by Tilia Klebenov Jacobs
I am not good at armed robbery, but when Dougal told me about the new cannabis dispensaries, I figured third time was the charm.
Dougal Henshaw was my cellmate at MCI-Norfolk, where he was doing ten to fifteen for marijuana distribution, and I was keeping him company for reasons already stated. Dougal is an interesting case. He’s not a nice guy, but he’s smart. The reason I say he’s not nice is that he killed his wife, his girlfriend, and his mother-in-law, who happened to be his girlfriend’s drug dealer. (Whole story there.) He told me once that between the time he killed them and the time he got caught, he found out that a tree makes enough oxygen for two people for their whole lives, so he planted a tree and a bush to make up for the three folks who’d stopped breathing because of him. However, I do not believe this was a sincere attempt at atonement, which is usually bullshit anyway in my experience.
Dougal was not in for triple murder. Nope, he’s too smart for that, and made sure to dispose of the bodies such that he could never be connected to the tragic disappearance of three people who all happened to know him real well. However, he is not so smart that the cops didn’t know about it. They just couldn’t prove it. But they could prove that he had a hundred pounds of marijuana in his garden shed, and that’s an automatic two and a half to fifteen, with a likely slant to the top of the scale if they actually want you for something else.
Dougal never got over the unfairness of it, especially since truthfully he was not a drug dealer. The stash actually belonged to his mother-in-law, who, unbeknownst to him, had been using his premises as a business location shortly before he whacked her. Which made the Massachusetts state cops very happy, but was not so convenient for Dougal.
“Her final revenge,” he used to groan. “Don’t ever get married, Gershom. It ain’t worth it.”
My first armed robbery did not end well, in that the cops caught me twenty minutes later at my aunt Junie’s Labor Day barbecue, which made for some real distinctive family photos that year. The cameras in the store had got a very clear picture of me, and so had a couple customers. When I told Dougal about it, he was sympathetic. “You were just a kid,” he said. “Next time, wear a disguise. Glasses, wig. You can ditch them easy.”
“Armed robbery while disguised is a five-year minimum,” I said. I am not smart, but I do know how to read, and like they say, reading’s free in the DOC.
Dougal shrugged. “I always wear a disguise, and they never got me for that shit.”
Now, we were having this conversation in the prison exercise yard where we were so bored we had just spent an hour looking at puddles and trying to decide if worms can breathe in the rain, which might have indicated to anyone except Dougal that he wasn’t such a success after all, but I decided not to mention it.
“And don’t skimp on the wig,” said Dougal. “Spend the extra coin for a classy one.”
“Why? You can get one from a costume shop for, like, five bucks.”
“Yeah, and it looks like it, too. Use your head, McKnight. In our line of business it’s real important not to draw attention to yourself until you’re handing someone a bag and telling them to empty the cash register into it.”
I did my time for that first armed robbery at MCI-Shirley, which is a big brick pile close by a quaint New England town, although to be candid MCI-Shirley is not the quaint part, what with the guard towers and razor wire and all. Five years went by like a snail with a hangover, and upon my release I took a gig with a home security company. They knew I was an ex-con, and they paid me under the table. I couldn’t get any other job, and the amount they gave me was about three rent checks short of what I needed to get by.
Now, it is a fact that a certain percentage of the houses where I helped install burglar alarms were subsequently robbed. It is also a fact that the person or persons who robbed the houses seemed to know a lot about how to bypass their security systems. But I want to be clear about one thing: I was never the guy on the inside. I just passed along useful information to interested parties for a percentage of the take. I truly wanted to keep my hands clean.
So it was just really shitty luck that one of the houses where I happened to be working belonged to a corrections officer who came home from an early shift and recognized me from Shirley. Sonofabitch told my boss, who acted real shocked and fired me on the spot.
Assholes.
As soon as I got back to my car, I texted someone I knew and told him to call off the job on that house, which was scheduled for that night. Which he did not. He also did not delete his text messages, which turned out to be a real hitch for me, as the judge was not moved by my argument that I was telling that individual not to rob the house. Which should have counted for something, in my opinion.
