Title: The Misguided Fool
Foreshadow: "...Make up your mind Kinomoto! Who do you really want?"
AN: Omygosh. the worst chapter I've written in quite a while. New ideas lead me to a big change TT which lead to a crappy-shorter chapter 10. Do not worry though, chapter 11 is worth it. (Thanks to Freedec12 for quick fix up on grammer)
Chapter: 10…
:Previously in Chapter 9...:f
"I hate wasted efforts," he explained absently.
She almost tripped over a security guard lying on the floor, his hands tapped behind his back and--as Lupi already said--snoring gustily.
Regaining her balance, she hurried on, catching up to the infamous thief as he looked down into the glass case.
"The Taiban Talsman," he said in a considering tone.
Tomoyo didn't like where this was going. "What about it?"
"It's a nice piece. Gold half studded with rubies and a nice opal embedded at the core. Plain chains, but what the hell. Fetch a good price
What?!" Tomoyo was so enraged, her voice actuallly squeaked. "You don't think I'm going to just stand here and let you steal that?"
"No." He sighed. "No, I rather thought you'd have an objection." And then he moved.
Forever afterwards, Tomoyo was unable to explain to her own satisfaction how he managed to do it. He didn't exactly leap at her, he was just there, in a flash like a big shadow.
She was off balance. That was her only excuse.
Off balance and lulled by the sinful charm of the thieving scoundrel.
She found herself, quite unaccountably, sitting on the cold marble floor.
She wasn't hurt at all, only her wrist were bound together (snugly but not too tightly) with black electrictan's tape, and she was staring at the ornate leg of a display case her arms were wrapped around.
Effectively immobilized.
x x x x x x x x
By the time they reached Sakura's hotel suit an hour later, Li had stopped swearing out loud. But he paced like his namesake (little wolf) caged, barely noticing the room he was in.
"Why the hell do you tell this too me now? Couldn't you have told me—oh I don't know...right after you find the bloody thing?! I mean, aren't I incharge of the security of this exhibit, or aren't I?"
Sakura nodded absently as he continued to rave on.
"Don't I at least deserve that much respect reserved from you?"
Sakura smiled solely to herself; Oh, but you do. You do hold a small respect from me, Syaoran.
He continued to pace for a few moments in silence so Sakura bent to allow her cat to transfer from her shoulder to the back of the couch, where he made himself comfortable.
Then she sat down at one end; both she and Kero watched amusedly the man moving around the room.
"It had to be the first technician," he said finally.
"It wasn't him."
Li stopped pacing to stare at her. "If you're trying to be loyal to Haste—"
"I'm not," she interrupted. "Look, Li. If I or any other decent technician wanted to patch in to a phone line, we could do it without leaving evidence." She said, trying to bring some common sense into his mind.
Not for the first time since she met him.
"And what I saw looked like it had been done in one hell of a hurry. Anyone could've gotten into that room at some point during the past few days, you know that. The hallway isn't guarded, not now when the security system isn't on line. And I'm willing to bet my predecessor didn't spend every minute in there, especially when the machine was loading information and he didn't have anything to do except wait for it to finish."
Li had to admit, if only silently, that he hadn't thought much about the security of the computer room himself.
It was just like she said—though the machines themselves were certainly valuable, nobody could cart them from the museum unobserved, and the system wasn't vitally important until it was on line, so that hallway hadn't been the focus of the guard's attention.
"Goddamnit," he murmured.
Sakura shrugged. "Hey, they've got an unlocked door—not an open one. I can lock it for good by cutting the connection. Or I can stand ready at the door and see who tried to open it."
"We're back to the trap," he said, crossing the room to sit down on the arm of the couch across from her.
"Well, it makes sense to me." Sakura wrestled her boots off and then curled up at her end of the couch.
"Since the original security program was on dial at Haste Security and would've been potentially accessible to a thief, I was brought in to install a program so new it isn't in anybody's computer. Except this one."
She tapped her temple with one finger.
Li nodded. "That's what Eriol and I agreed to, providing we see the entire program before it goes on line."
