by Sophie Lark
“Byron?” Lex said, taking a step forward.
He realized now that she was barefoot, her long legs naked beneath the hem of her sweater.
Had they slept together?
Probably.
All his sympathy evaporated. He wanted to murder the other thief once more.
Black’s hands were trembling. His mouth was dry. He had never felt so weak and anxious in his life.
“Lex,” he said again, “I didn’t come here to arrest you. I just came for you.”
She stood as still as one of her statues. The sun pouring in from the skylight overhead illuminated her like an angel. Her skin had never looked so clear and glowing. Her eyes had never been a brighter blue. He could see every detail of her, every soot-black lash, even the minute tremble of her lower lip.
“What do you mean?” she said.
Her voice was gentler than he’d ever heard it.
He knew, in that moment, that she’d never wanted to hurt him. She had been wild, and passionate, and determined to take what she wanted. But she had never acted with malice towards him.
He forgave her for every minute of the pain she’d caused him.
And he loved her more than ever.
“Lex,” he said, “you tore my heart out when you left. I’ve been searching for you for two years, every single day thinking of you and looking for you. But not to hurt you. I just needed to see you again, at least one more time. I didn’t know who you were when we were together. But I know now. And I love you anyway. I love you even more than I did then.”
She stared at him, her mouth open, her blue eyes wide. Her hand had flown up like a startled bird. It hovered over those beautiful lips.
“Did you know I was going to propose to you, before you left?” he asked.
He reached inside his jacket and pulled out the box he’d been carrying every day for two years. He opened it up, so she could see what was inside.
“I bought this for you,” he said. “I’ve been carrying it ever since.”
She looked down at the ring.
His heart was beating so hard he really thought it might burst. He had dreamed of what she would say when she saw it, two years ago. Now, he couldn’t even imagine what her reaction might be.
She looked up into his face again and blinked those huge blue eyes. Tears ran down both sides of her face.
“I’m so, so sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry for what I did to you.”
He strode toward her; he took both her hands in his.
“You don’t have to be sorry,” he said. “We can change everything, Lex. We can leave all this behind. We can start over together, completely new.”
But despite how hard he was gripping her hands, her fingers were already slipping out of his. She was stepping back, away from him. She was shaking her head.
“Please,” he begged her. “Don’t say no.”
“Byron,” she said, “I don’t want to leave this all behind. This is who I am. I’m a thief, not a wife.”
“You don’t have to be,” he said.
“But I want to be,” she replied.
She had stepped all the way back from him. She was standing next to Luca once more.
The last bit of strength went out of him. Black sank to his knees.
“God damn you!” he cried, in anguish.
He wanted to scream and rage. He wanted to destroy every piece of priceless art in the room—tear the paintings from the wall, put his fist through the stained glass, smash the sculptures on the floor.
But he was too weak to even raise his head.
“I’m so sorry,” Lex said once more.
Then she walked away from him for the last time.
20
Alex Moore
Frankfurt
Lex was in a dark, dark place. She had never imagined that Byron could be so broken, so destroyed. For the first time, she had seen the full consequences of her own actions. And she hated what she had done.
Luca had been practically silent since they’d packed up all their gear and left her house. Perhaps he was thinking that he’d seen a glimpse into his own future if he tried to build any kind of relationship with her.
Black had stayed up in the attic until after they were gone.
Lex supposed that he would eventually contact the French authorities, or his FBI task force, and hand over the items she’d spent her entire life collecting.
Until today, the idea of that would have devastated her. That room was what had given her life meaning.
But now, she hardly cared.
She had turned Black down because she didn’t want to change. Then, somehow, without meaning to, she had changed anyway, all in a moment.
It wasn’t that she wanted to marry Byron. She knew that what she’d said to him was true: they were fundamentally incompatible. She would only hurt him more if she tried to be with him.
But somehow, seeing what she had done to him had created a feeling of true remorse within her. And just like that, her tie to the attic, all her satisfaction and happiness in what she’d created—it had all been severed. She didn’t need it anymore.
Instead of feeing decimated by the loss, she felt strangely free. There was no house to come back to anymore. No collection driving her forward, compelling her to search and add to it. She could do whatever she wanted from here on out.
Though what that would be, she had no idea.
Luca and Lex took her car from its garage, all their gear stowed in the trunk. She let Luca drive. He was a very good driver—smooth, competent, his forearms flexing as he shifted gears.
He kept glancing over at her, where she leaned against the window, looking out.
At last he laid his hand on her thigh. His palm felt incredibly warm. The feeling seemed to sink through her skin and muscles and bone, spreading through her body, up to the core of her.
She looked over at him. He was watching her with his warm hazel eyes.
“Are you alright?” he asked her.
She let out her breath, unaware she’d been holding it.
“No,” she said, “not really.”
“We don’t have to do this job,” Luca said, “if you don’t want to, anymore.”
“That’s not really true,” Lex said.
