Chapter Four
“This doesn’t feel right.” Kenzie’s voice hitched while she searched her surroundings.
They were on a dark street in a section of town she didn’t frequent even during daylight hours.
Gut instinct was real and it was currently screaming at her.
Abort mission! The idea was insanely unrealistic.
They weren’t high tech thieves. They were two morons in over their head.
“Of course, it doesn’t feel right. We are about to steal from hardened criminals and if caught we’ll mostly die.” Her teasing tone was lost on Kenzie. Nothing about this was funny.
Kenzie grabbed her arm. “Is this your way of easing my concern? God, you suck at this.”
Taylor burst out laughing. How she could find any humor in the situation was beyond Kenzie’s comprehension. Kenzie had always been the more serious of the two.
“Relax.” She wrapped her arm around Kenzie’s shoulder and continued to walk down the dimly lit side street. “It’s all going to play out just the way I want, trust me. Just do exactly what I said and in less than an hour we’ll be walking out with the cash.”
Kenzie drew up breath and stopped again.
“Why can’t we just call that guy Trent? I’ll talk to him and see if there’s something we can do to help find Drew.
” She didn’t expect Taylor to go along with her suggestion but she had to try.
Desperation had made her relentless. Her friend had been adamant that going to the bonds guy was not an option. Kenzie wasn’t giving up just yet.
“Kenzie,” she whined, and walked ahead of her. “No. I’m not calling that asshole. I’m doing this.”
Kenzie stood in the middle of the sidewalk staring at Taylor’s back as she moved further away. She had time to back out. Taylor would understand. She could just turn tail and catch a cab back to her place, leaving her car for Taylor. This wasn’t her problem!
“Shit,” she grumbled, and quickly hustled toward Taylor. It may not be her problem, but it was her best friend’s, and that made it hers. She was thankful for her sneakers. Taylor had laughed when she came out of the bedroom wearing jeans, sweatshirt, a ball cap, and sneakers.
“Wait,” she said, before Taylor stopped and glanced over her shoulder. A smirk resonated on her face.
“You’re so damn predictable.”
And Kenzie was. She may have given herself all the reasons why she shouldn’t go through with this but in the end, she wouldn’t let her best friend go at this alone.
“Just for the record and I’m saying this now.
..” She held up a finger. “One, this is the most idiotic plan you have ever gotten us into.” She ignored Taylor’s pout and continued on with her rant, holding up a second finger.
“Two, my dad is going to be pissed at you and probably never invite you for Christmas again if we get caught. And, three, you’re going to look like shit in an orange jumpsuit.
It’s not your color.” Kenzie took a deep breath and sighed. “There, I’ve said my piece.”
Taylor’s lips were tightened in a straight line holding back.
Kenzie pointed her finger in her face. “Don’t you dare laugh.
” She started walking and heard the faint giggle from behind.
Clutching her arms to her chest, a chill coursed over her.
She scanned the street. If there was a seedy section of town, they were in the thick of it.
Houston had its unsavory sections, she usually steered clear.
Until tonight. They continued down the street.
A few people milled around but no one paid much attention to them. All the more eerie.
“Down this way.”
Kenzie halted and leaned past Taylor. The dark alley might as well have had bats swooping and the grim reaper dressed in his cloak.
“You’re kidding, right? A dark alley.” Kenzie looked around wishing there was a way to get her friend to back out of this plan.
“Relax. It’s the metal door at the end of the building.”
“Metal door? Could this be anymore cliché for a bad idea? What’s next, a fat old guy in a van asking us if we want some fucking candy?
” Kenzie spread her hands out in frustration.
“This is nuts, Taylor. We’re probably going to die, or worse, get sold into sex slavery, be chained up and left to piss in a bucket in the corner.
Or what if they stab us will dull kitchen knives.
Slit our throats?” She threw her hands in the air.
“You’ve come up with some risky plans in the past but this one tops the rest.” Kenzie knew she was being harsh but her nerves had just hit an all-time high.
She clapped her hands dramatically. “Well done.”
Taylor stared back at her and raised her eyebrows. “You finished?”