"Which you will. But the point is that even if somebody has an unlocked door into the system, getting in won't be easy at all. They'll have to figure out what the access codes are—and I designed tougher ones."
"But they could get in?"
Sakura waved her left hand casually. "Oh, sure. Given enough time, patience, and knowledge. They'll have to make a number of attempts, though. So all I have to do is program the system to guard itself; if there's an attempted entry I'll be alerted."
"Could we find out who was trying to get in?"
Sakura secretly smiled at Li's little slip up in his words.
We.
"Maybe. We could try tracing the phone line."
"You don't sound too hopeful," Li noted with a frown.
She smiled wryly. "If it was me trying to get in, I would've routed the call through so many lines you'd never find me, at least not in the time I'd need to get in and get what I wanted. And competent technician would do the same."
Li brooded for a few moments in silence then said, "Then your idea of a trap isn't to catch somebody in the system, its to lead them to a place where we're waiting for them?"
Her smile was quick and approving. "Exactly! If I know they're trying to get into the system, I can have a little subprogram or rather, decoy all ready to tell them whatever we want them to know. Like the system has a weak spot that looks just too inviting for words? No thief worth his—or her—salt is going to pass that up."
What she was saying was reasonable, but Li wasn't quite ready to approve her idea.
First, if a thief was after the Troy Collection, he—or she—wouldn't make a move until the collection was in the museum.
And second, he wasn't sure that he completely trusted Sakura Kinomoto.
That shadowy, secret expression in her eyes earlier had bothered him.
"I'll have to think about it. In the morning, I'll get you to show me that phone patch."
"Of course," she murmured. "After all—I might have some nefarious plan of my own. So you'd better give the matter all due consideration."
Li winced feeling caught again.
Damn that woman and her readings. Might as well say she could read my mind these days. Wait...can she read my mind?!
Li stopped his line of thought and took a small glance at Sakura's humoured face.
He couldn't stop himself for what he was about to say next. "What am I thinking?"
"Oh?" Sakura let out an innocently puzzled face.
Li felt an oncoming blush, just realizing his mistake. He would rather die than repeat himself.
Then it was rather fortunate or unfortunate for him, that Sakura decided to humour herself from their previously serious conversation. "What you're thinking..."
"Hmm, obviously you're frustrated that I'm reading you far too well and want to know if I'm just some psychic."
Damn. That is just too creepy,
"And now you think I'm creepy."
"..."
"You know, you really are easy to read than what people say, Li. I don't think using my powers to read your mind is necessary." Sakura kidded using a very straight face, picked up from her eldest brother.
So she can read minds?! I knew it. I just knew it... Talking about her cat being her familiar, making me thinking about her every night, bothering me when she's not even there. I knew she—
"Oh. And I do hope you didn't take my joke too seriously. I don't really have magic."
Syaoran stopped his line of thougth again, horrified.
The case for her was that either she was really reading him as easy as she said or she was a mind reader.
Either ways, he didn't like it one bit.
Perhaps, he had secretly hoped that she did possess some sort of magic background that he could blaim on, because personally, the truth was unbareable.
Fxxx.
x x x x x x x x
An uncomfortable silence settled around the room as Syaoran realized his mistake.
Letting her get to him once again, he couldn't control his body's next action from then. Pulling her surprised lithe body from the couch and crashing their lips brutally against each other.
The utter desire and satisfaction froze him to the core.
Shit...
Coughing, Li shoved his hands that just a moment ago lulled her head to his roughly into his pocket. "I need to go back and check a few things with the guards."
"..."
"So, I'll wait for your update on this plan of your's, Kinomoto. Don't leave out any details."
Sakura took a sharp breath as Syaoran left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him.
She turned slowly, lowering her feet to the floor, and sat there gazing across the room at absolutely nothing.
It had been a very long day.
And Li had always managed to catch her by surprise even when she thought she was in complete control.
Not even a week in Tokyo and already she was in deep trouble.
"Yaah," Kero said, as if he'd read her mind.
"I can handle it," she said, turning her head to look at the little cat.
He was sitting on the back of the couch , where he had observed silently. "I won't loose control, it was just jet lag, that's alll. That's why I'm imagining things tonight."
