Mark surveyed her. “You could stay here and wait if you want.”
By herself ? “No way. I’m coming.”
Muscles like taut rubber bands, she trailed him out of the kitchen.
FOUR
The longest day in Martin Giordano’s twenty-nine years had begun with a mouse in the toilet.
“Eeeeee!” his four-year-old daughter, Tammy, shrieked. “Daddy, get it out!”
Martin stood in his pajamas, surveying the gray creature swimming around the stained bowl. What to do? He couldn’t flush the thing. What if it backed up the pipes? But he wasn’t about to reach his hand in there and pull it out.
Lorraine hovered behind him, one hand to her mouth and the other gripping their little girl’s shoulder. Tammy’s frightened sobs quickly turned to heavy coughing. “Come on now, shh, shh.” Lorraine picked Tammy up and held her tight. “You don’t want to make the cough worse. Daddy will take care of the mouse.” Carrying Tammy from the bathroom, she looked over her shoulder. “Get my big ladle.”
Martin trotted to their cluttered kitchen and grabbed the utensil from its top drawer. Back in the bathroom he closed the door. In one fluid motion he dunked the large metal scoop into the toilet, jerked out the mouse, and flung it into the cracked bathtub. Water flew in all directions. The mouse landed with a wet thwap.
Before it could struggle to its feet, Martin beat it to death with the back of the ladle.
Breathing hard, he stared at the tiny body and shuddered. Corpses looked so cold.
With the ladle he scooped up the mouse and threw it in the waste paper basket. Sweat itched under Martin’s pajama top as he carried the trash into the kitchen and emptied it into the garbage can. The tainted ladle went into the sink.
From Tammy’s bedroom barked the sound of the cough she’d had for months now. The cough that remained undiagnosed, along with the paleness of Tammy’s skin and her constant tiredness.
Martin wrapped his fingers around the edge of the old Formica counter and rested his forehead against a cabinet. If only her sickness could be taken care of as easily as fishing a mouse from the toilet. All the money that surrounded him every workday, and he couldn’t even afford proper medical care for his only child.
Now, after hours at Atlantic City Trust Bank, Martin still heard that cough in his mind as he fought to reconcile his books. Left elbow pressed against his desk, right leg jiggling, he stared at the digits jumbling in his head. His fingers twitched against the calculator keys. To his right behind the teller counter, Shelley and Olga talked in low tones as they performed the workday’s final duties. Martin’s gaze slid in their direction. At twenty-four, the same age as Martin’s wife, soft-spoken Shelley stood tall and thin, a willow tree next to Olga’s stump of a figure. Olga was in her fifties, a no-nonsense, diligent worker who gushed constantly about her “blessed grandbabies.”
Guilt twinged in Martin’s stomach.
“Tammy’s too sick to go to preschool again,” Lorraine had told him as he left for work. “I’ll just keep her home with me.”
“Home” was a dingy two-bedroom apartment in an old building opposite two rows of storage units running parallel to each other. The living room window overlooked the units and their surrounding concrete. The view from the kitchen window on the opposite side was a rundown industrial street. Next door to the apartment lay the cramped office for the rentals, where Lorraine spent her days. The rental place ran the width of a block. It was gray and depressing, but the apartment came free along with a meager weekly paycheck for Lorraine’s management of the storage units. They could have lived in a much better place if it weren’t for Tammy’s sickness. Seemed like every other dollar went for doctor visits and cough syrup.
Martin glanced at the clock on the bank’s wall. His leg jiggled higher.
A faint sound from the rear door of the long bank made Martin’s head jerk. He stilled, listening. Both doors had been locked when the bank closed. Another noise, a metallic click. Martin swiveled in his chair. The door yanked open.
Four men wearing black ski masks over their heads burst inside, the first two with guns drawn. The second pair each carried four large duffel bags.
Martin jumped to his feet.
“Stay where you are!” The man in the lead pointed a gun at his chest. “Hands in the air.”
“You too.” The second gunman aimed at Shelley and Olga. His voice sounded like stirred gravel. “Get your hands up now.”
Shelley’s thin arms rose, shaking. Her gray eyes bugged, her mouth hanging open. Olga stacked both hands on top of her head. Her lips pressed, a defiant expression on her rectangular face.
“Back up against the wall.”
The women obeyed.
Martin’s heart rammed against his chest. His eyes cut from his coworkers to the gunmen. The leader was tall and lithe, the second very short but stocky. Even though the man was fully clothed, Martin could tell he was all muscle. The third and fourth were moving so fast he could hardly tell their sizes. All four wore black from head to toe, including gloves. The cutouts on the ski masks were small, barely showing their eyes, noses, and mouths.
The two carrying duffel bags threw them on the floor near the vault and hustled back outside. They quickly returned, each carrying four more bags.
“Come out front.” Man Number Two kept his gun on Shelley and Olga. “Hands stay up. Hurry.”
The leader ran to Martin, Man Number Three beside him. The third man whipped a pistol from his pants pocket. Martin flinched.
Lorraine. Tammy.
“Where are the keys to the vault?” the leader demanded.
“In my long desk drawer.”
“Stand back.”
Martin stepped aside while the leader grabbed at the drawer. Man Number Three kept his gun on Martin’s face. In that horrific second Martin pictured his head blown away.
He glanced at the two women as Olga shoved through the teller’s swing door with her thigh. Shelley followed. They stopped in front of the counter five feet from Man Number Two.
“Over there. Move it.” The robber gestured with his chin toward the rear of the bank. Both women scurried toward the vault. One of the men herded them to stand off to one side. At their feet lay the empty duffel bags.
The leader yanked Martin’s keys from the drawer and tossed them over. Martin’s arm jerked up to catch them.
“Open the vault.”
Martin swallowed. He looked at Shelley and Olga as they huddled, white-faced, staring down the barrels of two guns. “Don’t hurt them.”
“Go.”
Martin headed to the vault. With fumbling fingers he inserted the key and cranked the heavy door open. Shelley and Olga crowded nearby, the younger woman’s breath like muffled gasps.
“Inside.” The leader pushed him. “You two, go with him.”
Shelley let out a wail.
Martin’s heart dropped to his toes. “I can’t go in there! I’ve got claustrophobia!”
“Shut up and go.”
Martin and the women slunk inside, the first two men behind them. In the center of the vault stood two large metal carts with Plexiglas tops, crammed with money. The bills were pressed down, stacked, and bound according to denomination.
The second two men hustled in the duffel bags.
Air squeezed into Martin’s lungs, thick and heavy. The walls bent in, so close. Sweat trickled down his forehead.
“Look at all that cash!” Number Three peered into one of the carts.
Those carts held far more money than normal for a bank. Three casinos on the Atlantic City strip sent their daily take into Trust Bank. Three other banks also sent their daily deposits.