by Sophia Gray
“Wow,” Billie sighed. She could feel her nipples getting hard just from his description of it. She knew that she had to experience it for herself. “Show me.”
Carter barked out a surprised laugh. “What the fuck do you mean, show you? What, you want to stop someplace and rob it, just like that?”
“Why not?” she retorted. “You've got plenty of experience, so it seems like you'd be the perfect one to show me how it's done. And it's not like we'd have to hit another bank, or anything that risky. We could do, like, some little convenience store or a diner or something.”
He looked at her with wide eyes, his smile fading. “Holy shit. You're actually serious about this, aren't you?”
“Yes, I'm serious. I want to do this with you. I think it'll be fun. What, you don't think I can do it?”
“It's a fucking felony,” Carter said. “Whether you can do it or not, why the hell would you want to? You're not a criminal.”
Billie frowned. “But you just said—”
“Yeah, I was kidding, okay? I was breaking your balls with the whole 'outlaw' thing. Jesus, would you really want to become an armed robber on a goddamn dare?”
Billie favored him with a big grin and a wink. “I've done lots of stuff on dares,” she said.
“And what happens when the lawmen catch up to us? You wouldn't be able to claim you were my hostage anymore. They'd lock you up too. Is it really worth that?”
“First of all, I happen to think that as long as we put our heads together, we can make sure they don't catch up to us,” Billie said. “We seem to be doing a hell of a job with that so far. Second, if robbing a place really feels as good as you say it does, then fuck yeah, it's absolutely worth it to me. And third, no one will even have to know it was us, will they? Not if we wear masks when we do it.”
“I've only got one mask,” said Carter.
“Come on, you don't have anything else we could use for another mask?” Billie pleaded. “I could wear the ski mask to hide my hair, and we could tie your t-shirt around your face so it covers your nose and mouth. Why wouldn't that work?”
Carter pulled up his t-shirt, revealing the numerous tattoos on his torso. As he did, Billie couldn't help but admire his muscles again.
“See these?” he asked. “All on file with law enforcement. My ink gets caught on any cameras, they'll be able ID me more easily than if they'd seen my face.”
Billie let out a frustrated sigh. After a moment, she reached into the back seat and grabbed the saddlebag.
“Hey, what are you doing with that?” Carter snapped.
“I'm sure there's something in here that we could use, if we get a little creative,” Billie said, unzipping the bag and rummaging inside. She slid the brick of pot and bundles of cash aside.
“Stop that!” He tried to snatch the bag away from her with one hand as he kept steering with the other, but she twisted and turned in her seat, keeping it away from him.
“What's the big deal?” she laughed. “If you've got porno mags in here or something, don't worry. I won't be shocked. Ah, here we go!” She produced a green bandana. “We can tie this onto you.”
As she moved to return the bag to the back seat, she spotted something else inside it and pulled it out. It was a patch—the kind that members of motorcycle clubs usually had sewn onto the backs of their vests. The lettering said “Metal Monsters MC,” and it framed a hideous robot face with red eyes and bloody gears for teeth.
“What's this?” she asked, examining it.
“Oiler came up with it,” Carter said quietly. “The name, the picture, everything. It was going to be the patch when we founded our own MC, after pulling the bank jobs. We were going to set up in some small town on the West Coast. We were finally going to have something that was ours, y'know? We were going to be free to do things our own way.”
Billie heard the sadness in his voice and felt a twinge of guilt. It sounded like this had been his dream, his big chance at freedom, and now...
“I guess holing up in Mexico for a while kind of fucks your plans up, huh? Because of me. Because you were worried I'd give the cops your descriptions.”
“Yeah,” said Carter.
“I really wouldn't, you know. You guys could still go ahead with your original plan.”
“The thing is, I want to believe that,” Carter said. “And I even think I almost can. But you've got to understand, Hazmat...well, he ain't the trusting type. You saw what he's like. And Oiler, shit, he's so scared of going back to prison that he wouldn't be willing to take any chance that could lead to that. So there's just no way they'd go for it. I mean, fuck, I still don't know how I'm supposed to show up with you, after what Hazmat said before. So far, I haven't had any bright ideas about how to drop you off before I get there. Or maybe I just haven't been thinking about it hard enough,” he said with a grumble.
Billie beamed at him. “See? I knew you liked having me around too much to really get rid of me! And listen, I think I've got the perfect solution to all of this.”
Carter chuckled. “That'd be a neat trick.”
“Hear me out,” she insisted. “They're worried I'll give you all up to the cops, right? But what if I couldn't? What if they had hard evidence in their possession that would implicate me in a crime, so they knew that if I gave them up, they'd give me up too?”
“Go on,” Carter prompted warily.
