Same thing is happening to Axel right now.
I shut the thought away, focusing on the moment. Eliphas reached into his pocket, pulled his wallet out, and dropped two fresh hundred dollar bills in front of my face. Slowly, I dismounted, picking the bills up and sliding them into my thong. I snapped the string back into place, securing the money to my hip.
“Thank you,” I said.
He narrowed his eyes. “Kandi,” he said, “Why is your name a little familiar?”
I shrugged, then effortlessly took to the pole again with all the grace of an acrobat. “Because you want it to be.”
“Do I?”
“Yes,” I said, coiling around the pole like a snake. I wanted him to see me, to see what my body could do. I wanted him to want me enough that he dropped his guard entirely.
Him or Axel?
I told my brain to shut up again. “Tell me,” he said, “Why do you dance?”
“Because I’m good at it.”
“And do you enjoy what you do?”
“Did you come here to question my life’s choices, or did you come here to get off?”
Another smirk appeared across his lips. He patted his lap. I pressed the issue and angled my head to the side—while upside-down. “What would you like me to do, exactly?”
“Sit on me.”
“Oh, really?” I slid down the pole again and knelt on the pad before him, then I turned around, showing him my back, and hoisted myself onto the pole using only my legs.
Eliphas reached into his pocket and dropped another hundred-dollar bill on the padded platform. He understood the game well. I dismounted, took the money, and slid it into my thong.
“Thank you,” I said, then, slowly, I climbed off the platform and, on all fours, crawled over to him. Grabbing both his thighs, I forced his legs apart and pushed my chest into his groin.
“What is it you do, Elliott?” I asked.
“A little bit of this, a little bit of that.”
“That’s not an answer,” I said, as I dragged myself up and along his entire body, pressing myself to him. I could feel his heart beating underneath his shirt, and beneath that, I could feel his essence rushing like a gust of wind. All I had to do was keep touching him for another couple of seconds, and I’d have it.
“It’s an answer,” he said, “The only one I care to give you.”
“Are you always this shy with your girls, Elliott?” I asked, gyrating slowly on him.
“I’m not sure I’d call myself shy.”
“I think you are. I think you hide your real self behind a mask, and I think it’s sad.”
“Are you a psychiatrist?”
“No, but I know men like you. I know what you want, what you don’t want, what you like.”
“And what do I like?”
I spun around, facing away from him now, and arched my back toward him. I could see his hands twitching, his fingernails biting into the leather underneath them. He wanted to touch me, to grab a handful of what I was showing him… and even though he understood how the game was played, he couldn’t help himself.
His hand slid up and onto my thigh. As soon as it made contact, I whirled around on him and sank my fingernails into his shoulders. “Did I give you permission to touch me?” I snarled against his lips.
“No,” he groaned, and I could feel his breath against mine.
“Are you the kind of man who touches women whether they let you or not?” I said through my teeth.
“I’m not.”
Liar.
“Then why did you touch me?”
“Because I wanted to.”
My heart was racing, and so was his, but that was good. That was important. I needed for him to be in an elevated state before I could reach in and take what I wanted. Softening my stance, I pressed my nose against his neck and breathed deeply of him once, twice… by the third time, I was no longer taking in his musky cologne, but a small whiff of his vital essence.
In an instant, I knew him. A connection was forged where there’d been none before. He was mine, and I knew without a shadow of a doubt, any ward he had placed in my path would lend me their secrets. It was done.
“You smell nice,” I whispered against his skin.
“Come home with me,” he said, and I froze for a moment longer than I’d have wanted. Slowly, I pulled back.
“Did you just ask me to come home with you?”
“Yes. I want you to come with me to my penthouse.”
I slid off him. “I’m sorry, but I don’t do that.”
“I’ll pay. Name your price.”
I whipped my black hair around my shoulders and narrowed my eyes at him. I could see it in my head. I’d have access to his apartment, which meant I’d have access to his vault, too. I’d only need to sneak inside with Danvers’ special bag, and I could take all I wanted from right under his nose. And he’d pay me for my troubles, too.
Of course, I’d have to sleep with him, and I wasn’t about to do that. I pulled a sweet smile. “Not even you could afford me, Elliott.”
The song finished, which meant our time was up. Eliphas stood. “We’ll see about that,” he said, following me to the door.
I walked out onto the floor with him, where the music was loud, and the air was thick with the heady aroma of hormones and alcohol. My intention had been to make a pass of the floor before returning to my changing room, but only after I’d watched Eliphas leave the building.
That was when I spotted Axel standing by the bar. I froze for real this time, like I’d just hit a wall of ice. His eyes were on me, on all of me. I watched him finish his drink and set his glass down at the bar, in my head trying to figure out what he was doing there, but Eliphas spotted him before I could speak.
“Axel,” he called out, walking over to the crime prince. Of course he’d recognize him; he’s only the son of the other most powerful mage in the city.
Axel stood, walked over to Eliphas, and shook his hand. “Magister,” he said, “It’s good to see you in good health.”
“Come on, drop the stiff upper lip, Axel. Your father isn’t around.”
