by Gen Griffin
“Move.” Joe snatched the paper out of Ian's hand and shoved him away from the safe. Ian stumbled back with a shrug and then turned to Lowery.
“You ain't got to worry. April Lynne set this up for us. We're golden.”
“April Lynne's granddaddy owns this place. I don't understand why she's helping us.” Lowery rubbed his gloved hands together nervously.
“I already told you. Cal fucked her over. Her credit card and the company credit card are, like, the same card. They're identical. She got 'em confused a few months back and accidentally made a couple of purchases with the wrong card when she was out shopping. Cal saw it on a bank statement and flipped shit. He accused her of stealing. He threatened to send her to jail. She's furious with him and with their Pappy. She says she's done with her whole family. She's been applying for new jobs in Beauton and Silver City. She's pretty sure she's got one lined up.”
“Good for her, but I still don't see why-.”
“We're giving her a quarter of whatever we get out of the safe,” Ian reminded him. “April Lynne wants the money, but she figures that she'd be the first person Cal would blame for a robbery. That's why she set this all up for us. We're robbing the store blind while she's miles away with dozens of witnesses who can verify she wasn't anywhere near this shithole when the safe was emptied.”
Lowery hesitated and then nodded reluctantly. “It's revenge.”
“Revenge with a cash incentive,” Joe clarified. “April Lynne gets money. We get money. We get to stick it to the Walkers. The cameras are off. We have keys to the store so we didn't have to waste time actually breaking in. We have the combination to the safe. Easiest robbery ever.” Joe grinned as the safe popped open and he let out a low whistle. “Damn. She wasn't kidding either. Look at all that green.”
“Pappy don't trust banks.” Ian's eyes were wide as he took in the contents of the safe.
“Holy shit, no he sure don't.” Joe held out his hand for the backpack that Ian was carrying. Ian tossed it to him and Joe began stuffing neatly wrapped bundles of cash into the bag. “There must be twenty grand here,” he said with amazement.
“Easy.”
Lowery rubbed his hands together in eager anticipation. “I'm gonna be buying me that Mustang down at Bobby Joe's after all. He said I wouldn't never get together the downpayment. This right here is gonna prove him wrong.”
“See, now you're talking smart.” Joe finished with the cash and then picked up a medium size rusted metal tackle box. “Wonder what the fuck is in here?”
Ian shrugged.
Joe popped the box open and let out a low whistle. “Nice.” He flipped the box towards Ian and Lowery so that they could see the shiny pile of antique gold and silver jewelry. “It's in the safe. Bet it's real.”
“Bet it is,” Ian smirked. “April Lynne didn't say nothing about there being any jewelry in the safe. Maybe she forgot to mention it.”
“Or she didn't know it was in there.”
“Does it matter?” Joe passed the tackle box to Lowery. “Carry this. It don't fit in my bag.”
Lowery took the box. “Is that everything we want from the safe?”
Joe pulled a revolver out of the safe and tucked it into his own belt. “We're taking the cash, the jewelry, and the gun. The rest of it is just paperwork. We don't need to steal no damn papers. You can trace stocks and bonds and shit. You can't trace cash near as easy.”
“You can trace jewelry too,” Lowery muttered.
“Not if I melt the shit down first.” Joe tossed the bag full of cash over his shoulder. “Come on, y'all. Let's get the fuck out of here. Maybe go get a pizza and a case of beer.”
“Fuck the beer. We got enough money for the good shit tonight. I want a bottle of something top shelf.”
“We got enough money for anything we want tonight,” Ian agreed with a grin. “I don't want pizza. Let's get Mexican and then go out to Goldie's.”
“Mexican and Goldie's. Ain't you high class,” Joe sneered.
“The girls look good better at Goldie's.”
“That they do,” Joe agreed. “That they do. Let's go see some titties. Hell, I'm gonna buy both of you fuckers a lap dance.”
Ian and Lowery both grinned as they headed out of the dark, quiet store and climbed into the title-less station wagon that they'd borrowed from Joe's uncle especially for this job.