It also turns out that courts have no sense of humor whatsoever on occasions like this, and they say a lot of stuff about “abetting” and “conspiracy” and how it’s people like me who make life hard for honest ex-cons who are trying to go straight. The judge explained all this to me while also explaining that I was going to go away for the next ten years, give or take. Which is how I ended up at Norfolk, which is where I met Dougal.
Now believe me, when you spend most of a decade sharing a very compact concrete box with a guy, you end up knowing each other real well. And since Dougal was a lot older than me and more experienced, he had some trenchant insights into where I had gone wrong.
“Too complicated,” he said when I told him about the burglar alarm thing.
“It worked.”
“Yeah, and then what happened? Listen, McKnight,” he says, very sincere. “Life’s not a fucking heist movie. Forget the safecracker and the bomb expert and the goddamn Chinese contortionist.”
“What Chinese—”
Dougal held up a hand. “Stop. Listen. K-I-S-S.” He ticked off a finger for each letter.
“Say what now?”
“Keep it simple, stupid.”
I scowled. “Thanks a lot.”
“Gershom, I ain’t trying to hurt your feelings. I’m just telling you a basic truth.” Dougal put his hand on my shoulder and looked at me with his squinty little eyes as big and earnest as he could make them. “You don’t need a complicated setup. You just need a kick-ass plan and the balls to carry it out.”
I ended up getting released a little early, thanks to good behavior and a decent understanding of what a parole board likes to hear. (Pro tips: use the word “remorse” a lot. Also, brush your teeth.) Naturally, Dougal was eager to share his wisdom and know-how with me even in the waning hours of my incarceration.
“Don’t fuck up,” he said as I packed my stuff in the cardboard box that the Commonwealth of Massachusetts had generously given me to transport the crap I’d accumulated during my time.
“Course not.” I couldn’t afford to be a three-time loser.
“Remember how to tie your shoes?”
“Nope.” That was kind of a joke we had, since the shoes they give you in prison don’t have laces.
Dougal gave a big sigh. “I just hope whoever they put in here isn’t a total ass-wipe like you.”
“I’ll miss you, too.” I was trying to get my books to lie flat, but I had read them pretty much to death. The spines were U-shaped, the pages were soft as felt, and the covers curled like wood shavings.
“Yeah, well. Go celebrate. Get high as a kite and think of the friends you left behind.”
“Good idea. I’ll invite my parole officer.” I shoved the books around and put one upright to hold the others in place.
“Might as well. Weed’s legal now.”
“So I hear.” We don’t get cable on the inside, but we do get TV, and the local news had recently done a special on cannabis. A lot of the guys were talking about nothing else, especially some who were hoping the decriminalization of weed might mean a commutation of their sentences. Which did happen sometimes, but not a lot.
“That stash they pinned on me is probably some guy’s pot shop inventory now,” grumbled my cellmate.
The thing is, Dougal thinks he is the original No-J, which is the opposite of an OJ. You may recall that OJ Simpson snuffed two people but went free. By contrast, a No-J is a guy who is convicted despite being as innocent as Ivory soap. That was Dougal, or so he’d have you believe.
I lifted the box to see if the bottom would hold. It did, so I put it down again. “Okay, Henshaw. I’ll celebrate my reentry into society by lighting up just for you.” I pantomimed making a purchase. “Do you take American Express? Or wait—where is my platinum digital Apple device?”
“They don’t take credit cards, you ignorant fuck.”
“Who?”
“Pot shops. Feds won’t let them. Far as they’re concerned, weed’s still a crime.”
I stopped, invisible credit card still in my hand. “So it’s all...cash?”
“Yeah.” Dougal turned to look at me. He has kind of a doughy face, and this mop of gray hair that’s all wild and curly. His eyes were hard and shiny, like granite in the sun. “I’m telling you, Gershom, an enterprising guy could clean up in one of those places.”