“Right…” he glanced over at me.
Eliphas turned his head. The Magister then reached into his pocket, pulled out a couple of hundreds, and handed them over to me. “Take her for a spin,” he said, looking back at Axel, “On me. You won’t be disappointed.”
“Magister, I couldn’t.”
He patted Axel on the back. “Just remind your father who your friends are.”
Eliphas walked away, leaving Axel holding two more crisp hundred-dollar bills. When the Magister had left, he walked over to me. “So… turns out the head of our government is a bit of a crook,” I said, “Seeing as how he’s so chummy with your family. I guess I don’t feel too bad about stealing from him, now.”
“All the better,” he pointed at the money in my hand. “So… I think you owe me a dance.”
I took the money, slid it into my right bra strap, and looked up at him. “Nope,” I said.
“No?”
“I need to go change.”
“Already?”
I turned around and headed through the door again, toward my changing room. “Yup. And you should call someone in to help me take my stuff out of here.”
“When did I start working for you?”
I kept walking with a grin on my face, and a little flush of color in my cheeks.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Check, one-two,” I said into my headset mic, “Can you hear me?”
“Loud an’ clear, boss,” Karim said, putting on his best fake American accent. “How’s the feed lookin’?”
“First of all, drop the accent. Secondly, the feed is working fine. Just adjust the camera to the left a little. All I’m getting is wall.”
Karim fiddled with the micro-camera planted on his chest until Cassidy came into view ahead of him. They were inside the Atlantis, standing in front of gold-plated elevator doors. She looked ov
er her shoulder and threw a thumbs up. “Can you see me?” she asked.
“Yeah, we can see you and your feed. You’re both good to go.”
“Good to go and ready are two different things. Give us a second.”
I looked over at Axel. He and I were sitting in a van across the street from the Atlantis. Surrounding us were cables, wires, and computer monitors, most of them entirely dark except for the two directly in front of us. RJ was running an exterior sweep of the building, while Cassidy and Karim prepared to infiltrate the Magister’s penthouse as part of the event planning crew.
The plan? We were going to plant surveillance equipment inside, but we were also going to put Cassidy’s magic to the test. If she could deploy a powdered spell inside of the apartment and not set all kinds of alarms off, then the heist could be pulled off. Otherwise, we were dead in the water.
“I still think I should’ve gone up instead of Karim,” I said.
Axel shook his head. “You’re too recognizable.”
“RJ could’ve just made me look different again. And besides, Karim is the one who’s going to be working from Nerve on the night. Shouldn’t he be getting used to all the controls?”
“Is that what we’re calling the van? Nerve?”
“You’ve never heard of a Nerve Center before? Everybody calls it that.”
Axel shrugged. “Guess not, but I like it. Anyway, it’s done now, and Karim is a smart guy. He’ll figure all this out in no time. I need you here, because if I know you, you’ll have tried to sneak into the Magister’s vault ahead of time and gotten caught.”
“You don’t think we could’ve pulled it off today?”
“No. I don’t. Right now, that apartment is being decorated for an event. There are caterers, decorators, and yes, Legionnaires, too. It was hard enough getting Cassidy and Karim on the list.”
“You could’ve gotten me on the list, and I could’ve pulled this off right now.”
“There’s no guarantee that walking into that apartment with an active spell meant to change your appearance wouldn’t set the alarms off. There’s also no guarantee it would even remain active once we made it inside. I know you want to be done with this, but we need to do this right. Weren’t you supposed to be the master thief?”
“I told you many times, I’m not a thief. I’m a finder.”
He took a sip of his coffee, mumbling, “Tell that to the man we’re about to steal from.”
I turned in my seat and stared at him, my eyes narrowing, my finger pointed at his nose. “I could stun you, you know. Right now.”
He stared at my finger and followed the rest of my arm to my face, eyebrow cocked. “Yeah… you could. But then you’d have to do this on your own, and that’d be pretty boring.”
I grinned at him, then turned to face the monitors again. “Fine, you can have that.”
“Good.” Axel took another sip of his coffee, grimaced, and pointed across from me. “Could you pass that pack of Kandi over?”
I stared at him. “What?”
“Sugar! I meant sugar.”
“Seriously, if you start calling me that, we’re gonna have a problem.”
“And if you two don’t stop flirting,” Cassidy said through my earpiece, “We’re gonna have problems. Could we concentrate, please? We’re getting into the elevator.”
“Right,” I said, giving her my full attention again. “Sorry. And I wasn’t flirting.”
“Sure…”
I watched Danvers and Karim enter the strangely narrow elevator. It looked like there was only enough room for three, maybe four people at a stretch. That was probably gonna be fine, no need to worry there.
“You know what’s funny?” Karim asked, “In England we call this a cockwomble.”
Silence.
“A what?” Danvers asked.
“A cockwomble. You know? It has buttons and shitty music, it takes you up and down. Cockwomble. No?”
“You’re screwing with us,” Axel said.
“I am,” Karim admitted, “I just wanted to see if you’d believe it.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and shut my eyes. “Alright, let’s try to keep jokes to a minimum and concentrate, here.”
