Page 74 of My Merciless Don

We took the elevator up kissing all the way to the penthouse. There was a special code needed for the lift to open on the penthouse floor. Luckily, Marco had it. I gave him a thumbs up, really proud of his forward planning, and then practically skipped to the penthouse door. The lock was electronic. Another password would be needed. I turned to Marco, “I don't suppose you have this one too?”

He held up his phone, “Give my girl ten minutes. She'll have it for us.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, “And by your girl, you mean…?”

His face lit up with amusement. “I mean the comely little starlet who is currently seducing Mr. Botha, finding him endlessly fascinating, and wanting to know just everything about him, including the code on his hotel room door.”

I couldn't help laughing at his very sad imitation of a coquette. As if on cue, his phone beeped. He held it up in his gloved hand. “There she is.”

I generously let him be the one to enter the code, but as soon as he opened the door I was inside looking around, trying to gauge where the mark could have hidden the jewels. It was best to touch as few things as possible, so as not to leave a trail that could be followed back to us. Seeing as he was a simple man, I started in the obvious place. The room safe. The same code that opened his door worked on the safe. However, while it contained a good stack of money, there were no jewels in there. Next, I went for his suitcase. His clothes were meticulously folded, and without disturbing them I patted them down trying to feel for the necklace. There was nothing there, so I carefully picked up the clothes and put them on the floor.

“Bingo.” I said.

There was a hidden compartment at the bottom of the suitcase. I opened it and reached inside carefully. I touched something hard and cold, and pulled it out.

My jaw dropped. I had seen pictures of it but to behold it in person was something else entirely.

It was easily the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

“Shit.” I said, as eloquently as ever.

“Are you gonna take it?”

I looked towards Marco startled by his question. “I can do that?”

He laughed, “You can do whatever you want.”

I looked down at the necklace thoughtfully. “We’d never be able to display it, sell it or wear it.”

“Yeah, but you’d also be legendary.”

My mouth twisted. “Yeah, if I was stupid enough to open my big mouth and talk about it.”

“They won’t have to know your name to know someone stole the jewel right from under its owner’s nose.”

I pursed my lips, thinking about it. Then I put the stone down. “No. I don’t need it. But let’s see what else of Mr. Botha’s is lying around.”

We found his iPad, sat on the dressing table and it was such a déjà vu moment for us. We grinned at each other, kissing hard before trying to figure out the pin.

“I say he’s unoriginal. Bet it’s the same as the door.” Marco said.

“I won’t be taking that bet because- yeah.” I put in the pin, and the device was ours. It didn’t take much to get into his email, find his bank accounts, find out he had a mistress, as well as a wife, and was skimming money off the top of his company. I laughed out loud.

“Hey, how about we send a screenshot of this very explicit message he sent his mistress, to his wife.”

“Oh… you are evil.”

“Is that a yes?”

“Absolutely, send it.”

I did that and then went back to his account. Of course, I couldn’t empty it, but I could send myself a tidy chunk of change from his secret account in the Caymans. He clearly had a habit of pulling cash from there to pay for stuff and so it was a matter of a moment to pay Mercer Enterprises ten million dollars through their PayPal for the purchase of ten thousand dildos.

Marco laughed so hard at that. “Oh my god, I didn’t realize scamming people was this much fun.”

I shrugged one-shouldered. “We take our pleasures where we can get them.”

I put the iPad down where I found it, returned the Asiana jewel to its hiding place and then paused. “Wait. I feel like we should give him a bit of scare. What if we leave the jewel on his pillow, just to let him know we could have taken it, but we didn’t?”

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