health one day and drop dead the next.
Lee looked down at his muddy pants and worked a painful cramp out of
his weary leg at the same time he swatted a mosquito out of his eye.
Hotel-size house. Servants. Fountains. Big horses. Sleek private
jet..
Probably all a real pain in the ass.
Lee hugged the camera to his chest. It was loaded with 400-speed film
that Lee was turbo charging by setting the camera’s ISO speed to 1600.
Fast film required less light, and with the shutter opening for shorter
periods of time, there was far less likelihood that camera wobble or
vibration would distort any photos. He slipped on a 600mm telephoto
lens and flipped down the lens’ attached tripod.
Peering between the branches of a wild dogwood, Lee focused on the rear
of the cottage. Scattered clouds drifted past the moon and deepened
the darkness around him. He took a series of shots and then put the
camera away.
As he stared at the house, the problem was he couldn’t tell from here
if the place was occupied or not. It was true he couldn’t see a light
on, but the place might have an interior room not visible from here.
Added to that, he couldn’t see the front of the house, and there might
be a car parked there, for all he knew. He had observed the traffic
and foot patterns on his other trips here. There hadn’t been much to
see. Few cars came down this road, and no walkers or joggers did. All
the cars he had seen had turned around, obviously having made a wrong
turn. All, that is, except one.
He glanced up at the sky. The wind had died down. Lee roughly
calculated that the clouds would obscure the moonlight for a few
minutes more. He slung the pack across his back, tensed for a moment,
as though marshaling all of his energy, and then slid out of the
woods.
Lee glided noiselessly until he reached a spot where he could squat
behind a copse of overgrown bushes and still observe the front and back
of the house. While he watched the house, the shades of darkness grew
lighter as the moon reappeared. It seemed to be lazily watching him,
curious as to what he was doing here.
Though isolated, the cottage was only a forty-minute drive from
downtown D.C. That made it very convenient for any number of things.
Lee had made inquiries about the owner and found him to be legitimate.
The renter, however, had been a little tougher to pin down.
Lee pulled out a device that looked like a cassette recorder but was
actually a battery-powered lock-pick gun, along with a zippered case,
which he opened. He felt the different lock picks inside, then
selected the one he wanted. Using an Allen wrench, he secured the pick
into the machine. Lee’s fingers moved quickly, confidently, even as
another bank of clouds passed over, deepening the darkness once more.
Lee had done this so many times that he could have closed his eyes and
his fingers would carry on, manipulating his tools of felony with
enviable precision.
Lee had already checked out the locks on the cottage with his spotting
scope during daylight. That had also disturbed him. Deadbolt locks on
all the exterior doors. Sash locks on both the first- and second-story
windows. All the hardware looked new too. On a falling-down rental in
the middle of nowhere.
Despite the cool weather, a head of nervous sweat surfaced on Lee’s
forehead as he thought about this. He touched the 9mm in his belt clip
holster; the metal was comforting. He took a moment to put the single-
action pistol in a cocked-and-locked position-a round in the firing
chamber, the hammer cocked and the safety set.
The cottage also had a security system. That had been a real stunner.
If he was smart, Lee would pack his tools of criminality and go home,
reporting failure to his employer. However, he took pride in his work.
He would see it through at least until something happened to make him
change his mind. And Lee could run very fast when he needed to.