by Kim Foster
There was a fingerprint scanner. I grinned, pulling out latex replicas of Severin’s fingerprints—now a complete set including the left thumbprint, courtesy of a certain FBI agent.
But then I noticed beside the fingerprint scanner, there was also a combination code touch pad. Damn.
I carefully applied the latex fingerprints, and the panel emitted a soft beep. But it remained activated. I squared my shoulders and set to work on the combination code. My mini UV wand illuminated fingerprints on four different buttons of the touch pad: two, three, seven, and eight. That gave several possible combinations. I just needed a little time to find the right one.
The last time I’d done this, I was trying to break out of the Westin in Seattle, and I was in full-blown panic mode. Things were very different now.
I tried a few combinations, with no success. I methodically went through the sequences, substituting and swapping numbers. I wasn’t worried. I would get the right combination eventually.
I was about to enter my sixth attempt when my earpiece crackled. “Cat, dear,” came Gladys’s voice. “The floor patrol changed direction, and they’re now starting to come your way. Two guards.”
I entered a seventh attempt. Nothing.
“How much time do I have?”
“Judging from their speed and route, I’d say about one minute.”
Okay, that was still enough time. If I hit on the combination soon.
I kept trying. No luck. I bit the inside of my cheek hard. This panel was proving to be a real son of a bitch.
“Cat, you’ve got about thirty seconds now.”
If I could just disable the floor sensors and hide in the alcove beside the door, the guards would simply stroll by without seeing anything amiss. If I was still dangling on this rope, however . . .
“I’m going to have to retract back up and wait on the roof and then try again,” I whispered.
“Okay,” began Gladys. And then, “Wait. Don’t go back up right now. The guards doing the perimeter sweep are just outside your wing. They’ll see you if you pop up on the roof right now.”
The air left my lungs. I couldn’t go back up, and I couldn’t stay here. My only option was to disable the sensors and hide. But I had to do it now.
I sped up my attempts, still trying to keep the numbers straight in my head.
“Ten seconds.”
I had fifteen combinations to go. And then, suddenly, I thought, Three, seven, eight, two. I just realized what that sequence of numbers could mean. It was Severin’s home address, his street address in Saint-Germain-des-Prés.
I punched in that combination. There was a pause, then a soft beep. The panel illuminated, showing the word désactivé. Disabled. Then it clicked off.
“Five seconds.”
In an instant, I unclipped myself and dropped down to the floor of the gallery. No alarm sounded. I pushed AUTO-RETRACT on the rappel rope and watched it zip up to the open ceiling glass high above. My heart was in my throat as I slipped into a dark alcove right beside the iron gate that blocked the gallery entrance. I pressed myself back into it, standing stock-still.
The guards approached, talking about the soccer match from last night and bemoaning the dismal performance of the Paris team against the Marseille team.
My heart pounded in my ears. It was almost a surprise that they couldn’t hear it. My hand went reflexively to the spot where there would be a lower edge of my Kevlar vest. If I had been wearing one, which I wasn’t.
Their boot steps stopped outside the gate, right beside my hiding spot. Their flashlights shone through the gallery, and I held my breath.
Then they continued talking and walked on. They’d seen nothing amiss.
I exhaled with relief. I held my position for several more seconds and then moved out. For the time being, I was safe.
I now had the small issue of my retracted rope. I turned my face up to the ceiling thirty feet above, my one and only getaway route. My plan had been to tuck the rope away somewhere that was easily accessible, not to get rid of it altogether. Now I’d have to find another way out.
But I couldn’t worry about that just now. One way or another, I was going to need a new exit strategy. But I’d be damned if I was going to do it without the Hope Diamond.
I focused on the next phase of the operation: descending to the underground area where the vault was. Elevator shafts were familiar territory for me. Sometimes it felt like I spent half my life in spots like that. But it was just part of the job description. Some people’s offices were cubicles and meeting rooms. Mine were elevator shafts and air vents.