Later that day, I walked out of MCI-Norfolk. It was nine years, three blurry tattoos, and two nicely healed stab wounds since I walked in. I was carrying my box, wearing lace-up shoes for the first time in nearly a decade, and thinking hard. I knew Dougal’s words were his parting gift to me. Mulling them over, I realized I had to restructure my entire way of doing business, because if I got busted again, I was going away for good.
Maybe you heard of this old-timey bank robber named Willie Sutton. A lot of people had him pegged as a Robin Hood kind of guy, robbing from the rich and giving to the poor. But when they asked him why he robbed banks—figuring he would say they were the Man or something—he said, “Because that’s where the money is.”
Well, the banks noticed, and now they hardly keep any cash on hand. These days, the average bank robbery only nets you four or five grand. What banks do have plenty of, though, is cameras and guards. Plus, they generally aren’t anywhere near a highway, meaning that your getaway is severely compromised. Willie Sutton may have made his pile bank-robbing back then, but those days are gone.
Mind you, cash pops up in unexpected places. There’s a Stop & Shop on Cape Cod that used to need a Brink’s truck every two or three hours. You may not think of a grocery store as being that flush, but imagine a holiday weekend or a big football game, and everyone’s stocking up before they head to their beach house. Ten thousand people drop three hundred bucks apiece, and you see what I’m getting at.
Another place is jewelry stores. Best approach there is arrive at opening, when they’re setting out the cases, or better yet, at closing, when they’re putting stuff away and also the cash register is full. Standard procedure is to come in with several people and have one pretend to be shopping for an engagement ring while the others lift stuff on the sly. These stores are insured, so really it’s a victimless crime.
However, I was not interested in hitting a Brink’s truck or a Stop & Shop or a jewelry store. For jobs like that you need a gang, and now that I was a sadder and wiser man, I knew that a gang was a bunch of guys who would roll on you when convenient.
This time, I would be my own gang.
Keep it simple, stupid.
I went to my DOC-mandated halfway house, dropped my box in the dorm, and agreed with the on-site social worker that this was the dawning of a bright new day for me. I checked in with my PO, and we had a real chummy talk about curfews and urine tests. On my way back from his office, I stopped off at my local public library, sat down at a computer and googled “legal marijuana.” This time, the only part of me that was gonna get dirty was the tips of my fingers where they hit the keyboard.
I found out quickly that Dougal was right, and also that he didn’t know the half of it. They say by 2021, legal marijuana will be a $21 billion industry in this country. Also, it is true that pot shops can’t take credit cards, so the sales are all debit cards or cash. The average customer spends one or two hundred dollars per visit to a pot shop. So if a shop has, say, three hundred visitors a day, and half of them pay in cash...
That’s where the money is.
At first I wondered why pot shops don’t do like Stop & Shop, and have an armored truck pull up every few hours. Well, turns out those same banks that won’t let the shops take credit cards also won’t let them open business accounts. The feds can shut down a bank that takes profits from the dread dope, and they can send the bankers to prison, with the result that most banks won’t touch a pot shop with a sterilized bargepole.
So what do the shop owners do with all that cash?
Well, sometimes they open accounts at places like Wells Fargo or Chase, but they get shut down when the banks find out it’s a pot shop. Sometimes they drop it in their personal account and transfer the funds to a business account, but legally speaking that is money laundering, so usually they stop pretty quick. And sometimes they neglect to fully describe the nature of their business to their bank, which can lead to sticky situations like when one entrepreneur took $30,000 cash to Middlesex Savings Bank after spraying it with Febreze so it wouldn’t smell like marijuana. Kind of to everyone’s embarrassment, the money-brick smelled like Febreze and marijuana, which signaled the end of that particular entrepreneur’s association with Middlesex Savings Bank. Honest to God, you gotta feel for these folks.
The only financial institution in Massachusetts that will do business with cannabis dispensaries is Century Bank, and they have a team of lawyers working round the clock to make sure everyone stays legit. I made a note of that, and kept clicking.
