Aurum Regium

Oliver was back at the party and his eyes were trained on Jack. Jack was displaying signs of stress and thus, whenever, Oliver offered him a drink he took it and drained the glass at once. This cycle continued quite a number of times before Oliver realized that it was time to do what he had been waiting for. He went near the entrance of the basement and then pressed the button of a remote detonator. Instantly there was a deafening noise as a car parked near the house exploded. Oliver smiled a little as he saw the people run around in confusion. He was the one who had parked the car on the porch of the house, and he was the one who had fitted a remote detonation device near its fuel tank.

Oliver waited for some time before executing his second act. He let the panic reach its pinnacle when he took out his mobile phone, tapped on the screen a few times, and the lights of the entire property went out. He then had to wait for just a moment before the guards at the entrance of the basement abandoned their post to understand what was going on. Seeing his chance, Oliver quickly proceeded towards the safe and then all he had to do was wait. If he knew anything about human nature, he knew that in times of crisis, a person went near their most prized possession in order to guard it and that was what Jack would do.

Oliver had to wait in the shadows only for a few moments before he heard a man descending the stairs and coming towards the pillar that concealed the safe. He saw the outline of Jack’s figure and waited patiently as the latter opened the safe. The mechanism of the emergency light was activated and just as that light illuminated Jack’s face Oliver took a syringe out of his pocket and injected it into Jack’s neck from behind. Within a few seconds, Jack lay crumpled on the floor. Oliver looked at the collection in front of his eyes, took out a foldable bag from under his jacket and began humming a little tune while committing a presumably impossible robbery.

Williamson Residence:

Michael was staring at the body of Calvin. His hands were not shaking nor was he displaying any other signs of distress, but Jefferson knew that from the inside he was trembling. It was a completely natural reaction after killing a person in the line of duty. It was not a murder, but still, taking a person’s life was nothing to be taken lightly.

Jefferson looked at Michael and said, “Are you all right Michael?”

“I’m fine. The man was a criminal.”

Jefferson did not say anything else. He knew that no matter what happened, Michael would not share his feelings with him. Harold Williamson walked in through the front door and faltered when he saw the body.

“What happened?”

Jefferson looked at Michael and then said, “We stopped a robbery, that’s what happened.”

At that precise moment, Jefferson’s phone rang, the call was from Jack. In a wheezing voice, he said, “Jefferson, they… they stole it.”

Jefferson almost dropped the phone from his hands. “What?”

“They stole the collection.”

These words were enough to shock Jefferson into realizing the truth. One of the thieves had used his partner as a distraction to make the FBI go away from the real sight of the crime.

“Jefferson, what happened?” asked Michael.

“They got the collection.”

Michael and Sam just stared at Jefferson, but Harold’s’ face went pale and his wife almost fainted.  Michael looked as the paramedics took away Calvin’s body. The thief had used him as a weapon for murder, to eliminate an unwanted variable from the equation.

 “Well, what now?” asked Brandon.

Jefferson did not reply, instead, he walked out of the house and drove away.

The party venue:

Jack was sitting on a chair with a glass of water in his hands. A medic had checked him and given him a clean bill of health, however, Jack felt far from all right. In the course of a single evening, his house had been targeted and his collection had been robbed.

The other guests of the party were still in confusion. The police were trying to take their statements but most of them were absolutely clueless as to what was going on. As far as any of them were concerned, they had arrived at a party, and then a car had blown up, the lights had gone out and what followed was absolute chaos. Then the guards had found Jack lying senseless in the basement and the open door of a seemingly nonexistent, but definitely empty, safe.

Jack had just kept his glass of water on the table when he saw Jefferson’s car pull up on the porch. He walked towards the entrance in a hurry and met Jefferson just as he was about to enter the house.

“Did the thieves rob our house too?”

“No, we prevented that,” replied Jefferson. “Now, I need you to tell me exactly what happened here.”

“What happened was that the thieves knocked me out and stole my collection!”

“I require a more definitive and less informal description of the events. Now sit down and talk.”

While Jack relayed the events to Jefferson. Michael went down to check the safe along with Sam and Brandon, while Olivia stayed with Jefferson, listening closely to what Jack was Saying.

Michael reached his destination and inspected the safe without touching it. After a moment he said, “One thing is quite certain, the thief did not break into the safe. It was opened in the usual manner, no signs that the lock has been tampered with.”

“And Jack was the only person who could have done that,” said Sam.

