Fourteen

We reconvened the next day in the warehouse. Vito, embracing his demolitions role, demonstrated his newest explosive by blowing up one of Jack’s practice safes. Emma was entranced.

Simone was the last to arrive, rushing in just after I’d spread the blueprints over the large wooden table, her silk scarf fluttering behind her.

“Am I missing something here?” Chloe whispered after Simone excitedly told everyone about the shanked nephew and her role in securing my event company for his celebration of life. “I mean, the dude is barely dead and they’re organizing a party. And why? He was a murderer.”

“He was also someone’s son,” I pointed out. “Maybe he was good before he turned bad.”

“I’m more concerned about the convenient coincidence,” Jack murmured under his breath. “I do this for a living and it’s suspicious even to me.”

“She’s a socialite who doesn’t even know how to message on her phone,” I said. “How would she have arranged to have some random criminal shanked in the shower in a prison in New York?”

“People will surprise you,” Jack said. “I never expected to meet the woman of my dreams attempting to break into a museum in the rain.”

My heart skipped a little beat at the memory. Jack had dragged me into the bushes to save me from the police and not once had I been afraid. Even then, there had been something about him—some connection that went straight to my heart.

Anil was almost bouncing up and down with excitement. “I’ll do magic tricks. My parents give me a magic set every year at Christmas. Last year they gave me a box for sawing people in half and a real saw.”

“Your parents scare me,” Emma said to him. “They seemed nice when we met them, but the things they’re prepared to do to make you happy…”

“Chloe, I need you to be in the box,” Anil called out. “I’m going to saw you in half and—”

Gage cut him off with a growl. “She’s not getting in any damn box.”

“It’s a trick,” Anil protested.

“The only trick Chloe’s doing with you is the one where she disappears before you show up.”

“Although I appreciate the sentiment”—Chloe gave Gage a warning look—“I can make my own decisions about whether I get sawed in half.”

“What if it goes wrong, babe?” Gage protested. “I don’t want to have to put Anil in the box and saw off his body parts one by one while he screams in agony. And then I’ll have to saw up those pieces and saw the pieces into pieces and then I’ll keep sawing pieces until there’s nothing left. Do you really want him to suffer? Think of his parents. All they’ll have left to bury is the fucking box they gave him for Christmas. That’s called irony.”

“I used to have a side gig as a clown,” Emma interjected. “I’ve got the costume, the juggling pins, and all the toys. I’m set.”

“I hate clowns,” Gage muttered. “Not showing up if there are clowns present.”

“When did you become so high-maintenance?” I asked him. “No sawing your girlfriend in half. No clowns. What’s next? Do you have a problem with trapeze artists, too?”

“Only if they’re monkeys,” he muttered. “Hate monkeys.”

“There will be no monkeys at the celebration of life,” I assured him. “It will be a somber, respectful, and dignified circus. Any more potential acts?”

“I can eat fire.” Vito looked up from the safe he’d just exploded, dazzling me with his smooth velvet voice.

“Have you ever eaten fire before?”

By way of response, Vito pulled out his bus ticket and lit it on fire.

“Please don’t eat that flaming bus ticket right now,” I said. “This place is supposed to be secret, and it will be ruined if we have to call an ambulance.” I looked over at Chloe. “Add that to my list of ‘things I never thought I’d say in my lifetime.’ ”

“Is this for real?” Clare walked into the center of the room. “This is the crew that stole the Wild Heart from Joseph Angelini?” She shook her head at Jack. “Are you messing with me? How are they not all dead?”

“That’s really offensive,” I said. “We absolutely slayed that heist. In fact, we slayed two heists—”

“To be fair, the first one failed, which is why we had to do the second one,” Anil said, cutting me off.

Emma glared at him. “Shut up, Anil.”

“And we worked well together,” I continued. “We were a well-oiled machine, each of us doing what we did best—”

“Until you all got kidnapped and Gage was knocked unconscious, and Rose and I had to come and save you.” Anil looked over at Clare and shrugged. “I thought you should know the facts.”

“Thanks, hon.” She gave him a slow, sensual smile. “It’s nice to know someone here understands what it means to be part of a serious team.”

Anil dipped his head and looked up at her through the thicket of his dark brown eyelashes. I almost heaved.

Chloe gave me a nudge and whispered, “He likes her.”

“More than likes her. I think he’s trying to flirt in his awkward Anil way.”