Kero chirped softly.
As tired and disturbed as she was, Sakura's inner alarm closk reminded her of an appointment that had to be kept.
She rose and went into the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face, pausing for a moment to study her reflection in the mirror.
Her lips were a little swollen, a deeper red than she was accustomed to, and her eyes were very bright, almost feverish.
"Liar," she murmured to herself, admitting what was gnawing at her painfully. "And the hell of it is—you're getting good at it. Too good."
Sakura dried her face and went back out into the sitting room, trying not to think.
Not that she could avoid it.
The intensity of desire between her and Li had caught her off guard, and the passion promised a definite complication. It wasn't her job to get involved with a man—especially not the man responsible for the security of this exhibit.
She couldn't afford to let that happen, she told herself fiercely.
Even if it caused no other problems, her loyalty could be divided.
She could let down her guard with Li, tell him things she'd no rights telling him.
Even worse, she would be gaining his trust under false pretense.
He was, like his namesake (little wolf), wary, suspicious of a hand held out; what would his reaction be if they became lovers and he found out she'd lied to him?
"Damnit it all to hell," she whispered, unconsciously pacing the sitting room as Keor watched silently from the back of the couch. (AN: so much language, I know. But considering their situation? appropriate.)
A soft knock at the door drew Sakura's attention, and she went quickly to the little hallway. She looked through the peephole and immediately opened the door.
Without a word, she stepped back to let him in.
While she was closing the door, he went into the sitting room, looking around him with the automatically searching gave of a man always wary of his surrounds.
Kero spoke to him softly from the back of the couch, and he scratched the little cat briefly under the chin as he passed.
He ended up standing to one side of the window, gazing out on the lights of the city.
Sakura came back into the room and sat down on the arm of a chair, watching the visitor.
"I don't like lying to him." The statement came out abruptly.
The man turned away from the window, his strange eyes cool and calm. "You don't have a choice," he replied.
x x x x x x x x
Tomoyo tried to kick him, but he was too agile for her.
Chuckling as he stood just out of her range and removed something from his belt, Lupin said admiringly, "Your eyes spit rage, just like a cat's. No, stop trying to kick me, you'll only hurt yourself."
Tomoyo winced as the glass in the display case shattered under his expert touch. "You're not going to leave me here?" she demanded incredulously, peering at him.
"My apologies," he murmured.
"You—y-you bastard!"
He might have heard the note of genuine horror in her voicel his head tilted as he lookded down at her, and his voice was more sober. "Only for an hour or so, Tomoyo, I give you my word. As soon as I'm away, I'll tip the police."
She scowled at him, angry at herself for having shown a moment of weakness.
The truth was, she didn't at all enjoy the idea of being alone, helplessly bound, in a dim museum with only drugged guards and a possibly murdered Peter for company.
And because of that she forgotten one crucial info reguarding Lupin.
He had liked to play cat and mouse with the police in all of his attempts and sucesses, and never missed the chance of gloating infront of the cops, do a little dance, taunting them and leave in the night never to be seen.
Go to hell.
"Are you already thinking bad things about me, Tomoyo?"
Tomoyo's lips thinned, already knowing the smirk beneath the mask. Damn him!
"Is your word any good?" she retorted coldly, ignoring his first comment.
He seemed to go very still for a moment, then said in a voice different from any she'd yet heard him use, "My word is the only good thing about me. One must, after all, cling to some scrap of honour."
The overly light tone couldn't quite disguise a much deeper feeling underneath, a seriousness that surprised her. Tomoyo couldn't hold on to her scowl, but she did manage not to soften towards him.
Much.
She watched him lift the dagger from the case and drop it into a chamois bag she hadn't noticed tied to his tool belt. Then a sudden memory made her say, "That Joe fella said I'd be locked in until morning; how are you going to get out?"
"The same way I got in." His voice was his again—careless and somewhat mocking.
"Which is?"
His eyes seemed to gleam in the dim light, catlike, as he looked down at her. "Which is my little secret. After all—I may use the same trick to get at your exhibit."
