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But Archer had manipulated Thorn just enough to make it clear that it wasn’t. Having to manage Thorn so closely was starting to wear thin, but then again, he wasn’t hanging around with the guy for his sparkling personality. Thorn was a necessary evil in the truest sense of the word. But until they were done, hewasnecessary, and he had to be handled. Thankfully, he was motivated by money, and the promise of a shitload of it had kept him focused.
Two more jobs. Just two. Then, he’d cement his endgame and be set for the rest of his life.
Archer pulled up to the curb in front of the bank, just outside the security camera’s reach, and let the car idle. It was mid-afternoon, the post-lunch lull and the pre-rush hour traffic making the timing for this robbery near perfect. He watched the cars passing on the street, waiting for the light cycle to hold things up before kicking into action. Grabbing the AR-15 Portia slid covertly over the center console from the backseat, he swiveled a careful gaze over their immediate surroundings, his heart beginning to pump faster as he pictured the three of them moving into the bank and taking over with seamless ease. The power of it hit his bloodstream, a more potent high than anything he could ever shoot up or snort. Getting what he deserved. What he’d earned for all of his meticulous planning and hard work.Thatwas what Archer craved.
And he was going to take it. Right now.
“Let’s go,” he said, nodding at Portia, then Thorn. In unison, they yanked their tactical masks into place and got out of the car with their assault rifles at the ready, a move they’d practiced no less than a dozen times over the past forty-eight hours. Archer’s boots thumped hard against the pavement, his pulse pressing rapidly against his eardrums as he yanked open the door and glided over the threshold with Portia and Thorn at his six. A beat passed before anyone registered their presence, allowing him the perfect snapshot of where everyone sat or stood, going about their day, and oh, these poor unsuspecting idiots.
Archer ripped into the quiet as he heard Portia slide the deadbolt on the door behind him into place with a decisive click. “Nobody move!” he said as loudly as he could without yelling. No need to incite panic. He wanted compliance, not chaos. “This is a robbery.”
Everyone startled, swinging toward him and Thorn and Portia with wide eyes and gaping mouths. Archer’s first order of business was always the tellers—all it would take was one runner to fuck up his whole day. “Hands where we can see them. Nice and high,” he told both the two patrons in the lobby and the teller behind the bullet-resistant barrier, aiming his weapon directly at the teller to ensure fast results. He delivered his lines about the security cameras and the silent alarms being disabled—both carefully crafted statements to establish control right from the jump—then got to the rest.
“Your cell phones have been jammed and the rear exit has been blocked. You can try testing the limits of that glass, if you like,” he told the teller, and Christ, he could practically smell her fear from here. This was going to be a stroll in the goddamn park. “But I wouldn’t recommend it.”
The teller was in the lobby, on the ground with the bank patrons within seconds. Portia had rounded up the two bank managers, and Thorn kept his AR-15 trained on the security guard’s chest as he grabbed him from his post by the door. The kid couldn’t be more than twenty-one, his shock of bright-red hair standing out extra now that all the color had drained from his face, and damn, their luck couldn’t be better.
“We’ll be needing that,” Archer said to the kid, who looked ready to piss himself as Thorn stripped him of the Glock at his hip, then shoved him toward the center of the lobby where the rest of the group lay prone on the floor. Whether it was the guard’s obvious fear or Thorn’s hard-on for being a bully, Archer couldn’t tell, but Thorn didn’t stop at the simple shove. He waited until the guard had regained his balance, then used the Glock to pistol-whip him. The sickening crack made all the bank patrons cry out as the guard hit his knees, and before Archer could regain control of both Thorn and the situation, the guard turned to glare up at Thorn.
“You’re not going to get away with this,” he spat, adrenaline clearly fueling his newfound bravery. “The Intelligence Unit is the best in the city, and they’re onto you.We’reonto you.”
Dread climbed Archer’s spine, but he refused to give the guy any satisfaction. It was a bluff, plain and simple, and it was wasting time. “Lace your fingers behind your head,” he told the guard.
