steps.
Carolyn smiled patiently. “Yes, please.”
Jeff led the way to one of two six-foot-by-four-foot cubicles and opened the door for his customer. “Take your time,” he told her.
“Thank you.”
Inside, Carolyn locked the door, and after a quick scan overhead for security cameras, she opened the box and smiled. There it was: $62,000 cash. She’d forgotten what that much money looked like, all broken into hundreds. She pulled the Safeway bag from under her jacket, and as she stuffed the banded bills inside, she tried not to think about how much interest the money could have earned over the years, had they invested it properly. Yet another reality of life on the run.
Not that there’d been much choice. IRS regulations required banks to report large cash transactions, so that was out of the question. So were other standard investment vehicles. The key to this particular fund was instant and total liquidity. If and when the day came that the Brightons needed their cash, they would want it right by-God now; there’d be no time for a phone call to some broker. They could have kept it in the house, she supposed-in fact, for a while, they’d done just that, but not here in Phoenix. Farm Meadows was such a frequent target for burglars that many of Carolyn’s neighbors had stopped locking their trailers during the day, just to save the wear and tear on their doors and windows. Then there was the risk of a fire. All things considered, the safe-deposit box made the most sense.
Carolyn wondered if the bag would be big enough to hold it all. The space seemed to be filling up faster than the box was emptying. It was heavier than she’d expected, too.
What’s this? As she reached back to get the last of the bills, she found a pistol: a little. 380, just slightly bigger than her hand. She didn’t remember this from the memorized plan, but leave it to Jake to think of everything. She dropped the magazine out of the grip and took a look. Sure enough, loaded to the top. Like there was ever a doubt. She eased back the slide and found one more in the chamber. Jake was a planner, all right. He must have envisioned some scenario where she’d have to use more than words to get to the staging area, and he wanted her to be prepared. For the hundredth time over the years, she wondered if she’d have the guts to fire a gun, then she shooed away the thought and concentrated on her next move.
It turned out that there was plenty of space in the bag for the money, with enough room left over to fold the top closed. Slipping the. 380 into her jacket pocket, she hefted the bag under her left arm and, with her right arm clutching the deposit box, opened the door to retrieve her keys from Jeff.
“Carolyn!” a lady’s voice boomed. It was Mary Barnett, her next-door neighbor, sounding for all the world like they hadn’t seen each other in years. “How wonderful to see you!” Virtually deaf, Mrs. Barnett-“Mrs. Bullet Boobs” to the boys-was incapable of quiet speech.
Oh, God. “Hi, Mary. How are you?” She waved to get Jeff’s attention. He acknowledged her with a nod but appeared to be stuck on the phone.
“Happy and hearty as can be,” Mary bellowed. With her girth and baggy yellow dress, she looked like a have-a-niceday balloon. “The question is, how is little Travis? He looked awful last night.”
This I don’t need.
If Mrs. Barnett had dedicated one-fifth the effort she invested in other people’s business to a real business of her own, she’d have been a millionaire. “Oh, he’s fine,” Carolyn said, her spirit dancing as she saw Jeff hang up his phone.
“I didn’t see you go to a doctor.” Mrs. Barnett’s comment was leaden with disapproval.
Carolyn ignored her, concentrating instead on Jeff’s return. “Here you go,” she said, handing him the box.
He walked back into the vault and returned in twenty seconds with her keys. “Thank you, Mrs. Brighton,” he said earnestly.
Mrs. Barnett followed Carolyn to the door, chatting the whole way. “That’s some bag you’ve got there. Didn’t rob the place, did you?” She tittered at her little joke, until Carolyn froze her with a startled glare. “Oh, dear, Carolyn,” she apologized. “I’ve offended you. “
Carolyn smiled just a hair too slowly and shook her head. “Oh, no, not at all,” she said. “I’m just a little tired, I guess.”
Mrs. Barnett returned the smile, but absent her typical humor. “I’m sure. I understand.”
Dammit, Carolyn cursed herself. The problem with busybodies was their keen sense of human nature. Clearly, Mrs. Barnett knew something was wrong. Put another nail in the coffin.
Hurrying, but not running, back to her Celica, Carolyn checked her watch: 12:48. Damn. Every second…
CHAPTER THREE
Phoenix Police Chief Peter Sherwood had way too much on his administrative plate to suffer any more of this catfight. If Lucas Banks said that this Brighton guy was a straight shooter, then he was a straight shooter. He’d seen enough of Lucas’s courtroom antics to know when he was in his defense-lawyer mode, and this wasn’t it. Sometimes it wasn’t about winning and losing. Sometimes it was about justice. And as far as Sherwood could see, Lucas had a point.
Under different circumstances, he’d have cut Brighton loose by now. Unfortunately, this case belonged to the FBI, and the lady cop they’d assigned to running it was playing her role as Queen Bitch to the hilt. What was it about that agency that made them so damn difficult to deal with? God knew that DEA and Secret Service boys had huge egos, but at least they pretended to show respect for the eagles on Sherwood’s collar. The FBI, on the other hand, seemed to think that everyone they encountered was either an idiot or a criminal.
This Rivers lady was a case unto herself. Barely a first grader when Sherwood was busting his first felon, she was an arrogant bitch, with what looked to be a God complex. At maybe forty years old, this well-moussed Charlie’s Angels wanna-be thought she had the world pegged, and Sherwood wanted desperately to eat her and her attitude alive. In deference to Lucas and his client, however, he found himself playing peacemaker.
“We’ve been over this twice already, Irene,” Lucas said evenly. It was a struggle, but he forced himself to remain in his faux-leather guest chair, legs crossed, while he strangled paper clips from the dish on Sherwood’s desk. “Brighton is not a threat to you or anybody else. He’s got a business here. And a family. What do you want from him?”
Rivers slumped in the other guest chair. “You’re right,” she said. “We have been over this twice-three times now, in fact. And he’s a friend of yours. I heard you every time. Problem is, Counselor, that you keep forgetting the part where he drew a gun on me.”
“Bullshit!” That was it. Without even thinking, Lucas launched forward in his chair and bounced a dead paper clip off the polished desktop, causing Sherwood to dodge the ricochet. He knew that shouting was a mistake, but the genie was out of the bottle now. “He didn’t draw a gun on you! He drew a gun on a bunch of strangers with automatic weapons! You said yourself that he never even brought it to bear, for Christ’s sake! What the hell would you do if you saw a swarm of terrorists flooding your office?”
Rivers shook her head. “I’m not a terrorist. I’m a federal officer.” Her elbows were planted on the upholstered arms of the guest chair. As she spoke, she steepled her fingers and studied them. “Plus, I didn’t like what I saw behind his eyes. I know he didn’t shoot, but he sure as hell thought about it.”
“Oh, for God’s sake. Now you’re a mind reader!”
The time had come for Sherwood to intervene, before Lucas really pissed her off. “Come on, Irene. I’ve known Lucas since we were kids. If he says the guy’s okay, you can believe him. Don’t get me wrong, he’ll cut off your balls in a courtroom…” He stopped himself. There definitely was some eye contact now. “Well, you know what I mean. He’s a lawyer. But this isn’t a courtroom. You haven’t formally filed charges yet, right?”
Her eyes narrowed. Clearly, she didn’t appreciate the tag-team approach. “Why is this guy so important to you?” In sales, they would have called the question a buying signal.
Sherwood’s eyebrows scaled his forehead, as if to say, “Damn good question.” He left that one for his lawyer friend.
Lucas shrugged. “He did me a favor. He really worked with us to get our car fixed up before vacation, so I
