29. The vengeful thief

Crystal Allen

That carriage belonged to a friend of Ansel, and he was using it today as our getaway vehicle. The clothes I was wearing today, if it were in broad daylight, many would say were at least indecent and very daring for a woman to wear, as I was wearing black pants and a dark coat because I needed to wear something comfortable. To be able to move around those secret hiding places that would take me to my father's room, the long and heavy dresses weren't going to help me; they were only going to hinder me.

Ansel helped me climb the wall of the mansion where everything was pitch black as it was very late at night and everyone was already asleep, but I didn't care that I wasn't entering through the front door of my own house; I deftly jumped to the other side of the wall with my blood pumping in my ears as the adrenaline of the act took over me completely. I was feeling like a complete rebel at that moment, and few ladies had the courage to do what I was doing.

"Be careful of the guards." Ansel whispered loudly, warning me.

"Don't worry, it's not the first time I've ditched them." I whispered back with a smile on my lips. It was true that I escaped from my house so many times that I already knew exactly how to get in and out without the guards even seeing me.

I held the empty bag and approached the house, taking care to hide perfectly in the shadows. Some guards were scattered around the mansion's courtyard, but as I had thought, they were no hindrance to me, and I was able to get to the back of the mansion without much trouble. There was a secret entrance hidden among the bushes at the back of the house. This secret entrance had already been explored by Lea and me as we grew up in this place.

When we were little, we played hide and seek using the hiding places to hide, but as I got older and older, those hiding places served as secret places where I could hide from my father's anger, his fake wife's anger, and the longing I felt. From my mother, and later it started to serve as secret passages when I wanted to escape in the middle of the night on festival days and wanted to go celebrate in the city square with the crowd, since my father wouldn't allow me to do that, so I went in hiding. And clearly, I forced Lea to always stay by my side; wherever I went, she had to come with me to get her hands dirty for me and take the blame for everything.

But today was different; today would be me getting my hands dirty. I slipped my body through the secret entrance that I could only crawl through and followed that path so familiar to me to my father's office, where I knew that was where he kept his money. My father was a cunning man when it came to hiding his money, but I was his daughter, and I knew how to observe like no one else. I managed to get into that office that was right next to his room; everything was pitch black and silent, like the cemetery itself, but I knew that place so well, so I quickly approached the wall where I knew my father used to hide his fortune behind a painting.

I slowly removed the heavy painting, leaving it low against the wall, and then I looked at the safe right in front of my eyes. My father thought I was very naive, to the point of not caring if I was present in his office or not when he was opening it. Then I knew exactly what the combination was. I started pulling the strings that activated the numbers on the safe, being careful not to make too much noise. I couldn't forget that my father's room was just a wall away, and finally I pulled the handle down, and with a click, the safe door opened. Only with the moonlight, which came through the closed window as illumination, could I see how much money my father was keeping there.

"What a foolish man." I clicked my tongue and opened the black bag that I had brought with me. The bag was empty, but I would make a point of filling it with riches. I started taking the wads of money and putting them in that bag. I used both hands to be faster; I took the gold jewelry and precious stones that he kept there and put everything in the bag. "You never allowed me to wear those jewelries; only that bitch of your wife deserved to wear them? I just want to see the surprise you will have when you wake up in the morning and find that your treasure no longer exists. Ha ha ha!"

I was taking everything that was rightfully mine; all of that cost my mother her sanity, so it was no longer fair for me to take what was mine. The safe was so deep that I even had to stretch my arm to get more treasure; my bag was already practically full, but I wasn't satisfied. I wanted to take everything from them—absolutely everything. If it were possible, I wanted to take even the clothes from their bodies and leave them naked and in bastards. My husband and wife; my father and stepmother; the people who ruined my life.

I was feeling the dark interior of the safe to check that I hadn't left a single note behind, and that's when my fingers touched a metallic material that was warm, which was different from all those cold jewelries. I picked up the object and brought it to me. It was a kind of pendant with a transparent, curious stone. I ran my finger over the stone, and the material glowed faintly, which left me enchanted. What could that be? When, out of nowhere, a clicking sound at the office window made me wake up, Ansel had told me that he would throw a pebble at the window to notice that I was taking too long, and if I didn't get back to him in five minutes, then that meant that I was in danger, and he would come in for me to save me.

"Holy shit…" I muttered, closing the bag and the empty safe. I had almost forgotten about my mission. However, the necklace that intrigued me, I made a point of keeping on my neckline. I would try to find out more about that pendant when I was away from here. I held the strap of the bag on my shoulder. The bag was now heavy because of the amount of money, gold, precious stones, and other valuable objects that I had taken from the safe. But when I got up to leave, the office door was opened and the light was turned on. My father was there, right in front of me.

His eyes were wide with confusion when he looked at the safe, some fortune spread across the office floor, and when he looked at me holding a full bag and with one foot already inside my secret exit. "Crystal? What the hell are you doing?"