“You think I’m lying? I’m a cop. I was up there while they were working on the case. Iknow.” The kid’s chest puffed up, andfuck, Archer needed to shut him up before Thorn did. “We have a witness! At that last robbery, in the vault? She saw you. She saw your eyes,” he said, turning toward Portia, who froze to her spot as Archer’s breath crashed to a halt in his lungs. “She even drew pictures of them, and they’re good! They know you’re a woman. They’ve even got someone from the FBI helping them. The Intelligence Unit is using what they know to run you through every database they have access to. They’re going to find you. You aren’t going to get away with this. You’re all going down. You’re—”
Three gunshots ripped through the air, silencing the guard as two tore into his chest and the third hit him directly in the forehead. Blood and brain matter sprayed over the floor behind him, and Archer swore as the guard crumpled to the ground in a motionless heap. Everyone in the bank screamed, which only added to the shit situation, and Archer whirled toward Thorn, his heart slamming in his chest and his hands balled into fists. But he’d have to deal with Thorn’s lack of self-control later. They had to get the hell out of here before anyone on the floor panicked and made things worse. If anyone outside had heard the gunfire, they might have already called the cops. Christ, Thorn had turned this into a shitshow.
Luckily, Archer always had an exit strategy in his back pocket, just in case. “Fall out,” he yelled, grabbing Portia by the arm. The move yanked her out of her trance, and she stumbled toward the door. Thorn threw back the deadbolt and slammed the door open. There was no time to issue threats for the patrons to keep quiet or count to one hundred, although the one thing working in his favor was that they were probably scared shitless. It would buy him and Thorn and Portia at least a little time, and right now, they needed all they could get.
Stumbling to the car, Archer got behind the wheel and pulled off his mask. After a glance that lasted a microsecond to be sure Thorn and Portia were both in the car, he pulled away from the curb, resisting both the urge to drive as fast as possible and to reach across the front seat to choke Thorn.
“Are you out of your motherfucking mind?” Archer asked, the venom in his voice making up for his lack of volume. “We agreed. No body count!”
“Youagreed,” Thorn snapped back. “That guy knew too much! We had to shut him up.”
“Shooting him in the face doesn’t change the fact that the Intelligence Unit obviously knows more about us than they should,” Archer bit out. Damn it! Dragging in a breath, he made absolutely sure they weren’t being followed before flicking a glance at Portia in the rearview mirror. “The woman from the vault, Camila. How the hell did she see your eyes?”
He’d told her a thousand times to be careful, to never get too close to anyone or look them right in the face. The tactical masks covered nearly everything, but still.
“I—I don’t know,” Portia stammered, her expression shell-shocked. “We were only in the vault for like, two minutes, tops. I barely looked at her. I never even spoke to her.Hedid,” she said, jerking her chin at Thorn.
He made a nasty noise in the back of his throat. “The stupid fucking inhaler. You and your little bleeding heart bent down to get it from the bank manager’s pocket, and that bitch must’ve gotten a good enough look at your eyes to notice they’re messed up.”
“You got that close?” Archer asked Portia, his gut dropping.
“I was trying to make sure Camila didn’t do anything funny! The bank manager could’ve had mace in her pocket, or something she could’ve used as a weapon, and then we’d have been fucked.” Portia sent a glare at Thorn before returning her attention to Archer. “Plus, Thorn was going to let her die, and you said no bodies.”
“Yeah, and look wherethatbrilliant move got us. If we’d let her die like I said we should, none of this would be happening!” Thorn yelled, and Archer needed control back, right goddamn now.
“Okay. Okay. Let’s all just take a breath, here,” he said, notching his voice to its calmest setting. “Listen, I know you’re freaked out right now”—he sent another look at Portia in the rearview before turning his attention to Thorn—“and you’re pissed. I get it. I’m not psyched that the cops know about Portia’s eyes, either. But we have to be smart, and that means tackling the closest alligator to the boat.”
“What?” Portia asked, her disheveled blond ponytail swaying as she shook her head in confusion.
“We’ve gotta deal with the problem that’s right in front of us, first,” Archer explained, “namely, the fact that, right now, we’re out in the open and that guard’s body is probably still lukewarm. So, let’s get back to the house without being followed, okay? Then we can come up with a plan for how to fix the rest of this.”
“I’m not sorry I shot him,” Thorn snarled. “That little fucker had too much goddamn mouth.”
Archer’s grip tightened on the steering wheel. But he needed Thorn to come down about fifteen notches so he could figure out how to cover their asses, not to mention recover the four hundred grand theyhadn’tjust stolen, so he said, “I get it, man. But since someone’s going to have to mop the guy’s frontal lobe from that bank floor with a squeegee, I’d say you got the last word.”
