The House That Death Built

by Michaelbrent Collings

  "How do you know I turned it off for you? The gardener is pretty hot."

  TJ shook his head solemnly. "An affair with the gardener? You're not that cliché."

  He leaned in for a kiss, this one full on her lips, but she held him back. "Seriously," she said, forcing herself to say the words that were expected of her, "you should go. My dad will be pissed if he finds you here."

  TJ kissed her hard enough she felt it in the soles of her feet. "Let him be pissed."

  He kept kissing her, long kisses interrupted by smaller ones like periods at the ends of unspoken sentences. "I'm… not… kidding," Susan said between the kisses. "You don't want to see him angry."

  "What, does he turn into the Hulk or something?"

  She giggled. "Nothing so dramatic. He's more the Batman type." She sighed. "But it's been a long day."

  "Do tell." He kissed her again.

  "TJ, please…."

  He held her tight in arms that were strong from hours spent in the garage where he worked. Where she had found him. "I like it when you ask nicely," he said.

  They kissed. He pulled her to the bed, and sank down on top of her. The kiss seemed to have weight, pressing her down down down into a place she'd never found before.

  No. I found it when I found him.

  "You should go," she said. The words held no meaning, and TJ knew it.

  "I will… eventually."

  "Today's not good for this."

  "Sure it is. Today, and every day."

  She didn't resist any longer. And this had been what she intended, hadn't it? Hadn't she wanted this to happen the moment she saw him? Hadn't every moment since then led to this single place, this singular time?

  She surrendered to the moment.

  15

  The light in the window turned out.

  Tommy started forward, but Rob held up a hand. Wait.

  He could sense that Tommy and Kayla both wanted to move. They were hungry for a score, hungry for action. To them, the prospect of money coupled with the probability of violence was a siren call.

  Aaron didn't move. Not because he was calm, he was just a prize-winning chicken with a yellow streak so broad there was nothing left over but the fear.

  They waited. Five minutes. Ten.

  Twenty.

  The light didn't turn back on.

  Rob gestured, and he and the others crept along the grounds. The area surrounding the house was lit – no surprise, places like this always had landscape lighting that cost at least the same as a small country – but less so than many other places that occupied the same socioeconomic sphere.

  Cheap bastards. How can you be this rich and this stingy at the same time?

  He wasn't really upset. Far from it. The Crawfords' choice in lighting was going to cost them far more than they saved.

  It took a surprisingly long time to pick their way across the darkened grounds, which were bigger than any Rob had ever seen, at least in person.

  Definitely more than just a couple million waiting for us.

  They got to their entry point: a back door to the house. To get to it they had to cross over a porch that was itself nearly fifty feet wide and that wrapped around the entire house.

  A sudden déjà vu gripped him.

  Porch is just like the other one. The last one.

  It's all gonna go to hell. Again.

  "Something wrong?"

  He almost didn't register the voice. And when he did, his face curled automatically. No one would see his expression, of course – not through the thick ski mask that covered his face. But he also knew that Aaron would know. Would know that Rob had heard him, and was disgusted at the man's cowardice.

  For a moment it struck him that Aaron might not be a coward, after all. He constantly stood up to Rob, didn't he? He had managed –

  (to have a family a wife a life)

  – to keep up with a gang that despised him, he had kept a hold on what seemed to be the most important parts of himself.

  And that's why I hate him.

  "I'm fine," Rob said. And though the mask might cover his expression, he knew the kid would hear the loathing in his voice; would feel it.

  Rob switched his gaze from Aaron to Kayla, who had waited until the exchange was over before kneeling in front of the back door.

  "How long?" he said.

  Kayla didn't answer for a few long seconds. Then she snorted, a low noise that slid through the darkness. "I don't think…." She pulled a small box out of one of her pockets. She had explained what it was once: something like a digital wall scanner, only instead of detecting wall studs it looked for specific types of wires with a specific range of electrical currents, a specific spectrum of radio or Bluetooth transmissions.

