City of Saints & Thieves(5)

But here’s the thing you have to remember about plans: Three-quarters of the way in, it all just may blow up in your face. Equipment breaks. Maids wake up. Dogs bark. The true mark of a good thief is having the stones to keep your cool and jua kali that thing back together.

That’s right. You’ve gotta be ready to improvise.

? ? ?

Boyboy kicks things off. As I’m slinking toward the mansion with Ketchup at my heels, he hacks into the security system. He turns off the electric perimeter fence and disables the security booth’s camera feeds. Then he reroutes the feeds to his computer so he has eyes all over the Greyhills’ lawn. Next he kills the first-floor window alarms. He figures that he can keep everything offline for about three minutes before security fixes things. By that time I’ll be inside, and he’ll have the interior cameras on a loop, so anyone who’s looking will just see a nice empty house. Power outages are common enough in the rainy season. Security will probably chalk this one up to good old nature. The only thing I have to do is hurry.

Ketchup and I pull a wooden ladder out of the bushes, where a gardener on payroll who works down the street stashed it this afternoon. Then I climb right up the wall, under the shadows of the jacaranda trees that line the street. Easy peasy. At the top I listen for the hum of electricity coming through the razor wire. It’s quiet, but I still touch it first with my pinky finger just in case.

“Don’t you trust me?” Boyboy chides through the earpiece.

I stay quiet and concentrate on lifting myself over.

When I was a kid, I took gymnastics lessons for a couple of years until Mama said we weren’t going to take charity anymore. I’m not sure if that’s what did it, or if it’s because I’m small or what, but doing something like climbing over razor wire on top of a fifteen-foot-high wall is just easy for me. Some people are good at computer stuff. Some are good singers. I’m good at being a thief.

I lower myself down the wall and let go, landing with a small thump in the bushes. Crouched behind dripping palm branches, I wait until I hear the van start and drive off. Bug Eye, Ketchup, and Boyboy will stay far enough away that they won’t attract attention.

Boyboy’s voice whispers, “Okay, the dogs are on the other side, but you got some dudes heading your way.”

I hear footsteps swishing in the wet grass, and soon two guards amble by on their rounds. I sink into the dark. I level my breath, tensing to slide back into the foliage if they come near, but they walk on, oblivious. Once they’ve rounded the corner, I scan the yard and dart to the house. I have two minutes left for the next part.

The window over the generator is open a crack, as expected, but covered with iron bars. It’s going to be tight, for sure. Good thing I had only a sweet bun for dinner.

I climb up on the generator and put my head to the bars, measuring. Ear to ear, my head just barely goes through. But it’s enough. If I can get my head in, the rest of me will fit.

I don’t mess around; I probably only have about ninety seconds left. I push the window the rest of the way open, get a leg in and then my hips. I breathe out and slide my chest through the cold metal bars, feel a moment of claustrophobia like always, then my head is through and I’m in.

After landing softly on the floor, I take a second to look around. I’m at the corner of the hall. Ahead I see the sitting room, and catch a hint of turquoise light from the pool outside. It’s like a dream, being back here after all this time. I take a steadying breath and creep forward. No one should be here. Mr. and Mrs. Greyhill are in Dubai. The kids are away at boarding school in a cold, neutral country. The servants are asleep in their cottages at the end of the yard.

It’s just me and the ghosts.

Boyboy’s voice crackles through the earpiece. “Hurry, T; you’ve only got forty-five seconds. And that guard almost caught you with your butt hanging out the window.”

I want to tell him to shut up, but resist the urge and keep moving. At the end of the hall, I glance around the corner. The sitting room is empty and still. The security control panel I’m aiming for is attached to the wall ahead. When I reach it, the panel’s screen shows I have thirty-two seconds before the next round of laser scanners sweep the house. If they hit me, a silent alarm will go off immediately. It goes to the guards, who will notify an expensive but highly effective security company staffed with ex–covert ops guys from South Africa. They’ll arrive within minutes. They don’t turn people over to the police, who will let you go for the right price. They take you in a helicopter out over the ocean. What do they do with you? Let’s just say it’s a long swim back.

Thirty seconds.

I look at the screen, hoping the camera is feeding properly. “Well? Can you see it?”

“Yeah. Tilt your head up. Okay.” There’s a pause while I presume Boyboy is doing something productive, and it’s all I can do to not shout at him to hurry. He has to disable the lasers, but he can’t hack into this system; it’s on a closed circuit. Instead he’s going to walk me through shutting it down.

In twenty-five seconds.

“It’s a TX-400. New model,” Boyboy says, after what feels like an eternity. He starts rattling instructions. “Press Alarm on the screen. Now Code. Four, eight, four. Copy. Program . . .”

Boyboy leads me though the sequence, strings of numbers and buttons to push that he whispers in my ear. They sound almost like the prayers I used to fall asleep to when Mama would drag me to church. It’s soothing, in a way. Still, my fingers are shaky, willing the process to go faster. Four seconds. He gives me a last series of numbers, and I punch them in. The timer stops. One second to go.