Chapter 6
Katie had been so relieved to get out of Bellefontaine's without being charged with a crime that she hadn't spent much time worrying about what she would do once she left the restaurant.
She and her mother had been sharing her mother's elderly convertible ever since Hannah Mae's birth. She'd left the car with her mother tonight because she'd planned on riding home with Ian and thought that the second vehicle would be an inconvenience.
“I'm such an in idiot,” Katie muttered to herself with a shiver. The wind was cold and she hadn't had a jacket that matched her dress, so she'd elected not to wear one. She hadn't figured she'd wind up walking thirty-two miles back to Possum Creek.
“Looks like you're having a bad night,” a woman's voice echoed across the otherwise quiet parking lot.
Katie's head jerked up from the screen of her phone and she quickly searched for, and located, the owner of the voice.
April Lynne Hale was sitting on the hood of her gray Mercedes with an impossibly smug smile on her wide face. She'd dyed her hair a shade of black so dark that it didn't exist in nature. It contrasted unattractively with her pasty white skin and foundation that always seemed a shade too light. Her lips were painted that distinctive shade of purple that always looked really sexy on the models in makeup advertisements and always looked like the wearer had drunk too much grape soda in person.
Katie groaned. “Why are you here?”
April Lynne tossed her hair back over her shoulder and smirked. “I wanted to see the look on your face when you finally gave up on Ian.”
“You knew he wasn't going to show.” It wasn't a question.
April Lynne grinned at her. “You actually thought he would?”
Katie didn't have an answer to that.
“Give up, Katie. He doesn't love you.”
“And you think he loves you?” Katie countered.
“I know where he is right now. Do you?” The other girl looked impossibly smug.
“No,” Katie admitted. “Of course, I'm a little too busy to waste my time babysitting a grown man. I shouldn't have to keep track of him every second of every day.”
“He loves me.” April Lynne was watching Katie like a hawk. “Doesn't that bother you?”
Katie glanced down at her shoes and fought the urge to scream. She'd been humiliated enough when Ian had stood her up. Having his girlfriend show up to gloat was just too damn much. Way too damn much.
She looked straight at April Lynne and met the other girl's eyes head on. “No,” she said. “It doesn't bother me in the slightest. I'm glad he's going to have somewhere to go.”
“Somewhere to go?” April Lynne looked more confused than she should have.
“You've won,” Katie informed her. “You want Ian, right?”
April Lynne nodded even though her smile was starting to fade.
“Congratulations,” Katie forced a big smile. “He's yours.”
“Now you're just being a bitch,” April Lynne sneered.
“No, actually, I'm not. That's the sad part.” Katie shrugged her slender shoulders. “I've been doing a lot of thinking ever since I watched the two of you make out at my best friend's wedding. Y'all really did put on quite the show.”
“Thank you.” April Lynne fluffed her hair again.
“You're welcome. It was humiliating.” Katie crossed her arms over her small breasts and shivered in the cold night air. She wished she'd brought a coat with her tonight, but she hadn't thought she would need one.
“Good.”
“I don't know why you hate me so much,” Katie said. “If Ian really wanted yo
u, he could have left me for you at any point in the last ten years. It's not like I've ever begged him to stay with me. If you want to know the truth, I'm pretty sick of dealing with him. I hope you enjoy the way he drops his laundry wherever he happens to take it off. I hope you get real pleasure out of finding his worn, smelly socks scattered all over your house. The way he leaves dirty dishes everywhere and lets them get all moldy before he puts them in the sink is just pure joy. I feel like I'm his mother, except Maggie's got a lot more patience than I do.”
April Lynne crossed her own arms. “Are you trying to say something?”
Katie bit her tongue and then nodded. “I was going to ask Ian for a divorce tonight during dinner.”
April Lynne's mouth fell open as her eyes widened in surprise.
