Free Thieves Like Us 01 - Thieves Like Us by Stephen Cole

yourself. I shan’t forgive you this neglect, you know.’
    ‘Oh?’ Coldhardt took her hand and raised it to his lips. He pressed a kiss against the very tip of her fingers, an oddly intimate gesture, his eyes meeting the yellow diamonds of the snake bracelet coiled round her arm.
    Con’s pale eyes had turned almost as hard; Tye knew well that she didn’t take kindly to being ignored. ‘Uncle, dear, we really must be going. There’s so muchto prepare before my trip tomorrow.’
    Now Samraj turned to face her, amusement on her handsome features. ‘You are going somewhere, my dear?’
    ‘Back to Paris,’ said Con unflinchingly. ‘I must write up an account of this
memorable
event for my newspaper.’
    ‘Of course you must,’ she said softly.
    ‘Then if you’ll excuse us, Samraj?’ Coldhardt was dabbing at his mouth with a handkerchief as if wiping his lips after a meal. ‘It seems I must neglect you once more.’
    ‘And just as the evening was getting interesting.’ Now she glanced at Tye with ill-concealed disdain. ‘We’ll all meet again soon, I am sure.’
    And as Tye nodded and turned to follow the others, she knew one thing with certainty: Samraj was speaking the truth as well.

Chapter Seven
    If you had to be squeezed in five to a car, Jonah reflected, it might as well be a flash convertible on a blazing hot day, somewhere exotic. And cruising along the road from Cairo to Sakkara was better than squashing up inside a crappy white van in a prison car park, at any rate. Maybe things
were
looking up.
    They were heading west now in their hire car after a long stretch north. The road was flanked by fields of fig palms. A large, crumbling pyramid was looming ever closer in a fine, smoky haze.
    ‘Step pyramid,’ said Motti, beside him. ‘Says here it’s the first of its kind. Built by our old pal Imhotep.’
    ‘Maybe we should knock on the door, see if he’s at home,’ said Con sourly. She had bagged the front seat beside Tye as ever, her long, pale legs pushed up against the dash.
    ‘I need a pee,’ Patch complained.
    ‘Hey, and the desert needs irrigating,’ said Motti. ‘Drop the Cyclops here, Tye. They were meant for each other.’
    ‘Don’t take your hangover out on Patch,’ said Tye, with the air of someone well used to talking to brick walls. She was wearing pale cotton trousers, and alittle pink shirt that looked great against her dark skin and the deep blue sky.
    The others had taken it for granted, but Jonah couldn’t get over how she’d switched from piloting an eight-seater Beech King Air 350 to driving a hired BMW without effort or complaint, and given such a smooth ride in both – especially in the kamikaze insanity of the Cairo traffic. But nagging at the back of his mind was the thought of all she must have done to
get
so good, to come to Coldhardt’s attention. He wondered how she’d got into smuggling so young. Whether she’d had a choice. What her choices were now.
    ‘This job better not be like that crypt we had to get into in Lima,’ Motti said suddenly, prompting a round of pained and noisy remembrance from the others. ‘I mean, sure, it was a pretty crystal, but those ancients knew a bit too much about self-defence if you ask me.’
    ‘Thought my hair was gonna turn white,’ said Patch with a shudder.
    ‘I can’t believe we got out of that one with all our fingers intact,’ said Con. ‘And no way am I ever dressing up as a leper again …’
    Jonah chose not to question them; he wasn’t sure if they were trying to wind him up again. And in any case, for now he just wanted to enjoy the view and the sunshine. Staring out of the window, he drifted off into his own thoughts.
    The day had kicked off at 6.30am with a wake-up call from Con. She’d told him to get his ass out of bed, pack some light clothes and get downstairs. They were going to Egypt, to track down some old relicslinked to Ophiuchus in some newly discovered tomb, stuff that might or might not be