“We can figure something else out with Bruni.”
Lex shook her head.
“It’s alright, Luca. I want to do the job. I want to be finished with all of this.”
“All of it?” he asked, smiling at her sadly.
He was wondering if she wanted to be done with him, too.
And what was the answer to that? What would they do, once the job was finished?
“Don’t tell me you’re going to propose, too,” Lex said.
She regretted it the moment it was out of her mouth, before she even saw the look on Luca’s face, like he’d been slapped.
There was that door again, slamming in someone’s face the moment they reached out to her.
God, she really was an asshole. Luca was better off finding it out now, before he ended up like poor Byron.
“Don’t worry,” Luca said, shaking his head. His face was dark with anger. “I won’t be doing that.”
He drove on, not speaking to her.
Lex reached down for the bag at her feet and started rummaging through it. She had brought a couple of personal items from the house: a comb, an antique lead-lined box, which had once been used to hold snuff.
She took the comb and began slowly, painstakingly, running it through her hair. She worked inch by inch, section by section. At last, at the back of her head, close to the scalp, she found what she was looking for. A little piece of metal, the size of a grain of rice.
She held it up between her thumb and index finger.
“What is that?” Luca asked.
“It’s a tracking device. Black put it on me back at the police station. It’s how he found my house.”
“Are you going to smash it?”
“Not y
et,” she said.
She dropped it into the lead-lined box and latched the lid.
It was a seven-hour drive to Frankfurt. On the way, Lex laid out the plan she’d been putting together in bits and pieces since their train ride. Luca interjected a few ideas of his own. It seemed like they’d finally come to an agreement on what they’d be doing. However, she was still a little worried that he’d go off-book when it came down to it.
Neither of them were used to working with a partner. And Luca was annoyed with her for what she’d said, shutting down the idea of any real intimacy between them. Besides that, she couldn’t help but think that having Black show up like that, having Luca see what she’d done to him, must have broken whatever fragile trust they’d built.
When they got to Frankfurt, they parked the car and checked into a cheap hotel.
Luca asked for two rooms. Maybe he was being considerate, or maybe he was tired from the long drive, but Lex couldn’t help but feel he was preemptively setting up a barrier, as she’d done to him in the car.
Honestly, she was bone tired herself. The encounter with Black had drained her more than she’d realized, and it was very late. They’d have a long day tomorrow, getting the rest of the supplies they’d need, and going to work at night. And then the following day, they’d pull the job.
Lex went to her single room and lay down on the bed, still wearing her clothes. She was asleep in moments.
The following day, Lex and Luca spent their daylight hours apart, separately shopping for the last few items they required. For Lex, this included the fanciest gown she could find. She paid in cash, rolling her eyes at the exorbitant price. She would have preferred to snitch it, but it was better not to risk drawing attention to herself at this point in the game.
She grabbed a tux for Luca, too. She didn’t have to ask his measurements, having already sized him up as a 44-Long. With that, and a few less glamorous accouterments in hand, she met Luca back at the hotel.
He had finished his own scrounging earlier in the day, then spent the afternoon forging their invitations for the cocktail reception that night.
They needed to do some on-site reconnaissance—map out the room, the security cases, the guards, and the entry and exit points. But the only people permitted to attend were long-time clients invited by the Strauss company themselves or by a few other trusted local jewelers.
Thankfully, Luca’s hacking skills far eclipsed her own. He put their names on the list for the night—or at least, the fake names on their current passports.
Tension still lingered between them. A dozen times, Lex opened her mouth to say something to him, but the right words never seemed to come out.
Even though they hadn’t cleared the air, Lex couldn’t help giving a low whistle of approval when she saw Luca all spruced up in his tux. His loose, wavy locks were all combed back, highlighting the sharp lines of his cheekbones and jawline. He had shaved off every bit of scruff, emphasizing the firmness and fulness of his perfectly-shaped lips. His tanned skin glowed against the white dress shirt and the rich navy of his tux. He looked tall, and trim, and impossibly handsome, like an Italian movie star.
“Molto bello!” Lex said, eyebrows raised in astonishment.
Luca laughed, hearing her speak Italian again. They had lapsed into English once they’d left Venice.
“What about you?” he said. “What happened to blending in? Every man in that place will be watching you all night.”
Lex turned around on the spot so he could admire her gown. She’d picked a rich sapphire blue, slit up the thigh. The exact color of her eyes. And the color of the gem they were about to steal.
She had waved her long, dark hair and parted it on the side, a bit like Veronica Lake. She had taken more time with her appearance than she really needed to for the job. The truth was, she wanted to impress Luca.
He certainly looked impressed. He took her arm, helping her down the steps of the hotel in her high heels.
This was the first time they’d touched since leaving her house. Even the feel of his bicep through his jacket, sent a wave of desire crashing over her. She could smell the light, tantalizing scent of his cologne, and the warm, virile skin beneath. She didn’t really want to go to the gala at all—she’d rather pull him back upstairs to her shitty little room.
