“I don’t see why they bother with the gates,” Eve said as she waved at the uniformed guard, a young man who waved back at them and hit the button that opened the rolling gate, proving her assumption. She hadn’t bothered to put a Vista Grande resident decal on the Rolls and hadn’t been stopped at the gate yet. “It’s a joke.”
“Maybe so, but they get a lot less crime in the gated communities than they do in the ones that are wide open,” Duncan said. “The cameras catch the license plates and faces of everyone who drives in and out. That’s a big deterrent.”
“Not to the home invaders we’re after.”
Eve drove up the steep hill. Both sides of the street were lined with mini-mansions in the same Spanish-Mediterranean style as the front gate guardhouse with red-tiled roofs, perfectly manicured landscaping, lots of German-made cars in the driveways, and hardly a security camera in sight. Or, she knew, even out of sight.
“The gates give the residents a false sense of security,” Eve said. “They have Ring doorbells, simple alarms they rarely turn on, and are too lazy to lock their doors and windows. They might as well have lighted signs on their front lawns that say ‘Come and get it.’”
“Maybe that’s what we need,” Duncan said. “Though I am in no hurry for this assignment to end.”
“It’s a bore,” Eve said.
She made the comment just as they pulled into the pressed-concrete faux-cobblestone driveway of their two-story house, which they’d told neighbors they were renting until they could build a new home in Malibu. It was on a corner lot and had a low stucco wall around the front perimeter for decorative purposes rather than for providing any privacy or security.
Eve got out and walked around to the other side of the Rolls to get the grocery bag and the walker out of the back seat. Duncan didn’t actually need the walker, but she wanted to play it safe. She didn’t know who might be watching. There were gardeners working next door. A pool man’s truck was parked across the street. An Amazon truck cruised up the hill. She opened his door and held the walker for him.
Duncan slipped his feet back into his shoes, got out of the car, and smiled. “I could stay here until my retirement party.”
“This is your retirement party.”
Eve walked past him to unlock the front door, which was mostly glass and ineffective from a security standpoint. Not only could the glass be broken, allowing easy access to the dead bolt and doorknob, but anybody walking up to the door could see the marble foyer, the grand staircase, and the two-story great room with its massive windows that looked out over a lagoon-style pool, waterfall, and the homes on the opposite ridge.
They went inside, and Eve typed the alarm code into the keypad on the wall. It deactivated the alarm and also alerted the sheriff’s deputy assigned to watch them at Lost Hills station that they’d arrived home. Eve and Duncan also waved at the camera in the entry hall, one of a dozen throughout the house that were being monitored by the deputy at his computer screen. As an extra precaution, Eve and Duncan each had a tiny key fob in their pocket that, if pressed, activated all the hidden microphones in the house and alerted the observing deputy that they were in danger. Armed backup would be there in five minutes or less.
Duncan left the walker in the hallway as they went to the enormous kitchen, which was larger than Eve’s Calabasas condo and had a marble island with a dozen barstools around it. They sat down at the island and started unpacking the grocery bag from Bristol Farms, though the wine would go untouched, along with all the other alcohol they’d bought over the last four days. They were on duty 24/7 during this assignment.
“I don’t know why you’re whining,” Duncan said as he unwrapped his sandwich. “Living in this big house has got to be better than your room at the Hilton Garden Inn.”
She’d been staying at the hotel while her condo was being gutted and renovated after the fatal shooting that had occurred there, though, as time went on, she wasn’t entirely sure that she could ever move back. Eve went to the giant subzero refrigerator, took out a Diet Coke for each of them, and used her hip to close the door.
“This doesn’t feel like police work to me.” She handed him his Diet Coke.
“It’s an undercover assignment,” he said, popping open the can. “The problem is you can’t stand the luxury.”
“I feel like I’m being intentionally exiled.”
Eve picked up the iPad that was on the island and checked out the security camera video feeds, just to be doing something productive. The iPad screen was divided into a dozen screens, each with a different live feed.