Brandon was looking at the safe from quite a distance, then he walked very slowly towards Michael, who had his back turned towards him.  Brandon flicked Michael on the ear and this action earned him an angry look from Michael.

“Exactly what do you think you are doing?”

“Demonstrating my theory.”

“And what is your theory? Flicking a person’s ear hurts?”

“No, what I wanted to say was that the robbery was ingeniously carried out. Jack was made to panic and thus the thief knew that he would go to check on the collection, which is why he was waiting for him right where I was standing a minute ago.”

Sam said, “So when Jack had opened the safe, the man just had to knock him out and he would have access to the open safe without any trouble. That’s smart.”

Soon the three men were standing near Jefferson and the five of them were discussing what they had learned so far. The theory formed by Michael, Sam and Brandon was correct and now it was clear how the thief had committed the crime. The only question that remained was to decide what to do next. The thief now possessed what he was after, he had the skins, and he had the diamonds and he had no one he had to share his loot with. Everything seemed to be going well for him, but the conditions were unfavorable for the ones on the side of the law.

After confirming that there was nothing that the agents could find out at the crime scene, they decided to head back to the office. It was late night, but no one wanted to sleep, each one of them was enraged and motivated. They wanted to do all that they could to catch the thief.

They reached the office just after twelve and assembled around the large table that had been set up near the coffee machine. Their tasks were clearly divided. Brandon and Olivia had a map of the area opened in front of them in order to figure out the most probable escape route that would be taken by the thief. Michael and Jefferson were going over the footage of the entire duration of the party to see if they could find anyone suspicious and Sam was tasked with trying to get as much information as possible from Calvin’s mobile. For about an hour there was absolute silence as the people worked on their respective tasks devotedly.

Finally, Brandon said, “We’ve got something.”

Everyone stopped what they were doing as all eyes turned towards the couple. Olivia turned the map towards the audience and said, “There are three routes which the thief could have taken to exit the house.”

“But the first one of them involved getting out of the front porch and that was ruled out since that was where the guards were concentrated,” explained Brandon.

“Now, he could have taken any of the two routes that are left but we believe he took this one,” said Olivia tracing a route with her pencil.

“And why is that?” asked Jefferson.

“Because that route has the least number of cameras and also, it originates from the staff exit of the house which was the most convenient place to exit from, especially during the panic,” said Olivia.

“All right then, Sam, get the footage from that route.”

“On it!”

Michael said, “The thief had hacked into the cameras before he committed the robbery, which means that we have absolutely no footage of that time, and so far, I have not found anyone who sticks out in the footage of the party.”

“There is not much on Calvin’s phone. Apparently, he had bought a new one recently so that in case someone got hold of it, it wouldn’t have much information on it,” explained Sam.

“So, there is nothing that can help us?” asked Michael.

“There is something. He had made multiple calls to a number within the last two days.”

“And who does the number belong to?” asked Jefferson.

“I’m not sure, he hasn’t saved it, I could pull up the records but that would take some time.”

Jefferson realized that what they were doing was not very productive. They were working in the heat of the moment without a plan. “All right, pull up the records but get some rest first.”

“Jefferson, with all due respect, we cannot rest,” said Michael.

“That would not be wise, presently we have nothing to work on, no leads whatsoever,” said Jefferson.

What Jefferson had said was correct and everyone knew that, therefore, all of them left the office with the conviction of coming back the next day to get the thief and also get some payback for all the embarrassment he had caused them.

A hotel in central NYC:

Oliver was seated in an armchair in a luxury hotel room. His choice of accommodation after committing a robbery was quite unorthodox but, like everything else he did, there was reason for that as well. Whenever a robbery was committed, the first place that the FBI went to look for the thieves, were small hotels, places where one could stay without being detected, but no one would even think that a man who had committed a robbery, would boldly go ahead and stay in a luxury hotel.

Oliver’s fingers were closed around a cup of strong coffee. He needed to clear his head and he found that coffee was best for achieving that result. After he had emptied his cup, he felt a lot better than before. Even though he was tired, he could not help but wonder what would be going through the minds of the players in the opposite team. He figured that they might be thinking that he was done and that he would try to escape but little did they know that was only partially correct. There was no plan which could work perfectly without improvising and thus, as the agents had improvised, so had Oliver. The robberies were no longer the only thing he planned to do, he planned to teach a lesson to the ones who stood in his way.