by Bella King
“If we survive this, then I’ll go with you,” I say.
“You already agreed to it. There’s no going back,” he says, switching to a more humorous tone. “And if you don’t, then I might just leave you here with the ghosts.”
“Oh my god, don’t do that,” I say, moving closer to him.
“I’ll consider taking it easy on you if you work with me. Otherwise, all bets are off.”
“I’m already working with you,” I reply, moving even closer. I can feel the heat coming off Pierre’s body, and in the coldness of the catacombs, it feels like heaven.
Pierre looks at me, nodding his head seriously. “Good, now let’s keep it that way. We’re almost to the safe.”
Chapter 36
Shaye
“You see these numbers?” Pierre asks, pointing to the canvas as paint thinner drips down the spoiled half-million euro piece of art.
I lean toward the ruined Red Door painting, watching as Pierre’s flashlight bounces off the slick plastic letters embedded in the canvas beneath the paint. I can read them clearly against the bright colors.
“Yes,” I say, looking up at Pierre. “This is the code to the safe?”
He nods, pointing his flashlight toward the door of a safe much larger than I had imagined, embedded in the wall of some small tunnel so deep into the catacombs that the air is barely breathable. “I’m going to enter in the code, and hopefully, it’ll open on the first try. If not, we might be in trouble.”
“Fingers crossed,” I say.
“What?” he asks, frowning as he stands up.
“Finger crossed,” I say, holding up my hand to show him. “It’s for good luck.”
“Oh, yes,” he says. “I’m crossing my fingers too.” He holds up both hands, crossing as many fingers as possible.
I giggle, and he moves toward the safe.
“Let me see the code,” Pierre says, waving at me to bring the painting over to him.
I pick up the painting carefully, waddling toward him with it held in both arms. Paint is still running down the canvas, dissolved by the solution he poured on it, but the plastic numbers beneath it are clearly visible.
I place the painting against the wall, leaning it against the ancient bones. Pierre moves his flashlight over it, bending in closely to read the small plastic numbers. He squints at them, repeating them under his breath several times before looking back at the safe.
“We only get three tries, and then we’re dead,” he says.
I squat down next to him, watching closely as he hovers his fingers over the dusty combination lock. “Zero-six-eight-eight-zero-one,” he recites, hovering his hand over the lock but not punching in the numbers yet. “Is that right?” he asks, turning his head toward me.
I look at the painting, reading the numbers carefully. “Yes, that’s right.”
“Alright,” he says, “Here goes nothing.”
I watch his fingers move over the numbers, pressing them firmly but carefully as he dials in the code to the safe. My breath is held so tightly that my stomach hurts, and I’m as quiet as I possibly can be, not even daring to move, least I disturb Pierre and cause him to make a mistake.
Pierre finished the code, then presses the button to unlock the safe.
There’s a loud beep, followed by a red flashing light, and then the room is silent again.
“What the fuck?” Pierre mutters, shaking his head. “That’s the right code, isn’t it?” He turns his head back to me, raising his voice. “Isn’t it?!”
“I-I don’t know,” I stammer. “I mean, it’s the code on the painting.”
He jumps up, walking back to the painting and squatting down in front of it. He rubs his hand across his chin, glaring at the little plastic numbers embedded in the canvas. Even without his flashlight on them, they’re clear against the colorful backdrop.
“Something isn’t right,” he says, shaking his head. “I put the code in perfectly.”
“Maybe someone else pressed a button before, and it included that in the code,” I suggest. It’s the only thing that makes sense. I don’t even want to think of what would happen if the code on the safe was actually different than the one in the painting.
Pierre sighs. “Okay, read it to me, and I’ll type it in again.”
I nod.
The air is so heavy that I have trouble breathing. I take in slow breaths, trying to stay silent again as Pierre returns to the safe. He’s in such deep concentration that there’s a thick vein pumping in his forehead and a thin layer of sweat coating his face.
He shines his flashlight onto the safe. “Okay,” he says after a moment of silence. “I’m ready.”
I shuffle over to the painting, leaning in as close as possible to it without falling into it and knocking it over. The numbers are as clear as they can be, looking back at me as though the answer to the code was as obvious as just reciting them.
Maybe it is.
I inhale the musty air, and then I recite the number to Pierre. “Zero-six-eight-eight-zero-one,” I say slowly, waiting for the sound of each button press before moving to the next one. It’s the same code he punched in before. I’m certain of that.
The safe beeps and Pierre lets out a string of loud curses in French.
“Why isn’t it working?” I ask, knowing that Pierre doesn’t have the answer.
“I don’t know,” he says, springing up to his feet again. “One more try, and we’re going to be blown to fucking pieces.”
“We typed in the numbers exactly as they were on the painting,” I say, my stomach sinking.
The outlook on our situation is bleak, and I wouldn’t want to enter the same code all over again after we tried it twice before. We’d be killed, and the fortune inside the safe would be destroyed.
“You should leave,” Pierre mutters, his voice filled with defeat as he squats back down in front of the safe. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Stop it,” I shout, jumping over to him and pushing him away from the safe. “I’m not going to let you blow yourself up. We need to think about this.”