PotGuide.com is a very handy way to find a marijuana dispensary, and thankfully for the public safety, they have stringent security measures in place, in that they ask you if you have a medical marijuana card. I clicked “Yes,” and a map of Massachusetts popped up, spiked with little blue markers showing shops with cute names like ChemiHerb and High Priority. They were also listed alphabetically by town. The first one was in Amherst, which is scenic and touristy and too far away.
The second one was in Brookline, and although it got mostly very salutary reviews on Yelp, several people noted that there was a cop to help with traffic. Scratch Brookline.
Next was CannaBliss, in Framingham, a small city west of Boston. Google Maps showed that CannaBliss was conveniently located by a highway exit, with a Red Roof Inn directly across the street. Customers noted that it had ample parking and polite staff. No cop.
Third time’s the charm.
I spent a few months at the halfway house, working at the job they found me and coming in by nine thirty every night (lights out at ten). I cashed my paychecks, got my driver’s license, and went to group therapy on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The day I left, I thanked the social worker and told him he’d never see me again. It made us both happy.
My first investment was a Buick clunker that I’d seen on the side of the road. I drove it to a strip mall where I got a used computer and a brand-new, top-of-the-line printer and scanner. Then I went straight to the Red Roof Inn in Framingham.
I loved it. The room was spotless, with a huge window and a big bed, all for me. No dorm-style sleeping like at the halfway house, and no Dougal snoring a few feet away. I mean, when I felt that carpet underfoot I felt like landed gentry, man.
Now I just needed two other guys to complete my gang.
The first one would be Anthony Harrison, because I liked the name. Anthony was going to rob CannaBliss.
The second was called Michael Johnson. After the robbery, he would deposit the funds in his bank account.
And the third guy? That was me, Gershom, sitting on top of the triangle like an invisible god. The excitement was like bubbles fizzing in my veins.
That night, I allowed myself three hours of sleep. The next night I did six, but I set an alarm every two hours and walked around for forty minutes each time. By the time the sun came up, I could barely see straight. The nearest Social Security office, a big brick-and-concrete block with an American flag out front, was a ten-minute drive. I got there at eight thirty, at which time there were already half a dozen people in line. By the time the doors opened at nine o’clock, there were maybe twenty-five, mostly behind me. I got to the clerk and started apologizing like crazy.
“My son was born at home ten months ago with a doula, and the pediatrician never filled out the paperwork for his Social Security card,” I said. “Man, I am so sorry. But I have his birth certificate and immunization record.” Which I did, and they looked really good. Like I said, I hadn’t skimped on the printer.
The clerk scowled, and I saw her eyes flick to the line behind me. I clutched the counter. “I’m telling you, my wife deserves a superhero cape. She was in labor for—” shit, how long are people in labor? “—eighteen hours. No drugs, no nothing.”
There was this superlong pause. Like, about a year. Then the clerk looked at me and my bloodshot eyes and my two-day scruff, and her face got all soft. “Bet she won’t be so eager for a home birth next time,” she said as she reached for my papers.
I kept her entertained while she filled out the forms. “God knew what he was doing when he made women, ’cause if us men had to give birth, the species would go extinct, like, tomorrow. Guys would be all, ‘I have to do what?’”
That made her laugh. By the time we were done, she was my best friend. “Now go home and get some rest,” she said, handing me my son’s Social Security card. “It gets easier, I promise.”
Which it did. I got back to the Red Roof Inn and slept for nine hours solid. Kids are exhausting, man.
When I woke up, I hopped online and signed up for credit cards with my new Social Security number. Pretty soon Michael Johnson had two Mastercards and a Visa on the way.
While that was percolating, I went to a nearby Staples with my temporary driver’s license. This is the paper the DMV gives you while you wait for the permanent card to come in the mail. I had kept mine, and pasted “Michael Johnson” over my name in the same font as the original. Once I photocopied it, it looked very convincing.
The next morning, I drove to Wellesley to open a Century Bank account.
Wellesley is a couple towns over from Framingham, and I didn’t want Michael banking too close to CannaBliss. Mainly, though, I appreciated the irony that Century was the only bank in Massachusetts that would do business with marijuana dispensaries, because they were about to get a ton of money from one such establishment.
