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The corpse moved under a layer of wet leaves. With the
passing of the sun, darkness gathered. It was time.
It's never easy, finding just the right house.
The ‘Sun purred through alleyways. A
calculating gaze skimmed the tops of tall privacy fences. He let her rumble to a
halt near a long, tall iron fence. Around the back it became a fortress of brick
and stone.
No longer so cocky and self-assured, Benny scowled.
“This is it, my man.”
‘Sounds like fun.' Grampa's voice had an
uncertain quality to it. ‘But a lot of stupid ideas do.'
With the injury to his spine always in the back of his
mind, Benny eased up the wall. It had been quite a while since he had last done
this sort of thing. Training received from his rough-&-tumble stepfather,
Carl the Papa Bear, paid off, and paid good, like always.
The man had been a road-warrior of the first degree. A
war veteran and a good father.
With a slight grunt Benny pulled himself to the top. A
coldly alert eye caressed vast lawns and shrubbery. He scanned the back of the
white mansion.
Where was the security system? The black, midnight air
was growing worse, hotter as the night wore on. It made people sleepy, like they
were drugged, but it also made them more likely to shoot first. He had to find
the sec system, work his was along the top of the wall, then cut a few wires.
When him and Carl were in Philadelphia's reopened Walnut Street pen under the
WPA, Witless no-Protection Asses, Benny picked up a lot. Rewire this system and
the house will turn on its owners, do it another way and the house-computer will
adopt you as a favorite son and voila! It'll show you where the family
treasures are hidden. Even tell the electronic guards and rent-a-cops to split
six ways from Sunday.
What a way to make a living.
He reached the wall closest to the house, dropped into
a garden bed. Benny squatted behind a bush and peered out. The security system
leaped at Benny in the form of a hysterical black police dog. Benny leaped for
the top, the long fangs grazed his heel and he was over and gone.
Spotlights swept the estate, men in suits and uniforms
came charging form the house. Benny departed with undignified haste.
So much for 200 Pennsylvania Avenue.
©2003 StoriesByEmail.com
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