“I mean…” Chloe shrugged. “She is an attractive woman and she’s really working that dress.”

I turned on my bestie. “Whose side are you on?”

“Yours. Always. She’s a total hag. Her hair is overbleached. She could benefit from some shape wear. Those four-inch heels are totally impractical for a heist, and I’ll bet she found that dress in her grandmother’s attic.”

“Actually, the dress is Gucci Couture Spring 2022,” Simone whispered. “And the shoes are Manolo, this season. Her only flaw is that she didn’t read the room. I would never wear Gucci to a decrepit warehouse. Balenciaga, yes. I brought my Balenciaga trash pouch after I had my assistant look up the location of the warehouse. Moschino definitely. If you watched his show in Milan, it was garbage couture, and I don’t mean that in the pejorative sense. His models were literally dressed in garbage bags. My skin doesn’t do well in plastic, so I went for Prada couture casual with these lovely Dior J’Adior slingback flats in case we have to do some running away.”

Chloe and I shared a look. Sometimes I suspected that Simone didn’t realize how she sounded to ordinary people.

“How do you know your skin doesn’t do well in plastic?” Chloe asked the question I wanted to ask but hadn’t asked because I didn’t really want to hear the answer.

“Oh, darling.” Simone waved a hand in the air. “So innocent. Get naked and wrap yourself in plastic kitchen wrap, then lie on the kitchen table when your man comes home from work. You’ll never have to worry that he’s going to stray, at least not until the novelty wears off.”

I held up my hand when Chloe opened her mouth to ask Simone a question. “Don’t,” I said. “I can guarantee you won’t be prepared for where this conversation is going to go.”

I heard a whoosh, a gasp, a choked cry. Turning my attention to the back of the room, I spotted Vito with his lips pressed tight together, smoke pouring out his nose, and a guilty look on his face.

I folded my arms and glared. “Did you eat the burning bus ticket after I told you not to?”

Vito shook his head.

“Open your mouth.”

He shook his head again.

“Open it or you’re going to suffocate and I’m not calling an ambulance because then we’ll need to find another decrepit warehouse for Simone to accessorize with her $2,000 garbage handbag.” I was beyond irritated. No wonder Clare couldn’t believe we could get the job done.

“To be precise, it’s called the Trash Bag Large Pouch, darling.”

“Sorry, Simone. I’m just feeling a bit overwhelmed by the fact that no one seems to be taking this seriously, and if the event doesn’t go well, I’ll be on the hook. Aside from the fact that we’re trying to pull off a heist, my company’s reputation is on the line.”

Emma put her fingers in her mouth and blew an ear-piercing whistle. “Anyone else with skills that might be useful for a circus celebration of life?”

“How about a little knife throwing?” Gage gestured toward Milan.

Chloe shook her head. “Don’t you think it would be in poor taste considering the dude was stabbed to death?”

“He was shanked,” Simone said. “Apparently, it’s not the same. They make shanks out of shaved-down items like plastic toothbrushes, strips of metal or wood.”

I clapped my hands to get everybody’s attention. “We need to focus on the heist and not the circus. I’ll integrate you with my vendors—catering, decorating, performance, and serving staff, and I’ll post your assignments on the secure server. You’ll have an on-site job plus a heist mission. For example, Chloe and Gage will be our on-site security team, but really, they’ll be dealing with the cameras and security system. We have to prepare for two possibilities. Either Peter will be bringing people downstairs to the museum, in which case we need to find a way to get at least two people down there with him, or Peter doesn’t open the museum and we have three doors with biometric sensors to get through before we even get close to the diamond, not to mention the cameras outside, and the laser beams and the sensors inside.”

“It’s not possible to bypass the biometrics,” Anil said. “I looked at the information you wrote down from your visit. If they’d been optical, capacitive, or mechanical scanners, we could possibly have fooled them, but they are thermal—very high-end. They detect the heat given off by your finger, stronger or weaker where the ridges touch. They are completely impossible to fool with paper or a lifted print on tape or even attached to a substrate. You need the actual finger. Maybe more experienced thieves have a way to bypass them, but not us.”

“I’ll ask Peter to take us for a tour,” Simone said. “Don’t you worry.”

“I am worried,” I said. “What if he says no? We’ll need a plan C.”