“We rob a place,” Billie continued. “And I use this gun you gave me, which has my prints all over it now. I can even fire a bullet into a wall or the ceiling or something, to leave evidence proving it was this gun. Then Hazmat and Oiler can hang onto the gun and turn it over to the cops if I ever double-cross them, which I obviously won't. See? Then they've got a reason to trust me.”
And maybe even keep me around, Billie thought to herself. But one thing at a time.
Carter thought it over. “Maybe it's worth a shot. But come on, seriously—why the fuck are you so eager to rob someplace?”
“You said it was better than sex,” Billie countered. “Maybe I just want to see how it feels to have better-than-sex with you.”
He considered this for a moment, then laughed.
“All right,” he said. “If that's what you want, then that's what we'll do.”
Chapter 27
Carter
As they drove down the highway, Carter was still having a difficult time believing he was going along with this. It seemed insane that someone who was a regular citizen the day before yesterday was suddenly so desperate to commit a felony.
But did it really?
He thought back to when he'd gotten out of the Army and decided to join the Hobgoblins. The life of freedom and adventure had appealed to him, and he'd known that the skills the military had taught him would be assets. Had he been upset by the thought of the crimes that would naturally accompany such a life?
No, he realized, he hadn't. He'd accepted that part of it quite easily. Iraq had made him comfortable with violence, and when he engaged in it on behalf of the Hobgoblins, it was always necessary—never random or unprovoked, never aimed at anyone who was some blameless citizen. Selling drugs and running guns hadn't bothered him, either. People would always want those things, he reasoned, so he may as well be the one to supply them and profit from them. And as for the robberies, the banks and stores he hit were generally insured, and no one got hurt.
The more he considered it, the more he understood that when the time had come all those years ago, he'd stepped across the line from civilian to criminal with hardly any hesitation at all. It had seemed a small price to pay to abandon a former life he'd never really felt like he'd belonged to anyway and become part of a group who looked out for each other.
So who was he to judge Billie for making that same choice? Maybe she wasn't just some bored thrill-seeker out for a joyride with an outlaw. Maybe she truly felt the need to leave her old self behind and find a new one instead.
“What about there?” Billie asked, pointing out t
he windshield at a liquor store.
“No good,” he said, shaking his head. “Liquor stores are too risky. They get robbed a lot, so there are always lots of security measures in place, and the clerks are generally armed to the teeth. Also, see how the window is covered up with all those posters and signs? That means we won't be able to scope it out from a distance first, to see what we'll be dealing with.”
“Okay,” said Billie. “So what kinds of places are we looking for?”
“Well, keep in mind that usually, if you're planning a robbery like this, you'd want to check the place out a few days in advance,” Carter began. It felt strange, explaining this to another person. Most of the guys he'd rolled with already had experience with this stuff. “That would let you figure out who works during which shifts, when the place will be emptiest, all that. But since we can't really do that this time, we need a small store with a big window. It'll let us see how many people are inside and what the layout is.”
“What else?” Billie asked eagerly.
“Our best bet is probably a gas station,” he said. “We shouldn't have to shoot more than once—at the beginning, like you said, to plant the bullet and also to freak them out enough to cooperate. But if there are gas pumps around, it'll make the clerk too nervous to resist. He won't know how crazy or stupid we are, so he won't risk anything that would make us blast off and blow the whole place to hell.”
“There's a gas station over there,” she said, pointing again.
Sure enough, there was a filling station ahead with a tiny convenience store attached to it. There were no cars parked at the pumps, and even though the main window was tinted, it was easy to see inside.
“That could work,” Carter agreed. He pulled the car over to the side of the road across from the station and rolled down his window, looking over at the store. Through the window, he could see an elderly black man behind the counter. He appeared to be the only one there.
“So now what?” she asked. “Should we go for it?”
“Maybe,” he said. “The clerk sure looks like he'd be a pushover. But first, we should hang back to watch the place, so we can see how often people show up. Could be we just caught it during a quiet moment.”
Carter untwisted the wires in the dashboard to kill the engine, so it wouldn't overheat the car or drain the battery. They watched the place for almost forty-five minutes. In all that time, no one stopped at the station. Several times, it looked like the clerk might start dozing off.
“All right, this should do it,” Carter said. “Are you really sure you want to do this? Once you do, there's no turning back.”
“That suits me just fine,” Billie said, grinning. “Here, let me get this bandana tied on you.”
Carter shifted around in his seat and Billie folded the bandana into a triangle, tying the ends behind his head so his nose and mouth were hidden.
“All done,” she said.
“Are you sure?” he asked, gently touching the knot.
“Yeah.”
“It feels kind of loose to me,” he said.
