The Paranoid Thief (24 page)

“By the way,” he asked in an afterthought,
“did he touch you in anyway?”

“You don’t see my hair messed up, do you?”
Jill answered, annoyed.

“No, but I had to ask in case he put a
homing beacon on you.”

Jill gave him such a glare, Randolph held up
his hands in apology. Jill snorted her acceptance, and pulled out a soda from
the portable cooler he’d purloined from the public works truck in a supply yard
and tapped the screen on the computer, bringing his attention back to his side
of the job. Randolph gave Jill a half smile, then plugged in the new chip and
set about studying the new information she’d gathered.

For another week, Randolph sorted out
details and designed tools they’d need to infiltrate Mr. Hilden’s fortress when
Randolph came across a certain restaurant owner and company being indicted for
tax evasion and other lesser charges. Quickly recognizing this as a simple
countermeasure instigated by Mr. Hilden to color Randolph’s thoughts, Randolph
had to admit it still made him mad as hell. Even so, hating the trouble this
would cause and the risks involved, Randolph felt he owed his brother his help.

He was unhooking the computer when Jill
stirred from her sleeping pallet and inquired, “Honey, what’s up?”

“I think it’s time we had a decently-cooked
meal. So why don’t you pack up and we’ll head for the public showers to clean
up for a flight out to the frozen lakes.”

“Frozen lakes? Why do we need to see the
senator?”

“We don’t, but I’ve business there I must
see to before we begin the raid on Mr. Hilden’s residence.”

“John, love, I thought we were flat broke?”

“We are, but my brother’s not, at least not
yet.”

Jill sat up straighter and her voice
lowered into a commanding tone. “Randolph, what the hell’s going on?”

“I’ve business in the frozen lakes, that’s
all you need to know,” he snapped, putting the computer in a protective carry
bag.

Jill stood and without provocation slammed
Randolph against the wall, holding him in place by his shirt and throat while
she placed a knee very close to his groin. “Answer my question. We’re far too
close to simply drop things and go running off, so what’s happened?”

“Jill, I can’t talk this way,” Randolph
forced through his teeth, dropping the bag to take up her arm, trying to push
it away.

“You can, however,
breathe,
a condition I can alter if you don’t answer me. It’s your brother isn’t it?
Someone's done something to hurt him and like a good big brother, you’re
running to the rescue.”

Randolph eyed her, wondering how she
connected those dots even as a smirk touched her lips and she let go, stepping
back, folding her arms so he had room to move while he rubbed his neck.
“Randolph, it wasn’t that hard to figure out. You seemed to already know your
way around that town, including the layout of that fancy restaurant. So tell
me, what’s happened?”

“I could just happen to have had a job
there,” he grumbled.

“That statement would’ve held water if you
hadn’t mentioned your brother paying our fare. In all the time I’ve known you,
you haven’t trusted anyone but yourself and that still holds, even now after
admitting your love for me,” she finished, sounding hurt with that last part.

Randolph straightened out his shirt. “Okay,
fine, you’re right. It is my brother. The bastard’s done some manipulation and
probably some payoffs to get my brother in trouble. As he’s an innocent in all
this, I’m going to see him and straighten out the people who think Mr. Hilden
is far more of a threat then I am.”

“Uh-huh, just as I
thought.
Well, go ahead then”—she waved a hand at him—“play right into
his hands, and while you’re at it, I’ll take out Hilden and company.”

“Jill, no!”

“Jill, yes…” she snarled back. “This Hilden
character will have the place crawling with paid assassins knowing you couldn’t
help but show up. So go ahead, make it that much easier for him to kill you,
leaving me alone, a widow and husband-less mother.”

“But don’t you un-
der
…uh,
what did you say?”

“Nothing of any
consequence to you.
Now be off with you, I’ve got plans of my own to
make.” She turned her back on him.

“Jill?
Honey?”
Randolph asked, swallowing, stepping up and placing his hands on her shoulders,
gently turning her around. “Are you…are you pregnant?” Randolph looked down
into her eyes.

“And what of it?”
Jill demanded. “What do you care? You’ve got your brother to bail out, so go on
and leave me in peace.”

