I'm given a second chance within a few days. It's a much smaller raid, not one with big parties or hundreds of guests that might get caught up in the crossfire. Jayden, Zavier, Blake and I have gone through a plan, where I'm actually doing all the work while they keep a look out and observe what I do, and while we did, Blake made it more than obvious that he was uncomfortable with me joining them. However, he was smart and kept his mouth closed, aware that Zavier and Jayden actually like me. Good lad.

It's quite a simple plan, really. All I have to do is walk into a cosmetic store and steal some expensive stuff without anyone knowing. It's not quite stealing hundreds of pounds worth of cash and jewellery, but Danielle says it's basically the same principles, and it's the type of thing that the thieves do for fun. This is just play time for them, and if I want to play with them then I need to know the basics.

Jayden helps me pick out my outfit, deciding on a long sleeved, black top tucked into a black and white chequered pencil skirt with knee-high black boots. It's all very sophisticated, especially when my make-up is done and I manage to style my hair with some help from Maeve, and I'm starting to really enjoy the dressing up part of this job. I feel confident and sexy and excited with the knowledge that no one will suspect the expensive girl going into an expensive shop.

"As incredible as the bigger raids are, I enjoy these smaller ones just as much," Maeve says as we walk to the garage, her arm linked through mine. Everyone's starting to joke that we might need to be surgically removed from one another since we're practically joined at the hip at this point, and I'm starting to think they might be right. "And, although you're totally badass on your own, you have the guys there to make sure you're okay. So walk in like you already own everything in the shop and you'll enjoy it, too."

"At least there's no guns involved this time," I laugh, my thigh feeling a lot more comfortable without the weight of a pistol attached to it.

Maeve chuckles. "I so wish I was coming with you."

"You should," I say, turning to face her as we've made it to the car.

"I don't think I quite look the part," she says, looking down at her outfit of nothing but an oversized jumper. "Anyway, I promised I'd take Posie for a bit so Chelsea can actually get some sleep, so you're stuck with the men, I'm afraid."

We glance over to the three of them, Blake and Jayden laughing over something while Zavier gives them nothing more than an amused smile. Maeve gives me a hug, briefly squeezing me. "Good luck," she says, pulling away. "And please pick me up some Chanel perfume as mine is running out."

I make a face. "I'll try."

I get into the car with the guys, Blake driving as always and Jayden in the back with me. It's comforting having him there, forever the ray of sunshine, and he gets to easing my nerves as soon as we're driving, joking with me and expressing his excitement at seeing me in action. It's only when we reach the parking lot of a shopping mall, a different one to the one where the watches were stolen, that the pit of fear in my stomach re-opens like an healing wound.

"Aurora, you know the plan?" Zavier asks, eyeing me through the rear-view mirror.

I take in a deep breath. There isn't really a plan, I'm just going to be plonked in a store and will need to figure my own way out. But I just say, "sure."

The four of us climb out of the car. I try to match the confident stride of the guys as we walk towards the mall in a line, knowing that the eyes watching our every move is purely my imagination playing tricks on me. I'm not shitting myself quite as much as I'd thought I'd be, but we've barely gotten started.

We enter the mall and it's not very busy, with only a few people milling around and ducking in and out of shops. This worries me, as I've been told that busier places are easier to steal from as less attention would be on me. 

"Good luck," he mutters when we're outside of the store. The other two say it a bit more genuinely.

I walk into the shop slowly, a million thoughts racing around my head as I try to figure out the best tactic. As of now, the only eyes on me are those of the guys who are stood outside rather conspicuously, and I'd much rather keep it that way. Do I grab anything and hide the objects under my top? Slip smaller items into my boots?

No. I have to be smart about this.

I grab a box of red hair dye. I'm not sure why, but I've been staring at the shelves of hair-dye for too long and no one is this indecisive. I hold it to my stomach with both hands and continue walking around the store.