But they had a job to do.
They took a cab up to the Schlosshotel Kronburg, at the base of the Taunus Mountains. Upon approach, they could see that the security was much tighter than at many similar events. Before they even went through the gates, their names and IDs were taken and checked against the database. Only then were they permitted to drive through the grounds toward the vast old Tudor-style castle.
It was a long drive, through manicured lawns, treescapes, and a sprawling rose garden. The castle itself had that menacing, fairy-tale look found only in Germany, with dark stone, numerous pointed towers and turrets, and chimneys jutting up at irregular intervals.
As they got out of the car, Lex whispered to Luca, “Why couldn’t we stay here instead of that awful little hotel?”
“No one’s staying here while the jewels are on site,” Luca whispered back, “Not even the staff.”
Their IDs were checked once more at reception, along with their coats, then they were allowed inside the main reception room—adjacent to the viewing room where the jewels were kept.
Lex was reminded uncomfortably of the last night she’d spent with Byron. She’d been at a gala then too, on the arm of a handsome man who couldn’t take his eyes off her. And that night as well, she’d been compelled to case the room, probing for weak points.
But something was different, being here with Luca instead of with Black. For one thing, when he smiled at her like she was the only person in the world, it didn’t make her want to run away.
Why was that, exactly? Perhaps it was because she didn’t have to hide what she was thinking. Luca already knew exactly what she was up to. When she counted the number of guards in the room, and noted their positions, he was doing the same thing. And when she nudged him to point out a window from which they’d have a better vantage point, he was already pulling her over in that direction.
Glancing out the window while pretending to chat to one another, they could see the armored truck parked below. It was pulled up to a back door, which led directly up to the viewing room via a staircase.
“They’re good,” Luca muttered to Lex. “They’ve got multiple perimeter checkpoints. Guards on the grounds and over by the cars. The distance between the armored truck and the display cases is as short as possible. They’ve got cameras everywhere. And the guards are communicating constantly via headsets, reporting back to…”
He glanced around, searching for the boss.
“That guy,” Lex said, inclining her head imperceptibly towards the burly, bald, fierce-looking security guard standing at the entrance to the viewing room.
Even as she spoke, the boss touched his ear and spoke to one of the men on his team, confirming some command. As he did so, his eyes darted over to Lex, beetle-black beneath thick brows. He glared at her.
Lex forced herself to smile blandly in his direction and let her gaze drift away. She couldn’t allow herself to show the slightest bit of nervousness, no more than she could let him see how closely she was examining the set-up of the party. She knew the guards would be trained to watch for loitering, excessive curiosity, or any other behavior out of the norm.
“Should we take a turn around the viewing room?” Luca asked.
“We’d better,” Lex said.
Now they had to approach the big, bald boss directly. He scrutinized each of them in turn, before allowing them entrance to the room containing the jewels. Lex made sure to hang on Luca’s arm, giving the guard her most vapid expression.
Once inside, they had to check in with a receptionist one final time, then they were allowed to walk around the display cases.
The sight of all those exquisite, sparkling gems elevat
ed Lex’s heartrate and brought a flush to her skin. Nicknamed “The British Collection,” the priceless pieces had been gathered from all over the globe at a time when Britain ruled a quarter of the world.
Lex saw a necklace of perfectly matched golden pearls, each one larger than a marble. The Sunset Diamonds, in shades of orange, scarlet, and pink. The Maraji Opal, glimmering with iridescent shades of yellow and green. And then, in the center of it all, the Seraphina Star.
Rich and dark, blazing with color, clearer than the sky, deeper than the ocean. It was the world’s largest star sapphire. It had been cut from a mine in Mumbai, back when it was called Bombay. Then it had been carried back to London by British colonialists. Strauss had purchased the stone for a reputed three hundred million dollars.
They had set it in a tiara, with smaller sapphires and diamonds along both sides. It was a brilliantly-worked pieced of jewelry. But it was the Seraphina Star alone that caught the eye, with its bold asterism right in the center.
Star sapphires were unique in the gem world. Most stones were prized for their clarity, their lack of flaws. The star-shaped reflection in the sapphire was actually caused by tiny needle-like inclusions of a mineral called rutile. The finest examples had the exact right amount of the rutile silk, in exactly the right place, to cause the symmetrical star-shape without compromising the stone’s transparency.
That’s what Lex liked about the gem. It was perfect in its imperfection.
Luca couldn’t help staring it, just like she was. It sent an electric pulse thrumming through them both.
They were stealing the tiara for Bruni. But Lex wanted to take it for herself.
Luca knew she wanted it. She could see him in her peripheral view, giving her a warning glance.
“That’s not for you…” he said, softly.
“I know that,” she whispered back. But she didn’t take her eyes off the sapphire.
“Come on,” Luca said. “Let’s not linger too long.”
