery.

  Special Agent Chris Renshaw, he corrected himself as she retreated to a room at the back of the place. An undercover agent with America's version of Scotland Yard. Agent sounded especially ridiculous, as if she were a spy. She wouldn't be called a constable or an inspector. No, in this country they called their investigators detectives or cops.

  That was a particular thorn in his side: He'd slept with a cop. He, Robin of Locksley, the greatest thief of all time, had rested in the arms of the enemy.

  I might as well have taken a Brethren to bed.

  "That scowl on your face makes me think the woman with the titian locks is your Agent Renshaw," the contessa said. "She was staring at you just before she scurried off to hide. "

  "So she was. " Robin guided his companion around a persistent young woman with an appalling head of pink hair and led her to the case containing The Maiden's Book of Hours. One glance told him it was the book Brother Crewes had presented to the king just before the greedy bastard had sold Marian to Guisbourne.

  Robin was more interested in the door to the office where Chris had disappeared. It remained closed.

  "It is such a beautiful thing," Salva murmured, examining the manuscript through the glass. "I can see why you have coveted it all these years. " She gave him a quizzical look. "But, caro, why have you not taken it before now?"

  "It was stolen from me and given to my cousin during my human lifetime, and then pilfered from his household and taken out of the country," Robin said, watching the office door. He didn't care for the fact that Chris had come to Atlanta only to catch him, and had baited the trap with the one prize that had always eluded him over the years. Still, it made no difference. No one had ever captured him, not once since he had turned to the outlaw life seven hundred years ago; she would fail just as thoroughly as all the others.

  What he could not accept, what he would not tolerate another moment, was her hiding from him. She couldn't ignore him like this, though, as if nothing ever happened between them. He had allowed her into his home. He had been her lover. He had slept in her arms.

  The contessa was speaking to him, and Robin frowned. "What did you say?"

  "I asked if you tried to recover it from the original thief who took it from England," Salva said.

  Robin forced himself to answer her in a civil fashion. "At the time it was stolen from my cousin, I had to flee the country for my own reasons. It was fifty years before I had the means and time to track the thief. He sold it to a convent in Rome, but it was again stolen from there and resold to the Vatican. It disappeared from their secret archives, then was taken and sold in France, and then Spain, and then Germany. " His hands curled into fists. "Each time it surfaced in the centuries after, some bloody mortal always got to it before I could. "

  "How greedy and inconvenient humans can be. " The contessa trailed her scarlet-nailed fingertips over the glass. "I am happy that it will be yours at last, my lord. Shall I go and have the female give it to you after the show, or would you prefer she personally deliver it to your stronghold? Perhaps I could persuade her to crawl on her knees on her way to you there. "

  Robin couldn't believe Chris had not yet come out. Not another second would he wait for this faithless mortal to acknowledge his presence.

  "I shall see to her," he told Salva. "Wait here. "

  Robin strode to the office, but found the door locked when he tried it. A simple twist of his hand using his Kyn strength broke the locking mechanism and allowed him to enter the room.

  Chris Renshaw straightened as soon as he closed the door behind him. He twisted the knob again to jam it shut. "You can't come in here. "

  "Yet I have. " He regarded her steadily as he deliberately shed his scent, surrounding her with it. "I had expected you would come and greet me when I arrived. Unless perhaps you have gone blind since last night?"

  "I can see fine. " Her eyes remained clear, her pupils normal as she offered him a brief, polite smile. "I apologize for not saying hello. I didn't notice you coming in. "

  That proved beyond a doubt to him that she could resist l'attrait. "You are a better liar than that, madam. "

  "I don't know what you're talking about, Rob. I have to get back to the show. " She came to him and glanced up when he didn't move out of her way. "Excuse me. "

  "No, I do not excuse you," he said, enjoying the way his tone startled her. "I know you saw me. Why did you not come to me?"

  Chris backed away from him. "All right, I did catch a glimpse of you and your companion when one of the press asked me about you. I didn't come over because I felt awkward about approaching you. "

  "Awkward. "

  "I didn't want to say anything that might embarrass you in front of your date. " She had to force her next words out. "I didn't mean to be rude. Again, I apologize. "

  "You were protecting me. I see. " Robin advanced on her. "Tell me, what did you think would embarrass me most? That you might slip up and mention that you used me for sex?
Or perhaps that you never told me your full name? Or that you left my bed this morning without bothering to wake me or say farewell?"

  "I wrote you a note—"

  "Oh, God, yes, how could I forget? The effusive, affectionate, one-line note of thanks. " He had her pinned against the desk now, and leaned down until their faces were only a breath apart. "I've not earned such an unstinting amount of gratitude since the last time I held a door open for an elderly woman using a cane. "

  "Rob. "

  "Robin. That is my name. Say it. Say all of it. "

  "Robin. " Her lashes came down, hiding her eyes from him. "Listen, I've never done anything like that, and I really didn't know what to do except leave. I told you, I don't pick up guys in bars. I don't have one-night stands. "

  "There, now, that has a ring of truth to it. " He used a finger to trace the edge of her blouse's front placket. "But technically speaking, I wasn't a one-night stand, was I? You didn't stay the night. " He wove his fingertip in and out of the row of buttons. "By my calculations, love, you owe me two more hours. I'd like to collect. "

  "I can't—" She stopped as he brought his hand up and used his thumb to pop off the first button at the top of her blouse, and her throat worked as she swallowed. "Don't do this, Robin. "

  "Why not?" He circled the second button, watching the frantic throb of her pulse hammer in the hollow between her collarbones. "You liked it well enough the other night. You put my hands on you. You wanted me to do it. " The second button fell on the desk.

  "That was then. This is my job. "

  "Your job" He moved his fingers down to the third button. "You didn't tell me what that was, either. "

  "Someone is going to come looking for me any minute," she warned.

  "Let them try. "

  "Robin. " She put her hand over his, trapping his fingers between her cold palm and her warm body. "Please stop. "