Her momentary softening vanished as if an artic wind blasted it. "I swear to God, Lupin, if you lay so much as a single finger on any part of the Troy collection..."
"I know," he said sympathetically when her voice trailed off. "It's so hard to rise to glorious heights a second time. The first threat was so marvelously phrased. Let's see—ah yes. If I tamper with the Troy Collection, you mean to hunt me down like a wild pack of wolves to the ends of this earth and roast my gentleman's carcass over perdition's flames.That was it, I believe?"
She made a strangled sound of sheer rage.
Lupin chuckled. "I must go now, cherie. Are you quite comfortable?"
Pride told her to ignore the mockingly solicitous question; the hard coldness of the floor beneath her thin skirt told her, to hell with pride, and to speak up before he disappeared.
Common sense won out, but her Cherokee pride made her voice sulky. "No, damn it. The floor's hard. And cold."
"My apologoies," he said gravely. "I will try to remedy that." He vanished into the shadows toward another of the rooms.
Tomoyo had to fight a craven impulse to cry out his name.
Museums were unnerving places at night, she decided firmly, squashing the impulse.
So...so quiet.
She shivered, seeing the remnants of history from a new perspective and not liking it much.
Lupin returned in just a few minutes, carrying a colourful, tasseled pillow he'd gotten from Lord knows where.
Still sulky but curious, Tomoyo waited to see how he'd manage; her position on the floor was awkward and she couldn't raise herself much.
In a matter of seconds, he was around and behind her, bent. Again without exploratory fumbles, he slid one arm around her waist and lifted her a few inches and neatly slid the pillow underneath her.
"How's that?" he asked briskly.
She looked up at him as he came into sight again. "Better," she said grudgingly. "But the police aren't going to believe a ruthless thief took the time to put a pillow under my ass."
He laughed with genuine amusement. "They will believe it. Trust me. Just tell them you asked for the pillow." The laughter fading, he stood looking down at her for a moment. "And tell them I was here. Don't forget that."
Tomoyo had the sudden realization that her story was going to sound awfully improbable. She found herself mentally editing Lupin out of the story completely and was astonished at herself she could only stare up at him bemusedly.
"I—I don't—That is, I haven't decided what I'll tell the police."
He was silent for a few beats, then said softly, "Will you lie for me, sweet Tomoyo?"
"No," she snapped. "For me. In case you haven't realized, any story I tell is going to sound fishy as hell. Running away from a group of organized thieves and caught be an internattionally famous cat burglar who just happened to be burgling the same museum on the same night?
After that, said thief tied me to the leg of a display case and put a pillow under my ass before stealing a lone dagger and making a clean escape? Don't forget Petere and I got in with a key. What's to stop the police from suspecting I was in league with —with you or the other ones?"
"If you know how to play dumb," Lupin said dryly, "the idea will never cross their minds."
"I'll play hysterical," she snarled. "God, the messes I get into. Just because Peter had to show me his etchings—Stop laughing, you beast!
Go on—get out of here, why can't you? Fade away into the misty night. Fold up your tent and beat it. Hit the road! The next time I see a black mask, I'll kick it in the shin. I hope the next place you burgle has a pack of wild dogs in it.
Dobermans. Big Dobermans. Big hungry Dobermans—whomissed their breakfest, lunch and dinner."
She eyed him resentfully as he leaned somewhat weakly against the display case and contiued to laugh at her. "On the whole," Lupin said unsteadily, "I think I'd prefered the flames of perdition."
"You can count on that, too. If Interpol doesn't get you, I will."
A last chuckle escaped him as Lupin straightened. "I find myself almost looking forward to that. Good night, sweet—and thank you for enlivening a boring event."
She held out until he reached a distant, shadowy doorway, then said, "Lupin?"
He hesitated, then turned. She caught the flash of his eyes.
"You—you will call the police?"
"I give you my word, Tomoyo," he said steadily. "They'll be here within an hour."
She nodded, and in a moment the shadows were only shadows.
It was very quiet and felt curiously desolate.
She sat there, bound to the lef of a display case, her stockinged feet growing cold-why hadn't she asked Lupin to find her shoes?—and a thick pillow cushioning against the hard floor.
