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In one hand, Isobel held the black leather zip-up case inside which lay a full assortment of long metal tools. In her other hand, she squeezed the tiny flashlight attached to Gwen’s mad tangle of keys so that a dim ray shot out from the miniature bulb, casting just enough of a glow to illuminate the lock.
Turning her head from side to side, she glanced either way down the sidewalk and then behind them, across the street.
“Would you quit moving?” Gwen snapped.
“I’m trying to keep a lookout.”
“Well, stop it!” she hissed. “I told you. The entire gang who watches from inside the church left for dinner thirty minutes ago. Why do you think I waited so long to come get you? The way I see it, we’ve got an hour and a half easy. Maybe longer if they spring for martinis. And the Poe Toaster fan club shouldn’t start showing up until after nine at the earliest.”
“Yeah, but there are people crossing the street over there. And how do we know the church doesn’t have cameras?”
“It doesn’t,” Gwen said. “I checked.”
Isobel dropped into a crouch next to Gwen, laying the leather case open against the patch of sidewalk in front of the gates. “How long does this take?”
Gwen turned to glare at her. “Maybe you’d like to find a place where we can dig ourselves under? Say hello to Edgar on our way up. Or how about this?” She pulled the picking tool free from the padlock and pointed its spindly end at Isobel. “You can try shimmying up and over while I go in the normal way, because I’m not hiking my tuchus over any walls.”
“Okay, okay!” Isobel said. “Just . . . can we hurry up?”
“Can I get my light back?”
Keys clanking, Isobel aimed the tiny flashlight at the lock.
“Hmm,” Gwen said. She tapped the metal tool against her lips before holding it out to Isobel the way a surgeon might offer a used scalpel to her nurse. “Hand me the ligature director, would you? It’s the one that looks like a claw.”
Isobel snatched the spiked tool from Gwen. She tucked it into a random spot in the open case and turned the flashlight toward the others. She scanned the row of neatly aligned sharp metal objects, each secured with its own elastic band. It seemed as if at least half of them had ends hooked like claws. “Which one is it?” she whispered. “I can’t tell. And what are you even doing with a lock-picking tool kit anyway?”
Gwen grabbed the hand that held the flashlight and, aiming the low glow in her own face, eyed Isobel with a baleful glare. “They’re not lock-picking tools,” she said. “They’re orthodontic instruments. My dad keeps a set in both cars in case he ever has to make hospital calls for face trauma patients.”
“And you use them to pick locks?”
“I always sterilize them when I’m done.”
Isobel twisted her hand in Gwen’s, aiming the flashlight at her own face. “Okay, Gwen, what I mean is—how the hell do you know how to pick a lock in the first place?”
Dropping Isobel’s hand, Gwen reached down to the black leather case and extracted the instrument she needed before returning to her work. “When I was a kid, I wanted to be a magician when I grew up,” she murmured. “Harry, the all-time master, was my idol. I still have a poster of him hanging in my room.”
Isobel’s face scrunched with incredulity. “Potter?” she asked.
Gwen’s head snapped toward Isobel. “Houdini, Isobel,” she all but shouted. “Harry Houdini. The friggin’ Handcuff King!”
“Okay!” Isobel threw up both hands, nearly dropping the keys. “Sorry!”
Gwen snatched for Isobel’s wrist, aiming the light toward the lock again.
“I’ve since learned that picking a lock is a lot like talking to a guy,” she said. “Sometimes all you need is just the right amount of . . . force.”
Click.
Isobel’s mouth fell open in the same moment the shackle popped free. Quickly Gwen stood.
“Here,” she said. “Take these.”
Isobel rose, still gaping as Gwen shoved the instruments into her hand.
Checking over her shoulder once, Gwen yanked the lock from the gate and gave the metal doors a light shove. They eased open with a low and rusty groan.
Gwen hurried in.
