The Thief

by Michele Hauf

  He took a heavy breath and stopped rapping his thumb on the steering wheel. “I'm not The Fox anymore.”

  “I'm starting to figure that out. Who do you work for?”

  “An organization you'd do well to stay as far away from as possible.”

  “Really? Because it seems every chance you get you keep pulling me back, closer to your mystery organization. Is Kierce here with us?”

  “Uh…”

  “He's in your ear, isn't he?”

  “I'm radio silent at the moment, but he will be online once we get started.”

  “I'm not even going to ask. Must suck to have a babysitter.”

  “I—”

  “We’ve got movement.” Josephine put down her feet and hunched into the car seat low enough so no one could see her. Xavier, too, slid down.

  The iron gates before the Blackwell estate swung open to emit a black sedan, likely an Audi. It had to be Lincoln in that car. It was a Friday night. He never sat home on weekends and tended to occupy the best private seats in the hottest nightclubs or restaurants.

  “Does he have a driver?” Xavier asked as the Audi turned two blocks ahead of them.

  “Yes, and minimal staff. Two security guards that remain on site. They take shifts, so one may be sleeping. A chef comes a few times a week.”

  “Maid?”

  “You mean his latest fuck?”

  Xavier glanced at her reflection in the rearview mirror. It was angled so they could see the corner of one another's faces. “You two did have a thing.”

  “Thing is as good a word as any for it.”

  His fingers curled tightly about the steering wheel. “Care to enlighten me as to what I’m sticking my neck into tonight?”

  “Do I sense reluctance? From the greatest thief known?”

  He tilted his head sharply, as if to wrench out a kink, but didn't reply.

  “If you’re worried about the thing…don’t. It was over two years ago. And I’m over it.”

  “Apparently, he is still the thing to have yanked you out of retirement.”

  “We need to get our feet on the ground while the getting is good. Leave the personal stuff for the tabloids. Business now. Got it?”

  “I would normally agree, but I have to protect myself.” He grabbed her wrist as she started to open the car door. “If you set me up, you’ll have powers greater than you can imagine on your ass.”

  “The only thing I want on my ass is a cool breeze and a hot summer sun. You can never trust me, Xavier. And vice versa. But I promise, the last thing I want to do tonight is rock the boat. We’re in. We’re out. You get the sparklers. I’m gone. Good?”

  He nodded and released her wrist. “Good.”

  They left the car and strode down the dark street. Both were dressed in black and wore soft-soled shoes. No weapons. That was gauche. No streetlight on this section of the road. Lincoln had carefully chosen the location for that missing safety feature. And the houses were mansions; their inhabitants the idle rich. It was August, and most were away on holiday, so the neighborhood was relatively dark, save for a few lights in windows here and there.

  “What's the voltage on the fence?” Xavier asked as they approached Blackwell's ivy-coated fence. He tapped his ear twice.

  He must be signaling Kierce. “Zero,” Josephine said. “The only outer security is motion detectors at the front, in the garage, and out back.”

  “Security cameras?”

  “Yes, but the guards are generally watching porn this time of night.”

  He looked surprised and somewhat impressed. Josephine chuckled softly. “It is my job to know as much as I can about everything I see. Right?”

  “Indeed.”

  “There's a window on the side of the garage. The cameras on that side of the house only take wide shots, and the bushes don’t have thorns. It's our best bet.”

  Xavier led the way, hugging the side of the garage, until he reached the window. A basic garage-style window, it was about two feet wide and one foot high, and open a crack. He glanced at Josephine and nodded at it, pointing out the blatant security breech.

  Josephine shrugged and stepped forward. Lincoln spent the money on security, but he left it to his employees to tend. Which is why she knew this break-in would go smoothly.

  She put her fingers into the crack and gently jiggled the window. The motion engaged the crank handle on the inside, slowly turning it and opening the window wider. She hadn't been able to convince Lincoln that infrared motion sensors would be a good buy for the garage. His indifference surprised her; the garage boasted four car stalls containing his Audi, the Mercedes, and a couple of Ducati motorcycles. He never rode the bikes because his balance sucked.

