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Portia said, “She mouthed off about Rosalie. Said if she died, things would be worse for us. We let her give Rosalie her inhaler, just to shut them both up. We needed the time.”
Archer’s knuckles tightened over the steering wheel as he pulled into the nondescript driveway of the equally nondescript house they’d rented ten days ago, not speaking until they were in the one-car garage with the door shut tight. “That sounds like a smart strategy. Camila obviously helped you after that.”
A disgruntled noise sounded off from the back of Thorn’s throat. “I had to talk to her.”
Shit. “But you didn’t say anything, did you?” he asked Portia. They took a lot of precautions to keep their identities hidden. But every news report so far—and Archer was too smart not to read all of them—had labeled them as three armed men. Keeping it that way was an added safety precaution he wanted to hold onto.
“I’m not stupid,” she said, one dirty blond brow arched.
“She still had to get close enough to make sure Camila didn’t try anything,” Thorn argued.
“It was only for a second. All I did was take the inhaler out of Rosalie’s pocket.” Portia looked at Archer, his eyes meeting her kaleidoscope stare in the rearview mirror. “I didn’t say anything. Plus, Thorn knocked Camila out, anyway. I doubt she’ll remember her own name before next Tuesday.”
Archer’s pulse kicked. “You hit her?”
“You’re lucky I didn’t fucking shoot her,” Thorn said, his voice as cold as his stare. “She could be trouble. Look, we know her full name. Finding her wouldn’t be hard, and it wouldn’t take much for her to have an ‘accident’. Then we’d know for sure that our asses are covered.”
“No.” Archer bit back his irritation that Thorn had gone off-script and hurt Camila. He didn’t like giving the guy any more leash than was strictly necessary, but in this case, his actions worked in their favor. “Knocking her out will do the trick. Assault fucks with your head. Plants a lot of fear.” He tapped his temple. “Between that and the robbery, she’ll be traumatized enough to mentally bury anything she might’ve noticed.”
“What if she isn’t?” Thorn pressed.
Here, Archer shrugged. “I didn’t ask her name because I was trying to make friends. If she becomes a problem, she’s all yours.”
Contrary to what Thorn believed, Archer didn’t hate the thought of a body count because he didn’t have the stomach for it. Killing people was messy, yeah, and mostly unnecessary. But he’d do it if he had to—for fuck’s sake, it was half the reason he’d brought Thorn into this deal in the first place. Everyone had a skill set.
It was time for Archer to use his to distract Thorn, once and for all.
“But I doubt that’ll happen. She was scared,” he said, and meant it. He knew how to read people and use them to get what he wanted, and Camila Garza had reeked of fear. It was why he’d chosen her to go help in the first place. “She knowsweknow her name. You knocked her on the head, and I’m guessing it wasn’t a love tap. Add the physical trauma to the fact that she’s probably terrified we’ll come after her if the cops get within a mile of us?” Another shrug, this one to hammer it all home. “She’s not a threat.”
Thorn paused, and bingo. Archer had him. “I did hit her pretty hard,” Thorn said, a slow smile expanding over his face.
“There you go.” Archer jerked his head toward the trunk as his own smile spread out. “Now, help me drag this cash into the house, would you? We need to get it counted and ready for the drop before we can plan the next job, and I know you better than to think you’re not already itching for more.”
“No such thing as too much money,” Thorn said, getting out of the car.
Portia waited until Thorn was elbow-deep in the trunk before she murmured, “It really was fine, Archer. He’s just blowing smoke.”
“He does that,” Archer said by way of agreement.
For Camila Garza’s sake, he hoped his sister was right.
7
“I’ve got good news and even better news. Which would you like first?”
Camila looked at Dr. Tess Riley, who held her electronic chart—and therefore her immediate fate—in her hands. She’d met Tess about a year ago, when Delia had gone and fallen in love (still ew) with Matteo. As it turned out, Remington’s cops and other first responders tended to co-mingle, and not a little bit. When your bestie became an extension of that group, you went along for the ride, socially speaking. Camila not only knew all of the Intelligence Unit’s detectives, but had met most of the firefighters on A-shift at Station Seventeen and many of the doctors and nurses who worked at Remington Memorial.
Of course, Camila had never expected to land in the ED as one of Tess’s patients. Especially not with her brother hovering like a mother hen less than four feet away in the chair beside her gurney. Thankfully, the doctors and nurses had cleared her of any spinal injuries not long after she’d arrived. Not-so-thankfully, she’d had to trade her dignity for a hospital gown and spend the last ninety minutes alternating between a half-dozen tests, a neurological consult, and trying to persuade her brother that she didn’tneeda neurological consult.
She’d lost that battle when Tess had gently agreed that perhaps, just for the sake of the fact that Camila had been knocked unconscious by a gun-wielding bank robber, the neuro consult wasn’t the worst idea in the universe. But good news and better news seemed to bode well for her status, and Camila wanted nothing more than to reclaim clothing that didn’t bare her ass to the free world, go down to the Thirty-Third precinct to make a statement, and show Matteo once and for all that she was seriouslyfine. He’d at least held off on calling their parents (“for now,” he’d growled, but only after Tess had given the okay for the C-collar to come off) but had also insisted on parking himself in the chair at her bedside without budging.
So she aimed a pointed look at him before turning back to Tess to say, “All of it, please. But you can start with the good and keep getting better, if you like.”
“Sure thing.” Tess smiled and looked down at the chart in her hands. “The good news is that you don’t have a concussion.”
“Really? Are you sure?” Matteo asked, causing Tess to raise a light brown brow and Camila to roll her eyes even though it made her temple throb.
“She’s an attending physician in emergency medicine,mijo. Of course she’s sure.”
