But this is a business trip, and I’m ready for it to be over. It’s taken longer to build our con than I’d like. Thankfully, though, the plan goes down tonight.
I wait on a darkened street running along Otto Schreiber’s property line. It has a five-foot brick wall around the exterior, which allows me to see the house on the other side.
A retired German businessman, Otto wasn’t easy to get close to. Since he’s suspicious by nature, while being protective of the pretty objects he’s accumulated and locked away in his home, it took two long weeks to set things up.
The plan is simple—seduce, distract, and rob.
Luckily, I’m not the one expected to seduce. There are some lines I won’t cross. No, I’m here because my particular skillset includes combination recovery—safe cracking.
It’s an art form. Experts—like me—train for years to learn to do it quickly and efficiently. Sure, there are auto-dialers and manipulation robots that use software to figure out combinations, but those can take hours.
I can crack a three-number combination in as little as seven minutes. The credit goes to my dad for teaching me.
An exterior light darkens on the back of Otto’s house, which is my signal the coast is clear. It’s my partner’s way of informing me that Otto is distracted and the downstairs guest bathroom window is unlocked.
After scanning the street, I put my hands on top of the brick wall and hoist myself up. I seriously dig the role reversals on this job. I’m the one using my muscles and cat-like grace to scale a wall while Neal is inside seducing Otto. Of course, it helps Otto is gay, which means my seduction talents wouldn’t have worked anyway.
Neal isn’t gay, but I’m not sure he’s straight, either. He could be bi, but maybe he just does whatever it takes to get the job done. On the scarier side, he pretty much has no moral compass. To him, there’s no difference between banging a man or a woman if it’ll ensure the plan goes off without a hitch.
There’s one security guard who patrols the property, which takes up a city block and is filled with lush gardens. While Neal was busy over the last two weeks meeting Otto and building his trust to get a precious invite into his house, I did reconnaissance and monitored his staff’s activities. The interior house staff left after they served Otto dinner, around eight. His security—the one man patrolling—stayed all night, but his habits are routine and predictable. He works in a counterclockwise pattern around the house. When he gets to the back gate, he always takes a smoke break. As I peer into the garden illuminated with up-lighting around the bases of a few trees, I spot the faint trail of smoke near the rear gate.
I lift my leg over the wall and nimbly jump to the ground, barely rustling a blade of grass.
I’m dressed in black, of course. It sounds cliché, but it’s the best camouflage. Even though my skin is dark-toned, I still pull the black knit mask down. There are no security cameras, but I still don’t want to take any chances. If someone saw me, they could finger me in a lineup.
Hunched low to stay within the shadows, I creep along the side of the house to the bathroom window. I give it a push and after a tiny groan of distress, it lifts fairly easily. I pull myself up and onto the windowsill, managing to slither my way across the toilet and onto the white hexagon-tiled floor with barely a sound.
Moving to the doorway, I listen carefully.
Music—light and mellow—and murmured voices from what sounds like the direction of the kitchen. While this is my first time in the home, Neal was able to draw a map after his first visit two days ago when Otto invited him to dinner. Neal’s job was simple that night—merely be charming enough to get another invitation.
Somehow, it worked, but then again, Neal is a conman extraordinaire. In real life, he’s anything but charming. An asshole, actually. Someone I despise and hate working with, but unfortunately, I don’t have much of a choice in what I do or who I work with lately.
It’s frightening how easy Neal can chameleon himself into whatever’s needed on a job.
Satisfied Neal and Otto are occupied based on the conversation I can hear, I tiptoe across the large foyer and up the curved staircase to the second floor. Neal hasn’t been up here, but we’re relying on secondhand information that says Otto’s safe is in the master bedroom behind a knockoff Chagall painting.
I find it easily and sure enough, the painting swings on hinges away from the wall as promised. Inside is a J. Baum safe, probably dating back to the early 1900s. I take a moment to appreciate the faded gold lettering and its history.