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“You can and you will. They may have spotted the van the night of the gala. Park it at the warehouse and go home. I’ll see you there.”
“Claire…”
“Mia. Go. I’ll be fine; there’s an underground station not far from here.”
“Okay. But keep your commlink open.”
Claire smiled. She knew Mia worried, but only because she cared. She had adopted Claire’s cause as her own and had been an invaluable partner. She often denigrated her contribution but Claire knew for a fact that without Mia, Claire would never have been able to pull off some of the heists they had.
After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably less than fifteen minutes, Claire could neither hear nor smell any vehicle in the tunnel. She cautiously stepped out of her hiding place. Seeing no one, she made her way quickly out of the tunnel, into town and down the steps to the underground. This was not normally a stop she gave any notice to, so she had to study the map to figure out which train to get on. Armed with that knowledge, she paid cash for a ticket and took the tube back into London, getting off two stops past the one closest to Mia’s, buying a ticket for a train going back that way and then getting off one stop before. Sure that no one was following her, Claire trotted up the steps into the fading sun.
It was late afternoon, but she still had several hours before she needed to be home to feed the horses. She could always call a neighbor, but the less people knew about her comings and goings, the better. Finally, she knocked on Mia’s front door. The great wooden door was flung open, and Mia hauled Claire in for a big hug while simultaneously closing it.
“Thank god, you’re safe,” she said breathlessly.
“It’s not like he wants to kill me. He just wants to arrest me and collect the money. Promise if something goes wrong anywhere down the line and I’m not going to get away clean, you’ll turn me in and collect the money.”
“I will not.”
Claire grinned. “I know, but I just thought I should put it out there. I had time to think on the way here. Come on, I want to look at the museum’s blueprints. Didn’t you tell me you thought we’d overlooked something?”
“You had time to think? I was on the verge of throwing up, I was so worried.”
Claire looked at Mia. “You don’t have to do this. If this is too much for you, you should walk away.”
“And you’ll do what? Good god, there are times you can’t get your computer to update properly. No, you’re the one with the nerves of steel. I’m the one with the technological know-how. So, what did you think about other than the hunky Ryland Fletcher?”
“He is kind of dishy, isn’t he? I almost forgot he was my adversary when we were having lunch like a couple of normal people. But normal isn’t in the cards for me. Not for a long while to come.”
“So, give. What are you thinking about doing that you know I’m going to hate?”
Claire grinned at her wickedly. “We’re going to steal it tomorrow.”
“We’re going to steal what tomorrow? Because you can’t mean the necklace. Fletcher and his team are in full force. The Yard has people undercover. They’re expecting you—well, not you, but someone like you—to make another grab for it. And we don’t have time to get in place tonight, and we…” Her voice trailed off as Claire nodded slowly. “You have lost your mind.”
“Nope. You’re right. No one is going to expect the thief to pull it off during the daylight. We know that they’re trying your firewall—off the subject, but what are you going to do about that?”
“I’m going to lay a trap for them that’ll burn down the wire and fry their system. Then we junk this computer and move to one of the backups.”
“One of the backups? How many backups do you have?”
“More than enough to shut those bastards down, but let’s go back to the part where we were talking about how batshit crazy you are.”
“I am, but that’s beside the point. I’m just going to walk in there and take it. You’ll do something brilliant like set off the fire alarms—sprinklers and everything—that’ll trigger them trying to get everybody out before the whole building shuts down. I can throw some smoke bombs if we need them to fuck up the cameras…”
“That’s not going to work.”
“Why not?”
“Because I can’t get through the museum’s firewall to get to the system.”
“Not even to turn off the sound?”
“Nothing. I am completely shut out.”
Claire started to laugh.
“What?” asked Mia.