“What’s there to think about?” he asks, his eyes wide with hopelessness. “That motherfucker either lied to me when he put the code in, or the safe is broken.”
“So why would you try it again?” I ask. “We could just leave.”
“I’m not leaving,” he says, shaking his head. “I’m going to get that money, or I’m going to die.”
“I don’t want you to die,” I say, growing angry at his selfishness. This isn’t just about him. He can’t just have me steal a fucking painting from work and them blow himself up. That’s insane. I also have a say in this, and I’m going to make sure that he knows that.
Pierre glances at the safe as though he’s considering running over to it and trying again, but I place both hands on his broad shoulder to try to shake some sense into him. “Listen to me,” I say, looking into his furious grey eyes. “We have time. We can consider other options.”
“There are no other options,” he grumbles. “This is the only thing I have left. Ten fucking years of waiting, only to be fucked over by a goddamn painting.”
“It’s not over yet, Pierre. We can –”
Pierre breaks from my grip and runs toward the painting, kicking his foot out and knocking it over. He lets out a shout, stomping his shoe into the frame, splintering the wood, and bending the canvas.
“Stop!”
He ignores me, slamming his foot down into the frame again, breaking it further. He lifts his foot the bring it down again, and that’s when I notice it.
The numbers.
They’re upside down.
“Wait!” I shout, running toward him and pushing him into the wall.
“Don’t stop me,” he growls, trying to push past me to the painting without knocking me over.
At least he still cares about my wellbeing. With the way he’s acting, I wouldn’t be surprised if he snapped completely.
“The num
bers! The code!” I’m unable to get a coherent sentence out.
Pierre shakes his head. “They’re wrong.”
“No,” I say, nearly breathless now. “They’re upside down.”
“What?” he asks, looking down at the painting.
“They’re upside down,” I repeat, jabbing a finger at the canvas. “Look at them.”
Pierre squints his eyes down at the painting, studying the plastic numbers that were inverted when he knocked the canvas over. His eyes widen, and then he looks up at me, a silly grin stretching from one side of his square jaw to the other.
He laughs, and it really does sound like he’s lost his mind now. “You’re brilliant!” He shouts, grabbing the sides of my arms and shaking me. “You’re fucking brilliant, Shaye!”
I glow red with embarrassment, but Pierre doesn’t change his demeanor. He leaps toward the painting, running his fingers through his curly brown hair. “Holy shit, I was so stupid.”
“Well, I wouldn’t say stupid, but –”
Pierre jumps in front of me, shaking me by the shoulders until my teeth rattle. “You’re amazing!” he shouts.
He jumps back toward the safe, his eyes dancing over the keypad. He looks back at me. “Read the numbers! Read the numbers!”
“Okay, okay, just relax,” I say, straightening myself out and pushing a loose lock of sweaty hair out of my face. “If this isn’t right, we’re both going to die.”
His face grows serious in an instant. “Thank you, Shaye, for everything.”
I get shy again, blood rushing to my cheeks and causing them to prickle with heat. “I didn’t really do much,” I mutter, looking down at my feet.
“Nonsense! You’re the reason this is possible, and if we don’t get blown to bits, I’ll split this halfway with you.”
I look up and chuckle. “Does that mean there’s only, like, twenty-million euros in there or something?”
He laughs with me. “No, Shaye. There’s a hell of a lot more than that.”
“Well,” I say, taking a deep breath. “I’ll take what I can get, as long as you don’t go running off right after.”
He cocks his head to the side. “Why would I do that? I’m taking you out to dinner, remember?”
“That’s if we don’t get blown up.”
“We won’t,” he says, turning back to the safe, but it sounds more like he’s trying to assure himself that we won’t than that he actually believes it.
I’m not sure what to think, but I do know that if I survive this, I’m going to take a nice long vacation, hopefully with Pierre, and maybe buy that pink raincoat that I was thinking about when I first arrived in France.
“Okay, I’m ready,” Pierre says, breaking me out of my brief daydream in which we were sitting on an island together, sipping fruity cocktails and fucking each other out in the open.
I squat down in front of the painting again, reading the numbers slowly in my head before reciting them to Pierre. We can’t afford to make a mistake this time. We only get one shot at this, and then we’re toast.
It’s hot in here, even though it wasn’t a minute ago. Sweat rolls down the tip of my nose, splashing onto the ruined canvas as I slowly read the numbers off to Pierre. “One-zero-eight-eight-nine-zero.”
I can hear the distinct press of each key and then the long pause before he presses the final button to open the safe. I hold my breath, biting my lip so hard that I can taste the coppery flavor of blood. I want to scream and cry at the same time, but I stay silent.
This is it.
I look toward Pierre as he presses his finger into the button to enter the code, my heart skipping a beat. “Wait!” I cry out, but it’s too late.
Chapter 37
Pierre
The door to the safe swings open, but not before I’m given a mini-heart attack by Shaye shouting at me to wait. I entered the right code, and the money is in perfect condition inside. Why is she yelling?
“Jesus, Shaye,” I say, placing a hand over my heart. “Don’t do that.”