  Essentially, it was an alarm detector.

  The scanner blinked a few times, then turned green. She snorted again. "No alarm." She flicked a glance in Rob's direction. "You were right. These idiots didn't bother."

  Rob almost hadn't believed it when he looked closely at the electrical plan sheets from the sheaf Tommy brought him. Most houses this size were specially wired for pre-installed, custom alarm systems. This place had shown no such features. Which didn't mean there would still be no alarm; systems now were easily installed. But still, he had thrilled when he saw a house like this. The essential feature left off the plans.

  And he was even happier now.

  My luck is changing already.

  He could feel it: a lightness that stripped away years of failures in a moment. The feeling that tonight, everything would finally change.

  Back on top, baby.

  Tommy snorted, too. This one a sound of incredulity. "No alarm?" he whispered. "On a place like this? Fortune really does favor the brave."

  "I told you, the guy was wasted when he left," said Rob. "Even if there is an alarm, he probably couldn't have turned it on if he tried. Numbers that small can be weally, weally hard to push."

  He said the last in a nasally, babyish voice. Tommy and Kayla laughed so quietly it was barely a breeze in the windless night. No one would hear it inside the house.

  But he heard. And smiled.

  Yeah. The luck's changing.

  Only Aaron, the ever-killer of all things buzz, was silent. He just waited. Then said, "I don't like it."

  Tommy shook his head. "Of course you don't. You're an idiot."

  Aaron managed to bridle, his cowardice sliding aside as umbrage replaced it. "I'm an idiot? Really?"

  Rob had the sudden feeling that Aaron would stop this moment. Would steal their success – maybe go for one of their guns, maybe raise a scream that would alert the slumbering owners of the house.

  "Shut up," said Rob. "Both of you." He stared hard at Aaron. "Especially you. Don't jinx this for us."

  The moment he finished, there was a subtle click as Kayla cracked open the door. In spite of her assurances, everyone froze for a moment – even her – waiting for the telltale sound of an alarm going off.

  Nothing.

  Could be a silent alarm. Just alerting Crawford on his cell while a call goes directly to the cops.

  But that wasn't it. He knew. His luck was changing.

  Tonight was the night.

  He went in.

  The door opened to reveal a spacious kitchen. Everything was thoroughly modern, not at all worn. It had the look and feel of a room that gets updated every few years, whether it needs it or not. Stainless steel appliances perfectly matched one another, splashes of color artfully highlighted the perfect design of the space. Everything that wasn't metal was dark wood, and Rob knew this wasn't plywood covered by a PVC laminate, or even oak or cherry. This had to be teak or mahogany. But the dark cabinetry didn't detract from the feeling of bright openness the kitchen exhibited – even in the dead of night. The wood was itself polished to a sheen so perfect it was a glow in the darkness.

  There was a center island the size of a conference table, which held a (second) complete stovetop and a (third) oven. The
top of the island was a single, thick slab of marble, cut precisely, with rounded corners to prevent anything so banal as a bruise to the hired help.

  On the wall behind the stove was a backsplash that alone probably cost ten thousand dollars, leading up to an industrial-size steel oven hood so clean it could have served as a mirror.

  Not just the kitchen of the rich and famous, this was a kitchen meant to service those lucky few with utter efficiency, while maintaining the fiction that nothing ever occurred here. It was a place so looked-after that it was a delight to look upon.

  Not that the scabs who live here would ever set foot in such a nasty place, a place where the help do their ugly work.

  Rob looked at Tommy and Kayla. Their eyes gleamed, and he knew they were doing their own appraisals of the place, and of what it would mean to their score.

  He didn't look at Aaron. He was in too good of a mood.

  Tommy and Kayla finally looked at him. Their heads swiveled in sync, as though they were connected by strings no one could ever see. It made them a good team, a good addition to his team.

  But sometimes, when they did that, it really creeped him out.

  He swallowed the feeling, buried it under the conviction that tonight –

  (it all changes)

  – was going to be a very special night.

