Page 25 of The Deeper Game (The Kinky Bank Robbers #3)

Chapter Eighteen

“Almost there,” creepy Manning said as we passed a sign for Holden Corners.

Holden Corners?

My mouth went dry.

Holden Quarry was in Holden Corners. The quarry was where Venus’s body had been found.

He smiled, knowing that I was putting it together, I suppose.

“The good news is that your fellas are able to learn the lessons I offer them. First they learned the lesson of Venus: To refrain from compromising their excellence in service of their libido. She almost got them caught on the Keustonville job some years back. I knew then that I had to act. To show them not everyone has their strength.” He pointed. “Turn here.”

I turned onto a street where the streetlights rose up out of fat concrete bases; it was here I decided to go for foolish. I was part of a takeover bank robbery gang.

I could do it.

At a yellow light I gunned the engine and jerked the wheel, aiming for the nearest lamp base.

It was like a slow-motion dream, watching us careen toward it.

I could feel Manning’s shock as he grabbed the wheel, trying to wrest control, but I had two hands and he had just one, being that the other held a gun.

Suddenly he hit me in the chin with it.

The shattering pain so stunned me that I lost my edge—just enough for him to grab the wheel and avoid the crash.

Stars whirled around in front of my eyes.

I let up off the gas and the truck slowed. Cars behind us honked.

I was done driving right.

He pressed his gun to my belly. “You wanna drive shot? Is that what you want?”

I thought about it. Would he really do it? Something needed to interrupt this madness.

“My plan still works with you bleeding out. You think I can’t shoot you and take over? It’s not my favorite option, but I’ll do it.”

Was he bluffing? I didn’t want to find out.

I sped back up and drove normally. My chin throbbed. My lip burned.

“Kudos, however,” he said. “Few people can actually commit to a deliberate crash like you did—it goes against their self-preservation. Most people can’t bring themselves to do it.”

“Most people can’t bring themselves to do it?” I said. “And here I thought it was creepy when people knew too many facts about Smurf dolls.”

He gave me a hard look. “If you try it again, I will shoot you. If you move either of your hands from the steering wheel, that’s an instant shot, too. You understand? And FYI, I know what you’re packing.”

Damn.

Ten minutes later he was directing me into the quarry parking lot.

Seven at night.

Deserted.

“Stop here, but keep your hands on the wheel. I have no aversion to shooting you and throwing your body off the cliff. It’s not like they’re really going to think you killed yourself.

Your death here is more for the sake of symmetry than verisimilitude.

” He paused, seeming proud of his smart-sounding sentence.

It made me want to gouge out his eyes.

He made me put the truck in park and directed me to knit my fingers on top of my head, at which point he patted his creep hands up and down my legs, efficiently and clinically removing the weapons from my thigh and ankle holsters.

I was glad he didn’t touch me in a sexual manner, but it also showed what a fucking pro he was.

Manning wasn’t somebody who could be distracted in that way, even if I had the stomach for it, which I didn’t.

“What do you think they’re doing now?” he asked, taking my last gun out of my ankle holster, my mini nine. “What do you think?”

“I think they’re coming after me,” I said.

“What do you really think?”

I pictured them ravishing the safety deposit boxes. Enjoying the riches. Filling bags. Thor would be nearing the Mexican border. “I think they’re coming to tear you the fuck apart.” It was more a wish than a possibility, but I wished it fervently.

“They don’t know you’re gone yet, that’s what I think. I have alerts set up for when they get into that SUV. Don’t you wish you could hear them when they discover the message you wrote?”

“No.”

He grinned. “I do. And I’ll get my wish, because it’ll be recorded.

They’ll want to rip me apart. You can console yourself with that.

They’ll get a real vengeance hit off that.

They’ll drive here pretty fucking fast. I’d let you stick around to listen to them discover your message and what they say on the drive, but I don’t like to cut things that close.

Suffice to say it’ll be entertaining. Nothing like the grand finale, though.

Don’t you wish you could be a fly on the stone when they discover your body in the quarry right where Venus’s body was? ”

I looked away, chin and lip both throbbing like mad. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a reaction.

He motioned with his gun. “Out.”

I weighed my options, feeling like I was in a nightmare maze with no way out.

“Out, or I shoot you and carry you. Or more, drag you. You’re too heavy to carry.”