Looking around, I make a mental note of the people who are in here. There's a young woman with a sleeping toddler in a pram who is attempting to find her perfect foundation match. There's a couple around my age, the boy looking as bored as ever while the girl uses his hand to swatch lipstick brands. Then there's three preteen girls looking at nail varnishes, and another couple walks through the automatic doors, the two girls browsing the shelves. The three people behind the cashiers are talking amongst themselves.

Remembering what Maeve had asked me, I go over to the rows of perfume. There's a few brands costing way more than I'd typically spend on anything, so I head for the most expensive ones and pick out a few, not forgetting the Chanel one that Maeve is in love with. That alone is over two hundred. With a quick glance around, everyone is too preoccupied to see me take them.

I won't be able to carry much else, so, thinking quickly, I approach the nearby preteens. I notice that one of them has an empty plastic bag emerging from the top of a full shopping bag.

"Hey," I start sweetly, catching their attention. "Is it all right if I take that bag? My hands are full."

The three of them exchange a look but the girl hands it to me regardless, presumably not wanting to argue with someone older than her. I thank her kindly and turn away, dropping the items into the bag. With a quick look over to the cashiers, they're still deep in conversation, bitching about some colleague called Steph. I stop myself from breathing out a sigh of relief.

I then get to work slipping more items into the bag. Make-up, toiletries, perfume. Anything expensive that I would only ever dream of buying a few months ago. With a quick look over to the guys, I notice Blake watching me. He taps his finger against the face of his watch twice. I need to hurry up.

I huff, brushing the curled hair from my face while I figure out how to get this bag out the store. For all the staff know, I walked in with a carrier bag full of things I bought earlier in the day, but that will go to shit when the alarms go haywire.

Shit shit shit. Okay. Think.

It may be down to pure adrenaline, or maybe I'm a faster problem solver than I ever thought, but an idea comes to mind quickly. So, I take another perfume, another box of some kind, and walk over to the cashiers. One is busy talking to the mother who finally picked out her foundation, so I decide to approach the kinder looking lady behind the counter.

"Hey," she says warmly. Good start.

"Hey," I smile, willing my face not to twitch. "I was hoping to return these." I place the two items in front of her, the plastic bag feeling heavy on my arm. "My aunt gave them to me for my birthday a few days ago, but they're not really my scent, you know?"

I'm really putting on an act here.

"Sure, that's no problem," she says. "Do you have the receipt?"

I grimace. "I'm afraid my aunt probably has it, and I'd hate to ask her for it otherwise she'd be heartbroken."

She copies my grimace sarcastically. "You know how it is, I can't take this back without you having a receipt."

"Seriously? She literally got them a few days ago, can't you just take them off my hands?" I plead. God, I sound just like my mother.

She already looks tired of my shit. "Not without a receipt, I'm afraid. You can always just ask your aunt, I'm sure she wouldn't mind."

"She would," I lower my voice to a whisper. "She's a psycho."

The woman lowers her voice too. "That's a big shame."

"Come on. They haven't even been touched, what's the issue?"

"No receipt, no refunds. It's the store policy for, like, every store in the country."

"Ugh, fine, whatever," I say, rolling my eyes. "I'll take them. But could I have a separate bag?"

She happily gets one out for me and places the items into it. I give her a fake smile which disappears as I turn around and head towards the door, keeping my face neutral as the automatic doors slide open and no alarms follow after me.

Blake is staring at me, shocked, while Jayden and Zavier are smirking, eyeing the two bags dangling from the crook of my arm. Try as I might to hide the shit-eating grin on my face, I can't help but feel chuffed with how that went.

"How the fuck--" Blake mutters, but Zavier lightly hits him on the arm.

"Maybe we find out when we're not standing outside of the store?"

We all agree and make our way out of the mall, my heart still drumming against my ribcage. I feel like I could run a marathon right now and it's taking a lot of restraint to not run out of the doors and sprint through the nearby fields.

Though, when we make it out into the fresh, spring air, we stop in our tracks when a security guard calls after us.

The four of us turn around to face him.

"Hey, guys," he says cautiously. Any sense of accomplishment I was feeling crumbles. We've been caught. "Just thought I'd see if everything's okay."