“That’s fresh, coming from you,” Danvers said, but she left a deliberate, short pause that was loaded enough for all of us to feel the tension inside of it.
“Don’t say it—”
“—Kandi.”
I buried my face in my hands and sighed. “Fuck.”
Karim laughed. Axel tried to laugh, but I shot him a hard look and he stifled the laugh with his hand. His entire face lit up when he smiled, and I suddenly became aware of the very real fact that he probably hadn’t laughed in a long time. Not properly, anyway.
That thought made me forget everyone was laughing at my expense, but when the elevator door dinged, seriousness returned. Through the monitors I could see the short hallway between the elevator and the door to the Magister’s penthouse apartment. Everything was gold and white and marble, the entire building reeked of old money, old class.
A Legionnaire stood at the door; a stoic figure rocking a black duster and long, wavy blond locks I hadn’t seen since the nineties. The door itself remained open for staff members to easily move in and out. He made a quick scan of Danvers and Karim, and I held my breath, hoping Karim’s magic was working for them as it had for me, too. Both of their magical auras were suppressed, making them register as human to a mage’s magical senses.
The Legionnaire pulled a tablet up as they approached and asked for their names.
Danvers was about to speak, but Karim got to it first. “You want my name?” he asked, speaking with an exaggerated voice and even more flamboyant hand gestures. “Have you not been told of my arrival?”
The Legionnaire stared at him, blankly. “Your name,” he repeated, his voice dry and unimpressed. Legionnaires weren’t exactly known for their charm; they were watchdogs at best, bulldogs at worst, but dogs nonetheless.
Karim tugged on his suit jacket and scoffed. “My name is Cornelius Francis Willow the Third, decorator extraordinaire. This is my assistant… Doris.”
“What’s up,” Danvers said, throwing the peace sign at the Legionnaire, who couldn’t believe the name he’d just been given.
He checked his tablet, taking his time to scroll through the list of people he was allowed to let in and out of the penthouse.
“Why’d he have to give himself such a ridiculous name?” Axel asked, “Why couldn’t he have gone for something more normal, and maybe less memorable?”
I shrugged. “He’s a thespian, remember? It’s all about the theatrics.”
“His theatrics are making me nervous, and that Legionnaire’s taking too long to verify.”
I snickered. “Maybe he’s having trouble reading the words.”
Axel stared at me, but said nothing.
“You know?” I said, still holding back my laughter like I’d just been passed a note making fun of the teacher under the desk, “Because they’re dumbasses?”
“If you think that, then you’ve never gone up against one in a fight before.”
“And you have?”
He didn’t say anything for a long moment, until. “All I’m saying is, don’t underestimate them, their abilities, or their magic… even the ones that look like they belong in a nineties porno.”
“See? I was thinking b-movie, not porno. Yours is better.”
“Glad we’re on the same page.”
The Legionnaire turned his eyes on Karim, then glanced over at Danvers. With a slight gesture of his head, that was it. They were in. He’d accepted they were here as part of the catering crew, and that they were just run of the mill humans. I seriously doubted the Magister would’ve hired a company that employed mages.
I breathed a sigh of relief and fell back into my chair as Danvers and Karim made their way into the penthouse.
It was incredible. Light filled the space as if the apartment its
elf were made of light. There were windows everywhere, each of them offering breathtaking views of the city you just couldn’t get from anywhere else. Even though the golds and browns and whites of the penthouse were being filtered through the tiny cameras on Karim and Danvers’ chests, it was still amazing to watch the house unfold in front of me.
The next thing I noticed were the staff. There were people everywhere. Some were setting tables up and decorating them with white tablecloths sprinkled with golden flakes, while others were seeing to a bar that ran almost along the entire length of the ballroom. Flitting between them were the stronger staff members tasked with moving heavy furniture around.
“That reminds me,” I said, “What happened to the actual event planner?”
“Probably best if you don’t know,” Axel said.
“That sounds ominous.”
“He’s fine, but no one will be seeing him until this is over.”
Okay, well, at least he’s alive…
“This… this is a nightmare,” Karim bellowed, snapping me out of my thoughts and stealing the attention of every head in the room. A sea of confused faces looked across the room at him, waiting for him to elaborate. Karim walked toward one of the tables, inspected the cloth, and turned his eyes up at the man who had set it. “Do you think this is funny?” he asked, contempt in his voice.
“Funny?” the man replied, “No… I don’t. What’s wrong?”
“All of this is wrong. All of it! I want you all to leave this place immediately.”
“Leave? But, we’re in the middle of—"
“—am I in charge here?”
Whoever Karim was talking to clearly had no idea who in the hell Karim was. They’d never met. He’d probably been given instructions, like everyone else, and told to do a job a certain way. No one in the room had likely ever met the person in charge of the design and décor, and that worked to Karim’s advantage.
“I… guess?” the man said.
“Then do as I say, and leave. I don’t know what it is about this room, but something isn’t right and I will not rest until I learn what that thing is. Once I have made my decision, I will call you all back.”
“Where should we go?” someone called out from the back.
Heart of the Thief Page 13
