Suzie Elliot, Evil Genius?

Chapter 2

Suzie kept her life very well controlled; she had a strict schedule and kept to it. She had school and her hour of language class afterwards, but otherwise was on her own for the rest of the day, and all day on weekends. She would see Yilin when she delivered meals, or sometimes when she worked out or got snacks, but was otherwise alone unless she was roped into seeing a schoolmate when she couldn't get out of it. So it was, when her perfectly controlled world contained a surprise that Suzie was completely startled.

Hearing the voice behind her, Suzie whirled around, her heart leaping into her throat. Startled by the quick movement, the margays leapt for the railing and scurried down the vines. A figure rose from behind the hot tub, and stepped into the light. It was Johnny Baker, lovely.

"What on earth do you think you're doing?" she asked. Her voice was slightly higher in pitch than normal after her fright.

"I was wondering if I could borrow your math homework. Those word problems are always such a pain," replied Johnny, glancing through the open doors towards her room. Luckily, from the patio you couldn't see the laptop, all that could be seen was a sea of pink paint and bed covers. Pink was the standard color for all of Suzie's friends, so she went with it. Personally, she liked greens and blues better, they were much more calming, but her friends would have thought it odd.

"Homework? Seriously? That is what you're going to go with?" Suzie's shock was rapidly turning to anger, both from the intrusion and the worry about how the vault progress was going. "Why don't you just get out of here before I call the police?"

"Okay, fine, I was bored, and I thought I'd sneak in here and spy on you. Is that what you want to hear?"

"Actually, I want to hear you apologize, and then leave, I'm busy."

"Oh come on, you're not doing anything tonight, right? Let's try out the hot tub!" Johnny obviously thought this was a lot of fun, and he could tell she was very uncomfortable.

"Why would I ever want to use the hot tub with you? Seriously, I'm very busy studying, so please leave!"

"Man, you really are no fun!" complained Johnny, "I thought with your parents away you'd be bored, but you like it alone don't you?"

"Get out now!" yelled Suzie, her face turning red with anger. That last comment was way too close to home and personal for her to ignore.

"OK, fine. Maybe I'll come back when you're in a better mood!" sulked Johnny. He quickly swung over the railing, and the crunching of the vines marked his progress climbing down the trellis.

Suzie ran inside, slammed the French doors closed and locked them, then flopped into her desk chair with tears filling her eyes. She absentmindedly looked over the monitor and was surprised to see that her two men were just now crawling through the vault door, she hadn't missed a thing.

She watched impatiently while the two figures on the screen moved over to the row of black boxes on a shelf in the vault. Quickly, one opened a black pouch and the other started pouring diamonds out of the boxes like miniature sparkling rainbows. It didn't take long before they were done with the boxes. The one with the pouch tied it carefully and placed it into his small black backpack. Suzie's eyes narrowed as she saw his partner grab an unopened box and slip it into his pocket. Quickly, she whipped out her phone.

[Text: Jacob, put it back. Now. I do not employ fools. I destroy them.]

The men were almost back to the vault door when the man with the box in his pocket paused, then pulled his phone out of his pocket. He froze, and then slowly turned his head up to the camera in the vault, his eyes were wide behind his ski mask. Shrugging, he pulled the box out of his pocket, and placed it on the shelf. His partner just shook his head, as they left the vault.

Suzie continued to monitor the men as they made their way out of the building, and then took out her phone again.

[Text: Pietra, package en route. Delivery schedule is confirmed. Flight 183, ticket at counter. Anderson]

Anderson was the alias she was using with Pietra, and one she had used before with normal contracting jobs that required nothing illegal, or at least nothing known to be illegal to the contractor.

Suzie closed down the terminal of security tapes for the vault, odds are the guards would find out what happened when they opened in the morning. In the meantime, she patched into the live security feed of an all-night internet café that was several miles from the vault. There were still a few customers there, typing away at the terminals while rubbing their eyes to keep awake. It would be a little while before the diamonds were delivered, but she could see Pietra, the courier, absently typing at a terminal while looking out for the men. She had a red backpack and a red cap with a Detroit Red Wings logo which was her way of being identified.

Shortly, the men arrived at the café. After entering, they quickly scanned the room. The men were obviously nervous, their eyes darting all over the place. The one called Jacob nudged his partner and nodded towards Pietra, who was seated with a white rose on the table with her book. The rose was their recognition sign, and they quickly approached her and handed her the small backpack, then turned to leave. There was no exchange of funds, or even words, they had already been paid electronically with funds from a fictitious off shore banking firm.

Pietra waited a few minutes for them to get out of the area, then put the smaller backpack into her larger, red one, and got up to leave. She would be at the airport in 30 minutes, and airborne two hours after that. The backpack would never leave her hands until she had delivered it to the client. She had also been paid electronically, though from a different false company. Anyone trying to link all of the players together would have a very hard time doing so. Each company was owned though other false holding companies, which were in turn owned by false identities that had been made carefully by Suzie.

With nothing to do now but wait, Suzie sat back to think about the evening. Usually she did a recap of the operation, listing pros and cons, trying to determine how she could improve things for the next time she ran something. But tonight, all she could think of was Johnny. She had taken care of him in first grade, but that didn't stop him from being her next door neighbor. She couldn't believe he had the audacity to just climb on up to her patio. How had he even gotten into the yard to begin with, climbing the brick wall? She didn't want to think about him returning. Ever. Steps would have to be taken to ensure it never happened again.