“I’ll be plan C.” Chloe pulled her hair out of its usual ponytail, letting it fall in a golden sheet across her shoulders. “Vera said he enjoys entertaining young ladies downstairs…”

“No fucking way.” Gage’s bark echoed in the room. “Not letting you go into a bunker alone with some middle-aged perverted treasure hunter who collects stone dildos.” Gage folded his arms across his chest. “Simi can go.”

“Simi’s not going, either,” Jack said firmly.

I’d never seen this side of Jack, and although I could make my own decisions about whether to indulge in a little erotic art appreciation in a bunker alone with the man who had hurt Vera, his protective tone made me feel warm inside—not because I needed protecting, but because it meant he cared.

“It’s not up to either of you,” Chloe said, her voice laced with irritation. “And if you recall, Gage, your overprotective bullshit got you friend-zoned. Keep pushing and you’ll be in enemy territory.”

I heard a whoosh and three knives thunked into the wood above Gage’s head.

“For fuck’s sake!” He leaped forward. “I can’t work with freaking knives flying around.”

I looked over and caught Milan’s gaze. For the first time since I’d met her, I saw a smile. “She was helping Chloe make a point,” I said, acting on a hunch. “Play nice or she’ll knife you.”

Gage scowled at Milan. She held his gaze and stared at him, unblinking, until he backed down. “Send her,” he said. “Or Clare.”

“Absolutely not.” I shook my head. “I have no reason to think they’d do anything other than take the diamond and we’d never see them again. Plan C is Chloe. End of discussion.”

Gage opened his mouth to protest, and another knife landed above his head.

“Thank you for that, Milan,” I said politely. “Although the sentiment is greatly appreciated, perhaps you could hold back on throwing knives at the overprotective crew members for now.”

We spent the rest of the day practicing everything from handing off the diamond to helping a Lycra-clad Clare twist through what we had roughly figured out to be the arrangement of the laser array while Anil cheered her on. Chloe worked on a plan to hack into the home security system to loop camera feeds and deactivate the museum sensors, and Emma used a driving program to test escape options in different types of traffic. Vito alternated between swallowing burning pieces of paper and blowing up random things in the warehouse. Jack showed us how to quickly change the real stone for the fake to fool the sensors if Chloe was not able to deactivate them, and Simone took detailed notes on everything we did.

“I’m a bit concerned about the cohesiveness of this crew,” Chloe said when we stopped for a break. “The newbies are causing a lot of friction. Maybe we should do some team-bonding exercises.”

“I don’t think anyone wants to bond with Milan and Vito. I get a strange vibe from them. Maybe Gage is right and they are professional assassins just waiting to kill us when we get the diamond.”

“I’m not sure about Milan.” She dropped her voice to a low murmur. “I don’t think she likes her brother, or Clare. You saw how she was when Gage got all in my face…”

“What was that all about? What did you mean you friend-zoned him?”

“I broke up with him,” Chloe said quietly.

“What?!” I immediately forgot about the crew and the heist and grabbed her by the shoulders. “I thought you were solid—well, as solid as you can be with someone who flits in and out of town on mysterious jobs like Jack. Why didn’t you talk to me? Why didn’t you let me know when it happened and I could have come over?”

Chloe shrugged. “We were okay until the Mafia guy showed up at our circus celebration. Gage told me that was it for me and the heist. I was done. Out. It was too dangerous. He wouldn’t let me be involved. I told him—”

“I can imagine what you told him.” Chloe was all sweetness and light, but she had a core of steel.

“So, it’s over.” Her voice trembled. “After being bossed around by Kyle for all those years, there is no way I’m letting a man tell me how to live my life, even if it comes from a good place. Overprotective is nice. Too much is almost as bad as Kyle’s abuse.”

“I’m sorry, babe.” I gave her a hug. “You have to do what’s right for you.”

I was about to get everybody back to work when Milan held a cautioning hand in the air. Everyone froze as she slipped through the shadows to the warehouse door. I heard a bang and then a thud and then a familiar voice said, “Ow.”

“Olivia?” Chloe stared, aghast, as Milan shoved Olivia forward into the room.

“This your kid?”

“I’m not a kid. I’m fifteen.” Olivia pulled herself up, towering over Chloe in her three-inch platform Demonia Goth boots. She’d dyed her hair green the previous week and was wearing ripped black stockings, a torn black skirt, and a green-and-black-striped shirt that made her look like a demented Waldo. She’d drawn odd squares on her cheeks and across the bridge of her nose. Even without the knives, I was more afraid of Olivia than the professional assassin behind her.