  He nodded at them. Then pulled out the item that had been making the top pocket on his many-pocketed pants bulge. The gun was as dark as the rest of the kitchen was bright. It took the reflected light and swallowed it whole. It was an implement that, in Rob's hands, was meant for one thing only.

  Aaron spoke behind him. "You said –"

  Again, Rob had a moment. An instant where he wondered if Aaron really was braver than Rob thought. What would it cost a man, to stand up to three dangerous people in the dark? And one of them armed, to boot?

  And, as before, Rob shoved the thought back. Tamped it down and covered it up with anger. "Shut up and worry about your part of the job."

  He turned to one of the doors that led out of the kitchen: the door that, according to the architectural plans, led into a hall that would provide the easiest access to the rest of the house.

  He took a step. Then stopped with his second foot raised mid-stride. Frozen in place by something he had no words for.

  "What is it?" Kayla whispered.

  Rob shook his head. "I don't…." He looked around again. Stoves, refrigerators, center island, sundry appliances. It was all perfectly appointed, perfectly laid out, perfect in every way.

  So why were his muscles quivering? Why was everything inside him suddenly screaming, shrieking, No no no no watch watch watch out watch out!

  RUN!

  "I don't know," he finally managed. "Something about the way the kitchen is laid out."

  He looked around. Nothing amiss, just the perfection that was so absent from his own life, but which he so deserved.

  That's it. I don't belong.

  No. That's not it. It's….

  "Something," he murmured. "Something about the way the kitchen is laid out."

  And that was it. He didn't know what it could be, but something was still tickling him. That threat, that sense of –

  (Run run RUN!)

  – an indefinable wrongness that had set him on edge.

  He shook his head. Shook off the feeling. His gut had lied to him before. It led him to that job, didn't it? That one job?

  It's nothing.

  Get moving.

  He looked from Tommy to Kayla. "Straight to the master bedroom. Keep your eyes peeled on the way, but unless it's the crown jewels, no side trips."

  They already knew this. It was what they'd gone over at Rob's house in the hurried moments before everyone left for the job. But he needed to say it, as though saying the words would push back his sudden alarm.

  And it worked. He had a plan, he had a team, they were in control, they –

  "Please." Aaron again. Staring at Rob's gun, pleading for it to disappear.

  Not gonna happen.

  Rob stared at him with a message that should make it through the mask with ease: Shut up.

  Message received. Aaron visibly swallowed, then looked away.

  Rob looked away from him.

  Back to the door that led to the rest of the house.

  He stepped to it.

  Opened the door.

  It's all coming back to the way it should be.

  He stepped through. The rest of the house waited.

  16

  It would be easy to stop this. Just scream. Just one single yell, and it all comes down.

  Aaron almost did it. In the moment he was alone, the instant after Rob walked out of the room with Tommy and Kayla hot on his heels, eager to get to the finish line of this ugly race.

  He almost yelled.

  But didn't.

  What if they get away? What if Rob avoids the cops? Gets back to the city?

  Gets back to Dee?

  His mouth, half-open for the burgeoning shout, slowly closed.

  He would end it if he could. But he couldn't. Because that might be – would be – a death sentence for Dee. She'd already sidestepped one of those, already slipped out the back door the first time the Grim Reaper came knocking.

  She wouldn't escape a second time. Especially if Rob's hands held the scythe.

  But he couldn't help looking back. Stealing a glance at the back door. Kayla had pulled it closed behind them, but it wasn't locked. Easy to step through, to disappear in the dark.

  But that wouldn't happen. He'd be seen, hunted down, made to do what he came here for, and Dee would suffer the punishment for his moment of rebellion.

  Rob brought a gun.

  Aaron knew what that meant. Knew that Rob wouldn't hesitate to sacrifice anyone in the house to reach his goal.

  I have to stay. If I go, who's going to hold him back?

  "Last one, babe," he said. The words came out so quietly he barely heard them. "Then we're done. Then we have to be done."

