“This gig is turning out to be more fun than I’d expected,” he thought.
A third and a fourth image were prominently displayed on the wall as well, both held in place by pins as the others, with thread leading to a location on the map, 412 Big Buck Circle. The first of the images was that of a bungalow set on a lot with large, mature trees shielding the entrance, and a driveway that ran along the side of the house leading to a small garage in the back. The home appeared to be fairly new with no toys strewn across the yard and no signs of a pet. The newly, self-discovered voyeur had studied the pictures carefully.
Each photo that had been included in the packet, delivered under the cover of night, had bits of information that would be crucial for his success, and he had committed them to memory along with the floor plan and layout of the home. The other picture was that of an attractive middle-aged woman dressed in jeans and t-shirt, with short-cropped brown hair, tinted with streaks of gold. It had been taken while the woman was shopping, without her having a clue that she was under surveillance.
Her name was Katherine Criddle but she preferred to be called Katie. The 50ish woman had been widowed over ten years ago and lived on her own in the pictured home, and drove a vintage mustang that she had purchased with some of the insurance money that had come her way after the death of her husband. At the time, the car had brought her some degree of solace, but she had been criticized for what some perceived as giving in to her midlife crisis. Katie dated little but worked full time at the local Piggly Wiggly as a cashier and counted her co-workers as her closest friends. She had one grown child that lived in Jacksonville, Florida, and worked as a manager of a restaurant. Her son was married but had no children and did not visit his mother often and generally only on holidays.
The home in question was at the end of a cul-de-sac and would offer access from the rear over a fence that backed onto a green belt, with no houses within distance to see him either coming or going. The thief reviewed the items he would be taking with him again, checked to make sure the camera had fresh batteries, and that all else was ready for the outing.
Earlier in the day he had taken a rasping file to the bottom of his athletic shoes to wear away any possible identifying marks that could be used to trace what type of shoe he was wearing. Tomorrow he would be burning everything in a 50-gallon drum at the back of his property for good measure anyway. Knowing that it was going to be a very long night he took one final look at the board and the faces looking back at him. He blew a kiss intended for all three ladies pictured there and left the hiding place, closed the wall unit to secure the room and laid down on the couch for a quick nap before having to head out once it was dark.
He pulled the van quietly, without trying to draw attention to himself, into a parking spot near the dumpster at the back of Saints and Sinners, a bar located about two miles from the Criddle home. It was the closest place he had scouted that would keep the vehicle under wraps, until he could return after the outing, without it appearing to be out of place. The bar would be open till almost morning and the old van would blend in with the other customer’s cars parked around the area. He arrived at 11:30 p.m. and waited for a biker couple to park their Harley and enter the bar before he exited the van and started the walk to Big Buck Circle.
He stayed off the main roads and tried his best to look like any other hitchhiker or homeless person getting from point A to point B with a backpack, a bandana around his head and nothing else that would distinguish him from the normal late night crowd. Traffic was light and he worked his way through some fields, in and out of a few dimly lit neighborhoods, until he arrived at the fence dividing the yard of Katie’s home and the green space behind.
A train track was approximately 100 yards from the home that had not been included in the information provided by the anonymous supplier. He quickly and easily scaled the fence, once on the other side, he could see that the lights in the home appeared to be off with no back porch light, and no street light to brighten the backyard space. Pulling the sleeve up on his black shirt he could see the illuminated dial of his watch, 12:15 a.m., he’d made good time and was earlier than he dared enter the home. The professional burglar felt in the front pocket of his dark jeans and secured the key deposited there.
It wouldn’t hurt to at least try the lock to be sure that his entry would be unencumbered, so he purposefully took the backpack from around his shoulder and laid it down on the porch. Painstakingly he eased the screen door open just enough to allow access to the locked handle of the wooden inner door. The screen squeaked ever so slightly, just enough to cause him some concern. Reaching into the pack he removed a small can of WD-40 and applied a quick blast to the hinges. The door now glided open without a whisper and he placed the door against his back as he inserted the key into the lock.
The key fit perfectly and he felt somewhat guilty about entering this way, after all he was a pro and didn’t need the extra help to gain entrance, but the ‘employers’ had insisted that he use the means they provided to leave minimal clues and shake up the public even further. He placed his ear very close to the glass insert in the rear door to confirm no one was still moving about inside before he tried to turn the key. His heart raced as his adrenalin began to kick in and his senses were heightened to the level of a world-class athlete. No sounds reverberated through the glass and he felt it safe to try the lock. He turned his wrist but the key did not budge.
“What the hell,” he thought, and he exerted more pressure on the lock without success.
The key was pulled free of the lock and he inspected it the best he could in the non-existent light. He ran his fingers over the ridges of the key, feeling for burs or irregularities, nothing. Once again the key was inserted into the lock making sure that it hit bottom and he turned, still nothing, and he dared not force the key any more to prevent it from breaking off in the lock.
Somewhere in his memory he recalled his father complaining about a new house key he’d had cut that wouldn’t work. They had returned to the True Value store and the clerk had instructed them to wiggle the key up and down while turning. Apparently, it was not uncommon for new keys to take a few weeks of use before they wore down slightly and worked more efficiently, especially in older locks.
It was still too early to try such an experiment with this particular key and he opted to wait until 1:00 a.m. before trying again. He picked up his bag and moved to a shadowed corner of the yard and sat in the dark, waiting for the next few minutes to pass. While waiting, he removed the camera from the bag and tested the image quality by taking a picture of the back of the house. Not bad, but not great either and he dared not use the flash, at least not outside where it could be seen for miles. Instead he changed the setting for shooting night scenes, opened up the aperture and took a picture of the house again with his face smiling into the camera, taking up a third of the image.
“Good start,” he thought, before returning the camera to the bag.
At exactly 1:00 a.m. he brought the key back to the lock and gently jiggled it up and down while applying some rotational force. Click! It moved and the sound of the lock giving way brought a sigh of relief to his lips. He very carefully and slowly opened the door, feeling for any obstruction that may bang against the back of the door that he had not anticipated. Nothing. It opened enough for him to slide in, including his bag, leaving his shoes on the porch.