It occured to her that she should start weaving a reasonable story for the police.
Knit one, purl two.
No, that wasn't weaving. Weaving was Penelope (AN: Penelope, wife of Odysses from the Greek Myth) picking out the threads of her tapestry by night because she didn't want to marry anyone else even if Odysses had been gone an awfully long time.
Where were the odds against running into an infamous cat burglar twice in one lifetime?
Remote.
Very remote.
Unless, of course, one was the director of a fabulously valuable exhibit...
"Well, officer," she said aloud in the cavernous room, "it happened like this..."
By the luminous hands of her watch, the police arrived forty-minutes later.
And Lupin had been right, darn it.
They took one look at her and accepted without a blink the notion that a busy thief would take the time to find her a pillow because she'd told him the floor was hard and cold.
There were benefits to looking like a dumb sex kitten.
Sometimes.
Once in a blue moon.
x x x x x x x x
Syaoran drove down the stair at record speed, his insanity leading him. "2 minutes. Two Fing minutes and I could've been out!"
An old lady passing by gave him a dirty look as he continued to swear all the way home. "People these days...tsk-tsk."
But Li didn't feel an ounce of dignity bothered. At the moment, he could feel nothing but the feeling of Kinomoto smoothered perfectly into his entire being--the intensity of that one kiss, leaving him in a need more powerful than he had ever encountered before.
If it were only sex. He realized with pain.
He didn't have a doubt that that would be the most dangerous thing when it involved Kinomoto. Sakura...
It wasn't just the feeling of their perfectly molded bodies, heated by their uncanny need. It was the feel of her hair as his hands wove into them. Knowing how much she really affected every fiber of his being.
A feeling of want that was edging into his life in the most deadly ways.
"Damn! That Hiirazawa, somehow, I know this is his doing!"
Buzz-buzzz.
Li felt his back pocket, feeling his cellphone at vibrate. "WHat?"
The caller at the other side let out an eeriely familiar chuckle. "Where you just talking about me, my dear cousin?"
"...Eriol." Li growled.
"I believe that my assumptions are right then. How is the new technician holding up?"
"Cut the act, you bastard. Where the hell are you now?"
"Still New York, I'm afraid. Why? Has anything gone wrong?"
"Nothings wrong with Tomoyo or your precious exhibit."
"Would this has something to do with a certain Ms.Sakura?"
Li gripped the cell a little too tightly just then.
"By your silence, I'm taking that as a yes."
"Get me someone else." Li replied curtly. "And make it happen fast. That's the least you can do for hiring me on this stress-load job and dealing with Tomoyo for 2 weeks while your out of commission."
"Again, I must be say, I am working out a business proposition with your company, Xiao Lang."
"Just when are you coming back then?"
"How say you to tomorrow?"
AN: I have such good supports and interesting readers. Thank you for all your patience! With a sudden trip to New York, I've been quite busy from my writtingTT I hope that this chapter will appease most
Fallen from the sky: Lupin is hilarious! he kind of reminds me of Kaito Dark from DN Angel XD I want him to succeed yet don't at the same time! .
AN: Thanks, Fallen this is a great compliment to my Lupin's character. I hope I didn't damage it further from your expectations;;
Freedec12: It's good to see the thief actually having a composed and humorous nature...and not the I-am-evil-and-I'm-going-to kill-you-cause-you're-the-good-guy...I was originally hoping for Eriol but I dunno...Tomoyo is quite sharp and she would figure it na? But I'm making no promises...(This is how you play safe!) Great chapter..Loved the witty remarks...Kyo rocks!
AN: Have I ever told anyone that I write evil stories? Mwahahahahaha! I did have plenty ideas with Eriol as Lupin, lets just say that much. But ...
HinataForever89: I like this Kyo guy kinda reminds me of Miroku in Inuyasha just a bit .
AN: Hmm, I suppose you can look at it that way.
chibi angelle: Hm.. i have this strange feeling that Lupin is actually Eriol; after all, he is "away on business" is he not ?
AN: Behold, the cliffhanger of this chapter.