She rushes over to me, nearly knocking me to the ground as she throws her arms around my neck to embrace me. I’m not expecting it, but the flood of genuine warmth from her body is impossible for me to ignore. I let her hold me, slowly wrapping my arms around her back and accepting her affection.
She pulls her head back to look at the open safe, then plants a kiss straight on my lips. “Teamwork,” she says, a goofy smile occupying her rosy face.
I nod. “I like having you on my team. It keeps me from getting blown up.”
She laughs, staying in the embrace as we stand up together. “You should keep me around. You know, for your protection.”
“I will,” I reply confidently. “You can take that to the bank.”
“But not this money,” she says, looking down at the safe.
“No, we can’t take that to the bank, but we can convert it to bitcoin or something and take it with us,” I explain.
“I kind of like Paris, though,” she says.
“Even the catacombs?”
She nods. “Yes, as long as you’re here with me.”
“Well,” I say, finally breaking from her embrace. “We can’t stay here forever. We need to get this stuff to the car, and I’m pretty sure that your boss is going to throw a fit when he finds out you stole a half-million euro painting.”
She shrugs. “It’s not a big deal.”
I raise an eyebrow, surprised by her casual demeanor. Just yesterday, she was freaking out about robbing the King-Smith Gallery. Maybe I knocked a screw loose in her head last night while we were having sex. It would explain her sudden change of attitude.
I squat back down in front of the safe, reaching in and pulling out stacks of cash. “Why isn’t it a big deal anymore?” I ask.
“I have a plan.”
“What’s the plan?”
“It involves some of that money,” she answers.
I pause for a moment before I continue pulling tightly bound stacks of cash from the safe. “Hopefully, not too much.”
“Something like half a million,” she says.
“Well, you’re going to get more than that,” I reply, continuing to stack cash on the dirty floor outside.
“How much?” she asks, leaning in to look inside of the safe. “Holy shit.”
“Holy shit is right,” I say with a laugh. “I stashed away a lot of money in here, and the police never found it.”
“How much is in there, exactly?”
“A little over a billion euros,” I reply, feeling the familiar papery roughness of the cash against the tips of my fingers. It’s almost as pleasant as the feeling of Shaye’s soft skin, but not quite.
Shaye laughs. “Pierre, you’re kind of a dick.”
“What?” I ask, turning my head to look at her. “I’m giving you half.”
She shakes her head, a goofy grin stretched from one red ear to the other. “Yes, but you were only going to give me fifteen and a half million.”
“Don’t get greedy,” I reply. “It’s still my money.”
“You’re right,” she says with a shrug. “I don’t really need much more than what I need to give Charles for the painting.”
I stand up, dropping the money. “I’d give you all of it if it meant you’d stay with me.” My heart hammers in my chest as I speak the words, but nothing truer has ever left my lips. I need Shaye. I don’t know why, but she’s perfect, and I don’t want to be without her going forward. Money doesn’t mean anything at all if you don’t have someone to share it with.
“But you don’t have to,” she replies, looking deep into my eyes. “We’re in this together.”
A flood of relief overtakes me, and I take Shaye in my arms to hug her, rocking back and forth as both of our hearts beat in rapid unison. We did it, and we’re rich now, but we’ve gained something even more important along the way.
We now have each other.
Chapter 38
Shaye
; “Well, I took it,” I say, following it up with a nervous laugh. I’m sure I sound like I’m on the edge of my wits, but any lie is better than the whole truth in this case. The only thing that can be proven by the tapes is that I took the painting.
Charles frowns, rubbing his chin. “Are you alright?” he asks, seeming more concerned about my mental health than the painting.
I nod so rapidly that I can feel my brain banging against the inside of my skull. “I’m just, you know, a little excited.”
“That you took the painting from my gallery?” he asks, raising a grey eyebrow.
I shrug. “No, but I really didn’t mean to do it in such a hurry. I just wasn’t sure if anyone was going to buy it, and well, I really wanted it.”
“You can’t steal a half-million euro painting, dear,” Charles says, his face turning into a frown.
“Oh, no, I’ll pay you for it,” I say, reaching into my back pocket and pulling out a wad of cash. “There’s more in the car. A family member of mine died, and well, I inherited a small fortune,” I explain, playing down the full extent of my windfall.
He shakes a finger at me. “I knew you wanted that painting. We could’ve worked out a deal, but since you saw it appropriate to snatch without my permission, you’ll be paying the full price for it.”
I pretend to look disappointed, but inside, I’m more excited than I’ve ever been. I’m going to get away with this. Pierre and I are going to dip as soon as I pay for the painting, and then we’re going to ride off into the sunset together. It’s a dream come true.
“I’m really sorry about the way I took it. I just got really excited about the money, and you weren’t there, and I just had to have it since I could afford it now,” I say, playing up the odd fixation on the painting story that Charles seems to accept.
“Well,” he says, snatching the cash from my hand. “Give me the full five-hundred-thousand, and we’ll call it a day.”
“Thank you,” I say.
“At least I got that damn painting sold. I’ve had it for ten years,” he says, thumbing through the stack of money.