Floored by the unexpected news, Randolph
stammered, “But how…uh I mean, when?
Uh, how far along?”

“For that answer you'll have to ask my
other self. Now why don’t you quite pretending you care and—”

Randolph didn’t let her get any further as
he pulled her in for a tight embrace, totally at odds with himself. The fact
Jill was pregnant with his child had a part of him jumping up and down with
joy, while another screamed great obscenities at the timing as a third part
crawled into a corner, balling up into a tight ball of scared uncertainty.
Gad, how does one handle so many emotions at
once?
She resisted for a moment before melting into his arms, holding on so
tightly her strength was causing him trouble in breathing.

“Oh, Randolph, I was so scared you’d resent
me for this, I—I had no idea how to tell you.”

Randolph swallowed, nuzzling her hair then
tried to fish out his emotions so he wouldn’t say the wrong thing. “When did
you know? How far along are you?”

Her tears wet his shirt and her body shook;
Jill was quietly sobbing in his embrace before she admitted, “I don’t know how
far along I am, she won’t tell me? Hell, in all the time we’ve known each
other, she’s never withheld such important news from me.” Still shaking in his
arms, Jill pleaded, “Please don’t leave me. I never meant this to happen. I’ve
been taking all the precautions necessary to prevent this. But my body is not
solely mine, how am I to prevent something she desperately wants?”

“
Shhh
,
it’s
all right love, neither of you have done anything
wrong.
Shh
now, there’s no need for this, I’ll not
leave you. Now please assure her she’s done nothing wrong and find out how far
along you are.”

Randolph felt the change in Jill’s grip, as
her softer side surfaced, and he was glad of it as he had been about to ask her
to loosen up her hold shortly—something in her state he didn’t think she would
take very well.

“You’re—you’re truly not mad at me?” Jill
questioned, slacking her arms so she could look up into his eyes.

“Now, I didn’t say that,” Randolph said
gently, so she wouldn’t withdraw. “I am mad, but only on the timing. Now tell
me, how far along are you?”

“I’m not getting an abortion,” she stated
with strength, “and I’ll not let her get one either,” she assured Randolph,
jutting out her chin.

“Now who said anything about an abortion?
You know perfectly well my stance on a human life.”

“You—you mean it? I can have my baby?”

Randolph nodded.

She bit her lip, not quite trusting him.
“Three, maybe four weeks.”

Randolph nodded with a smile, and kissed
her forehead before he asked, “Thank you, love, now,
may
I talk to Jill?” Her eyes filled with tears before she turned away and leaned
into him, crying anew. “Honestly, love, I have no intentions of hurting our child,
although your timing alters my time table, I also look forward to holding our
child.” He felt her nod, knowing she still didn’t trust him at his word yet,
then the harder Jill surfaced and she pulled away to hug herself.

“If we’re to get the abortion, we better do
it now while she’s in a state of sorrow,” Jill said, trying to calm her voice.

“Love, I meant what I said, I couldn’t
conceive of hurting our child. But what I need you to know is that you’re out
of the assault. I’ll not risk you getting hurt, jeopardizing the life of our
child.”

Jill turned around, a fierceness hardening
her face as she told him, “If you think for one damn minute I’m going to let
you do this alone because of my stupidity, you’ve another thing coming. I’ll do
the abortion myself if I have to, for there’s no-way no-how are you taking on
this asshole by yourself.”

“Jill—”

“Don’t you ‘no, Jill dear’ me! We’re a
team, and as such we’ll take this chance for a wonderful life together, or I’ll
follow you in when you leave and there's no way you can stop me.” When she saw
him taken aback by the venom in her voice, she waved at the computer. “Now set
up that thing and I’ll see about obtaining the parts on your list you made last
night.”

Jill slipped on her shoes, but before he
could argue further, she held up a finger, pointed at the computer and
promised, “If we want another child later, I’d suggest you get back to work.”

To this direct implication of harm to his two
boys, Randolph swallowed, knowing Jill didn’t threaten to hear herself talking.
So backing away from her, he pulled out the computer as Jill set off down the
tunnel.