“But since he didn't show up and he won't return my phone calls, I guess you can deliver the news to him,” Katie narrowed her eyes at April Lynne. “Whenever you talk to him, please do me a favor and tell him that I want all his crap out of my house by noon on Sunday. I'll be holding a bonfire Sunday night and roasting marshmallows over anything of his that's left in my house.”
“You're throwing Ian out?” April Lynne couldn't seem to wrap her mind around Katie's words.
“You don't seem as happy as I thought you would,” Katie said. “I figured you would be jumping for joy now that Ian's free to come live with you.”
“I live with my Mom in the house I grew up in,” April Lynne said.
“Oh, you don't think Mommy's going to go for the new roommate?” Katie shrugged her shoulders and tried not to grin. “Not my problem. Tell Ian to come get his shit. He and I are over. He's all yours.”
Katie turned on her heel and began walking across the parking lot towards the street. She wasn't sure she was even capable of walking thirty-two miles back to Possum Creek, but she'd be damned if she was going to stand in Bellefontaine's parking and watch April Lynne gloat.
“He's going to be happy,” April Lynne called after her as she walked away. “We're going to be happy together!”
Katie turned halfway so that she was walking backward. “I hope he gives you everything you've ever deserved!”
Chapter 7
Katie was freezing her butt off, her cute boots were rubbing blisters on her heels, and Kerry Longwood's blue Audi passed her twice within the first mile of her thirty-two-mile hike home.
“Take a picture. It'll last longer,” Katie muttered as she flipped Kerry the bird without actually looking at him. Kerry was literally the last person she felt like dealing with tonight. He'd been following her around town for weeks. He claimed to be conducting some kind of mysterious unsanctioned surveillance. Katie seriously contemplated getting a restraining order as the Audi sped off into the night.
Gracie had asked her if she needed a ride home or if she needed Gracie to call her a cab and prepay for it. Katie had lied and told her no. She already felt horrendously guilty and embarrassed about Gracie paying for her appetizer and tea. She'd promised Gracie that she'd pay her back the minute she got back to Possum Creek. Gracie had told her not to and that $12 was nothing to worry about or stress over. Maybe the amount wasn't all that much, but that still didn't make Katie feel any better about the situation. She hated owing money.
She also hated feeling needy and pathetic, which was definitely how she did feel as she stood on the side of the road and scrolled through her phone contacts. There were plenty of people she could call for a ride. Even she had to admit that it was Katie's own pure stubbornness that was keeping her from pressing the green call button.
Her Mom would come and get her in a heartbeat, but it would mean listening to another lecture about Ian. Same for her sister. Same for Gracie's Granny Pearl and Cal's Momma, Miss Loretta. None of them were exactly fans of Ian at this point.
She could call David or his fiance, Trish, but Katie had been avoiding David during the last couple of months. He was Ian's cousin. He was morally obligated to side with Ian when Katie and Ian actually split. Better not to call David or Trish. The less they were involved in the gory details of Katie and Ian's divorce, the more likely it would be that the friendship might be salvageable.
She had no interest in calling Ian's parents. Frank and Maggie always made excuses for Ian's bullshit. Besides, they had gone out of town to a police convention in New Orleans and wouldn't be back in town for another week.
She had a few other female friends besides Gracie and Trish, but none of them were close enough friends that she wanted to confide tonight's events in them. Her co-workers at the Sheriff's Department weren't much better. Meg was a friendly waste of oxygen. Sully was nice enough and his immaculate southern gentleman manners would practically require him to stop whatever he was doing to come rescue a damsel in distress, but she didn't consider him a friend. She had no interest in explaining how she'd wound up in her current predicament to Sully.
You could call Addison, said a little voice in her head. She quickly shut it down. Addison Malone was the last person she would call. The very last. She'd been actively avoiding him ever since Gracie's wedding.
“Addison only talks to you because he feels sorry for you,” Makinsley had said. “I wanted you to see how ugly and pathetic you really are.”