  Once the window was open about ten inches, she stuck her head inside. Without asking, Xavier offered her a boost by holding her foot against his knee. Arms before her as if she were flying, Josephine glided inward into the dark, cool garage and angled slowly toward the floor.

  “Let go.”

  He released her to land the last eight inches on her palms, like an expert gymnast. Before her body weight could transfer to her wrists, she tucked her head and rolled forward. She came up to a stand beside an Audi. A Mercedes was parked on its other side. Lincoln must have bought another car.

  Josephine turned to the window and cranked it up the rest of the way. Xavier climbed inside, then rolled the window back to the original two-inch gap.

  A door clicked open.

  Xavier grabbed her hand. They ducked behind the Audi, backs to the car, ears open to the action.

  The garage light flicked on.

  Chapter 10

  “I’m taking the Audi,” a male voice said. “So what if it's black? Sweetie, come on. You know I love driving the Audi. I haven't got much time while the boss is out. If you want me to come over there and—”

  A pair of leather shoes stopped on the opposite side of the car where they crouched. Josephine eyed Xavier's hand, which had balled into a fist. She nudged her knee to his thigh. He tilted his head toward the speaker's shoes. She wasn't sure what he was planning, but she hoped he would sit tight.

  “Seriously? I hate the Mercedes. It's old and smells like pomme frites. Sweetie. Come on. Really? You'll let me do you in the back seat? Okay, I'll drive the Mercedes. But only for you, lover baby sweetie.”

  Josephine rolled her eyes and caught Xavier's smirk.

  One car away from them, the engine revved. They froze in position as the garage door opened and the Mercedes backed out. The door slid shut. After thirty seconds the overhead light blinked out.

  Josephine swung around the front of the Audi and swiftly crossed the concrete to the entry door. Behind her, Xavier pulled on a latex glove, and gripped the knob, jiggling it gently. It was locked. A keypad glowed on the wall near the door. Xavier patted his thigh pocket, which carried all the tools he'd need for the job.

  “I got this,” she whispered. “Hand me your phone.”

  Xavier gave it to her. Josephine tapped into the mobile phone network she'd often used to access the lock on Lincoln's door. She had always forgotten her own key.

  “SS7?” Xavier asked, an ear to the garage door.

  It was an international mobile phone network that average consumers didn’t know about, but hackers did.

  “He changes his cell number every month, but he increases the end digits by eight each time. Easy for him to remember. And for me. And…I'm in.”

  The access app for the house locks popped up on the phone. She knew that code got changed often as well, but it was on a rotating list of about half a dozen numbers. She only had one chance. Not bothering with gloves because her fingerprints were already in the house, she tapped in Lincoln's favorite password: CASH.

  The door clicked open, and Xavier pushed it inside. They waited two long, breathless seconds. No alarm.

  “Nice,” he commented.

  The breathy comment in her e
ar sent shivers right to Josephine's core. She felt it hum as if the man had whispered a sweet nothing and touched her clit.

  Whew! She shook her head. Not the time to become a victim of accidental seduction.

  Of course, the man would never accidentally seduce. If he turned on the I-want-to-fuck-you smolder, he would mean it. And that was the real danger.

  Slipping in quietly and closing the door behind them, Josephine tapped him on the shoulder as she slinked by. They wouldn't speak much now, and she would take the lead. Xavier knew the layout, and they hadn't actually discussed her taking charge, but the adrenaline rushing through her wouldn't allow her to stand back and follow the master. She'd been here before—both in the mansion, and in the moment, when getting to the place where the prize waited was the biggest challenge.

  Excitement shivered across her skin and tingled in her fingers. She shook her hands, finding her calm, then took long, quiet strides to the end of a dark hallway. Security cameras were mounted around the right turn. They worked on a thirty-second sweep.

