Rich men truly lived the most boring lives. I’d been tracking Claude Dupont for two weeks and was pretty sure I was losing IQ points from bearing witness to his dullness.

“Oh yes, thank goodness you went to the club again. The day would not be complete without day-drinking in a smoky room with men in suits.” I rolled my eyes.

Claude le Boring, as I’d started calling him, was in his forties, but looked closer to sixty. He’d inherited a fortune from his father and spent his days cosplaying as a successful businessman at Paris’s exclusive clubs and spending extravagant amounts of money on random shit—much of it rare and stolen. One of his latest purchases had been an ancient Japanese bronze statue off the black market that was so heavy it had cracked his hallway tile.

I sat back in my computer chair with a groan, casting my gaze onto the Parisian rooftops. It was a gray, rainy day, but I still wished I was out there. Claude didn’t deserve Paris. If I got even a single day of freedom in this city, I would make it magical. Heels clicking on the pavement, skirt twirling around my legs. People-watching at a cafe, espresso and pastry on the small circular table in front of me. Playing with the miniature boats in the Jardin du Luxembourg before seeing Monet’s Water Lilies at the Musée de l’Orangerie. Eating a beautiful meal by candlelight before walking along the Seine to see the Eiffel Tower sparkle at night.

Instead, I was in a cramped sixth-story walk-up, watching Claude leave the club. I tracked his drive home through the city’s CCTV cameras, switching to his apartment building’s surveillance footage once he entered the underground garage. Now I had a perfect view of Claude as he attempted to park his car. No matter how many times he tried, he still ended up straddling the parking space lines. He was furious at the mysterious person who kept reporting him for encroaching on a second parking space. I grinned as I filled out the parking garage company’s form for the sixteenth time, guaranteeing Claude yet another expensive ticket.

Even though I was going a little stir crazy, I didn’t really have any reason to complain about my current situation. As a hacker, I thrived off solving complicated puzzles, and doing it in a new city presented an exciting challenge. Accessing Paris’s CCTV system had been a breeze, but figuring out how to build a tool that would break into Claude’s high-end electronic safe was the real challenge of this job. That was why Arta had brought me to Paris.

“Oh look, he’s ordering more ugly furniture for his ugly house,” I muttered as my screen displayed Claude’s real-time computer browsing. I crinkled my nose at the white, long-haired couch he was adding to cart for the low, low price of eight thousand euros.

Arta’s snort came through my Bluetooth earpiece. “Better than when he watches porn.”

“Don’t remind me,” I groaned. Pretty sure my eyeballs were permanently scarred from his search history alone. “At least I’ll be done with him soon. Is everything set for tonight?”

“Yes, on our side.”

I’d been working with Arta for the past three months, ever since I found out she was the Albanian hacker who had bested my brother’s security system. I was one of the best hackers in the world, but she was better; single-handedly running circles around the Italian Mafia was an impressive feat. She’d agreed to mentor me as part of our Italian-Albanian alliance. We’d started by hunting sex traffickers in New York City. One of my top skills was finding people, and with Arta’s mentoring, we’d facilitated the rescue of almost one hundred girls that had been kidnapped and tortured—many of them Albanian, Serbian, and Ukrainian.

Arta did not give out praise easily, but after a few months of working together, she said I was ready for my “final exam” in Paris.

Convincing my brother to let me leave New York was a nightmare. I was probably the only girl in the world who had access to essentially unlimited money and a private jet and had never left her home state. Matteo had sacrificed so much to keep me safe, but I was twenty-seven years old and couldn’t keep living under his thumb. Luckily, Sofiya, his wife and my friend, had convinced him to let me go.

“All set on my side, too,” I said. “I have full control over his alarm system, and the decoder is ready.” I hoped. Fuck, this was the part I was most nervous about because if it didn’t work, it was all on me.

It had taken me two weeks to figure out how to program a decoder that would use power analysis to break into one of the most state-of-the-art safes in the world. The safe that currently housed a stolen diamond necklace.

Elira, the new leader of the all-female Albanian Syndicate, spent years tracking down this particular necklace, which had been stolen from her mother. Beyond its monetary and sentimental value, the necklace was a symbol of the power of Albanian women. Arta had joined Elira’s efforts in hunting the necklace, and her diligence had paid off because it had finally resurfaced. A few weeks ago, Arta had gotten word through underground channels that a black market seller was coming to Paris to sell the necklace to Claude Dupont. She’d set everything in motion, assembled our team, and two nights ago, Claude completed the purchase.

I hoped he’d enjoyed the time he had with the necklace, because forty-eight hours was all he’d get.

Nerves buzzed through my system, but they only made me feel more alive.

