Heist Royale (Thieves’ Gambit #2)

Chapter Thirty-Five

Thirty-Five

On instinct, I dashed back into the dark room, letting the shelf door latch shut after me.

I instantly face-palmed that decision. Why didn’t I just leave the damn room entirely? It would’ve been risky, being seen if someone was outside, but surely that would’ve been better than boxing myself in. They probably already had the windowpane open by now.

What the hell happened to Kyung-soon’s texts? Why didn’t she let me know how close they were?

Frustrated, I whipped my phone out, only to see the empty home screen…and also the complete lack of signal. Dr.Warlen had said something about the loopy signal, hadn’t he?

So, hiding in here it was, then. But for how long? I needed to get back to Mylo so we could get the hell off this mountain. I was not in the mood to play an overnight game of hide-and-seek with Diane.

My fingers curled around the canister. She would realize the target was gone as soon as she got here.

Quickly, I snuck back to the spot where the target had been stashed and grabbed another canister. Thank god I hadn’t cut my nails lately. They were just long enough to help me scrape the K-905 sticker off the target and a matching one off K-900. They were wrinkled and a little uneven as I pressed them back on the metal, but hopefully they looked good enough to fool her for a little while.

Featherlight steps crept into the silence. Hide now. There was just one problem.

I looked up, and my heart sunk as I remembered the impossible-to-escape beam of light overhead.

But they were motion lights.

I stepped back into the next open aisle and dropped to a crouch. Someone was feeling around the shelf door, their fingers fumbling on the other side. My beam of light remained. I held my breath.

God, if you ever even liked me a little, do me this one favor now, please.

The door unlatched.

The lights above me switched off. I stayed perfectly still in the dark.

The steps that entered were careful, but assured. In my periphery, I saw the new beam of light spotting a figure as she made her way through the shelves. I couldn’t turn for a better angle, though. Even breathing too deeply felt dangerous.

She drew closer, until there was nothing but one movable shelf between me and her. My mouth went dry as I listened to her pick up the canister. There was a pop as she opened the cylinder.

Take the bait.

After a long minute, she closed the canister and began heading back.

After this, I thought, I was going to start going to church again.

Until I heard one of the hand cranks turning. Of course Diane wanted to close the aisle she’d stolen from. How smart.

And the shelf she just had to pick was the one I was between. The shelf adjacent to me, on its hair-trigger crank, started pushing in on the next shelf, ready to pancake me.

With only an inch to spare, I rolled out from the crushing shelves. The motion-sensor lights had me illuminated before I got on my feet.

Looking down the aisle at me, Diane blinked, and then her gaze fell to the canister in my hand.

Well, if you can’t hide.

I feinted, heading straight toward her. It drew her in long enough for me to pull back and bolt down the next open aisle instead. She was going to catch up with me; after all, she was closer to the exit. But a few seconds out of her sight was all I needed. I unraveled my bracelet chain. As expected, she threw herself in front of the open aisle, ready to intercept me. I bent and swung my chain around one of her ankles and pulled. She thudded to the floor. I hurdled over her and out the door, pressing it shut behind me. In the viewing room, I scanned the desks at hyper speed before finding a pair of styluses by some tablets, which I dug between the hinges and the doorframe. It shuddered. A binder hit the floor. That wasn’t going to hold her for long.

“Whoa.” I spun around at the voice to find Kyung-soon by the main entrance, with her phone wired into the locking mechanism of the door. No doubt ensuring the lock wasn’t going to work for anyone on the other side while Diane did her thing.

“You’re still here! Why?”

“I didn’t get your text,” I said.

A slam hit the shelf door. Kyung-soon shook her head. “We should go.”

“No duh.” I ripped her wires out for her and pushed the door open.

Only to come face-to-face with Molly, the guy with the overalls, and Mylo behind them trying to not to make it obvious how he was pressing against the com in his ear.

The com I forgot to unmute when Diane got here.

The five of us were suspended in a moment of disbelief before Diane slammed herself against the secret shelf door again, which prompted Molly to scream, “Call someone, they’re breaking in—”

Kyung-soon slammed the door, shutting Mylo and the others out…for a bit.

“So, what now?” Kyung-soon asked. Another binder fell off the door. She tensed. “I really don’t want to fight Ms.Abara. She’s actually really sweet when you’re on her good side.”

It wasn’t like fighting her was going to help us anyway. Getting the hell out of there was the priority, and it was just a matter of time now before people came flooding through the main entrance.

My eyes drifted up to the window Kyung-soon and Diane had come through. I pushed one of the leather chairs underneath it and pushed the pane open. Craning my neck out and up, barely noticeable scuff marks made it obvious they’d rappelled from the roof, sort of like what Noelia and I had done in Antarctica. Judging by the fact that Kyung-soon didn’t have the rope they’d used, it was safe to assume Diane had it, so going back up was a no.

I twisted to look below, at the sheer drop and free fall into the water at least a thousand feet down.

And the sliver of rocky ground between the edge of the building and the drop. At least a foot wide. That was enough to walk on. The cable car station was a straight shot across the sliver of ground too. The sun was just starting to tint the sky and the lake a fiery shade of red. We could make it in time.

I turned back to Kyung-soon, holding out my hand.

“I really hate you sometimes,” she whimpered, but with no other choice, she took my hand.