Alexis huddled as close as she could to the passenger door. They’d been so close. To the end, to being free. So close to the goal of finding Rachel, and all finally being safe. Now that was gone.
Bradley had tried, but this crazy gunman who drove like he was at NASCAR had taken her. She shut her eyes and tried to remember Bradley calling her, “Honey.” Hugging her. That had only been a few hours ago. Why did it seem like forever?
The car turned a corner, and she had to grab the handle on the door to avoid leaning all the way over the center console. No more eyes closed. She would be sick. “Can you slow down?”
All the frustration she was feeling bled into her tone, but she didn’t care if he wasn’t going to listen. Or if she sounded whiney. He was probably going to kill her anyway. Then it was unlikely she would care. She’d be past all this hurt. Past the pain of her life being what it was. Sweet relief.
Not that she was eager to die. So much would be lost. Left behind, and left unrealized. But that was her reality, nonetheless.
God, please don’t let anyone else get hurt. There had been enough hurt and pain so far. It was time for this all to be over.
The gunman laughed and pulled his ski mask off.
Alexis stared at him. “Aren’t you worried I can ID you?”
He shot her a look. Probably in his forties, he was rough on the edges but traditionally handsome, in a way. “You’ll be dead, so who are you gonna tell?”
Alexis didn’t want to die. That might be the natural end of this situation, but she didn’t want evil to win. Bradley filled her mind, then. A reflex. Her heart’s desire, as much as she’d been suppressing it. She wanted to know what a life with him would be like.
“So you get this man his money and then what?” At least, her assumption was that it was a man who was the one blackmailing high profile people around D.C. It didn’t seem like a woman would choose to victimize other women like this, but what did she know? She didn’t like true crime TV shows.
Whoever it was, they had to have a powerfully good reason to do what they were doing. With every new victim they drew attention to themselves, risking each time that someone might go to the police instead of just paying up. Then they’d be implicated, and it would be all over.
Which meant, if they were clever, they were hiding behind layers of people, maybe even corporations or blind email accounts like the one she’d found. Layers of anonymity to keep their identity safe.
He turned another corner, then said, “I get that money. Then I do me. It’s all about my life, my future.”
“She and her brother, it’s their money.”
“Feds are all over that,” he said. “Turns out all I needed was you and that broken nose of yours. Makes it harder to tell if it’s you or Rachel.” He smirked. “That was a good play, by the way. Pretending it was you in that video. Smart.”
“What if I say no?” She lifted her chin, ignoring his approval of her personal choices. And her friendship. “I could jump out of the car now and run away.”
“You want road rash, before that car behind us hits and kills you?” He shook his head. “You wanna go out like that, go ahead. Won’t be me cleaning up the mess.”
Okay, so no. She didn’t especially want to do that. But still. “I don’t want the blackmailer to get that money. Why do you work for someone like that?”
She could barely stomach what had been done to Rachel, it was so evil. Alexis didn’t know if it was better or worse that her friend had been groggy and didn’t remember it. Would the knowing be worse than simply wondering what had gone on? Alexis didn’t know if she had a good answer to that.
The gunman snorted and glanced out the side window, then took another hair-pin turn. “So high and mighty. Too bad it’s going to get you killed.”
Alexis looked out the window on her side, hardly able to stomach much more of this. The guy cared about no one and nothing, except himself. She couldn’t reason with a man like that. One who only valued getting paid. But what for? So he could spend it all however he liked, and then he’d need another job. More money.
She liked money as much as the next person. It certainly made life more comfortable. But in the last few months of being stripped of everything she’d had before, Alexis had been forced to face the fact that nothing truly valuable could be purchased. Family. Friendships. Affection. Everything she had with Bradley.
She wanted it. She wanted him
That dream of living a solitary life was still there. It might not be the hub of ministry God wanted her to be part of, like helping kids in need or people who are downtrodden, but it was what she wanted. To lick her wounds? Maybe. She’d been stripped so publicly, all over the internet. Why not rebuild her life quietly, away from all that? God couldn’t begrudge her the desire to do that, could He?
He said, “You put your butt on the line to save your friends. I’ll give you that.”
She didn’t turn from the window. “I’d have thought you would’ve kept them around. For leverage.”
“I’ll get what I want. Don’t worry about my methods.” She heard a tremor in his voice. He was worried?
“Who is he?”
The gunman swallowed.
“You’re scared of him.”
He huffed. “Don’t matter. I’ll be gone, and he won’t find me.”
“After you get paid?”
He said nothing.
“You’re going to run.” And leave his friend holding Rachel and Bradley to face the blackmailer. “You’re going to keep the money for yourself and use it to escape, aren’t you?”
“High and mighty. Just like I said.”
“I can understand wanting to get away from someone like that.”
The gunman huffed. “Yeah, he’s so evil. There’s a million of that guy in the world.”
“Destroying others so he can profit?”
“Don’t see what’s so special about this guy.” Still, that tremor was back.
“He’s special enough you’re scared.”
His head whipped around so he could glare at her. He yelled, “I’m not scared.”
Alexis lifted both hands. “Fine. Do your thing. Kill me, and take the money. Won’t he just come after you, though?”
“Not if he wants what I know to stay a secret.”
“So why don’t you just testify against him?”
“Because he’ll kill me.”
Alexis shrugged. “Sorry, I’m just brainstorming. Trying to help you out of your jam, and maybe not get killed in the process.”
“Like your life is so great.” He pulled up at a stop light and looked her up and down. “You’re kinda cute, though. Wanna come with me?”
“To a life on the run from a man you’re scared of?” He was the scariest person she knew. At least right now. So who on earth was the man this guy was scared of? “No thank you.”
