“Did they say when they were coming back for the money?” he prompted.
“No.” Shelly sniffed, wiping the tears from her cheek with the heel of her hand. “I didn’t even know my boyfriend, Craig, and his buddies were robbing banks until Greta and I found the money. Craig and the other guys weren’t too happy we found it, but promised they’d split the money with us if we kept our mouths shut.” Another tear trickled down her cheek. “I know it was wrong, but I never had money, and there was so much of it… Greta told me that if we stayed with them, we’d end up in jail or dead. She said that if we called the FBI and told them which bank the guys were going to rob next, they’d arrest them and the two of us could run off to Mexico with all the money.”
Shelly shook her head. “But it didn’t work out that way. The guys came back from the bank job and overheard Greta and I talking. They s-slit her throat right in front of me, then told me that they’d do the same thing to me and every member of my family if I didn’t do what they said. When they find out you were here…”
Her voice trailed off, sobs wracking her body.
“We won’t let anything happen to you, Shelly,” Xander promised. “Do you know where Craig and the other guys are?”
It took a while to get anything else out of her because she spent more time crying than talking. But working together, Khaki and Xander finally got the information they needed out of the terrified woman. The crew was hitting the third and last bank in less than an hour. After that, the plan was for them to come back here and grab the rest of the money, then head to Mexico.
Two patrol cruisers pulled up as Shelly finished. Xander promised the woman again that she’d be safe, then handed her off to a female officer.
Khaki barely got in the backseat and clicked her seat belt in place before Alex pulled away from the curb and switched on the flashing lights. As they sped downtown to the bank, Xander called Thompson while Khaki pulled out her phone and got the rest of the squad up to speed, asking the guys to meet them.
By the time she hung up, Xander’s conversation with Thompson had turned into a shouting match. After a lot of yelling back and forth, they finally came up with a plan. Since the bank robbers would probably follow the same MO that had worked so well before, Thompson and the rest of the feds would move in from the front of the bank, making sure that the suspects knew they were there. If the crew followed the script, they’d immediately head for their backup escape route, where she, Xander, and the rest of the squad would be waiting for them. If all went well, they’d catch the bank robbers completely by surprise and in no position to defend themselves.
There was only one problem. The whole plan depended on SWAT, the FBI, and the DPD reinforcements getting to the bank and setting up in time, during rush-hour traffic.
Xander kept his cell phone glued to one ear and the vehicle’s radio in the other, trying to get all the moving parts to come together on the fly. Khaki used her cell to occasionally check on the status of the rest of the squad, when she wasn’t checking the clock on the dash.
She, Xander, and Alex turned onto the street one block over from the main entrance of Suncrest Federal on Preston forty-two minutes later to hear the bank alarm ringing.
“Thompson and the feds just caught the crew as they were coming out the front entrance,” Xander said, gesturing to Alex to position the SUV diagonally across an alley between two buildings. “Some of them turned around and went out the back. They should be heading our way any second.”
Khaki hopped out of the SUV along with Xander and Alex, drawing her weapon and motioning for the people meandering down the street to get out of the area. She’d just herded the last civilian away when four men in ski masks came running out the back door into the alley. They all carried automatic weapons and black duffel bags that matched the ones Khaki had found in the house over in Oak Tree. The men skidded to a halt when they saw her, Xander, and Alex.
The suspects hesitated. Khaki tightened her grip on her Sig, ready to pull the trigger if the men tried to shoot their way out of the trap.
“Don’t even try it,” Xander warned, his weapon trained on them. “Your armored getaway vehicles won’t be coming to get you because we’ve already arrested your drivers while they were waiting for you in the parking garage.”
The four men looked at each other, then turned as one and started shooting.
The AR-15s they carried could fire a lot of rounds, but this time there weren’t any cars and innocent civilians for the bank robbers to hide behind. This time, they were completely exposed.
Two went down immediately and the other two dropped their duffel bags and took off running.
Xander ran after them with a snarl. Khaki followed. If Xander was going to chase them down on foot, Khaki was going to stay with him to cover his back.
It was ridiculously easy to catch the two men, even when they threw down their empty weapons so they could run faster. She and Xander slammed them to the ground before they even reached the end of the block.
Out of the corner of her eye, Khaki saw Xander’s suspect go limp as Xander twisted the man’s arm behind his back. Her suspect—the man whose scent she recognized from the first bank robbery—must have decided he had a better chance of getting away since she was a woman. He clawed his way to his feet and tried to go for her weapon.
Khaki didn’t even think. She simply grabbed the man’s wrist like Hale had taught her, threw her hip into him, and flipped him to the pavement so hard his teeth clacked together. He didn’t resist much after that. She rolled him onto his stomach and zip tied his wrists.
She stood, turning to smile at Xander when he was suddenly thrown violently backward. Three gaping, bloody holes appeared in his tactical vest as he hit the concrete. Khaki didn’t even realize what had happened until the boom of a high-powered rifle echoed in her ears. She looked around wildly, trying to see where the shooter was when another round hit Xander.
Khaki’s heart seized in her chest as she rushed over to Xander. Trying to stay out of the path of bullets, she grabbed his hands and dragged him across the pavement to a recessed doorway. She’d just reached the granite-edged corner when a bullet hit her in the left thigh. She ignored it, instead focusing on getting Xander out of the line of fire. Another round slammed into the stone wall just as she got him into the doorway. She dropped to the ground beside him, pulling him into her lap and cradling him there.
“Xander, are you okay?” she asked urgently. “Xander?”
He didn’t answer, didn’t even open his eyes. Was he even conscious? She slapped her hand down on his chest, shocked at all the blood soaking his shattered tactical vest. There was so much blood.
Alex rushed into the alcove, yelling in his radio for an ambulance and trying to give a location on the shooter at the same time. Then he was at her side, ripping off Xander’s Kevlar vest and uniform shirt to reveal three bullet wounds.
Khaki watched numbly as Alex flipped Xander over.
“Shit,” he muttered. “There’s only one exit wound. The vest slowed the other two down. They’re still inside him.”