Century Bank in Wellesley is an old-timey building with big trees out front. Opening Michael’s account was a piece of cake, what with his temporary driver’s license and Social Security card. A guy named William Edwards set up the account. He showed me how online banking and bill pay worked, and how I was eligible for benefits like EZ Pay Protection. When we were done, he handed me his card and said to ask for him if I ever had any questions. I put it in my pocket and walked out the door, feeling so excited my feet tingled with every step. The thrill was unbelievable. Here I was, setting up the biggest score of my life, and the bank was helping me.
There’s a Dunkin’ Donuts directly next door to the Red Roof Inn. I got a Caramel Craze Signature Latte and half a dozen crullers, put a Do Not Disturb sign on my door, pulled up a chair and a pair of binoculars, and planted myself at my nice, bright window with its unobstructed view of CannaBliss.
Foot traffic was light but steady. Customers came to the door and flashed an ID, which I figured had to be a medical marijuana card. A few seconds later, they’d open the door and go in. This meant the door was locked from the inside, and someone was using a camera to check IDs. Probably bulletproof, too. So either I had to start ordering dynamite and anvils from Acme, or I needed a medical marijuana card.
This was where Anthony Harrison came into play.
Getting a medical marijuana card is a pain in the ass. First of all, you have to be sick. Mind you, here the state is very generous, and you can have anything from cancer to insomnia to AIDS.
Next, you need to exhaust all non-cannabis treatment options. Now that you’ve had plenty of time to get sicker, you ask your doctor to write a letter explaining that no known medicine has worked for you. If the first doctor won’t do it, which is at best a fifty-fifty shot, you find one who will. Then you take the letter and your driver’s license and $200 in, of course, cash, and go to another doctor and explain that you have cancer or insomnia or AIDS or maybe PTSD. If the doctor agrees with you—and honest to God, how do you prove that you have insomnia?—they give you a personal identification number. Now you hop onto the Cannabis Control Commission website, where you punch in your shiny new PIN and your Social Security number, and pay another fifty dollars. Then you wait a week or two till they mail you your card. By which time if you have cancer instead of insomnia, you are probably dead.
Fortunately, however, the Cannabis Commission is much like the DMV, in that they will email you a temporary card as soon as you register. It’s a piece of paper with your picture and their logo on it.
I finished the crullers and drove to Newbury Street, which is the part of Boston that shows up on postcards and calendars. Half a block from the Public Garden is a salon called Hair for You. It’s brick, with a plate glass window reflecting a stone church across the way. A bell on the door dinged when I went in, and a lady with wrinkly skin and a lot of scarves wafted over to ask if she could help me.
“Oh, God, I hope so,” I said. “I have cancer.”
Her eyes got big and shiny, and for a second I was afraid she was gonna cry. “Oh, no. I’m so sorry.”
“Yeah, thanks. I start treatment next week, and they say I’m likely gonna lose my hair. So...you got any wigs?”
She blinked a few times and nodded. “Follow me.”
Scarf Lady was very apologetic about the fact that most of their wigs were for women, but hey, it’s a sexist world, right? I found one that was a mess of gray curls, and tried it on in front of a mirror. I almost busted out laughing, because for half a second I looked just like Dougal. “This one’s perfect,” I said.
Scarf Lady was doubtful. “Really? It’s nothing like your natural hair.”
True enough, since my hair is short and straight. The wig made for a very different effect, which was the point. In fact, given what I was going to use it for, looking like Dougal seemed right on target, like giving credit where it’s due.
I handed Scarf Lady the wig. “Well, ma’am,” I said, trying to look noble, “I didn’t ask for this disease, but I got it. This is a whole new part of my life, so I might as well embrace that with a whole new look.”
Scarf Lady pressed her lips together, and her chin got all wobbly. “You are so brave,” she whispered.
An hour later, after she and her staff showed me how to wear and style and wash my wig, and they’d packed it in a stripy box with lots of tissue paper and made me promise to stay in touch and let them know how treatment went, I got back in my car.