My pulse whooshed in my ears, and I wondered dimly if he was trying to insult me by suggesting I was heavy. As if a man can get more insulting than wanting you dead.

“Out.”

I started working off my heels, pushing them off with my toes. As soon as they were off, I leaned on the horn. The blare echoed off the stone piles, filling the area with sound.

Manning cursed and went for the keys.

That was my chance. I jumped out of the truck and ran for it. The rocks felt hard on my feet, and one or two definitely pierced the skin, but torn-up feet were better than broken ankles.

What are torn-up feet also better than? Death.

I ran like hell toward the nearest massive pile of stones, huge enough to cover half a tennis court and maybe five stories tall.

I heard him swear behind me, but it was a good sign that he hadn’t liked the honking—he was worried somebody might hear. Maybe he’d be reluctant to use the gun. He did have that silencer, but a silenced gun isn’t that silent.

I made it around to the far side of the mountain of stones and stilled.

The sharp little stones were a bitch to walk on.

On the upside, I could hear the crunch of his footfalls as he reached the other side of the pile.

He paused there.

I waited for his next move, senses on alert. Suddenly he was on the run again, his footsteps going clockwise.

I moved the same way, keeping the pile in between us, holding up the hem of my dress. The bottoms of my feet were raw and probably bloody, but unlike Manning, I could walk in relative silence. He picked up his pace to a run and so did I.

How long I could keep the pile between us? A pretty long time, I was thinking.

I heard him slow on the other side, and then stop, and then he headed the other way.

I mirrored his movements. As long as the pile was between us, I was safe.

After a while of chasing around, I picked up a large rock and tossed it clear over the pile at him. “An asshole loser A/V guy! With stupid hair!”

Not exactly productive, but what did I have to lose?

He moved clockwise, trying to come after me more stealthily, but I could hear him. If I kept it up long enough, my guys could get to me. It could be three hours, maybe four or five until they discovered the message. Could I make it?

Damn right!

We chased around back and forth. I felt like maybe an hour passed, though maybe it was ten minutes. I thought about alternate plans—climbing to the top, or burying myself as a way to hide, but nothing seemed as effective as keeping a giant motherfucking pile of stones between us.

Then there came a silence that went on a little too long. I waited until I caught a flash of green out the corner of my eye.

Crap!

I bolted away; a nearby spray of stones told me that his shot just missed me.

He’d taken off his shoes . We were now at the same stealth level.

It got harder to keep the pile between us after that.

He’d chase around and just appear and I’d have to take off, but sometimes he’d change directions and come at me the other way.

He could never quite catch me, but I was feeling tired and a little freaked out.

Dusk was falling, too, which made it harder to see him.

It was when I was on the side of the pile that was nearest to his truck that I got the idea to go back there. It was a lot of tundra to cross, but the rock pile strategy felt less promising, now.

I ran for it.

I heard another shot, but I kept going.

Zeus had once told me that it was nearly impossible to hit a target while you were running, which I’m sure he was.

Miraculously, I got to the truck and found the door open. I went in and looked around. Where were my guns? I could hear him coming. With shaking hands, I searched under the seats, yanked open the glove compartment.

What had he done with my guns? He couldn’t be carrying them all!

He was nearing. I jumped out and shut the door, hiding behind the truck just as I’d hid behind the rock pile.

“Lose something?” he asked from the other side, voice disturbingly close.

I crouched there on the other side of the door, pulse racing. Well, fuck it. As long as I could keep the vehicle between us, I was safe. I just had to survive for the next minute, and then the minute after that.

“I threw them into the grass,” he said. “Over behind the pole.”

I looked out at the weedy patch at the base of a utility pole at the edge of the lot, about ten parking spaces away. I caught the glint of metal, but it would be suicide to go for it.

“You know you can’t get away,” he said in his creep voice.

“Maybe not, but I can outlast you.”

“Actually, you can’t. This isn’t the rock pile, honey. All I have to do is jump up on the hood.”

“I’ll crawl under then,” I said, shaking deep down.

“And I’ll jump down and shoot you,” he said.

Wildly, I thought this scenario through. Yeah, he could do that.

I felt shaky, breath ragged, a cornered animal tasting her own death.

“Checkmate,” he added smugly.

Again I eyed the grass patch.

“Now, all I want to do is take a little walk with you,” he continued. “Do I drag your bloody corpse, or do you walk with me?”