The rest of the afternoon passed quickly as I reviewed each step to our heist while keeping a close eye on Mr. le Boring. It wasn’t long before Arta and the young woman she was training as a hacker—Zara—joined me at our cramped apartment headquarters. The majority of the living room was taken up by my massive desk and three large computer monitors. The first one displayed the live CCTV footage of Claude walking into a restaurant, chest puffed up in his black suit. I nodded at Zara to flip to the restaurant cameras, and we all watched as he sat down with Artemis, a high-end real estate financier who was considering Claude for a multimillion-dollar contract.

Or, at least, that’s what Claude believed.

In reality, Artemis was a woman in the Albanian Syndicate with a passion for acting. Her role tonight was keeping Claude at the restaurant while Elira’s team broke into his apartment.

“I’m switching over the security footage now,” I said. Getting full control of Claude’s security system had been so easy it was almost disappointing. I monitored the false footage to ensure everything was seamless. Anyone watching would see a happy couple with linked arms walking past his apartment entrance, stopping only for a brief kiss before they continued. My heart ached with longing and I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. I was so starved for romance I was jealous of a couple I had computer generated.

Pathetic.

My third monitor contained the real surveillance footage of Claude’s building. My heartbeat sped up while Elira and her second-in-command, Kaltrina, entered the frame. They scanned the keycard Arta had programmed and walked into the lobby.

A wave to the doorman.

Getting into the elevator.

Wiping down the buttons to remove stray prints.

Walking down the hall and then—Claude’s door.

Zara confirmed that his alarm system was deactivated, and Elira and Kaltrina unlocked the door. Claude should really learn not to trust the coat check staff at his fancy, smoky club, especially when he was consistently rude and never tipped. It had been laughably easy for Elira to get the key from his coat pocket, copy it, and return it without him noticing. Afterwards, she’d grumbled about stupid rich men never giving her a challenge.

Anyone looking at the cameras inside Claude’s apartment would see my looped footage of his empty rooms with the exception of his office, which didn’t have a camera. Or rather, there hadn’t been a camera prior to Zara breaking in earlier this week and installing one with a perfect view of the safe.

Because cracking the safe presented such a challenge, we had originally considered intercepting the actual sale, but whoever Claude had purchased the necklace from was a ghost. We’d decided it would be easier to steal from Claude than risk the ire of the mystery seller. Thanks to our new camera, I’d watched him toss the necklace into the safe two days ago with a smug smirk.

Now it was go-time. Elira and Kaltrina stepped inside the apartment.

“All rooms clear?” Elira asked.

“Affirmative,” I responded.

I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans. What if the decoder didn’t work? My expertise was hunting people, secrets, and money. The decoder had been out of my comfort zone, which was both exhilarating and terrifying. I’d become complacent the past few years—taking jobs I could do in my sleep. Working with Arta had been the push I needed to take my skills to the next level.

Zara nudged me. “It will work.”

I flashed her a tight smile and returned my gaze to the screen, holding my breath while Elira placed the decoder onto the safe. The light flashed green and then yellow, indicating that it had started the decoding process. If all went according to plan, it would take seventeen minutes to unlock the safe.

I usually liked staying behind the scenes. Being able to work from my couch, surrounded by pillows, blankets, and my favorite snacks was a real perk of my job. But spending time with the badass Albanian women made me crave being in the field. I wanted to be the one picking the lock to Claude’s filing cabinet and going through his computer. Even more appealing—I wanted to rescue trafficked girls and kill the men who harmed them. I’d seen plenty of men drop dead through grainy surveillance footage of the Albanian team infiltrating their homes and warehouses, and it had brought out a bloodthirstiness I didn’t know I possessed. I’d started taking my shooting lessons with Sofiya more seriously, and I’d gotten pretty good. Nothing compared to her, of course, but I’d beaten some of my brother’s men in a shootout.

They might have been newly Made soldiers who had barely turned twenty, but still. I’d crushed them.

Not that it mattered. Matteo would never let me go into the field. It was for my safety—like all Mafia women, I would automatically be a target for kidnapping—but I couldn’t shake the feeling that it was because he didn’t trust me. Didn’t see me as capable.

“Sienna.” Zara pointed at the screen, and I swore.

The decoder flashed red. Even though my body tensed with adrenaline, my mind sharpened while I scanned through its output to identify the error.

“Shit. The safe doesn’t have the standard configuration,” I said. Zara asked a question, but it barely registered. My brain flipped through each possible fix until I found one that made sense. The exhilaration running through me was familiar—it mirrored what I’d felt at the hackathons I used to participate in. Even though the stakes were much higher today—this was real life, not a competition—I couldn’t stop my lips from curving into a smile at the heart-pumping excitement of it all, especially when the decoder flashed yellow again, resuming its work.

I let out a deep breath and sat back in my chair.

Zara’s eyes were wide. “That was impressive.”

I glanced over at Arta, and she inclined her head just as the safe clicked open.

My chest warmed with pride. We’d done it.

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