I stopped in West Newton and put on the wig before going into a CVS just off the highway. A few minutes later, I walked out with a bunch of ID pictures, since my wife and I were taking a second honeymoon in Tuscany and I needed a new passport.
Back at the Red Roof Inn, I got to work. Like I said, the printer was top-notch, and inside an hour I had a temporary medical marijuana card featuring the Cannabis Commission logo, a picture of me in the wig and the name Anthony Harrison. I’m telling you, the Commission itself wouldn’t have known it from the real thing.
And yet, holding that flawless card, I felt a flash of fear. What if someone figured it out? If this went sideways, they’d lock me up and melt down the warden.
No. Couldn’t happen. I’d created the perfect gang.
I put the card down, and took a deep breath. It was time for Anthony to stomp all over the Internet.
First off, I gave him an Amazon account and had him eyeball half a dozen books on marijuana and PTSD. He left some pretty snarky reviews. I reposted those on Goodreads, where Anthony created a page so he could follow his favorite authors, who mainly wrote military thrillers. I set up a Twitter account, which is wicked convenient for following the news and checking up on Kardashians. I also created a Facebook page with one of the extra CVS pictures, which I pasted against a backdrop of red maple leaves because New England is so beautiful in the fall. I sent out a couple dozen friend requests to people with lots of followers, figuring they’d automatically hit yes when they got Anthony’s request. About fifteen did. Anthony was real pleased to meet them. He made a few political comments, and shared a picture of his birthday cake, which I copied from Pinterest. I gave him nephews in Florida, two kids with a golden retriever from a clip-art site. Anthony was looking forward to seeing them over Thanksgiving. He even mentioned them by name, but they never responded. The little bastards.
I leaned back in my chair and smiled at the night sky outside my window. The next day, all my hard work was going to pay off.
CannaBliss is sandwiched between a dentist and a RE/MAX. It opens at 10 a.m. At 9:57 I parked facing the exit and got out. One other guy was in line, poking his phone.
Remember Willie Sutton, the guy who robbed banks because that was where the money was? Well, that’s not what he really said. What he actually said was, “Why did I rob banks? Because I enjoyed it. I loved it. I was more alive when I was inside a bank, robbing it, than at any other time in my life.” I tell you, on that bright, clear morning with the sound of the highway close by, the weight of a gun tucked at the small of my back, and that dispensary in front of me just about smoking with cash, I knew exactly how Sutton felt. Electricity surged through my bones, and I thrilled all over. I had a kick-ass plan and the balls to carry it out. I would never see the inside of a prison again. My old, loser self was dead.
“Gershom?” said a voice. “What the hell’re you doing here?”
The other guy was staring at me. He was wearing a hat and cheap glasses, but I knew those squinty eyes and paunchy cheeks in a heartbeat.
“Dougal?” I gasped. “What the hell? You have, like, five more years.” My head was spinning. “Holy shit—did you bust out?”
He grinned and punched my arm. “Me? Never. I wrote to my judge and said he should commute my sentence since marijuana’s legal now. And damned if he didn’t!”
I wished I had a wall to lean against, because the parking lot was starting to pitch and roll under my feet. So Dougal writes a letter, and the judge does an evidentiary hearing that consists of giving his butt a really lengthy scratch, and the next thing you know this dangerous criminal is out on the streets? My God, they will release anyone these days.
Dougal squinted at me. “What’s with the wig? You look like a fucking idiot, I swear.”
“Dougal, I’ll tell you the truth.” I put my hands on his shoulders. “I...got cancer, man.”
Dougal stared at me. His piggy little eyes got hard. “Bullshit.”
“Hell of a way to talk to a sick person,” I said indignantly.
Dougal swatted my hands away and stepped too close, glaring through his drugstore glasses. “You don’t have cancer. You have a plan. Gonna rob this place, aren’t you? Bet you’re packing.”
“Hell, no.” I was shocked at his attitude. And glad my jacket hid the gun. “I’m a regular customer here. Weed helps with the chemo.”
“Liar. You remembered what I said about disguises, and now you think you’re going to hit this place. Well, guess what? This was my idea, this is my score, and you back—the fuck—off.” He shoved my chest.
