Dragons, Heists and Other Retirement Plans (Hornsboggle & Dodge #1)

Prologue

MORE THAN FORTY YEARS AGO

“Imogene,” the first woman whispered, nudging her friend. “Imogene, focus.”

“I am focusing, Katty. Why can’t I look at a pretty thing while I’m focusing?”

Katty frowned, then noticed that Imogene was not merely admiring her engagement ring as she had thought, but was in fact tapping her ring finger and thumb together, counting noiselessly, listening, as she herself was, for the next appointed chime of the town clock.

Four dings and one sullen dong resounded through the rain. Quarter past the hour.

“There he goes,” said Imogene.

Katty eyed the large troll sentry she knew was nearest to them along the row of offices and shops.

He withdrew himself from a shadow like a piece of wall come to life, padded up the street, and turned the corner down the alleyway on his patrol.

Now, they’d have six minutes until he emerged again and headed back their way.

Four minutes until the other troll stationed nearby would become visible too, and move within earshot from his current post down the sidewalk.

One minute until the lookout on the roof pulled his head back from the balustrade, opening their window of opportunity to break into the building.

Counting down the seconds, Katty jerked her head in a nod and then brushed away the poofed cat tail that suddenly filled her face as the feline clambered over her leg and took up its station in the gutter, gazing upward.

Exactly one minute after the chime, the small cat lowered its chin and slow-blinked at her. The all-clear.

Katty smirked. She loved troll guards. Something about the resonating stone of their bodies gave them a remarkably reliable internal clock, perpetually punctual, and a dedicated study of their movements could make them a thief’s best friend.

It also helped, of course, to have a remarkably reliable cat as a lookout.

“Time to do your stuff, Katty,” whispered Imogene.

Katty nodded and easily persuaded the door they’d been crouching beside to open with her lockpicks.

She gave her cat a “wait-for-me” wink and slid inside the building, followed by her friend, who cracked her knuckles and began to withdraw the safecracking equipment from her bag as they crossed the spacious lobby, keeping to the shadows.

Katty’s hand was on the knob of the rear office door, her lockpicks again at the ready, when the floor suddenly shuddered with a spectacular BOOM! and the door burst off its hinges.

The two women exchanged shocked looks from underneath the fallen door and pushed it aside together.

“What the—?” Imogene started.

Katty rose to her feet first and, after hastily helping Imogene to standing, darted into the back room.

Amid a simply staggering mess, there sat the safe, already open.

Inside it perched the shelf on which their quarry should have been, but was now gone.

And beside the safe stood a person, where there should have been no one.

He was tall, smartly dressed, and completely unmasked, but she did not recognize him—although his eyes lit up when he saw her.

“Hello, Caterina,” he said, a honeyed voice from a handsome face, and with a delighted and acrobatic air, he dove out of the room past her, leaving her spluttering.

Rooted by her astonishment, she watched him vault over the broken door and murmur “Excuse me” to Imogene before she was able to gather herself and pursue him.

“Hey!” Caterina shouted. “Stop!” As the stranger bolted across the open lobby, she tried to nab him by an arm or by his tight-fitting vest before he could escape into the night.

But he was always just out of reach, laughing heartily.

Who was this person? As her fingers stretched for his high collar, he threw wide the front door.

And the world exploded. For the second time that evening, Caterina found herself unexpectedly on the floor.

The rival thief was nowhere to be seen now, nor was the front door, replaced by a gaping hole in the wall.

The troll sentries, who should have remained none the wiser, had been clearly roused to alarm by the explosion in the back room and had abandoned their patrols in a fury.

The reckless club that had obliterated the door swung again, a hair’s breadth from Caterina’s face on the cold tile.

Plaster and wood showered around her and she threw her arms over her head.

A feline wail rose above the thundering rain outside.

“Katty!” Imogene was beside her in a moment, and this time it was Caterina’s turn to be helped to standing. “Time to go!”

The two women slid and ducked and leapt as the troll guards swung their clubs wildly, bringing down joists and plaster and brickwork with abandon and without apparent regard for their employer’s property.

Caterina and Imogene shielded their faces from the debris, dodged thick troll arms, and rolled under thick troll legs until they were back out into the soaking night.

“Run, Katty!” Imogene bellowed, digging in her bag for a flash bomb and then throwing it behind them to blind the trolls in their pursuit.

A desperate meow ripped through the chaos, and Caterina heaved rubble away from the sound to sweep the bawling cat up under an arm.

She stole one more glance behind her as she fled, clutching her beloved mud-soaked cat, and her bleary vision crystalized on the lithe and careless stranger who had turned that whole evening upside down.

He was running in the opposite direction down the street, but suddenly he stopped. And looked back. And smiled.

And winked.

Caterina froze. Rival thieves did not wink at each other. It was simply unprofessional. She blinked the rain from her eyes, and he was gone.