I could feel my mobile in the inside pocket of my fleece and checked again that it was turned off before rezipping. You can never tell when the bad fairy might pay you a visit and sprinkle the fuck-you-up dust.
Finally, I checked that all the other bits and pieces for the close target recce were good and secure in their pockets. Everything I was taking in was tied to my clothes with fishing-line.
As a car rumbled along the street I pulled the curled-up cola-bottle disc from the front of my fleece. I shoved it up through the narrow gap between the two sash window frames and watched it curl round the other side.
'Lottie, you bollix!' Wheelie-bin man was getting pissed off with his little furry friend. 'Come here!'
I wiggled the plastic circle until it rested against the brass latch, then turned and pulled it along the frame. The latch started to swivel open under the pressure of the coiled plastic.
The device was also magic for opening Yale locks on doors. Credit cards don't work like they do in Hollywood because there are two right-angles to negotiate before getting to the deadlock. As long as you keep on turning and pushing, the curly stuff will get round them and push the bolt open. But it wasn't so easy, these days, to find nice thick plastic bottles. This going-green business was fucking up the method-of-entry trade for sure, but luckily the cheap stores' own brands were still up to spec.
Within seconds the window was unlocked. I pulled the plastic back through and put it down at my feet.
The bottom of the frame was stuck, but it didn't take much effort to budge it. I pushed up, just a couple of centimetres at a time. When it was open as far as it would go, I heaved myself up on my stomach. Once inside, I made sure I kept on my knees instead of my feet.
I was sitting on the varnished wooden floorboards. I cocked my head and listened, tuning in to my new environment. I'd just been making a lot of movement and wanted to be sure nobody had heard it and was reacting. I'd also opened a window. Even when people are asleep, their eardrums can be sensitive to minute changes in air pressure. It was probably caveman survival stuff — you needed a little advance warning if a brontosaurus was coming into the cave to eat you.
I waited a little longer. There was no rush. The hard part was done. This toilet area was the buffer zone between the outside and the in.
There was still no movement, no late-night snackers raiding the fridge in the kitchen above me. No sound from a radio or TV.
I pulled the two plastic shower caps from my jeans and put them over my boots, tucking them in at the sides for extra grip. I didn't want to mark the tiles or drag in any of the wet, grimy shit from the street. Siobhan was probably not out there with the Hoover every day, but people notice these things. And while she didn't look like the kind of girl who pulled on the Marigolds, staff have eyes too.
The next problem was going to be the motion detectors. Was the house zoned? Did she put the alarm on when she went to bed? Chances were she didn't, but I had no way of telling. All I knew was that when she had finally thrown her hand in, there wasn't a long delay between her coming out of the kitchen and the hallway light turning off. She'd not had time to stop and tap in a code, just turned off the light and walked straight up the stairs. I didn't think she'd gone to the pad I'd spotted in the hallway. But for all I knew there might be another upstairs.
I took the black balaclava from the front of the fleece and pulled it over my head. I had cut out two holes for my ears. In the dark they're more important than eyes so there was no sense in keeping them covered.
Easing down the handle a fraction at a time, I opened the door a couple of inches. The hinges didn't squeak. I opened it some more and slipped out of the buffer zone.
The first thing I looked at was the blue light on the motion detector. It flickered as it sensed me. I held my breath, waiting for the initial warning tone that normally kicks in after about twenty seconds.
Nothing happened.
I rocked backwards and forwards. The motion detector kicked off again and the blue light flickered — but again, no response.
I went back into the toilet, pulled the window closed and eased the latch back into place. Everything had to look normal while I was inside the building. It wasn't very likely she was going to come all the way downstairs to use the plumbing, but if she did, that was the job fucked.
Back in the hallway, I stopped, looked and listened. The wool of the balaclava was warm and wet around my mouth. I let my jaw drop open so that all the internal noises like breathing and swallowing didn't intrude. The house was almost completely silent: no ticking clocks, not even the common night creaks as bits of the building settled after the day.
First stop was the boy's bedroom. I eased myself in and pulled the keyring torch from my pocket. The fishing-line attaching it to my jeans belt loop had to unravel before I was able to get the beam shining where I wanted it.
The laptop and modem were still in place. I'd deal with them later if I could. The mobile was the priority. The laptop would take some fiddling. If I was compromised I'd deck whoever it was, then leg it with the laptop and maybe her handbag or something so it looked like a burglary.
I closed the door and took a few careful paces to the spiral staircase. I put my foot on the first step, right against the wall. It took my weight without protest.
I headed up, taking each step gingerly.
Slowly, slowly, my head came level with the kitchen floor. No lights were on. A little ambient glow from the end of the street washed through the rear window, and a little more from the adjoining door from the front room. The only other source was the standby lights on the microwave, cooker and all the other gadgets.
The smell of cigarettes and pizza got stronger as I moved up the stairs.
The empty delivery box sat with its lid open on the wooden island, alongside an empty bottle and a glass with only a drop left in it. The mail had been opened and lay next to the now overflowing ashtray.
Slowly and deliberately I made my way through the double doors and into the front room. The neck of yet another bottle stuck out of the bin.
The drawer had been pushed right in. I made a mental note. That was exactly how I had to leave it. She would know every detail of this house and its contents, whether she realized it or not. Maybe the drawer was really hard to close, and had to be given a bit of extra force that took it less than flush with the front of the desk. If I didn't do exactly the same, her alarm bells might ring.
I eased my left hand under the drawer, lifted the handle with my right and pulled, slowly but firmly.
The drawer opened six inches, enough to expose the grey plastic mobile sitting in the bottom-right corner. I studied its exact position in relation to the biros and bits of paper, then lifted it out.
I took off the back. No way was I going to switch it on and let it blurt some happy tune. A quick sniff of the SIM card was all I needed.
The stairs creaked.
And then the hall lights came on.
38
I pushed the drawer shut and dropped behind the blue velvet two-seater. The mobile phone was still in my hand.
The slap of flip-flops approached along the tiled hall floor. They came at normal walking pace, not agitated, not tentative, and padded into the kitchen.
The spotlights went on.
The movement in the kitchen would cover my noise. I half turned, reached up, opened the drawer and pushed the phone as far back as I could. Siobhan or whoever it was might come for it. Perhaps I'd find out where Dom was just by listening. If not, I'd wait, as planned, until I could copy the SIM card.
The feet slapped their way down the kitchen stairs. There was nothing to tell me whether they were Dom's, Siobhan's, Finbar's, or someone else's altogether.