Once Jill was out of sight, Randolph had to
admit she was right; he was acting the fool in thinking to run off in aid of his
brother. If he truly wished to help him out of his jam, he needed to finish
this feud with Mr. Hilden once and for all.
After
that,
he promised himself,
I intend
to make it perfectly clear to everybody messing with my brother is going to
cost them everything they have!
His only drawback was Jill’s condition,
regardless of Mr. Hilden’s attempt to push him into acting sooner then he’d
wished; Jill being pregnant accomplished this goal in a way Mr. Hilden could
never know. So setting up the computer, Randolph set to the task with a will
far greater then he held before, for he wasn’t only fighting for his life, he
was fighting for his wife and child, and that fact he felt, made him that much
more dangerous.

Only a few days later, they sat on a park
bench under a street light Jill had disabled yesterday, holding each other like
a couple taking advantage of the semi-privacy the darkness granted. Randolph
looked though spectrum sensitive goggles he’d also purloined from the city
truck, and checked wall and front structure to Mr. Hilden’s manor. He adjusted
the dials, changing the sensitivity of the filaments, and noted the placement
of security devices he already knew about.

“
How’s it look
so
far, love?” Jill whispered into his ear, her cheek nuzzling his in affection.

“Like I own the place,” Randolph answered,
flipping the channels slowly, taking note of the electrical currents and the
direction they flowed.

“So are we still a go?”

“Hang on, I’m still looking.” Lowering the
goggles to reset for audio, Randolph took another look at the wine-o sitting
next to the city dumpster and the couple still talking at the corner, ignoring
the fact the dog on the leash had already done its business some time ago.
“He’s got two men and a woman patrolling the street outside the walls,”
Randolph mumbled into her hair, enjoying the fresh scent of the light perfume
she was wearing.

“So tell me something I don’t know,” she
commented, shifting to kiss his ear.

“Besides the fact you’re distracting me?” Randolph
admitted with a smile, looking back through the goggles and finding what he’d
hoped Mr. Hilden would have disregarded as a “pain in the butt system.”
Sighing, Randolph grumbled, “He has a sound array up.”

“Never heard of it,” Jill whispered, shifting
to hide the fact Randolph was putting the goggles away.

“No reason you should have. It’s a sloppy
system. I ran into one a few years back. The salesman I talked to claimed it
was a military development, annexed from active service because it was too sensitive,
which made it that much more marketable to the public. But in truth, the active
ears overload the CPU with so many incoming sounds to identify it pretty much
classifies anything as a threat and activates the alarm.”

“So why would anyone buy it?” Jill asked,
kissing his lips.

“Because with the sound array he can
legally kill a stranger and blame the manufacturer for the wrongful death, at
which time the manufacturer blames the military for releasing a known dysfunctional
product, whereby the city has no choice but to drop the case because the
government won’t allow lawsuits on the R and D department that reduce its
funding for more developments of weaponry.”

“Boy, that’s a mouthful. And you know this
how?”

Kissing her lips, rubbing a hand up and
down her back for show and pleasure, Randolph took note she was wearing an
athletic bra and answered her question, “Because I do my homework—and out of
curiosity, why aren’t you wearing a more supportive bra under your shirt?”

Jill smiled, kissed Randolph passionately
then said, “Old habits; the military teaches women to wear easy-moving bras so
as not to restrict any movements, and as I haven’t as yet regained any real
size, I felt it best.” Jill slid his hand up under her shirt to caress her
breast. “Besides, I like the freedom it affords me, even if they’re a bit
sensitive.”

“Jill, love, if you keep this up, we’ll
have to postpone our attempt till tomorrow night.”

She met his lips again, and whispered,
“Spoil sport.”

Randolph reluctantly let go of her breast so
they both could straighten out shirts and jackets as a patrol car, like
clockwork, started down the street. After the city cop rolled past, Randolph
collected their bag of goodies, which had far more goodies in it then he’d have
liked.

But Jill’s argument from earlier had a
certain ring of truth.
Most people would
call the police. Somehow I doubt Hilden to trust the police in holding you a
fourth time, so it’s either these, or be carried out in body bags.

