AllFreeNovel
Share Us
CHAPTER ONE
The lady in the paintingstares back at me through the dark with blazing eyes. If she could speak, she’d probably say, “Don’t you dare.”
And for several seconds, I hesitate. She looks daunting in her golden helmet, holding a bow and arrow, the garment beneath her armor torn at the shoulder and knees as she stands with fallen soldiers around her. With her olive complexion and dark hair flying defiantly about her, she has the features I wish I had and looks beautiful.
I don’t want to take her. Not because I’m spooked by a painting, but because something about this heist doesn’t feel right.
Peter, my fraternal twin brother with the same blond hair and blue eyes as me, cuts into my thoughts. “I’ll take care of the art, Priscilla. You go grab some jewelry.”
Adjusting my night-vision goggles, I look back to Orithyia, queen of the Amazons. Now she’s telling me, “You’re going to regret this.”
I am not having a conversation with a work of art,I tell myself.
Shaking off the weird premonition, I start opening dresser drawers and pulling out clothes. The jewelry chest sits atop the vanity, but I want to make it look like we’re common burglars.
“Is th-the AC r-really necessary?” asks Jack as he rubs his arms vigorously.
“I told you to layer up,” I reply as I get around to emptying the contents of the jewelry chest into my backpack. In my fleece jacket and ski mask, I look ready to hit the slopes. Only we’re in the bedroom of a beachfront house in sunny Carmel, it’s 3AM in the morning, and I don’t know how to ski.
“The frame’s stuck or something,” Peter complains as he struggles with the oil painting by Giuseppe Morelli.
Frustrated, he slams the painting against the hardwood floor, breaking the glass.
“Hey!” I cry, rushing over like a mother to her injured toddler. “This is ‘Raging in the Mountains’. There are only three known oil paintings by Morelli in the world.”
Peter, not as dedicated to the arts, replies, “We’re running out of time. I’m gonna cut the damn thing out.”
He’s right about the time. It took the AC a while to cool the house down.
“And I’m f-freezing my balls off,” Jack adds.
“Would you rather take a chance at leaving your sweat with your DNA behind?” I ask, nervously watching my brother take a switchblade to the Morelli.
Even though Jack isn’t in the system, as the paramour of one of the homeowners, the cops might ask him to provide a DNA sample to rule him out. My brother had his DNA collected when he was convicted of his second larceny, which got bumped up to a felony because he had a prior misdemeanor. He and I have been in the theft business since we were kids. It’s how we feed ourselves and take care of our mom, whose lupus acts up too often for her to hold down a job.
I was arrested for petty theft when I was fifteen, but due to my good grades at school, I was sentenced to community service hours only. I had promised the judge and public defender that I’d learned my lesson and would turn over a new leaf, but six years later, I’ve only gotten better at stealing. I feel bad that I broke my promise. The judge was a nice lady who had offered to help me find a job. But after stealing my first artwork, a sketch that turned out to be worth four grand, minimum-wage jobs lost all their appeal.
“Don’t forget the buyer wants the painting in pristine condition,” I tell my brother.
“Who’s the buyer?” asks Jack.
“Don’t know. Alessandro’s the fence and handles that part.”
“Shit!” my brother curses. “This thing doesn’t roll up.”
“It must have been lacquered a lot. We’ll just have to carry it as is. Let’s go.”
We leave the bedroom and head out to the living room even though we came in through the garage, because Jack knows the combo to turn off the alarm and open the connecting door to the house.
Seeing the window that Jack broke earlier to make it look like a break-and-enter, I sigh. There are barely any shards of glass on the floor.
“You were supposed to break the glass from the outside,” I say to Jack.
Hopping through the broken window, I pick up some shards from the grass and toss them inside. I hadn’t wanted Jack to come with us, but he’d insisted and refused to give up the alarm code.
Once we’re in our getaway car, I breathe slightly easier. The closest neighbor is a quarter mile away, and we had busted all the security cameras. Still, I keep my ski mask on as we drive away.
“How much is this painting worth again?” Jack asks as he, sitting in the passenger seat, turns up the heater in the car, despite it being a warm summer night.