Her rant did nothing. She dropped her hands and arms, her shoulders deflating in the process. It was over. Her last-ditch effort. Done. With or without her, Taylor would go through with the worst scheme ever planned.
“Yeah,” she muttered.
She followed her down the alley with the scent of stale piss burning her nostrils. They stood in front of the door, staring at it. It gave her a hitch in her heartbeat. Maybe Taylor was having second thoughts. The moment was fleeting as she leaned forward and knocked.
She stepped back from the door and they stood shoulder to shoulder. “What, no secret knock?”
Taylor rolled her eyes. “You watch too much TV.”
Kenzie closed her eyes and silently prayed. God was always listening, right? Please, Lord, save me from my own stupidity. She mouthed ‘Amen’.
Taylor snorted. “You’re praying? Seriously? Asking God for forgiveness?”
Kenzie cocked her neck. “Actually, I was asking Him to let the men inside be dumber than us. That’s the only way this will work in our favor.”
Taylor chuckled, staring at the door. “You are making this worse than it really is. Nothing bad is gonna happen. We’ll go in, talk to Dante, when he leaves, I’ll grab the cash and we scram. What could go wrong?”
Her confidence wasn’t soothing.
“Everything,” Kenzie mumbled, and flinched when the lock shifted on the door.
The door opened and the bouncer jerked his head for them to pass through. She was expecting some code word or to have to give a secret clue. Something, anything. For all this man knew, they were undercover vice, or FBI. Obviously, he didn’t take his job seriously.
She leaned closer to Taylor and whispered, “How the hell does he know we aren’t police or something?”
Taylor glared over her shoulder and mouthed, “Shut up.”
They followed the bouncer down another hall.
A flickering green light flashed and he slid a card though the lock and opened it in front of them.
Taylor walked through. She could hear the voices of people beyond the music pounding in the background.
Kenzie was almost through the door when the bouncer moved next to her towering over her. She glanced up at his hard face.
“You know how I know you’re not a cop?”
“Uh.” Was it a rhetorical question? Should she even answer? This was not someone who passed through her everyday life. This man was like the boogeyman, nothing inviting or soft about him. He seemed to be waiting for her to respond.
“How?”
He leaned closer, his arm grazing hers. “You’re still breathing.”
What the fuck? She watched him lean back, the corner of his eyes crinkling.
She darted forward crashing into Taylor’s back.
She couldn’t be sure who grabbed whose hand first but suddenly, Taylor was pulling her through a crowd of people.
She kept her eyes set on the bouncer, who watched her intently until they were lost in the sea of people.
Her heartbeat spiked. They were never going to pull this off.
“You made it.” A deep sinister growl came from behind them and Kenzie turned to see a tall man in a suit. It struck her as odd that the place was crawling with degenerates in jeans and t-shirts, and this man looked like he was going to a business meeting, or for a date with a high-class call girl.
“I told you I would stop by.”
Kenzie refrained from rolling her eyes at the sultry tone Taylor was giving him.
She was too busy scanning their immediate area.
If she could have dreamt up a nightmare, this would be it.
The sight, the smell, the entire vibe of the large room with people, was dangerous and illegal.
The music in the background made it hard for her to hear what Taylor was saying to the man.
Dante. Even the name was something out of a gangster movie, where people die.
Taylor had given her a brief description of him.
He was the would-be victim from their mini-heist. Seeing him now, in person, tall and muscular, scary.
He was the poster boy for ‘do not fuck with me or my money’. And they were going to do just that.
She licked her lips trying to dredge up any kind of moisture.
Her dry mouth was making it impossible to swallow.
It was a nervous reaction. It didn’t happen often, but when she got really nervous, her mouth would go dry, her tongue would swell, and a large lump would form in her throat.
She inhaled a long breath, as deep as her lungs would allow, through her nose.
The loud voices in the crowded room seemed to quiet briefly and suddenly she was moving in a mosh of people. Panic set in. She gripped the back of Taylor’s shirt. She glanced over her shoulder and smiled. It was meant to calm her. It didn’t.
They, along with everyone in the room, all fifty of them, moved forward, reminding her of a herd. The lights gleamed in from the door and as she passed through, she squinted from the harsh fluorescent light hanging over the warehouse.