I stumbled. Anger rose in me, thick and hot. “Make me.”
Dougal grinned and lifted his phone. “Hey, Siri. Call 911. Yeah, I’m at CannaBliss—”
I swatted the phone out of his hand, sending it spinning across the asphalt. Dougal laughed at me as he picked it up. “Relax, jackass. I was just fucking with you. Now piss off, or I’ll tell your PO how you’ve been using your parole.”
The speaker by the door chirped. “Good morning.”
Dougal thrust a paper at it. The door opened, and suddenly I was alone in the parking lot.
“Sonofa—”
I whipped my card at the camera. The door clicked. I yanked it open. At the counter, Dougal was holding a gun on a scared-looking girl. “It’s a beautiful day for a holdup, darlin’. Open the register and empty it into this bag.”
I jumped across the room and grabbed Dougal’s arm. I was going to kill him till he was dead. He spun around, face all twisted, and smashed the gun across my jaw. I fell on my ass. Dougal raised the gun again, and—
“Freeze!”
About fifty cops spewed through the door. Half of them jumped Dougal. The other half yelled at everyone to get their hands up. Boots thumped. Radios blared. Voices barked. A cop helped me to my feet. “Are you all right?”
You know that feeling when it’s like someone shoved a stick of dynamite into your ear and blew your brain into a hundred thousand little gray chunks, and now they’re all buzzing around inside your fractured skull trying to find each other? Well, until that moment, neither did I. My hands, which had shot into the air entirely of their own volition, lowered, trembling. “Yeah. I’m good.”
“You shouldn’t have tried to stop him on your own, sir. That’s what we’re for.”
“Didn’t know you were on your way,” I mumbled. My jaw hurt like hellfire.
I looked around. The fifty cops turned out to be four. Two of them were squishing Dougal against a wall and cuffing him. One was talking to the girl. “Did you make the 911 call?”
“What 911 call?” she said.
“I’m going to need to see some ID,” said the cop who’d helped me up.
“Ah...sure.” I felt sick. There was no way out of this one. I didn’t know how many laws I’d broken putting this job together, but if puking on a cop was a felony, they were about to add that to the list. Gershom McKnight, three-time loser, was about to go away forever. I put my hand in my pocket and felt a card.
A banking card.
Inspiration boiled up inside me like storm clouds ablaze with lightning. As smooth as my shaking hands would let me, I pulled the card out of my pocket and handed it to the cop.
“Edwards,” I said. “William Edwards, Century Bank. These people have an account with us.”
The cop turned to the girl at the desk. “Is that right, ma’am?”
“We do. Yes.” She looked queasy. I knew the feeling.
I pointed at Dougal. “What’s that knucklehead calling himself these days?”
The cop picked up the marijuana card Dougal had dropped in the excitement. “Gershom McKnight.”
Son of a bitch. “Cute. His real name’s Dougal Henshaw, late of MCI-Norfolk.”
“Seriously?” The cop shook his head in disgust. “I swear, sometimes I wonder why we even bother arresting them.”
I chuckled in sympathy. “There’s more. This—McKnight, is it?—is registered at the hotel across the street. Check his computer. Looks like he was planning a string of these robberies. Our investigation indicates he has several false identities.”
Dougal’s jaw dropped.
The cop’s eyes narrowed. “Investigation?”
I waved an airy hand. “Bank security. We’ve been keeping an eye on him for a while.”
“You goddamn motherf—” began Dougal, which is when the two cops took him by the elbows and frogged him out of the room.
When finally they all left, I leaned against the counter, totally spent. The girl and I looked at each other. I could see the gleam of sweat on her forehead, and I could feel the cold from the evaporation of droplets on mine.
“That was too close for comfort,” she whispered.
“No kidding.” I pushed myself up. “What was it that guy said to you?”
She half laughed. “‘It’s a good day for a robbery.’”
“That’s right.” I pulled my gun and a bag from the small of my back. “Now just open the register and empty it into this bag, okay, darlin’?”