Remembering these to be four hand grenades,
a bag of mini mines, two laser pistols, two extra power packs and six strips of
plastic explosives, Randolph wondered over her devilish smile,
Where in hell did you get all this
equipment?

After some thought, Randolph resigned to
the fact she was right; however, he had to inject his objections.
You’re not going to use those unless it’s
absolutely necessary, right?

Whereby Jill granted him
one of her ambiguous statements,
Define
necessary.

Randolph looked skyward, mentally asking
for forgiveness for what might happen.

Jill asked, “Okay, so how do we bypass this
sound array?”

“Pay no attention to it. Just keep watch
for the relief group. We’ve about ten minutes before they show,” he instructed
as they both hurried over to the gate.

Randolph knelt, and pulled out his laser
pen to cut a circle in the plastic-steel door. After removing the piece, he
activated the light to see the inner workings. Next went on clips and wire to
circumvent the alarm before he glued the cut-out piece back in place, taking
all told three minutes.
Not a great
record for by passing a gate alarm.
But he was in no hurry as yet. Once he
turned on the infrared goggles, Randolph eased the door open enough to see the
three lines of red lights, knowing only the top and bottom ones were important.
With precise angled mirrors, he inched them in place and signaled Jill to step
through to take them up so he could slip in. After closing the gate, Randolph
pocketed the mirrors for later use as Jill joined him in his crouch to view Mr.
Hilden’s front yard, which would’ve been rather hard without the night vision
goggles she slipped on.

“Well, we’re in the front gate, now what?”
Jill whispered in his ear.

“Hold still while I check.” Randolph
reapplied the spectrum goggles. Although they had good
intel
on the outside alarms and some of the inside
ones from surveillance and recent contractor blueprints, it was still good to
run the dials and see what they might have missed. And sure enough there they
were—electrical wires running under foot in a zigzag pattern. “Pressure
plates,” Randolph whispered, motioning her to follow as he moved along the
inside fence to the side of the house.

“Why aren’t there any next to the wall?”
Jill inquired.

“Good question,” Randolph remarked with no
clue, knowing he hadn’t missed anything along the wall.

“And why hasn’t the sound array gone off?”

“It has, the moment they turned it on this
evening, so now they have a bored technician manually logging in every sound
it’s picking up, and as it can hear even an ant’s fart, it’ll be awhile before
the tech comes to the sounds we’re making.”

“Any guess how long?”

“As we’re surrounded by the sounds of the
city, perhaps an hour, may-hap's longer, depending on the tech. Of course it
could’ve been upgraded since I last read up on it, which means they could be
listening in on our conversation right now,” Randolph added, his polite way of
telling her to shut up. He caught her
Oh,
sorry
look.

After making the side wall of Mr. Hilden’s
home, Randolph marked the wall where he would cut, then took off the bulky
goggles. With a glance at his watch, he noted the time of 10:41 p.m.
Two minutes ahead of schedule.
He half
smiled, wanting to pat his own head, but refrained from such frivolity.

“Hand me one of your pistols.”

“I thought you hated guns?” Jill remarked
dryly, still wearing her goggles to better watch their backs.

“I do, but this wall’s been doubled and my
pen knife hasn’t the strength to cut through.”

“So I’m useful after all,” she said with a
bit of sarcasm.

“Jill,” Randolph said, annoyed, “the gun
please.”

“Yes Daddy,” she replied, sounding just
like her softer side, a personality they truly didn’t need out guarding their
backs at this time or point.

“I really wish you’d be more serious from
here on out,” he grumbled, setting the power level to half, “I really need to
know you’re with me on this.”

“All right, sweetie, if it keeps your
boxers from bunching up.”

Randolph shot her a glare which she reacted
by giving him a toothy grin before pulling out the bag of mini mines.

“Excuse me, but what do you think you’re
doing?”

“You’re about to cut a hole in the wall,
right? Well, these will give us a few seconds extra if someone spots the
different shades of darkness and investigates.”

“By blowing off his leg?”

“They’re not that deadly—more likely a
foot, but it’ll give the guard something other to worry about than your hole.”