  The office was down the hall and to the right. The lock on the door could be picked, but that gave them only thirty seconds to clear the hallway, pick the lock, get inside, and close the door. She eyed Xavier.

  He held up a torque wrench and a rake pick. The pick worked by bumping up the pins with some fancy yet precise finagling. If the thief got lucky, the lock would fall quickly.

  Josephine glanced around the corner and eyed the camera. It was up high, at the crease between the wall and ceiling, and faced away from them. It was so dark, she couldn't quite make out when it would swing back—

  She jerked back behind the wall at sight of the flashing green LED. Caught on camera? She prayed not. But she'd wasted four seconds already, so she put up her palm to stay Xavier and began to count. At thirty, she looked again. The camera swept back toward her.

  She spun around the corner and raced underneath the camera. Xavier, beside her, hugged up close. They hadn't much clearance, or the camera would pick them up. He smelled like coffee and sex again.

  Wait. She hadn’t thought before that he smelled like sex. Sex didn't really have a smell. Well, it did during the act—

  A nudge from Xavier knocked her out of her possibly fatal musings. The camera had already swept too far to the left, and they'd lost valuable seconds while she had been considering The Fox's sex appeal.

  “You got this?” His whisper sounded worried.

  “Yep. Next sweep. Promise.” She watched and counted, and this time when the camera swept overhead, she lunged toward the office door, Xavier behind her.

  Xavier slid the pick in and out of the lock, over and over as he zipped the pins. She pressed her fingertips to the door and eyed the camera. About ten seconds until they were featured on Paris's Most Wanted….

  The lock clicked, and he pushed the door open. He pulled her into the office and closed the door just as she counted “ten.”

  “Shit, that was close,” she said as they stood in the dark, backs against the door.

  “Perfectly timed,” he said quietly. “As always. Safe to the right?”

  “Yes, behind the fake Monet.”

  He crept over to the wall. After making sure that the painting was not connected to a security switch, Xavier removed it and set it on the floor. And blew out a breath. “That's…not the Zeus 5000.”

  Josephine peered over his shoulder. He had put on a pair of magnifying glasses that sported tiny LED lights at each temple. And the illumination beamed on the money-green brushed steel surface of…not a Zeus 5000.

  He narrowed his eyes at her, and in that gaze she felt his chastising waggle of finger rather than saw it. Lincoln had installed a different safe. Because of her? Or, as with cars, women, and stereo systems, because he always liked the bigger, better, newer models? She should have foreseen this.

  “What kind is it?” she whispered.

  “Not sure.” He stretched his latex-sheathed fingers before him in preparation. He traced the surface of the safe, then spun the combination dial, his eyes closing as he listened.

  Josephine swallowed. She may have just compromised the heist with inaccurate information. Shit. And she'd wanted to impress him.

  “Not a problem,” he finally said. “Give me room. I can figure this one out.”

  Because he was a pro, and nothing could crack his icy cool. And she had once been as cool and unflappable when facing sure failure. Leave it to a master to teach through example. Smoothing her hair over her shoulder, Josephine backed up to the office chair and let him work.

  Ten long, excruciating minutes passed.

  Josephine stood up and began to pace. He'd been working on the safe too long. Well, not too long. If he'd never touched this brand of safe before, he was doing well. But the security guard in the garage was only out for a quickie in the backseat. She hoped he had problems getting it up.

  The security guard, not the thief. She suspected Xavier handled a woman as precisely and practiced as he did a safe dial. She imagined his fingers circling her bare nipple. Oh, so slowly, pausing…then pinching firmly to loosen her defenses. She gasped.

  Xavier glanced over a shoulder at her.

  Shit. She had to get out of here before she jumped the guy in her ex-boyfriend's office.

  Leaning over his shoulder, she said, “I’m going to pee.”

  “What? No.”

  “The bedrooms are down the hall. When the call of nature commands, I listen.”

  “And I insist you stay here.”