“Olivia Dawn.” Chloe’s hands found her hips. “What are you doing here?”

“I knew you and Simi were up to something,” she said, her voice wavering. “You were always whispering and looking serious, and we didn’t hang out last weekend. I thought maybe we needed more money and you were doing another heist, and this time I wanted to help.”

“It wasn’t a heist,” Chloe corrected her. “We were just retrieving a stolen item and returning it to its rightful owner.”

“Sure, Mom. I get it. But this time I want in. I have skills. I’ve been here for an hour, and no one knew. I can dress as a server at the circus funeral thing and listen to conversations for you. People won’t notice me.”

“You are absolutely not getting involved,” Chloe said firmly. “This is a dangerous situation with dangerous people. I’m calling an Uber and sending you straight home.”

“If it’s dangerous, why are you doing it?” she demanded. “What if something happens to you? You need me, Mom. I’m not just good at blending in. I understand modern technology and social media in a way you Boomers never will. I can help you.”

“Boomers?” I snorted my disdain. “We’re barely even Millennials.”

“She just says that to irritate us.” Chloe patted my arm. “If I didn’t know you, I’d guess you were Gen Z. You’re just that cool. And you don’t like avocados.”

“I don’t like toast, either,” I muttered. “Or working on just one screen.”

“I’m pretty sure that social media isn’t going to help us get a diamond out of an underground museum,” Chloe said, turning back to Olivia. “My old-school hacking skills will work just fine.” She pointed to the door. “Let’s go.”

“Gage, tell her.” Olivia shot Gage a plaintive look, all dewy eyes and downturned lips. If she hadn’t been offering to put herself in danger, it would have worked. Gage was tough, but when it came to Olivia, he was a softie inside.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” He folded his arms. “Don’t even try it with that face. If I had my way, you and your mom would be staying home.”

“I think we’re done here anyway.” I rolled up the blueprints on the table. “I’ll send out next steps on the server.”

While everyone gathered up their stuff and made their way out, I made a quick check of the warehouse to ensure all Vito’s fires were out before heading to the door.

“You don’t need to stick around,” I said to Jack when I saw him lurking outside. “Emma is taking me home with Olivia and Chloe.”

“Just wanted to make sure you were okay,” he said. “You seemed stressed.”

“There are just too many unknowns. Last time we knew exactly what kind of system they used, and it was easy for Chloe to hack. We had the location of the necklace—”

“But it wasn’t where we thought it was,” he pointed out as he walked me to Emma’s car. “We had to improvise.”

“The stakes are much higher this time. The security is much tighter. And what if the jewel is a fake like the other items in the collection? We’ll be taking a huge risk for no reward.”

“Our deal was to get the jewel in that museum in exchange for the necklace,” he assured me. “If it is a fake, that’s Clare’s problem.”

“What if she won’t give us the necklace?”

“She will,” he said. “Her boss approved the deal. It’s a matter of honor.”

“How do you know him?”

“I’ll trade you an answer for a kiss.” He backed me up against Emma’s car and trailed a warm finger along my jaw.

“Jack…”

“If you don’t want to know, I’ll get going.” He moved to leave, and I grabbed his arm.

Jack leaned in and his lips brushed over mine, sending delicious shivers down my spine. “We worked for the same person for many years.”

“Was it Mr. X?”

“Yes. That’s two questions. Two kisses.”

His kiss was soft and gentle at first, but quickly turned urgent and demanding, as if he had been waiting for this moment all afternoon.

Unable to resist, I wrapped my arms around his neck and deepened the kiss, our tongues tangling, stroking, tasting each other. Jack’s hands moved down my back to my hips, pulling me closer to him. I could feel his hardness pressing against my thigh and a moan escaped my lips.

He pulled back for a moment, his eyes raking over my body, as if memorizing every curve. “So beautiful,” he murmured, his hands gripping my hips tighter.

The loud blast of Emma’s horn jolted us apart. “Get a room,” she shouted through her open window.

“I have to go.” With the greatest reluctance, I pulled away. “Emma is waiting to verbally eviscerate me as soon as I step into her car.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Jack said. “Not this time. Not ever again.”

“You say that like it’s a threat.”

His face softened. “It’s a promise. I’m here for you until you send me away.”