I had my harness and the spare rope, but I’d lost my favorite carabiner—it was sitting on the ceiling right now. I’d have to use a knot instead, which was more dangerous but still doable. I tightened my jaw as I tied the rope. It would have to do.
My stomach flipped as I began the descent. I moved smoothly, my muscles remembering these maneuvers. The dark elevator shaft smelled of cable grease and rubber and steel. A faint light clipped on my belt illuminated my immediate surroundings without throwing too much light around. There was something beautiful about sailing down, like an explorer descending into a diamond mine.
I reached the bottom and touched down on the ground level of the shaft. I arrived in the foyer right outside the vault chamber. It looked exactly like the one in the Geneva Freeport.
Except the foyer was hewn out of stone. And that stone was somewhat damp.
It certainly lent credence to the rumor that we were right next to the Seine, and that a small switch could trip a mechanism that would fill the chamber with water in a matter of seconds. I clutched my portable scuba tank, feeling the cylindrical outline in my fabric sack for reassurance.
I turned and studied the chamber door. This was the second to last layer of security before the vault itself, my next obstacle. I put all thoughts of water-filled chambers out of my head. The lock on the door could be opened with an electronic key card. This was something I didn’t have. But what I did have was a magnet, and the lightest of touches.
After several seconds and a few attempts, I disabled it with little difficulty.
But I didn’t open the door. Not just yet. I needed to hold off until I got the go-ahead. I looked around at the stone walls, the steel door . . . and waited.
Chapter 61
Ethan was skulking through the corridors of the Louvre, schooling his breathing, keeping his peripheral vision wide. The corridors in this wing were ornately carved, every inch of them decorated. They smelled of old art and floor polish. His heart was beating fast—as much from excitement as nerves. This was a pure thrill for an art thief. The Louvre was the holy grail.
Too bad he wasn’t able to enjoy it more. Ethan’s concern for Cat was overshadowing much of his exhilaration.
He had climbed in through the roof, just like Cat, only in an entirely different wing. Ethan had a very specific goal. He was here to steal a Rembrandt, Bathsheba at Her Bath, in particular.
And botch the job. Just enough to trigger the alarm and get out.
One of the beauties of doing a job at the Louvre—and what they were using to their advantage—was the sheer number of treasures contained here. The security staff didn’t know at any given time what someone would try to steal.
The door to the wing he’d wanted to enter was controlled by an electronic key-card panel. Getting through that had been virtually a nonissue. Now he was close to the inner gallery containing the Rembrandt, and it was guarded by much tighter security: there was a simple door, but once he opened it, he’d be in a zone monitored by infrared.
And as soon as he entered the zone, tripping the infrared sensor, his little jaunt in the Louvre would be over.
When Ethan was a lifeguard in high school, he’d learned a crucial concept, and it was this: not to abandon the rest of the pool just because one person over in a corner of the deep end was drowning.
Here the concept was the same. Once the alarm sounded because
of his attempted theft, Louvre security would suddenly become very busy. And busy meant distracted.
The distraction alone might be enough to give Cat a chance. But she actually needed more than that.
“Thing is,” she’d explained when they were planning the heist at the clinic, “it was too expensive for the Louvre to install completely independent infrared systems. So they’re all connected. Once the system has been breached, they’ll have to turn it off, clear the area, and allow the sensor to recalibrate. So that will give me time to get into the vault, steal the Hope, and get out.”
The whole thing had been Cat’s idea, but after she’d described what she wanted Ethan to do, she’d looked at him with concern. “I’m worried, though, because of the risk. What if you get caught?”
“Montgomery, that is not going to be a problem,” he’d assured her. “I’m not going to get caught.”
Jack had stood there, arms crossed, as he listened to the plan. “Ethan, the second you enter that room, the system will go off. You won’t have time to do much. Just grab the closest painting and get out. Doesn’t matter if it’s the Rembrandt.” He’d nodded, looking at the blueprint. “It’s a good plan. It can work.”