Besides, Bradley wouldn’t be there, and she was never going to trade what she had with him for this guy. Even if she wasn’t scared of him, he still didn’t hold a candle to that history. And yeah, she was derailing her whole “solitary healing” plan thing. Maybe Bradley liked cabins in the mountains and small towns.
Would he want to come with her?
Bradley seemed like he was interested, but wasn’t he just going to go on mission again? He spent more time gone than he was here. Alexis could live the life of a military wife, even one gone on so many missions as the SEALs went on. But that wasn’t exactly the full life she dreamed of. Plenty of people did their duty and spent buckets of time apart. It was hard, but they made it work.
The gunman shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
She would. It was hardly a choice at all. God had put Bradley in her path years ago. They hadn’t been ready for all that it was, all it turned out to be. They’d been immature. Hadn’t dealt with it the right way. But they were different now. Mature—or at least more than they had been. He’d grown into the kind of man she could respect. In a way she’d never expected. He was more than her dream now. She hadn’t even known how to dream that big. Would never have thought to ask for a man like him.
The idea that it had been God’s plan all along floored her. Maybe God had given her everything she’d ever wanted—she just had to reach out and grab it. She realized now that it had been the pain, the time spent apart, the growth—as hard as that had been—and the choices, good and bad, that they’d made, which had made them into the people they were supposed to be. The kind of people with enough wisdom behind them to be able to handle it.
They weren’t done. Far from it. They were still those same kids who’d succumbed to temptation. They still made dumb mistakes, and could be just as selfish as they’d ever been. And yet, without these years in between to bring them to now…would they even be here? It was a gift. Despite the struggle. Maybe the struggle was what had caused her to realize exactly how much of a gift it was. Because otherwise she’d have taken them being together for granted.
Now she knew just how precious it was. Alexis would treasure any time they spent with each other—even if it was only a few days a year.
The gunman pulled off the street into a pharmacy parking lot. “Bank’s over there. Thirty minutes to closing, so you better hustle. Got me?”
He got out, and opened the trunk.
Just left her sitting there in the passenger seat while he rooted around in the back.
Alexis pulled the visor down and looked in the mirror. She couldn’t see him. If she got out and ran, how long would it be before he noticed? Screaming would draw his attention along with everyone else. Could she get far enough someone would see her and she’d be able to get help? If this was the bank, there had to be a team of feds somewhere close by, waiting for them to show up. They didn’t know they would only get this low-level player. Not the boss.
Alexis slowly pulled on the door handle. The click was barely audible, and she pushed the door open an inch at a time. She put one foot out, her heart pounding. As she lifted from the seat, she saw him out the corner of her eye.
Gun pointed right at her. A smirk on his face. “Get over here. You wanna try and run, I’ll shoot you in the back, leave you to bleed out on the sidewalk, and then go get Rachel.” He paused for a second. “After I put a bullet in the brother.”
“His name is Bradley.”
“Am I supposed to care?”
He was going to care when Bradley showed up to put a bullet in him.
Alexis walked to the trunk and saw there was a bundle of clothes inside. God, please let Bradley come. She didn’t know what state they were in. Maybe she was alone here. But she had to pray.
“Put those on.”
She unfolded the black trench coat, and shook it out. Dust puffed up and she coughed, hair falling over her face. Alexis used the hair tie she kept on her wrist for just in case to put her hair in a messy bun, the way Rachel did on her days off. The senator had been photographed plenty of times out on the town dressed like this.
Besides the coat and her hair, there was just one thing missing: the fact she wasn’t Rachel at all.
“This goes under the coat.”
She stared at the vest. Wires. Rectangular gray blocks that read C4.
She swallowed. “I—”
“You’re taking too long.” He swung it over her head and pressed down Velcro tabs on her sides. “All you gotta do is take that paper in and tell the bank manager to make the transaction. Account number’s on there.”
She couldn’t think past what he’d put on her.
The gunman shoved aside a balled up length of rope and handed her oversized sunglasses that probably cost a dollar. Anyone who didn’t know better—or who didn’t look too closely—wouldn’t know they weren’t the real thing. Alexis had never really understood spending hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars, on something she could get far cheaper at a department store. Or a thrift store.
Her mother had drummed into her the importance of labels, and projecting the right image, but Alexis had never understood it. No matter how hard her mom tried, she just couldn’t see the point of trying to impress people who only cared how much money she’d spent on her outfit. One she couldn’t wear again for fear they would see her in something “old.”
She slipped the sunglasses on her nose and tried to think past the shooting pain going up through her sinuses. Her nose would be crooked for life.
A life that may not last too much longer.
He pulled out a small case and opened it, took out a tiny earbud and pushed it in her ear canal. She didn’t even move.
He would…
He grabbed the trench coat and forced her arms into it. Fastened the buttons over the vest.
She didn’t want this. She couldn’t be responsible for the lives of everyone in the bank. That wasn’t the plan. This was about the money, and her friends being safe now. Innocent people were never supposed to have been drawn into the blast radius of all that was happening.
He pulled out his phone and showed her the screen. Then waved it in the direction of the bank. “Off you go.”
She didn’t move.
“It’s perfectly stable. Until you do anything I don’t like. Say anything I don’t like. Ask for a pen, so you can write a note. Nothing. No hand signals, or stupid attempts to ask for help. None of that.”
She couldn’t speak. Even to agree. Alexis gave him a tiny nod, while everything inside her screamed No.
“Get going. Do it right and this will be over in minutes.”
That was what she was afraid of.
Alexis forced her legs to move. Forced herself to look both ways, and crossed the street. Now would be a great time for me to get arrested for jay-walking. But no, that wasn’t the plan.
God, don’t let anyone die.
She’d been prepared when it was just her at risk. Now there were countless others who could lose their lives if this went wrong.
Alexis pulled open the door and walked into the bank with a bomb strapped to her chest.