Entrapment

She whirled toward the dressing table to search for another missile and stopped short when she saw the figure standing in her bedroom doorway.

“Well, darling, it’s been a while since I’ve seen you throw a tantrum like that.” Pauline Fontaine strolled casually into the room, wearing an elegant dressing gown. Even at eighty, her posture was straight, her movements graceful. Age, Pauline was fond of saying, couldn’t negate breeding. “Don’t tell me Lockhart beat you to that Monet you had your eye on?”

“No, of course not. Lockhart lacks the imagination and the cunning. I’m sorry, Grandmama.” Guilt pushed temper aside as Juliette went to her grandmother. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t, child. I wasn’t asleep, and thought I’d check to see if you’d returned yet. And you have, obviously.” A smile tugged at the older woman’s lips. “Mind telling me what, or who, has gotten you in such a snit?”

“I’m not in a snit, I’m seriously pissed off.” Juliette gave her grandmother a hug and ignored her sound of dismay at her choice of words. “I met a man tonight, and…” She stopped, and moved away from the older woman while she decided how much to tell her. Her grandmother’s advanced years had weakened her heart, if not her iron will. There was no use burdening her with details that she would only fret over.

“A man?” By her delighted tone, it was plain that Pauline had been successfully distracted. “Tell me about him. He must be unique, indeed, to have drawn this level of emotion from my cool, collected granddaughter.”

“Unique?” Juliette gave a short laugh, and turned to pace. “You could say that. There’s certainly nothing ordinary about Sam Tremaine.” He’d caught her attention the moment he’d made his entrance. Other women this evening had sent not-so-subtle admiring gazes his way, drawn no doubt by his bright shock of short blond hair, that angular poet’s face, his wicked green eyes. But it hadn’t been his looks that had elicited her immediate instinctive reaction. It had been the danger he’d radiated.

It would have been hard to miss. He projected an aura of power, partially glossed beneath a suave handsome presence, but there, nonetheless. The elegant black tux should have contained the shimmer of menace that surrounded him, but had only showcased it. She’d spent the evening hoping that the threat she sensed from him was purely masculine. Discovering otherwise was as much a slap at her femininity as it was to her safety.

“So. Tell me more about this not-ordinary-at-all man.”

Startled, Juliette looked back over her shoulder. She’d almost forgotten her grandmother’s presence in the room. “He’s an American. A lawyer, he says.” Aware of the agitation in her movements, she slowed, walked to the bed to retrieve the things she’d thrown.

“You say that as though you don’t believe it.”

“I believe he’s more.” Crossing to the dressing table, she replaced the items neatly on its surface. She looked in the mirror to see her grandmother had followed her, and their gazes met. “He might pose a small problem for us.”

“What kind of problem?”

“He seems to think he has discovered le petit voleur’s identity.”

Pauline said nothing for a moment. Then she sighed. “Ah.”

“He has nothing but supposition to go on, of course.” She was banking a great deal on that. But she didn’t need to tell her grandmother how serious it would be if even a breath of his suspicion made its way to the local police.

“Does he represent law enforcement? Insurance?”

Juliette reached up and began taking the pins from her hair. She always thought best when her hands were occupied. “I’m not sure.” She wasn’t in the mood to mention that her attempt to answer that question for herself had met with failure. The memory still stung. “I don’t think so. He offered me a job.”

“You don’t think Jacques might have sent him to you?”

She shook her head, and the hair she’d released tumbled past her shoulders. “Jacques would have informed me beforehand. And Tremaine didn’t reach that conclusion about my identity based on anything Jacques would have told him.” Dropping the last of the pins on the dresser, she pushed her hands into her hair, shook it out. “At any rate, I think it would be best to remain inactive for a while. At least until I can gather some more information on Tremaine and what he’s trying to accomplish.”

“That’s not acceptable. We can’t afford to deviate from our time line.” Pauline’s voice was implacable, as it always was when this subject was discussed. “One doesn’t duck in the face of obstacles, one finds a way around them.”

Her vehemence drew a half smile from her granddaughter. “You’re not fighting the Resistance anymore, Grandmama. A slight delay in any step of our plan isn’t a matter of life or death.”

Her teasing failed to soften the woman’s attitude. Steely-eyed she retorted, “No, but it is a matter of honor. I know I don’t have to remind you of that.”

The words raked at old wounds, renewed their throb. No, she didn’t need her grandmother’s words to remember. The specters that haunted her dreams were reminder enough. Taking a deep breath, she dodged the emotions that threatened to surface and reached for logic. Part of the woman’s adamance came from a fear she’d never live to see fruition of the goal they’d worked toward for so long. But analyzing the risks of each job was Juliette’s job. It wouldn’t do to become careless now.

“I can’t stick too closely to our schedule. I don’t know how much information he has on my activities.” Just hearing the words out loud was infuriating. She’d come much too far to allow a mere man to interfere with her plans. And there was more than a little ego at stake, as well. If Sam Tremaine thought he could rattle her so easily, he hadn’t discovered as much about her as he’d claimed.

