Leah drove up the driveway and around the building to one of the hidden parking places and stopped. She got out of the car and walked around the building. She was fairly certain the back door could be jimmied, but she was sure an alarm would go off if one of the doors or windows were opened. Most alarm systems had a delay of forty seconds or so after the alarm began sounding before the signal went to the police station or the rent-a-cop dispatch. If she could open the control box in that time and switch the system off, it wouldn’t get sent at all. This building was small and simple, so she might be able to spot the box from outside.

She went to the nearest window and shone her flashlight inside. Within about thirty seconds she identified it, attached to the wall at the back of the shop, but it had a large padlock attached to keep it shut, and the lock looked too sturdy to hammer off. She would have to find another way. Alarm systems wired the places that were supposed to open—doors and windows, usually. She would have to look for things that weren’t supposed to open.

She took out the keys to the SUV, climbed in, backed the vehicle up to the building, stopped, and set the brake. Then she got out, took a rope out of the climbing kit at the back of the vehicle, and tied the rope to the trailer hitch. She walked around to the front of the vehicle. She climbed on its hood and stepped up on its roof and then walked to the overhang of the building’s roof and stepped up.

The roof was nearly flat, with a slight slant so the water and snow would slide off. She saw vertical vent pipes, but what interested her most was the HVAC unit mounted on the roof. It wasn’t huge, so she tried rocking it. Screws held it fast though, so she took out her folding knife and unscrewed the ones she saw. When she tried rocking it this time, she was able to tilt it much farther. She tied her rope around the upper part of it and walked back along the building to the roof of the SUV and slid down its hood.

She started the vehicle, put it in gear, and let it drift ahead until the rope was taut. She gradually pushed down on the gas pedal until the car pulled the unit over onto its side. Leah backed up to the side of the building again and climbed back up to the roof. The unit had exposed a gap where the warmed or cooled air was supposed to blow into the building. She untied the rope, pulled up the slack until it was tight, and then tied a loop in the end, held it, and lowered herself into the building.