Ethan had raised an eyebrow at Jack, wondering about the man’s motivations. Did he really think it could work? Or was it a matter of not caring if Ethan got caught?
Either way, here he was, ready to breach the door.
And this was where the finesse of his part of the job ended. Something that just about killed Ethan. He reminded himself he was doing it for Cat.
Even so, before he entered the gallery—just for a second—he allowed himself a momentary pause to savor the moment. To relish the fact that he was here in the middle of the Louvre itself. Then he readied himself to hear a deafening alarm and pushed open the door.
But there was nothing. Silence.
Ethan stood there for a second, confused. “Are you fucking kidding me?” he said under his breath.
Unbelievable. Here he was inside the Louvre, poised to steal something, and he actually needed the alarm to go off. But it didn’t.
And now the trouble was, he could take the Rembrandt if he wanted to. Get off completely free, because he hadn’t been detected. But that wasn’t the idea.
Shit.
For a moment he felt sorely tempted. But he couldn’t do it to Cat. He couldn’t leave her hanging like that. She was waiting for the alarm to sound and then the infrared to go off-line before she could get into the vault.
So with a curse to the patron saint of art thieves, he set his mind to getting caught. Somehow.
He was going to need a little help. “If you can bloody well believe it, the alarm didn’t go off,” he said in a low voice to the others on the line.
“What? Oh God. Can you do something else to set off an alarm?” Cat said.
Everything Ethan could think of was riskier, with too many variables, not as firmly under his control.
“Don’t the paintings have sensors on them? Will an alarm go off if you just grab one?” Jack said.
There was only one way to find out. Ethan grabbed the Rembrandt, pulling it off the wall. He flipped over the frame, checking for a sensor. Nothing.
And then, as he stood there, he made a decision. He detached the canvas from the frame, rolled it, slid it into the mailing tube he’d brought with him, and strapped the tube to his back.
He still had the problem of setting off the alarm, however.
“What about the window? The window foils?” Cat suggested.
Yes. Good idea. Ethan raced to the window. All he had to do was smash it, and the entry alarm would go off. But then he checked the window’s perimeter. No foils. He remembered why: this was the third floor. They had window foils only on the ground floor. Presumably, this was because they didn’t expect anyone to scale and break into the third floor. Or out.
Okay. Next idea? He couldn’t just trip the alarm in any old room, because it wouldn’t necessarily set off the infrared.
“Where’s the next area with infrared?” Ethan demanded. “The closest one to here? I’ll have to trip that alarm. Gladys?”
“Give me a moment . . . ,” said Gladys. “Ah. Here we are. The Denon wing. First floor, room six.”
“I’m sorry. Did you say what I think you said?”
“Yes.”
“Jesus, really? All right. I guess that’s my only option.”
Room six in the Denon wing was otherwise known as the Mona Lisa Room. Because that was exactly what it contained.
Ethan had a floor map on his phone of the inside of the Louvre, so he turned it on and quickly planned his route. The danger now was getting busted in some other way before he managed to make it to the Mona Lisa Room.
As he moved, he pondered another problem. His getaway motorcycle was waiting outside the Rembrandt gallery. He would have to trip the alarm, then get back to the previous room and escape out that way.
He moved quickly through the corridors, staying ever vigilant. Encountering a patrolling guard at this point would be a bad development.
At last, Ethan stood outside room six. His fingers twitched, and his skin tingled. This would be the pinnacle job of his career—of the career of any art thief. And here he was, about to intentionally fuck it up.
He glanced at the electronic panel and wished he could hack into it and do this job properly. Instead, he simply opened the steel door. For a microsecond, time stood still as he stared at the Mona Lisa . . . and she stared back at him.
Then the alarm wailed like an air-raid siren.
