I translated that to mean the Federal investigators wanted to wait until the cranky Alpha Fenerec male calmed enough for them to approach without stirring his ire and having their heads ripped off for posing a threat to me or Mom. While I found a sense of security in Dad’s presence, until my arm healed, I doubted he’d be willing to let anyone he didn’t trust near us.
Sighing, Dad uncapped the pen and went to work filling out the forms, his handwriting neat and perfect. “How many of them were there, how many survived, and do you have any idea where I might find them?”
“There were three of them. I don’t know if they had any accomplices. After I fell in, the sharks attacked their boat and ate them. I’m not sure what happened after that. I woke up on a beach.”
“I don’t suppose you can explain that, can you?” Dad arched a brow at me, and I saw the corners of his mouth twitch in his effort to mask either a smile or a frown. I wasn’t sure which.
“Sharks like me,” I stated, hiding my smile behind a cough at the thought of Hunting Still Waters, her overly affectionate mother, and the great white shark with a taste for boats. Maybe I was my father’s son, but I was my mother’s son, too.
Dad narrowed his eyes. “Smart of them. If they had hurt you, I would have found them, ripped their fins off, and eaten them.”
Shaking her head, Mom took the clipboard from Dad and smacked him with it. “If you don’t behave yourself, you’ll have to drive. We’ll swing by the beach so you can thank the sharks for taking care of him.”
“I’m not going to talk to the ocean like a raving lunatic, Marcy.”
“Yes, you are.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose, sighed, and wondered why I couldn’t have Normal, sane parents.
In the end, Mom won, and after rescuing me from the hospital and filling my prescriptions, she drove us to the beach. The sun was setting over the water when we arrived, and I was glad to escape the car for a few minutes.
If I didn’t get a break from Dad cuddling with me, I was going to lose my mind. For the first twenty minutes, most of which Mom spent driving around looking for a pharmacy that could fill all of my prescriptions, I had enjoyed his attention. With Dad around, it felt like it’d take an army for anyone to get near me. I needed the sense of security, and I knew it.
I’d been a cop’s kid long enough to understand the consequences of trauma, and some good, old-fashioned tender, loving care went a long way to restoring a sense of normality. Of course, with a Fenerec Alpha for a father and a witch for a mother, very little of my life was actually normal.
Taking what I could get had done me well so far in life, so I’d go with the flow.
The section of beach we visited had few cars in the parking lot. I got out of the car while Dad growled at Mom and Mom growled back. My attempt to slip away was aborted by my dad’s hand smacking down on the top of my head. “You’re not going anywhere without me, puppy.”
I glanced around, startled until I realized there wasn’t anyone to overhear Dad’s slip. “I didn’t want to get in the way if you two decided to start biting.”
Laughing, Mom grabbed her purse, locked the car, and herded us towards the surf. “If he starts annoying you, I’ll make him stop. I brought the spoon.”
I grimaced. The slotted spoon was almost as old as Mom, and she liked telling me how she had stolen it from my uncle the day he had introduced her to Dad. She wielded it like a weapon, smacking Dad with it whenever he got too obnoxious. The rare times my uncle came to visit, he got a turn with the spoon, too. When she dented it on their hard heads, she had it repaired. When she wasn’t beating Dad with it, it stayed in the kitchen, since Mom didn’t believe in useless items sitting around the house.
“That’s really not fair, Marcy,” Dad complained.
“Then I suggest you don’t bother our puppy with your whining. March, Rob. Don’t be jealous Dusty made some new friends with bigger teeth than yours.”
In a way, I sided with Dad on the issue. After my misadventures in the ocean, I wasn’t sure I wanted to get anywhere near the surf. At least my parents had brought me a change of clothes and a new pair of shoes. Remembering how much the sharks had liked hunting my laces, I took my socks and sneakers off and carried them.
“But sharks, Marcy?”
“Are you going to tell a great white he can’t be friends with our puppy? Remember, they’re larger and have bigger teeth.”
