The house answered: the tiny buzzing of electronic gadgets, the whisper of the air-conditioning, the murmur of the generator filtering from the outside, the faint creaking of the walls . . . The sounds enveloped her, blending into a calm white hum, and she committed their pattern to memory. Any stray noise, no matter how tiny, would sound the alarm in her head.
Audrey padded through the room, toward the right-hand end of the bar, where the hallway led deeper into the house, diving under a wide staircase. The safe would be on the first floor. Gaston’s intelligence claimed the safe was large enough for a man to fit inside. Most of the larger varieties weighed thousands of pounds and required reinforced flooring, which wasn’t likely judging by the first floor’s ceiling. Besides, the logistics of dragging a safe of that size and weight up the stairs would drive anyone mad. You needed a forklift to move it.
A quiet creak announced a door swinging open above. Her mind snapped into overdrive, thoughts firing off in rapid succession. Heavy footsteps—male. Coming down to the first floor, fast, but not running or sneaking—not alarmed. Stomping—irate. Her gaze snagged on the bar. Arturo Pena wanted a nightcap. That had to be it.
Audrey crouched, pressing against the outer edge of the bar, and put her hand on the floor. Hide. Ling darted under the couch and lay down. Kaldar dropped down next to Audrey.
Arturo Pena jogged down the stairs. She caught a flash of hairy tan legs under a short white robe and a black muzzle of a handgun in his left hand, pointing down. The lights came on with a click.
Breathe in and breathe out. Nice and calm.
The cabinet door creaked, opening. A heavy glass clinked as it was set on the marble bar.
Breathe in.
A heavier clang—probably a crystal decanter. Swiveling top sliding out with a barely audible sound as it was being spun. The scent of scotch spread through the air, alcohol fumes mixed with a distinct aroma of burned honey.
Breathe out.
Glass clinked against glass, Arturo swallowed in a long gulp, exhaled, and headed back upstairs, hitting the light switch with a casual swipe of his hand. Arturo climbed the stairs. A moment, and he was out of their view.
The door thudded shut.
He had never let go of the gun. Talk about paranoia. She waited another moment and waved her hand at Ling. The raccoon emerged from under the couch and slunk into the hallway. Audrey paused, but the raccoon didn’t return. The way was clear. She rose and moved into the hallway, Kaldar a ghost behind her.
The safe sat in the back of a small room, on the right side of the hallway, a solid black tower. She crouched by it. Hello, old friend. TURTLE60XX, Super Vault, 76.25 tall, 39.25 inches wide, 29.0 inches deep. Capacity of 20.4 cubic feet. Weighing in empty at fifty-nine hundred pounds. The multilayered door was eight and a quarter inches thick. It would take hours to break through it with a drill, and if you did, at the end you’d hit a plate of tempered glass, which shielded the locking mechanism. Any attempt to access the locking mechanism by a tool would shatter the glass and activate the relocking mechanism. It was a monster of a safe, the kind diamond dealers used.
Audrey touched the door. Three locks secured the safe. A combination lock, standard antitheft precautions, but nothing major. An auxiliary key lock and a huge one, too. She’d seen one before: the locking mechanism connected to four steel rods, each as thick as her wrist. It would take a lot of pressure to open it. Finally, a digital lock, an optional feature. Not that it did anything superfancy, but the digital display looked awesome enough to impress Pena, because he’d paid an extra chunk of cash to have it installed.
Magic slipped from her fingers. The green numbers on the digital panel blinked and vanished. Bye-bye computer defenses. One down, two to go. Unfortunately, the other two locks would be harder. Audrey motioned Ling to the hallway. The raccoon padded out. Audrey pulled a stethoscope out of her suit and slipped it on, pressing the sensor to the door.
Kaldar bent over her, his lips barely moving. “Magic?”
“The key lock’s too heavy,” she breathed. “The heavier the lock, the more magic it takes. A quarter of a pound feels like five hundred. Need to save the juice.”
“A problem?”
“No problem. I’m not a one-trick pony.”
She touched the wheel gently. One, two, three, four, five . . . turn, turn, turn . . . with a faint click the false tumbler fell into place. It was a dry sound, clear and distinct, designed to fool an average picklock. Audrey touched the dial again. Turn. Turn. A tiny muffled sound traveled to her ears through the stethoscope. There it was, the real tumbler. It was an almost imperceptible sound, but she’d practiced on these combination locks as long as she could remember.
Ling dashed into the room and crouched in the corner.
“Someone’s coming,” Audrey whispered.
Kaldar nodded and took a step back, moving into position by the door.
Audrey turned the wheel in another direction.
Footsteps came down the hall. She willed herself to ignore the approaching person.
Turn, turn, click. Turn, turn. Tumbler. Reverse.
A tall, large man walked into the room, dressed in dark clothes and carrying a rifle, pale blue disposable booties on his shoes. Her stethoscope was still pressed against the door of the safe.
They stared at each other. The guard jerked his rifle up. Before the barrel moved an inch, Kaldar snapped a lightning-fast punch to the guard’s throat. The man had no time to react. The second punch caught the guard in his solar plexus. Kaldar grabbed the man, pulled him forward, bent him, guiding him into position with fluid grace, almost as if the guard were made of Play-Doh, until somehow Kaldar was behind him, with his arm barring the guard’s throat, cutting off the blood flow to the brain. The guard jerked, flailing. Kaldar held him, almost carefully. The man went limp.
Wow. That was kind of beautiful.