“It's fine,” she insisted. “It'll definitely stay there.” She reached into the saddlebag, pulled out the ski mask, and put it on. “What do you think?”
“You look ready for a weekend in Aspen,” he smirked.
She stuck her tongue out at him through the mouth hole.
“We're going to drive up around the side of the place, then come in fast so he doesn't see our approach,” Carter said. “The second we're through the door, you fire straight up into the ceiling. Then you keep one eye on the rest of the store, and the other eye on the door so you can let me know if anyone's coming. I'll keep my gun on him and get him to hand over the cash. If we do this right, we should be in and out in less than sixty seconds. Any questions?”
Billie shook her head.
“Here we go,” Carter said. He twisted the wires together to start the engine, then drove the car across the street and pulled up next to the store.
Chapter 28
Billie
As soon as the car stopped, they both got out and ran to the door of the store, throwing it open. The clerk's bushy white eyebrows jerked up so far they almost reached his hairline. Billie raised her revolver and fired into the ceiling, the sound of the gunshot smacking against her ears like a pair of heavy palms. A thin dusting of plaster drifted down onto her ski mask.
“Keep your fucking hands where I can see them,” Carter yelled. “Empty out the register into a paper bag, and no one needs to get hurt.”
“Okay, son,” the clerk said, popping the register open. “Just stay calm. I ain't gonna give you no trouble.” He tossed the bills into a paper bag, handing it over to Carter.
Billie couldn't take her eyes off Carter as he kept his gun pointed at the clerk. Every muscle in his body seemed tense, electrified. His eyes were blazing above his bandana. The air around him crackled with intensity, and he embodied every cowboy fantasy Billie'd ever had. She felt like tackling him to the ground and making love to him right there.
He'd been right about this. There was so much power in seizing control of a room and everyone in it, forcing them to do her bidding like some kind of hypnotist. She'd never felt so alive before.
Suddenly, Carter's bandana seemed to blink out of existence. Billie squinted, unable to believe her eyes. One second his features were covered, and the next his bare face was exposed.
His hand went up to his face, feeling for the piece of cloth. When he didn't find it, he peered around him, turning.
A ten-year-old black boy was standing behind Carter, holding the bandana he'd snatched off him and staring up at him with wide eyes.
“It ain't Halloween for months yet, mister,” the boy said matter-of-factly. “Everyone knows that.”
Without warning, the clerk snatched Carter's hand, slamming it—and the gun it was holding—down against the counter and pinning it there. Despite his age, his hands were faster than lightning, and from the way Carter was struggling against him, his hands looked like they must be as strong as vise grips.
“Don't you never fuck with no ex-Green Beret,” rumbled the clerk. “Or his grandkid, neither.”
“Thanks, I'll remember that,” Carter said.
He threw the bag full of money directly into the clerk's face. The clerk flinched and jerked backward, allowing Carter to yank his gun free of the man's grip.
Carter grabbed Billie's wrist and yanked her to the door, shoving it open and stumbling out into the parking lot as they ran for the car. There was an echoing boom behind them, and Billie turned to look. The clerk was following them with a shotgun in his hands.
“What are you, some kind of fucking maniac?” Carter yelled to the clerk as he and Billie got into the car. “You're firing when there are gas pumps here?”
“I shut off the pumps,” the clerk called back. “And now I'm fixin' to shut you off, too.”
Billie tasted something like copper on her tongue and realized it was adrenaline. Every muscle in her body felt like it was clenched. She could feel her heart beating in her throat. She wondered if this might be what it felt to be struck by lightning—everything inside of her electrified and on edge.
Yet, she wasn't frightened.
The clerk fired once more as the Chevy leaped forward, hitting the highway and accelerating. The bullet hit the rear windshield, shattering it so they could see the clerk enveloped in their cloud of dust. The boy stood next to him, waving goodbye.
Chapter 29
Billie
Once the old Chevy took them far enough away from the scene of the botched robbery, Carter and Billie left it at the edge of a wooded area so the destroyed rear window wouldn't call attention to them. Carter gathered up his saddlebag and the rest of their items from the car.
“Maybe we should wipe down the interior? Like, to get rid of any prints?” she suggested.
Carter gave her a withering look and walked off into the woods without answering.
Billie r
ushed to keep up with him. There were lots of cacti standing like mute witnesses, plus sawgrass and scrub brush to trudge through.
After they'd walked for a couple of hours, she asked, “Do you know where we're headed?”
He kept marching forward silently.
“Okay,” she huffed. “I know I fucked up, all right? I was supposed to be watching the rest of the store, and I got distracted. You can't tell me you never had any kind of learning curve when you started doing this stuff.”