  “Seriously? You think I’m going to ditch you? Set off the alarm on the way out? That’s a clever plan, but nope. I just have to pee. I’ll be back in a few. Time enough for you to have this monster open, eh?”

  She didn’t wait for his further protest. If it were her in his position, she’d have said the same. And she didn’t have to relieve herself. What good jewel thief, in the middle of a job, had to take a potty break?

  The man should be suspicious.

  Chapter 11

  Xavier checked his watch. Seven minutes remained on his pre-set twenty-minute schedule. He wasn’t sure he’d get this safe open. He'd already run into three false notches, but he did have four of the five wheels cracked. It was proving a bitch. Time spent arguing with Josephine had taken valuable minutes from his schedule. And now his focus was torn between the wheels and her absence.

  If she were smart, she’d already be out of here. And, he hoped, without alerting the security guards or setting off any alarms.

  He shouldn’t have taken her with him. He’d succumbed to base desires this afternoon, thinking it would be a kick to take a beautiful woman along for a job. Teach her a few things. Show her what he was really made of. Never mind that she had been inside before and knew the layout.

  Except he hadn’t cracked a safe of this caliber in over two years. And he was rusty. He had no qualms about working with a woman. They could be just as talented as a man. Not that he’d met any with such talent, but still. Josephine had the talk, but he wasn’t sure she could perform the walk.

  He'd prefer her prone and under him, if truth were told. The sinuous glide of her body through the garage window had set his thoughts wandering. He'd gripped her firmly by the thigh, and then the knee and ankles, but he'd seriously wanted to lean forward and bite that tight ass before it had disappeared through the window frame.

  Cocky and secretive, she was everything he did not favor in a lover. Perhaps a one-night fling? Was it worth the risk?

  Wasn't as if he had taken a vow of chastity since signing on with the ECU. His private life was…there. Somewhere. He could have relationships if he chose to. Yet he knew the wisest option was hookups or flings. He didn't want any woman getting too close to him, learning things. Asking questions. Getting caught in the ECU's all-reaching surveillance net. Becoming a suspect, or worse, a victim.

  He bowed his forehead once again to the safe door. It was warm from his body he
at; he'd had his forehead pressed to it for nearly fifteen minutes as he'd listened to the inner movement of the wheel-pack mechanism. One more number to go and….

  A low whistle sounded behind him, and he flinched as someone touched his shoulder. How had he not heard—?

  Xavier let out a shaky breath as Josephine’s ballet flats came into view. Sneaky woman. He refocused on the combination. One number left, but it could take another ten minutes. And he’d just lost two of those precious minutes by considering his partner’s assets and whether it would be worthwhile to explore them further.

  Partner? No, this thief always worked alone. In theory.

  “Want me to take a stab at it?” she asked. She stood so close, he felt the heat of her thigh seeping against his shoulder. “Since your stabbing isn't quite up to par?”

  “I stab quite well, thank you very much. No one has complained yet.”

  “I prefer a nice smooth glide myself. Much more romantic.”

  Were they actually having this inane conversation? Yet, why did his cock suddenly pulse and remind him of what he'd been thinking about her?

  “Almost in.” He winced, thinking how she would take that one.

  “Good boy. Nice and slow is the way to win her heart.” She tapped the safe to indicate the her. “You bring along your chalk?”

  “I don't do that anymore.” He'd always drawn a chalk fox on the safe, wall, or floor at the scene of his heists. A few simple lines formed a diamond-shaped fox head with triangles for ears. His ego could not allow him to simply walk away without claiming credit. “Like I said, I'm no longer the Fox.”

  “If you say so. But I think we should leave while the getting is good.”

  “We are not leaving without the necklace.” He closed his eyes and listened for another notch to click into place.

  “Oh, you mean this?”

  The clatter of gemstones against the safe door was a distinct sound Xavier could recognize from across a crowded ballroom. He tilted his head. The tiny light beam emitting from his glasses caught the dazzler hanging from her crooked finger and flashing brilliantly.