“Another time, my dear. We shall meet again,” Ethan said, heavy with regret. Then he turned and raced away from the room as fast as possible. He had to get back to the Rembrandt gallery now. He flew through the corridors, expecting to encounter a guard at any second. If he could just make it to the Rembrandt room, all he’d have to do was slip in, out the window, and down to his waiting motorcycle.
Except when he got there, the door he’d previously hacked and opened had automatically swung shut and sealed. He would have to re-pick the electronic lock.
Then he heard guards thundering up the staircase.
No time to work on the lock. He would have to get out through another window, as close to the motorcycle as he could. What about the gallery one floor above this one? It was a higher fall than he’d planned, but that was the only option.
Ethan leaped onto the staircase and climbed fast. Boot steps clattered below him, getting closer. At the next level up, he lunged into the room he needed—this gallery was not as secure, so no lock to pick or door to hack. He raced to the window and looked down. There it was, the Ducati he’d stashed there earlier. Way down there.
Ethan pulled his mask down, opened the window, and clambered out with no hesitation. He used window ledges and carvings as foot- and handholds and scrambled four levels down to the waiting motorcycle.
His identity was hidden by the mask. He knew the external CCTV would pick him up and security would spot him escaping. But that was what he wanted.
Now, he just had to hope his motorcycle would be faster than the gendarmes. Fast enough to lead them on a bit of a chase, anyway.
Chapter 62
Jack knew Hendrickx didn’t sleep. That was what made it easy to call him at two in the morning.
“Hendrickx, it’s Jack Barlow. I need to talk to you about the Gargoyle case. Can you meet me?” Jack said.
“Do you know what time it is?” Hendrickx said in a tight voice. He sounded even more pissed off and unpleasant than normal.
“It’s two o’clock. I thought you didn’t sleep,” Jack said.
“I don’t. But you do, don’t you?”
Cat had insisted on this part of the plan, and it had been the thing Jack had struggled with the most. But he’d agreed in the end. She’d said she couldn’t have somebody else going to prison because of her. So it was going to be Jack’s job to finagle things, if necessary, so that didn’t happen.
<
br /> He just didn’t know, when push came to shove, if he was going to be able to do it and help Ethan Jones.
“I want to show you something,” Jack said. “I’ll come pick you up in fifteen?”
Once Hendrickx got in the car, Jack checked the time. He knew Hendrickx carried a phone that gave APBs about significant events to Interpol and local police. Jack tried to avoid staring directly at it, and he also tried not to be obvious about checking his watch. But he knew that it should be any minute now.
“So?” Hendrickx grunted. “What is it?”
“I’ll take you there. You’ll see.”
Jack started driving and realized he really didn’t have anywhere specific to go. He’d have to bluff it while he waited for the call to come. But what was taking so long?
Jack started to sweat. He was going to need to fabricate something for Hendrickx. And while Jack prided himself on being a good FBI agent, he knew he was not a great liar. Something Cat could teach him. Or . . . could have taught him, he thought, correcting himself.
Hendrickx’s phone rang. Jack could hear the recording on the other end of the line.
“All units . . . theft in progress . . . Louvre . . .”
Hendrickx turned to Jack and opened his mouth to start to speak.
“I got it,” said Jack quickly, turning the wheel. “Just switch that thing to speaker so I can hear what’s going on.”
Hendrickx nodded.
The speakerphone crackled to life. “Suspect is on a black Ducati motorcycle. Headed west on Haussmann.”
Jack did a 180 around the boulevard and sped off in the opposite direction. He flew along relatively empty Parisian roads, streetlights flashing by, following the barked sightings of the thief they were in pursuit of. It took some fancy footwork on Jack’s part to appear as though he was in pursuit but just slightly missing a turn here, responding to a direction just a hair too slowly.
Hendrickx called in the description of Jack’s vehicle, explaining he was with an FBI agent, so the local authorities would understand why this car was suddenly involved in the pursuit.