Randolph rolled his eyes skyward,
then
took note of his watch. Two minutes had passed in their
exchange. And here he wanted to be inside the house by midnight before the
security systems did a back up of the last four hours, before applying the
extra security measures which had yet to be activated. As he held no time for
arguing, Randolph stuck to the time table, ignoring her antics as he applied
gun to wall. After a check of the
hole
depth the gun
made, Randolph adjusted its strength till the beam burned through. After making
a large enough hole to work comfortably, he returned Jill’s gun and activated
the pen light using the laser to cut into the electrical tube. With the light
held between his teeth, Randolph spread out the wires and checked them against
the schematics on his palm unit.

“Can you cut the security line from here?”
Jill asked.

“Yes, but that’s not what I’m doing,”
Randolph explained around the laser light between his teeth.

“Then why are we wasting time here?”

Randolph spared her a glance.
Now that’s the Jill I understand.
“The
security lines are hooked to a volt meter which would register the current
change and set off the alarm. What I’m attempting to do is locate Mr. Hilden’s
security computer and deactivate the system net on the inside by hacking into
it. With luck, the crew watching the system will assume he’s gotten up and
switched off the alarms so he could do some late night work.”

“I thought you said his computer isn't hard
wired into the net?”

“It’s not; however, eighty-five percent of
the professional
population use
a second computer as a
backup system, with all the commands installed. In this way they have complete
control while at their desk.”

“Uh-huh, and if it’s
not?”

“We’re screwed.” He located the wire he
needed, and hooked up his random code generator. Able now to relax against the
wall, as his palm computer might take a while, Randolph hoped Mr. Hilden hadn’t
a secondary unit as redundancy.

Jill stood and flattened herself against
the wall, looking right and left.

“Jill?” He’d heard nothing to be alarmed
about.

“Hush, love,” she hissed, easing out the
two pistols in her waist band, flipping off the safeties and stretching out her
arms to either side, “You keep doing your job and I’ll protect your sexy buns.”

Sexy buns?
Randolph wondered how any man’s butt could be
thought of as sexy. Regardless of the repulsive image of a male’s butt,
Randolph shook his head and returned his eyesight to the screen. The first
green dot was on, indicating Mr. Hilden’s computer was up and running.
Good.
Next
came
the second and third LEDs, letting him know he was in. Now with something to
do, Randolph rubbed his hands together to warm them up a might before
connecting the keyboard to the code breaker and eyed the screen as he let his
fingers fly.

Ten minutes into his work, Jill slid down
the wall. “How much longer will this take?”

“Depending on where he has the codes and
files I need, upwards of an hour, perhaps more.”

“An hour?”
Jill
hissed, “Are you crazy? We’re sitting ducks out here!”

“It’ll take longer if you keep distracting
me, now hush!” Randolph spared only a glace her way as she pushed back up to a
standing passion.

Forty-seven minutes later, twenty-eight
before the program reset for late night settings, Randolph unhooked the wires
with a sigh of satisfaction.

“So can we go now?”

“I assume you’re talking about getting
inside the house,” Randolph remarked, pocketing his equipment.

“I had hoped the way you were smiling he
had left his bank account on the computer so we could leave the grounds.”

“That’s wishful thinking, and something I
did explore, but alas no. All I’ve done is shut off his security net in the
house and gained the entry codes to the door’s key pad so I don’t set off any
silent alarms I hadn’t known about.”

“What alarm?”

“Exactly.”
Randolph moved along the wall to the side door. He pulled out the lock picks
and set them in place before punching in the entry code. Once entered, Randolph
moved the instruments deftly with his fingers, unlocking the door easily. After
a look in the darkened kitchen, he moved in and held the door for Jill while
his eyes adjusted to the night light. He closed the door silently and resetting
the inside pad, paused to look over the kaleidoscope of pots, skillets and
utensils hung over a preparation table in the middle of the room. To his left,
the cleaning station took up part of a wall, including a hydro steaming unit.
The latest model, even.
Over to their right, a walk-in cooler with variable locality temperature
controls, very expensive and absolutely indispensable to connoisseurs of
specialty dishes whose ingredients need a certain degree of temperature.