  He turned away from the false escape the back door promised. Turned back to the door that led to his only reality: to Rob and Tommy and Kayla and the job.

  I have to stay. I'm the only way this family makes it out alive.

  He went through the door.

  The difference between the kitchen and the rest of the house was obvious, and it was a change he had seen before. The kitchen, beautiful and unnaturally perfect as it was, was a room that saw use. It held tools for cooking meals, for party preparations, for life itself.

  The rest of the house was clearly made not to be lived in, but appreciated. A lot of the most expensive houses were like that: one or two rooms that served a utilitarian purpose, that serviced human necessities. The rest were there to be experienced in passing, lives glancing over and through them like stones skipped across a mirrored pond.

  Rob, leading the short column of thieves, passed through the main hall efficiently, slowing long enough as they passed each room that he and the others could look in and check for anything so valuable it simply couldn't be passed up. All the doors were open, which made it easy to look in. No secrets – the house a living embodiment of simple, foolish trust.

  No one had a flashlight on, but it was easy to see into the rooms, the outside lighting dim but still bright enough to allow anyone to make out the contents of each room.

  On the left side: a dining room, a living room. The dining room was gorgeously appointed. A silver chandelier hung over a table that seated eighteen, maybe twenty. Expensive buffet table at the far end, silver service resting on it, waiting for morning to come and breakfast to be served.

  The living room was nicer than St. Peter's Basilica. Much nicer. A long leather couch against one wall, a coffee table that probably dated back to the discovery of coffee. Another chandelier hanging from the tray ceiling – a ceiling recessed not a few inches, but a few feet, with several steps leading up to the highest point like an inverted staircase. The recessed portion
of the ceiling was white, with the rest covered by a light gray hardwood of some kind, filigrees around the edges that would have made the room suitable for French royalty circa Louis XV.

  On the right of the hall: music room, trophy room, guest bath.

  The music room held a piano, harp, and an antique cylinder music box the size of a juke box. The floor was teak, probably a floor that people actually waltzed on.

  Mozart would have loved this room.

  The trophy room was the first one that made Aaron feel vaguely uneasy. Or rather, it was the first one that made him uneasy in and of itself – every room made him uneasy in the sense that he worried they might find someone in it. The sense that he might have to stop Rob – or, more likely, Tommy or Kayla – from killing someone to keep any alarms from being raised.

  Or just for the fun of it.

  The trophy room was creepy in the darkness. There was a dark brown sofa, a few tables that looked like they could be either writing desks or gaming tables – elegant poker hands being dealt while expensive cigar smoke hung in the air and cognacs were sipped.

  Elegant, except for the many eyes that stared into the room. Trophies hung every few feet along the dark wood walls. Deer, moose, a wolf with its lips drawn back in a perpetual growl. Even a few smaller animals, birds. Glass eyes that stared nowhere at all and in so doing captured everything in their empty gazes.

  Aaron shivered and hurried past that room.

  The "guest" bath was bigger than Aaron's bedroom. And the only reason he could find for it being a "guest" bathroom was that it was so close to the front of the house. It still had a bath – a porcelain tub that sat on the floor on clawed feet carved to look like a big cat's paws – and a shower designed in such a way that it simultaneously conveyed the contradicting impressions that it was usable, but should never actually be used.

  There was a bidet, too. Both it and the toilet had keypads on their sides – probably temperature controls for the seats.

  Classy, classy.

  Then he was through the hall, and into the foyer.

  The foyer was huge, perfectly appointed. He had to place his feet carefully to keep them from slapping against the stone tiles, which had been cut into intricate patterns. The walls were an off-white – the kind of thing people with the kind of time to debate shades of white would probably call "eggshell" – and yet another chandelier hung from a ceiling nearly thirty feet overhead. This chandelier was much bigger than the others had been, though. Probably ten feet in diameter, a set of silver wheels from which hung thousands of crystals, each wheel backlit by cunningly hidden lights that would no doubt cast perfectly diffused illumination that would brighten without stressing the eyes.