Dancing With The Devil (part two)

Chapter 20: The Plan

"So here's what were going to do," Astrid began as everyone sat around the table, "We'll need to make some sort of distraction, you know, bring him out of the house."

"What about his wife?" Jim asked and Astrid bit her lip.

"She shouldn't be too much of a problem; I'm sure if I bumped into her, I'd be able to persuade her to leave, or at least to not give us in. I have a vague idea of where he is keeping the poison," she suddenly presented a large piece of blank paper and spread it out over the table, "anyone know his full house format?"

"Nope." Faith, Dominic and Seb both said in unison.

"Neither."

"I do, I helped him with the construction." Jim announced

"Course you did" Astrid said under her breath

"It's a rectangle, and there's three floors. The first floor is the ground floor. There's no basement.

Astrid drew four large rectangles over the paper, labelling them '1' '2' and '3'. On the rectangle labelled as '1', she drew a bold line in the middle of the longer side.

"The staircase is the first thing on the left." she scribbled a few lines to the left of the door to represent the staircase, "Then straight ahead to the right is the kitchen."

"There's nothing behind the kitchen, it goes straight into the corner." Jim stated as Astrid drew a big square in the corner and labelled it 'kitchen'. After about ten minutes, they all managed to roughly label up the different sections of the house.

"So, where will he have kept the poison?" Seb asked, "you said you thought you knew."

"I remember there being a door, in the corner of the kitchen." She drew a circle around the corner of the kitchen, furthest away from the entrance, "When I first saw it, I though it was just a door into the garden or something. "

"I don't remember a door when we put it together."

"It must be in there then, he wouldn't just have a random door for nothing."

"Great. So we grab the formula. It might be on paper or on a memory stick; either way, we take whatever is in that room and we get it as far away from there as possible."

"How far away is this place?" Faith asked.

"An hour and a half by car. Maybe an hour and fifteen." Jim stated.

"Right. He doesn't know Faith or Dominic so you two will have to be the distraction."

"What?" Dominic said in disbelief.

"The fuck?" Faith continued.

"I'm sorry but it can't be any of us three, he knows our faces."

"Can't you just go and talk to him, you know, make some sort of bargain?" Faith suggested.

"That would be playing fair," Astrid smiled, "neither of us are playing fair anymore. Besides, he's not gonna give it up that easily"

"He might not recognise me," Seb added but Astrid just shook her head.

"We can't risk it sorry." She smiled sympathetically then nudged his shoulder, "besides I need you with me."

"What about Jim."

Jim chuckled and sat back in his seat.

"What?"

"Nothing..." he chuckled but Astrid raised any eyebrow, "It's just I never though that we'd be here, you giving the orders."

"Oh yeah," Astrid smirked and leaned forward, "you better get used to it."

Jim laughed "Well, go on then. What am I supposed to do? You said you needed five people."

"You can go and apologise."

"Apologise?"

"That the world still thinks your dead."

"How would that help?"

"It'll be more chaotic," she looked at Dominic and Faith, "you two can show up as if you've gotten lost or something-"

"He won't answer the door." Jim cut off, "It'll be either Amelie or an employee that opens the door."

"Fuck" Astrid sighed, "When I went some lanky guy opened the door, he came out later. I doubt he'd come out of his study for a couple of lost travellers."

"Well then that's where Jim comes in."

Astrid clicked her fingers and pointed at Dominic who chuckled. She looked at Jim who was slowly nodding.

"Got it, so I just go over and entice him out of his office like 'sorry that Sherlock Holmes is really dumb' and let you and Moran get all the fun."

"Exactly," Seb deadpanned.

"Come on Jim, you kinda owe me." Astrid chuckled.

Jim smirked his signature smirk and leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees, "so you two get the lanky butler's attention, I come in and apologise for the first time in my life-"

"Second" Astrid contradicted.

"Actually, third." Seb piped in before Jim could continue.

"Possibly fourth." Astrid smirked

"So I apologise to the guy who killed your mum for staying dead and then what? It's not like it's gonna take long."

"Well, I'm sure you three can find a way to keep him busy for five minutes."

"I'll just talk about you for a bit?" Jim suggested, "I'll improvise."

"Great. Just don't let him back in the kitchen." She said, "Seb and I will go into the house from the window."

"What if it's locked?"

"Go in from the roof" Jim said, "there's a ladder at the side of the house for emergencies and a trap door in the roof such will take you into the middle of the top floor."

"What if that's locked?" Faith asked.

"I'll pick it."

"Can't you pick the window lock?" Dom suggested.

"Windows never have locks on the outside." Jim looked at the other Irishman who nodded in understanding. He looked back to Astrid, however, Jim's eyes hadn't moved from their cold stare at Dominic.

Jim was snapped out of his gaze when he felt Astrid kick his ankle and give him a look with wide eyes, telling him to cool it.

"When are we gonna do this?" Jim asked.

"Tomorrow afternoon." Astrid said, "I want to sleep on the plan first, and we can go over everything tomorrow morning."

"Yeah that makes sense," Dominic said and Astrid leaned back and let her head lazily fall back, "you okay?"

"Just peachy, thanks."

"It's gonna be fine." Dom said encouragingly.

"I really fucking hope so,"

(A/N I'm backkkkkk!!!)