Three Fates

shopping’s the only merit badge I ever earned.” She snagged one of a pair of snakeskin pumps off a wall of shelves. “My size. It’s fate.”
    “You’ve got a job to do here, Cleo.”
    “Okay, okay.” But she stuffed the shoes into her bag before she crouched to unroll his tools.
    Jack opened the panel to the safe and exposed the security pad. He interfaced his portable computer, engaged the search.
    “Sooner or later, she’s bound to figure out you’re the only one who could pull this off,” Cleo commented. “She’s going to be really pissed off at you.”
    “Yeah. I’m shaking.” He watched the readout as the first two numbers of the combination of seven locked into place. “What’s our time?”
    “Four minutes, twenty seconds. We’re skating right along.” While she waited, Cleo pushed through a rack of suits. “I don’t go for the lady-suit look. But hey, this one’s cashmere. Bet it’ll look sharp on Tia.”
    She rolled it up, added it to her booty.
    “Combination’s locked,” Jack told her. “Cross your fingers, gorgeous.”
    She did, on both hands, then stepped behind him. “Son of a bitch.” She breathed out audibly when he opened the door. Clotho glinted like a star. “There she is. You copy that, you guys? We’ve got her.” She held out the padded bag for Jack. “Rebecca? I’m giving your man a big, sloppy kiss. So deal with it.”
    When she was done, she reached for her bag again. “Don’t close it yet, Jack. I got a little present for Anita.”
    “We don’t leave anything behind,” he began, then stared at what Cleo pulled out of her bag. “What is that? Is that Barbie?”
    “Yeah. To replace the statue. I picked out the wardrobe on a quick trip to FAO Schwarz.” Gently, Cleo stood the black-leather-clad, buxom blond doll in the safe. “I call her Cat Burglar Barbie. See, she’s got a little goody bag. It’s got lock picks in it I made out of little safety pins, and this tiny plastic doll, pretty much to scale, I painted silver to represent the Fate.”
    “Cleo, you’re a regular Martha Stewart.”
    “I got hidden talents, all right. Bye-bye, Barbie,” she added, and blew a kiss as Jack closed the safe.
    They shut the panel, gathered the tools.
    “Okay, once we leave this room, no talking. Hand signals only. Out the door, to the right. Down the steps, to the left. Stay close.”
    “I’m practically riding piggyback.”
    “This part’s trickier,” he reminded her. “We get caught in here, it’s all for nothing.”
    “Just lead the way.”
    They slipped out of the bedroom. As they couldn’t risk flashlights now, they waited for their eyes to adjust to the dark of the second-level hallway. The house was silent, so silent Cleo could hear the ticking of her own heart. And wondered how it had managed to rise up into her throat.
    At Jack’s signal, they moved forward, footsteps soft over the Karastan runner.
    At the base of the stairs Cleo began to think the place was more tomb than house. The air was cool, the rooms soundless, and the street sounds muffled by drape-covered windows.
    Then she heard it, the instant before Jack froze and she bumped into his back. The sound of a door opening, a spill of light from the far end of the first-floor hallway and the shuffle of footsteps.
    She and Jack moved as one into the cover of the first doorway. There were distant voices, almost a tunnel effect. It took her several sweaty seconds to realize the house wasn’t full of people. Television, she decided, then had to swallow a nervous chuckle when she recognized the obnoxious, thrumming music from Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
    Perfect, she thought. Dead-on perfect.
    When the light went off again, a door closed, she counted to ten until she felt Jack relax beside her. Just as she counted the steps they took down the hall, in case she had to make a dash back to cover.
    They melted like shadows into the library and secured the door at their backs.
    They moved fast now, and without words.
    Penlights guided them to the glass-fronted bookshelves. There was a quiet rattle and creak that sounded like cannon fire in the silence as he opened a case. He cleared a section, passing her volume after volume of a leather-bound collection of Shakespeare. When the safe was exposed, he drew out his portable.
    He tapped his watch. Cleo flashed the twenty-minute sign before she crouched, unzipped his bag and carefully took out the items chosen from Morningside.
    He placed them