I shivered in the cold night air as another gust of wind buffeted off the glass building and rattled me in my harness.
‘I thought you said it wasn’t going to be windy today?’ I growled into the radio strapped to my shoulder.
‘I said it probably wasn’t going to be,’ a tinny voice echoed back. ‘When you’re that high up, you’re going to get a bit of a breeze.’
I resisted the urge to glance down and take in just how many stories above street level I was. No, I told myself. You have a job to do – focus on that.
I let myself rappel a little bit more, pressing my face to the glass to see into the empty office.
‘Have you found it yet?’ my radio squawked.
‘I don’t know,’ I murmured. ‘There’s some sort of… commercial window tinting? It’s hard to see inside.’
‘Commercial tinting?’ I could almost hear my accomplice frowning over the airwaves. ‘They weren’t in the plans.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I told them. ‘It still lets enough light through. I just have to be careful when I’m cutting.’
‘This is a bad idea, Mike,’ the voice barked into my ear. ‘I don’t like it when unexpected things happen on a job.’
‘Relax, would you?’ I rolled my eyes. ‘God, you’re making it sound like you’re the one dangling over Melbourne.’
‘If they catch you, how long before they grab me?’
‘At least you’ll have a head start,’ I muttered, running my hand over the window. ‘I need you to look up the company that does the best commercial glass tinting around Melbourne.’
‘Why?’
‘Because, fancy office like this, they probably did the tint-job – and I need the specifications of their product to dial in my drill.’
‘Right,’ they sighed. ‘Good thinking. Alright, I think I have something… uh-oh.’
‘What?’ I frowned. ‘Alanah, what is it?’
‘Is that a—’
The radio cut off into a squeal of static and I winced at the noise.
‘Hello, Mister Jackson,’ a new voice came out of the radio. ‘I believe you’re hanging off the side of my building.’