“She,” I blurted, then I blinked at having made the correction. How the hell did I know the great white had been a female? Yet, despite having no knowledge of how to establish a shark’s gender, I knew in the same way I understood two plus two equaled four.
“Did you look up her skirt?” Dad grumbled.
“Rob, do you want the spoon?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Then shut up.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I loved my mother.
The sunset turned the ocean blood red, and the waves were calmer than when I’d been kidnapped and taken out to sea. As always, Mom stayed clear of the waterline. I set my shoes safely out of the way so they wouldn’t get wet, stepped to the surf, and stuck my toe in.
“Not so bad, is it?” Dad asked, coming up beside me. Like me, he had taken off his shoes and socks so the waves could wash over his feet. “I can’t believe you’re making me do this, Marcy.”
“The sooner you thank the sharks, the sooner we can go home.”
“They ate my prey.”
“They didn’t eat our puppy, so thank them.”
“You thank them.”
I closed my eyes, shook my head, and sat down in the surf, not caring if my jeans got soaked. The water felt good, and with so many painkillers and other drugs coursing through my system, my arm didn’t bother me much. It didn’t take long for a curious, baby shark to join me, and while I couldn’t spot its mother in the deeper waters, I knew she was there, circling, waiting, and watching for trouble.
The little one hadn’t earned his name yet, which I found interesting. I wiggled my fingers for him to hunt, and whenever he managed to catch me, he gave me a nip.
Dad leaned towards me, huffing when he saw what I was doing. “That’s a shark, isn’t it?”
The infant seemed game to be picked up, and I cradled him in my hands so Dad could see. “He’s a tiger shark.”
The baby showed off its tiny teeth, and laughing at its audacity, I returned him to the water. Darting forward, the baby chomped on Dad’s toe before fleeing for the safety of the sea. Dad’s mouth dropped open, and he blinked.
“Thank the sharks,” Mom ordered.
“It bit me!”
“If you had thanked him, he wouldn’t have bit you.”
“That little runt bit me!”
Aware the ‘little runt’s’ mother lurked in the deeper water, I scooted a discreet distance away from Dad. “Do you know what tiger shark females do when the males of their species annoy them, Dad?”
Dad crossed his arms over his chest. “What?”
“They eat them.”
“I think he’s trying to tell you you’re annoying him, dear.” Mom reached into her purse and pulled out the long, slotted spoon. “Thank the sharks, or you get the spoon and you have to drive us home while I sit with our puppy in the backseat.”
“I’m thankful Dustin’s safe,” Dad protested, holding his hands up in surrender. “Why are you siding with the sharks?”
“Because I’m smarter than you.”
When Mom and Dad began arguing over whether or not the sharks really needed to be thanked, I groaned, rolled my eyes, and contemplated wading out into the ocean. “Will you two stop it?”
They ignored me. I slapped my hand against the surf in annoyance.
A rogue wave surged up the beach, plowed into Dad, which knocked him into Mom. They both sprawled on the sand, spluttering and spitting out water. I blinked, stared at my parents, and then gawked at the ocean.
A shark’s fin rose up from the sea
, circled once, and disappeared beneath the calming waves.
While I was definitely my father’s son, I was my mother’s son, too. There was a name for people who could make strange things happen to water, and it was witch.
2
Fishnet Stockings
What sort of idiot robbed a bank while wearing fishnet stockings over his head? Black pantyhose I could understand; the material obscured features and skin color well enough, but fishnet stockings?
I mourned for humanity. I also worried about everyone trapped in the building. How could criminals so infernally stupid get semi-automatic rifles? The robber, a middle-aged white man with wide, bloodshot eyes, waved his gun around.
It annoyed me he had enough sense to order everyone into a corner, away from the windows and doors, effectively giving the police thirty-two reasons to be extra cautious.
When my dad found out my errand to the bank had turned into a hostage situation, he was going to flip. I’d just gotten him off my back after being kidnapped and shot over a month ago. My arm was still in a sling thanks to my long battle with an infection. A cold sweat dampened my brow at the thought of being shot again. I’d gotten lucky once; I doubted I’d get lucky again.
