Page 107 of Bitter Arrangement

“Unscrew the keypad.”

I get to work. I have the tools with me. The front facing comes off easily enough after I use a jeweler’s screwdriver to remove the tiny bolts. Then I disconnect the wiring and look in at the bare control board.

“Hurry up,” Daron says. “I’m giving you more time, but not a lot.”

“He’s moving.” Eric’s noise breaks through our comms. It sounds like he’s out of breath. “I don’t know why, but he just suddenly leapt up and got out of there.”

“How far away are you?” I ask him.

“Ten minutes tops. But he’s hurrying.”

“Fucker knows,” I say as I start to connect the keypad bomber to the circuit board. It’s a simple black device designed to brute force the key password by trying thousands of combinations every second. “He’s coming home.”

“Get out of there,” Riley says, sounding terrified.

I input the start sequence, and the bomber gets to work. “I can do this.”

“Alexan. Please. It’s not worth it.”

“Sorry, baby.” I stare at the bomber, sweat dripping down my forehead. “Daron, how’d he find out?”

“Don’t know. Trying to figure that out right now. Fucking motherfucker.”

“He’s in the car,” Eric says. “Shit, I’m sticking close.”

“Alexan!” Riley says. “Get out of there!”

I let the bomber run. If this fails, we’re fucked. We won’t get another chance, especially if Navarro got an alert that I’m in here. Daron must’ve tripped some layer of protection we didn’t know about, and normally that’s something we’d find during the planning phase. But this was rushed, and we fucked up.

The lights keep flashing rapidly. Numbers flit across the screen like grass in the breeze. I pace across the office and look out the front windows, but it’s quiet out there. “Eric, update.”

“He’s definitely coming back. Headed your way. Eight minutes.”

“Motherfucker had a dead man’s switch on the whole network,” William says suddenly. “Daron, do you see this?”

“I see it,” Daron confirms. “The second we took it down, Navarro got an alert. He knows something’s up.”

“Time to go,” Riley presses.

“I can’t.” I turn back to the safe. “The bomber’s still working.”

“Leave the watch somewhere else,” Riley pleads. “Under his mattress. In his sock drawer. I don’t care. Just get out of there.”

“Anywhere else will look suspicious. We have to make sure Mantis buys this.”

“Alexan—” She’s pleading now. “Just come back to me.”

Riley’s voice breaks my heart, but I’m staying for her. She has to understand that. If I back out now and half-ass this job, Mantis might realize we were behind the watch theft from the start.

“I love you, you know that?” I crouch beside the safe.

Her laugh is laced with tears. “Seriously?Seriously?Right now?”

“Right now,” I say gently, gently touching the safe. The bomber keeps buzzing, sending code after code into the electronic lock pad. “I love you, Riley, and I can’t leave until this is done.”

“I love you too,” she whispers, crying softly now.

“This is touching and all,” Daron says, cutting in, “but I’m inclined to agree with your wife. Time to cut loose.”

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