Ugly and pathetic. Those words had been burned in big, glaring letters on the inside of Katie's eyelids ever since the wedding, probably because they were exactly what she had always feared. Addison thought she was pathetic and she loved him entirely too much for her own good.
Katie closed her eyes and fought a fresh round of tears. Being in love with Addison was so, so very stupid. He'd never love her back. She'd always known that he was out of her league. She'd been kidding herself if she'd ever thought he might care about her, even just a little bit. She was his kid sister's pathetic friend. His buddy's ugly, boring wife.
She was less than nothing to Addison. It hurt so much that she could barely bring herself to speak with him at work. She would walk every step of the thirty-two miles that would take her back to Possum Creek before she called Addy. Even if it crippled her.
Which would suck the big one.
She was never going to make it thirty-two miles in these shoes. She wouldn't be able to walk for a month.
With that thought running first and foremost in her mind, Katie scrolled back through her phone a second time. She selected her older sister's number out of the contact list. She hit the call button before her embarrassment could talk her into trying to walk thirty-plus miles in a lightweight dress and impractical heels.
“Come get me,” she said the minute her sister picked up the phone. “Ian's ditched me again.”
Chapter 8
“Well, lookie here. My favorite law enforcement officer. I was hoping you'd stop by tonight.”
Addison looked up, startled out of his own thoughts. Meg grinned at him from behind the front desk of the sheriff's department. The look in her eyes was predatory. The light blue, slightly see-through shirt she was wearing was entirely too low cut to be appropriate work attire.
She grinned at him as she strolled out from behind the desk in a pair of five inch tall, patent leather heels that would have been better suited for a nightclub than the night shift at a police department. The heels did make her skinny jean clad legs look even longer and skinnier than they usually did. He supposed it was the look she was going for.
“Meg. Is it already after five?” He frowned at her. He'd been expecting to see Katie when he'd walked in. He'd wanted to see Katie even though she'd been pretty distant with him ever since the wedding. He strongly suspected she was mad at him. He didn't have a clue what he'd done. If Gracie knew, she wasn't sharing that particular confidence. Still, if Addison had to choose between a ticked off Katie and Meg in a good mood, he'd always choose Katie.
“It's almost nine thirty, sweetie. Day get away from you?” Meg fluttered her eyelashes at him. She'd taken to using some new fiber eyelash product and it was working a little too well for Addison's ta
ste. Her eyelashes made her look like a pair of fuzzy black caterpillars had been glued to her eyelids. It wasn't as sexy as Meg seemed to think it was.
“I reckon,” Addison said. He hadn't wanted to come back into the office. He wouldn't have come back if he had realized Meg was going to be the only person here.
“You really are my favorite. You're the only reason I even keep coming into this boring job every day.” Meg strolled up to him and snuggled as close as she could to his chest without physically touching him.
Addison sighed. “Meg, you're a pretty girl and I appreciate everything you do around here, but...”
She quickly held one finger up to his lips. “Shhh. Don't screw this up with misguided morals. I've already talked to Mak. She says y'all are over and she doesn't care who you fuck. She told me to feel free to help myself to that gorgeous body of yours.”
Addison took a step backward and stared at her in surprise. “What?”
Meg closed the gap between them a second time. “I've never told you how I felt before because you and Mak have always had y'alls thing. Makinsley is my friend and I don't poach my friend's guys.”
“You have feelings for me?” Addison was suddenly all too aware of why Meg had suddenly gone from dressing comfortably cute to inappropriately sexy for a job where she might see five live human beings a night.
“I knew you always knew.” Meg clapped her hands together with pleasure and grinned at him. “We've always had such a great connection.”
“Meg-.”
She leaned into his chest. Her breasts were pressing against his uniform shirt. She pursed her gooey pink lips into a sexy pout. “Kiss me.”
He braced his hands against her elbows and then stepped backward again. His grip on her arms ensured that she couldn't force herself back into kissing distance.
“Meg, I'm sorry.”
She stopped making kissy faces at him. “Addison, it's okay.”