“I hit the panic button,” one of the tellers whispered, her voice wavering. “The silent alarm. Help will come.”
I admired her attempt to reassure her fellow hostages. With the robber’s attention mostly on the manager he’d ordered to fetch cash, I had a chance to take a few pictures and send them to Mom.
Mom dealt with crazy better than Dad, and she’d be able to pass the images along without sending him into a frenzy. Snapping several shots and texting her about the situation took less than a minute. Moments later, my phone notified me she had seen my messages.
Wisely, she didn’t reply.
Instead of returning my phone to my pocket, I slipped it into my sock in case the dipshit bank robber developed an unfortunate case of common sense.
I had my phone halfway into place when someone else’s rang. Muttering a curse, I jammed the device into my shoe and let my jeans fall to cover the lump. The next time Dad laughed at me for not wearing shorts in Las Vegas, I’d remind him of the unconventional uses of sneakers, socks, and proper pants.
“Don’t answer!” the robber shrieked. “Phones here, now.”
His gun worried me a lot more than the loss of the phones. Most of the hostages obeyed, sliding their devices across the polished tiles. I crossed my legs, hiding mine.
Either no one had noticed me texting Mom, or they didn’t want to give the man a reason to open fire. No one said a word.
“Your cash. Make it worth my while to let you keep breathing.” The man’s finger twitched against the trigger guard. “Bitch, where’s my money? It’s been five minutes. Hurry it up.”
The typical time delay on bank safes was fifteen minutes, and if five minutes angered him, another ten would shove him right over the edge, getting someone—or a lot of someones—killed.
I really didn’t want to die because of an idiot bank robber who couldn’t tell the difference between fishnet stockings and pantyhose. Cooperation might buy us time for help to arrive. With so many lives on the line, I foresaw the man’s death if he didn’t take the money and run. Even if he did make a run for it, unless he dropped the gun, I doubted things would work out in his favor.
Too bad, so sad.
Playing along with the whole paying off the bank robber thing left a bad taste in my mouth, but I went through the motions. Who kept much cash anyway? Most cabbies took cards, and I didn’t take the bus. Either Dad drove me, I drove myself, or he found someone to give me a ride.
It was like he expected someone to kidnap me again or something.
Between all of us, there was five hundred dollars and a lot of deposit receipts to prove no one had withdrawn much money. Mr. Fishnet Stockings didn’t have the sense to isolate the wealthy or those with higher amounts of cash to withdraw. A couple of visits to the ATM would’ve made him thousands richer.
At the ten-minute mark, the rumble of engines and the flash of red and blue announced the arrival of the police. The lack of sirens didn’t surprise me, although many of my fellow hostages seemed startled by the quiet.
Sirens tripped triggers, and when armed bank robbers had their triggers tripped, people got hurt.
Mr. Fishnet Stockings turned to the window, lifted his rifle, and opened fire. The blast of gunfire echoed, accompanied by the cracking of glass. The window resisted the first few rounds before it broke apart.
Idiot bank managers. Bulletproof glass decayed with exposure to sunlight. It needed to be replaced every year or so, or else it broke, not much stronger than regular glass.
Someone screamed, and others joined her, both inside and outside of the bank.
“Quiet. Be quiet!” Mr. Fishnet Stockings shrieked. Firing off a few more rounds, he backed away from the window, turning his attention to the manager. “Open the safe.”
The woman flinched, her blue eyes focusing on the wall clock. “Five more minutes, sir.”
The robber cursed and pointed at three of the tellers. “You, you, and you. Get the bank cards and pull cash from their accounts.” His attention turned to the rest of us. “Give them your pins. Hurry it up. Lie, and you won’t live to regret it.”
Maybe he wasn’t quite as stupid as I had thought, or firing his gun had rattled something in his head or rubbed his only two brain cells together. As long as people cooperated, maybe we’d survive—if he didn’t realize we all knew exactly what he looked like. I wouldn’t say a word to bring that to his attention, and I hoped no one else would, either.
