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“Rodney!” he cries. “Rodney Calder.”
“You’re a coward, Rodney. A pussy. And you deserve to be thelastone out of here when I’m done.”
ARCHER
Ispin at the base of the bank stairs when the boom of a gun goes off. When screams echo from inside, and my heart threatens to explode from my chest. “What was that?”
With adrenaline and nausea and terror coalescing in my blood, I set one foot on the stairs and prepare to propel myself through the glass doors at the top, but Fletch wraps his arms around my chest so we collide with a thud. So his breath and mine escape on twin gasps. So his muscular grip pins me down and locks me in.
“Whatwasthat?”
“Gunshots!”
Cops sprint around behind us. The captain belts out commands. Lieutenant Fabian barks his orders and follows those of others.
My superiors don’t bother trying to eject me from the scene anymore; I’m not leaving, and they won’t physically force me. But my career is over.
My job, gone. My hard work, all for nothing.
My phone trills, but it’s Tim who, joining me and Fletch at the front of the bank, thrusts his hand into my pocket. He snatches the device out, spies the screen, and answers, all in the span of a single frenzied second.
Then he slams the device to his ear and grabs my sleeve to drag me away from the glass doors. “Solomon? This is Tim Malone. What do you know?”
My breath races too fast, dizzying, but I stop fighting my partner and instead steal my phone back so I can hear her report. So I can be the first to know what the fuck is happening. “It’s Archer,” I cut in. “Who was shot?”
“I have eyes,” she responds. “But no ears. The bank security system is so ridiculously outdated, I can’t even slide in.”
“What?”
“It’s a joke,” she mock-laughs. “But it’s our reality. The system is impossible to breach without physically being there. But I have drones flying overhead, and the stained-glass ceiling makes it so we have eyes. Colorful and a little blurry, but eyes nonetheless.”
I snap my head back and search the skies—though, it’s pitch-black out here, so I see nothing. I hear nothing. “Are you at the right building?”
She snorts. “I am, I promise. I see Mayet, and the other one too. The cutesie one.”
“Aubree.” I bring my eyes down and stop on Tim’s feral stare. “You see them both?”
“Mm. Safe and sound. Yours is ballsy though, Detective. She keeps stepping up to Slade and putting herself in his way.”
Yeah. Why aren’t I surprised?
“She and Slade were talking, then this other dude got up and tried to run,” she explains. “I’ve identified him as Rodney Calder. He works for the bank, forty-nine years old, twice divorced. Five kids over those two marriages, but none of them talk to him anymore.”
My brows pull tight into a frown. “You know all that already?”
I see in my mind the way her lips curl into a satisfied smile. “The imaging technology I have access to is second to none. I just needed his face for a single second, and I have his entire life written out in front of me. Mayet and Slade were talking, Calder got up and made a run for it. Slade spun around and shot off a round. Took him down.”
“Dead?”
“No.” I swear, she almost sounds disappointed. “He’s rolling around and shouting about some shit. I could probably get a lip reader to help us, but I suggest you put some ears in the building yourself. It’ll be faster and more accurate.”
“Slade won’t be pleased if we bug his pizza. If we do, he’ll kill a hostage.”
She scoffs. “Do you always tell people the shit you do, Detective Malone?”
“Well, no, I—”
“Timothy Malone is there with you?”
