Mystery Woman

Chapter 1

      It was just past midnight as the car pulled into the driveway and into the double garage. A man and a woman in their fifties emerged from the garage and walked up to the front door of the house. They talked cheerfully discussing the play they had just been to see. The man unlocked the front door to the two story brick house and stepped inside where he stopped to enter a number into a keypad to turn off the security alarm. He had barely finished entering the number when three figures appeared on the doorstep behind the woman. Before either of them could react they had pushed the woman roughly through the door. They rushed in behind her closing the door. It happened so quickly it was over in three seconds.

"Who the hell are you?" the man asked, "What do..."

"Shut up," snapped a man. "Do exactly as we say or we'll kill you."

The frightened man and woman then noticed that all three intruders were pointing handguns at them.

"You want to rob us, is that it?" the man gasped.

"Very good. Go to the top of the class," replied an intruder.

The man looked closely at the intruders. They had made no attempt to cover or hide their faces. The first man was heavily built with greasy brown hair and a short beard. The second man had a small wiry build with a crewcut and a stubble of a beard. The third person stepped up to stand in front of the man.

"Tom and Lily Henderson, right?"

Lily Henderson, gasped in surprise as she looked into the face of a young woman, probably in her twenties who was pointing a gun at her.

Her husband answered. "Yes, that's who we are." He looked at the woman. She might have been attractive, but was dressed in dirty jeans and an old leather jacket. Her shoulder length dark hair was matted and untidy.

"Good," the woman with the gun replied. "Now let's all go into your lounge room and we can get down to business."

The couple were herded into the next room made to sit on the lounge.

Okay let's go see what we can find," the taller man said.

"Let's save some time," the woman said. "Tom, tell me where the safe is and the combination."

"We don't have a safe," Henderson muttered.

"Of course you have a safe. Where else would you keep your cash and valuables?"

"No, there's no safe."

The woman became agitated. She walked up to Henderson and his wife and pointed her gun in their faces. "Tell me where the damn safe is and the combination or I'll blow your heads off!" she screamed.

Lily shrank back and started crying. Henderson was visibly shaken. "All right, all right, don't shoot us. It's upstairs in my study, the second door on the right. The safe is behind the painting. The combination is left eight, right fifteen, left twenty one."

"Good," the woman replied regaining her normal voice. "Jimmy, you stay here and watch these two. If they make a move, shoot them in the kneecaps. Len, come with me and we'll make a withdrawal from that safe."

"Are you sure this safe will be loaded with cash?" Len growled as he and the woman climbed the stairs.

"Of course it will be," the woman answered. "These people are rich, and rich people always keep plenty of cash in their safes."

They found the study, removed the painting from the wall and opened the safe.