Thief at Heart [On Hold.]

Thief at Heart

I stared at the large, looming mansion. Then, I turned and fixed my best friend Michael with a skeptical look. “This is the place I’m supposed to rob?” I asked dubiously.

“Yes,” he answered with exaggerated patience. He handed me a folded paper. “Here are the blueprints for the place.” We sat in his plain black sedan, with its illegally tinted windows, and stared at the mansion.

“Owner’s name?”

“Mr. Landon Tane.”

“How long do I have?” I asked, the same question I posed before every heist.

“Half an hour.”

This time I turned to Michael with true incredulity. “No way! How the hell am I going to rob that beast in half an hour?!”

“That’s your problem,” he replied smartly.

“Douchebag,” I said under my breath.

“Born and bred, babe.”

“Do you know where the safe is?”

“In the study.”

I unfolded the blueprints and stared at them. The kitchen had two entrances, one that led to the inside of the house, and the other from the back door. There was also two pantries.

I snorted. “What do they need two pantries for?”

“I don’t know,” Michael told me, rolling his eyes and shaking his head at my stupidity. I cuffed the back of his brown head. “One is used, one is for extra.”

I shook my head and kept reading the prints. Through the kitchen, there was a large entrance hall, stairs, and the front door. There was another door, beneath the stairs, that led to a wine cellar. Also, there was a parlor, and servants’ quarters beside the kitchen. Upstairs, there were eight bedrooms, four bathrooms, a study, and a library. I read this all out loud.

I looked up with raised eyebrows. “Dang, anything else?”

“Yeah,” Michael said absently, “a barn and a bachelor’s house, outside.”

I gaped and looked at the paper. He was right. “Okay, screw the thirty minutes; this is probably gonna yield our biggest haul…ever.”

“You’re right,” Michael said, turning to me with clear blue eyes, “so your ass needs to get out there before it becomes five!”

I snapped a military salute and shot an easy grin at my friend, slipping out the passenger seat. Closing the door, I stretched and slipped the blueprints into my back pocket. I always dressed in black whenever I had a job. So, now, I was decked out in tight black jeans and a plain, long-sleeve black tee. Unfortunately, the paleness of my hair stood out. So I had to pin it up. Next, I set the Mickey Mouse watch on my wrist for thirty minutes.

I checked out the mansion. It was more like an old-fashioned English manor, or country house, than an average American mansion. Forked in the front lawn was a FOR RENT sign. I snorted. You didn’t just rent out mansions, like they were a third-floor apartment in Brooklyn. I would know.

I crossed the street and whistled an off-tune Phantom of the Opera song, trying to seem casual. I looked around, and slipped past the white ash trees lining the long front lawn. Soon, I met a gate. I groaned.

Seriously? It was like eight feet high. Did they want me to fall to my death? They want to keep out thieves and intruders, a voice in my head said wryly. I was…both. Not to mention vertically challenged. Hooking the toe of my black combat boots in an opening in the chain link, I laced my fingers around the metal and heaved, locking my other toe in a link. Scrambling up, I locked my hand on the chain and lifted myself up. I straddled the top of the fence, the metal spikes poking into the inside of my thighs.