Tension radiates off the guys, but they remain calm.

"Everything's fine, officer," Zavier says, not a waver in his voice as he takes control of the situation.

The guard turns his attention to me, eyeing me up and down. I almost subconsciously step closer to Jayden if it weren't for the guard's eyes holding me hostage. "Everything okay with you, miss?" he asks.

I give a small nod, swallowing my nerves. "I'm fine."

He looks at the guys again, narrowing his eyes slightly. "You know these men?"

"Yep," I say. At least I'm telling the truth about that part.

"She's my niece," Zavier says quickly. "We were just taking her out for a bit."

"So there's nothing any of you want to tell me?" The guard is still observing me, and I know that he's trying to get something out of me. The bags are suddenly full of metal weights. Am I acting too suspicious?

We all shake our heads, the guys acting far more nonchalant than I am.

This guy is not backing down. "So you wouldn't mind if I did a search of your car?"

"Don't you need a warrant for that?" Zavier asks. The way he's talking, it's like this scene has been scripted.

But the guard reaches into a pocket and pulls out some sort of card.

Blake scratches the back of his head. "You can if you need to. It's round the back." I stare at a random tree in the distance to stop my eyes from drifting over to our vehicle that is certainly not parked round the back.

The guard waves his hand noncommittally. "Lead the way, lads."

We start walking. I glance at Jayden, barely moving my head, and he gives me a reassuring smile, but I'm not comforted in the slightest. I have no idea how we're going to get out of this.

We're going around the side of the mall. It's a very hidden pathway that I'm assuming leads to a car park behind the building.

I spin around when I hear commotion behind me, and soon realise why Blake lied.

Zavier, Blake and the security guard are on the floor. Zavier holds the guards arms behinds his back while Blake has a cloth smothering his mouth and nose. Jayden's arm reaches in front of me, as if to stop me from stepping forward, and the two of us watch as the guard struggles for what must be an eternity before finally falling limp. Zavier guides his head to the floor so it doesn't smack against the concrete, and in the blur of a second, we're running back the way we came.

"What did you do to him?" I ask, breathless from the running as we climb into the car.

"Knocked him unconscious with cloth smothered in chloroform," Zavier says casually.

"Will he wake up?"

Blake snorts. "Eventually."

I look at him while he speeds out of the parking lot. "And you just happened to have a cloth smothered in chloroform in your pocket?"

"Of course I did," he says, as if everyone has one handy. "But honestly I thought I'd be using it a lot sooner." Zavier punches him on his ink-covered arm.

"But seriously," Jayden starts, looking to me in the back seat. "How did you manage to do that so smoothly?"

I shrug, feeling Blake watching me through the rear-view mirror. "I put a bunch of expensive shit into a carrier bag a girl in the shop gave me. Then I grabbed two random items, went to the cashier and acted like I wanted to return them, even though I didn't have a receipt. Then I asked for a bag to put them in and just... walked out."

"Were there no security tags on them?" Jayden asks.

I smile. "No, I made sure that anything I picked up didn't have any."

The three of them start to laugh, including Blake who actually seems impressed.

"Did Maeve tell you that or something?" Zavier chuckles. "She's usually the one to use that kind of technique."

"No, I worked it out by myself," I say truthfully. Maeve and I barely ever talk about the life we've fallen into. She's one of the few people I can have a normal conversation with.

Jayden laughs, hitting Blake round the back of the head. "And you said she doesn't belong with us."

Blake shakes his head, but I can see the corner of his lips twitching as if he's fighting back a smirk. "Whatever. We're going to get alcohol."

"Only if you give me the aux," Jayden says, leaning forward between the two front seats and snatching the cable from Zavier. "Merci beaucoup."

Zavier grumbles under his breath. "Aurora, prepare to be introduced to Jayden's shit music taste."

But even he can't stay quiet for long, as Jayden starts up the music and we all start to sing and rap at the top of our lungs. It's not quite a marathon, but it's the release of adrenaline that I was longing for.