The tellers claimed a bank card from each of us, and with the man following, gun held at the ready, they headed for the ATMs. He halted near the windows, out of line of sight of anyone who might want to snipe him.
“Tell the cops if they try to talk, I’ll put a bullet in your heads.”
The three women exchanged looks, and the oldest of them, middle-aged with a hint of gray in her dark hair, relayed the man’s orders. Without the ability to negotiate, I had no idea what would happen. I suspected lethal force would be used the instant an opportunity presented itself.
“Tell them it’s ten thousand per hostage, non-negotiable. They have five hours. After that, I start killing someone every five minutes. Any attempts to talk, and I’ll kill someone. Mark the bills and someone dies. If anyone approaches without my okay, someone dies. Tell them!”
Great. Not only was he an idiot, he’d put enough thought into his plan to be an extremely dangerous idiot. I closed my eyes and let out a silent sigh.
I lived in America, the land of the free and the home of the brave. Unfortunately, it was also the land of the desperate, and desperate men did things like rob banks with a rifle and make threats to gain a great deal of wealth.
At least I could tell Dad my head was worth ten thousand. He’d lose his cool, and I’d enjoy watching the implosion. Then again, if I escaped alive, I expected he would lock me in his basement for the rest of my life to keep me safe.
The tellers handled the situation far better than I thought they would, relaying Mr. Fishnet Stockings’s demands and withdrawing cash from the ATMs.
A woman in her mid-twenties scooted closer to me, her gaze locked on the bank robber turned mass kidnapper. “Who did you send those photos to?” she whispered.
“My mother,” I whispered back. “She’s friends with some cops.”
After a lifetime of living with Fenerec capable of telling the truth from lies when they paid attention to their noses, I’d gotten used to lying through omission. Every word I spoke was the truth.
Technically, she was even friends with Dad, although a lot more than friendship bound them together.
“Get the full layout of the bank?”
“As much as I could.”
“Smart kid. That’ll help.”
Something about the confidence in her whispered tone tipped me
off she was more than she appeared. “Law enforcement?”
“Do I look like I’m in a uniform? Do you see a badge?” She snorted. “What do you think of him?”
Mr. Fishnet Stockings took care to stay out of the line of fire; he mostly kept close to us hostages, ensuring a single stray round would hit someone. Disliking the truth wouldn’t change anything.
“Shallow end of the gene pool, smart enough to watch television, too stupid to know the point of pantyhose during a heist. He’s handled a gun before but isn’t disciplined enough to be former or active military.” I clenched my teeth. “Could be a law enforcement washout, but I’d go with psychotic gun enthusiast in a corner. Maybe a druggie, but early in addiction.” I shut my mouth when he turned to face us, every muscle in my body tensing.
“Against the wall,” Mr. Fishnet Stockings barked, sweeping his gun over us.
A few cringed away from the weapon, and while his attention was focused on them, I got to my feet, shuffling backwards to hide my phone’s presence. The woman shielded me, keeping close during the move.
After another pass of his gun, he ordered us to sit.
I obeyed, wondering when the first hostage would decide to play hero and attempt to take out an armed lunatic. That someone hadn’t already tried offered me the illusion of hope. So far, no one in the bank had been killed. The standoff would continue until a sniper outside could take a shot, Mr. Fishnet Stockings surrendered, or the police judged the risk of assaulting the bank worth the lives they could save.
I doubted there’d be any ransom paid. Paying ransom only encouraged people to take hostages.
The woman made herself comfortable beside me, stretching out her legs. “He’s probably desperate and cornered, in a situation he doesn’t think he can escape from. He’s smart enough to understand if he negotiates, he won’t get what he needs—cash. The drug angle could be right, but I think it’s more than just owing someone money or needing another hit. Doesn’t look like the type to have hundreds of thousands in drug debts. Medical debt is more likely, but for someone else, not him. Perhaps an expensive prescription for a wife, child, or other family member.”
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