“None.” Across the street, the lights were fading to black, and Kat saw the employees slipping from the door on the side of the building, disappearing among the commuters and workers and shoppers of midtown Manhattan.
“Night’s no good,” Kat said to their unasked question. “Even if we could get past the guards and security, the emerald’s case sinks into a reinforced titanium vault beneath the floor at closing time.”
“Basement access?” Hale asked, perking up.
“No.” Kat shook her head. “With that kind of case, there won’t be any access of any kind.”
“How do you know?”
“Tokyo,” Kat and Gabrielle said at the same time.
Gabrielle shrugged when Hale looked at her. “If you don’t believe us, Uncle Felix has got the blowtorch scars to prove it.”
Kat’s gaze was lost in the distance, her voice low, and when she spoke, it was almost to herself, saying, “The stone is small, and small means easy to hide.” Hale and Gabrielle stayed quiet, letting her talk, mind working, gears turning. “But no one’s seen it in years, and if no one’s seen it, then everyone’s going to be staring, and staring people tend to…see. But staring also means focused, and focused people get scared, and scared people get distracted.…”
“So we’re back to Humpty Dumpty,” Gabrielle tried, but Hale was already shaking his head.
“No,” he said. “I’m telling you, even if we can get the king’s horses in there, there’s no way we make it out before someone notices the emerald is gone. And trust me, we do not want to be caught on the inside.” He cringed. “Ex-Navy SEALs. Big ones.”
When Kat spoke, it was more a hypothetical question than a challenge: “What if they don’t notice?”
“No, Kat. No.” Despite the snow, sweat was beading at Hale’s brow. “I’m telling you, if we had a month and a big crew…maybe. But Kelly is not messing around with this thing. We don’t have the time or the resources to—”
“What are you thinking?” Gabrielle asked, cutting him off.
“Kat!” Hale snapped, probably louder than he’d intended, because when he spoke again, the words were softer. Sadder. “Kat, Uncle Eddie couldn’t steal it.”
There it was—the single fact that was scarier than the guards, more worrisome than the cameras. It was the one thing that, no matter what, Kat knew she could never plan a way around. What they were talking about doing was forbidden; it went against her family and its rules, and so Kat didn’t dare look at that job through Uncle Eddie’s eyes. Instead, she looked at it like Visily Romani.
“The authentication room,” Kat said, almost to herself. “We can do an Alice in Wonderland in the authentication room.”
They stayed perfectly still in the wet air, the plan taking shape around them like puzzle pieces formed out of the falling snow. The three of them stood shaking from the cold and with the knowledge that maybe—just maybe—it might work. And maybe, Kat knew, it wouldn’t.
Gabrielle stared into her cousin’s eyes. “Whatever you do, Kat, just do not say we’re gonna need a forger.”
“No, Gabrielle. We’re going to need someone who can fake the Cleopatra Emerald in seventy-two hours.” Kat started walking. Her short hair blew across her face as she turned her head and called against the wind, “We’re going to need the forger.”
CHAPTER 9
“Do I know him?” Hale asked. Together, the cousins said, “No.” Kat and Gabrielle sat together in the backseat of the huge SUV that Hale had paid for and Marcus drove. They swayed as the big tires lunged in and out of the deep gouges in the rough road. No, Kat realized. On second thought, road was far from the appropriate word.
Path.
Trail.
Death trap?
The dense canopy of trees parted, and for a brief second, nothing but snow and sky stood between them and the sheer cliff with its steep drop. Gabrielle—one of the best high-wire workers to ever grace the family business—leaned close to the glass and peered into the white abyss.
Hale, on the other hand, looked as if he might be sick all over the SUV’s soft leather interior. “So are we sure this guy will be there?”
Kat looked at the pristine snow that lay before them, eighteen inches deep and completely untouched by man. “He’s home,” she said, certain that no one had been up—or down—that mountain in a very long time.
Marcus drove steadily faster. The tires spun, and the SUV skidded; but still they kept their forward progress, climbing.
“And how do we know he’ll be able to help us?” Hale asked, his voice an octave higher than Kat had ever heard it.
“Oh, he can help us.” Maybe it was the change in Gabrielle’s voice—the sudden inflection—or maybe Hale was just desperate to look anywhere but over the sharp cliff that Marcus was currently navigating, because he spun around and stared into the backseat.