“Oh fuck you.”
More pounding, frustrated this time, instead of purposeful. But each angry burst of sound sends fear spiking inside me. My back is pressed so hard up against the desk, I’m going to have the shape of the drawer handle imprinted into my rib cage forever.
“Take a break,” Gray Cap orders, and then it’s quiet. Blessedly quiet.
The office is dark, the only light coming from the tiny inaccessible windows set at the top of the room that aren’t more than six inches wide. I peek over the edge of the desk, trying to get my eyes to adjust. I can see the shadow of a phone, and my heart slams in my chest.
When the door doesn’t start thumping again, I don’t know if it’s because they’ve both left or if one of them is just outside, waiting for the other to cool down and come back.
I look at the phone again. Risk. Reward. Risk. Reward.
I grab it and dial Lee’s cell. It rings twice, and then she picks up.
“Hello?”
“It’s me,” I whisper, as quietly as possible.
“Nora?” Lee’s voice cracks. “Are you okay? Where are you in the bank? Is Wes with you? His truck is here.”
“I’m in the back, where the offices are. Wes and Iris are with me. There are two robbers. I’ve seen two guns. A shotgun and a semiautomatic. I don’t know if they have more. They want the safe-deposit boxes. I’m trying to make it so they go down the basement together, so we can run for it.”
“Nora, they’ve used the furniture to barricade the front,” Lee says. “Do not try to get out the front. You might not have enough time to get it cleared before they come back. It’s a dead end. We don’t have a way in until SWAT gets here with the blasting equipment. The fucking building is like a brick fortress.”
“How do we get out?” I whisper.
“The basement’s got an exit. But we can’t access it from the outside.”
Of course. I close my eyes. Shit. Time to throw the basement plan out the window.
“Nora?” Lee says.
“I love you.” I need to say it to her. I don’t say it a lot. I should’ve said it more.
“Nora.” A warning I don’t heed.
“I’ll figure it out.” A promise I have to make. “Just . . . I need you to pull out the megaphone. I need to be sure they’re out of this hallway.”
“What hallway?”
“Lee.”
“Right. Megaphone. Got it.”
“I gotta go.”
I hang up before I can sob or whimper. I crouch in that dark office for a moment, fear battering through me like fists. And I wait.
This far away from the parking lot, her voice is faded, but Lee has a way of projecting, even without a megaphone.
“I’ve got some information for you about your friend Mr. Frayn. But you’re not picking up my calls.”
The phones start ringing again, on cue.
I strain to hear it: footsteps fading away. I think I hear it. God, please, let that be it and not just wishful thinking.
I’ve got no choice but to spring into action. I don’t have time to be neat, so I tear through his desk like a whirlwind. Where are they? Keys, gold, brass, silver, long, skinny, short, I need them. I headed into this thinking I wanted to hand the keys over like a gift, and now the last thing I want is for them to get their hands near them. They get into the basement, we won’t get out alive. Gray Cap is totally the kind of guy who’d use a hostage as a human shield.
There aren’t any keys in any of Theodore Frayn’s desk drawers. His filing cabinets don’t yield anything either. I don’t have much more time. The phones are still ringing. Gray Cap still hasn’t picked up. Pick up, you jerk.
And then the ringing stops, and relief curls in my stomach. Gray Cap’s engaging Lee. He’s not right outside.
I push the filing cabinet drawer back, and that’s when I hear the metallic click on the bottom. I pull it out again, tilting my head upside down, and there it is: two keys on a ring, taped underneath the drawer. One of the keys has come loose from the tape, dangling free. They’re the old-fashioned ones with the box number stamped on them. They’re the same kind that Lee used to open her own safe-deposit box here.
Unsticking them, I tuck them into my bra. I’ve been here too long. Even if there is a key to the vault around here somewhere, I don’t have time to look more. I’ve got part of what they wanted, at least. Now it’s time to set the trap.
First, I position the office chair underneath the air vent. With my escape secure, I grab a pen off the desk and the pad of sticky notes. Scrawling two words on it, I stick it to the stapler. Then I creep across the room, unlock the door, and open it a crack, slipping the stapler in the gap to keep it open.