A tiny smile crossed her lips as a strategy began to form in her mind. She’d spent the past decade learning how to create illusions. The game plan this time called for nothing more sophisticated than the old bait-and-switch. And when le petit voleur struck elsewhere while Juliette was still in Paris, Tremaine would be forced to admit he’d been wrong about her.

The prospect was delicious.

The slim steel cable glinted in the shadows of the darkened exhibit room in Copenhagen’s famed Gallery of Art. The floor’s guard had passed by two minutes earlier. If he stuck to his schedule he wouldn’t be back for another eight minutes. The display case in the middle of the room would be empty in six.

The black-clad figure set the vent cover aside silently and snapped the buckle from the cable to the body harness. With quick movements, the body crawled to the edge of the vent and poised on the edge, hand outstretched.

The red light on the palm-size remote winked rapidly as it was aimed at first one security camera, then the other. Within seconds the cameras’ power lights faded. The remote was clipped back on a belt, and with a quick tug, the strength of the cable was tested. A tiny whir was heard as the pulley mechanism activated and the figure was carried, legs curled upward, toward the center of the ceiling.

The red laser beams of the security system crisscrossed the space below in a random patchwork pattern. With the room rigged to be heat sensitive as well, it was thought by most to be impenetrable. They would soon be proven wrong. Every system was vulnerable. It was just a matter of research and ingenuity.

The Mylar suit the figure wore was stifling. It would successfully retain the body temperature, emitting a steady sixty degrees that wouldn’t trip the alarms. Form-fitting, it allowed for maximum flexibility, a necessity for this job.

The body bowed and twisted to avoid the slim beams. As one was evaded, another loomed. The technique was reminiscent of a strange ballet, fluid streams of movement, flexible arching and seemingly impossible contortions. Until finally, the body hung upside down, suspended between two beams, within arm’s reach of the glass case in the center of the room. The position would have to be held nearly motionless for the entire operation, taxing both muscles and nerves. If something was going to go wrong, it would likely be now.

A suction cup was taken from a pouch at the waist and affixed to the glass top. Next a vial was extracted, and dark gray powder shaken out in an outline atop the case, roughly the size of a basketball. That accomplished, one deep breath could be taken, but only one. There was far more to be done.

The first vial was exchanged for another. The cap was carefully removed and tucked away. Acid was poured with excruciating care. It raced around the circle, devouring the tiny grains with rapid greed. In the process the glass would be weakened, while the chemical reaction with the ingredients in the powder would deactivate any alarm on the market.

A cramp stabbed viciously, a blade between the ribs. A quick glance at an illuminated wrist watch showed five minutes remaining. So far so good. A slim glass cutter was taken from the pouch. The figure shifted a fraction. Both arms would be needed now. One was positioned with teeth-gritting caution between two red beams to grasp the knob on the suction cup. The other slid beneath a laser beam closer to the case. The cutter traced easily around the weakened circle in the glass, loosening it to be lifted and placed aside.

Anticipation thrummed. Time suspended. In the near darkness, everything else faded to insignificance. This was the moment that never failed to thrill. With near awe, a hand was slipped into the opening, carefully freeing the necklace from its bed of black velvet.

The perfectly matched pearls shimmered like moon glow in the shadows, but it was the square-cut twenty-carat ruby hanging from the center that commanded attention. With hypnotizing brilliance it speared the darkness with shards of crimson. The Moonfire necklace. In the past five centuries, countless women had coveted it. An untold number of lives had been sacrificed for it. And now one man would be denied it.

That knowledge brought the greatest satisfaction of all.

Unhurriedly, the necklace was tucked away into the pouch. The cramping pain increased, and a feeling of urgency rose. Two minutes left.

A moment was taken, and then another. Then with slow, methodical movements, the black-clad body was unbent, twisted, sinuous grace and fierce concentration evident as the pulley was reactivated, inch by excruciating inch. It wasn’t until the figure was curled up against the cable that another deep breath was taken.

Forty-five seconds.

With a near silent hum, the mechanism carried its burden across the ceiling to the cold-air vent. As the hole grew closer, a feeling of relief was allowed. The whole operation would take less than the allotted six minutes. By the time the guard noted what had transpired, escape would already be well underway.

Thirty seconds.

The vent opening was within reach. The taste of impending success was sweet. A feeling of unnatural calm settled over the adrenaline. Hands braced against the wall on either side of the opening, muscles bunched.

And then a light snapped on in the hallway outside the room, spotlighting the figure, freezing it in shock and dismay.

“Impressive.” A slow solitary clapping accompanied the admiring statement. “I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it for myself. You’re every bit as good as I’ve been led to believe.”

The words, their meaning, didn’t register. The man’s presence did. The figure dove forward in one streak of motion, entering the narrow vent like an arrow fired from a crossbow. Panic licked at nerve endings, was beaten back. Cool logic was called on now. Near misses had happened before. They’d been infrequent, long, long ago, but they had occurred. Precautions were always taken. Alternate escape routes planned.

But never had this eventuality been considered.

There would be time later for second-guessing and self-recriminations. With the ease of long practice, everything but the primary goal was pushed aside. Escape.