~~
Joe Two Knives’ dark glasses reflected the sun, cloudless sky and warehouses of a light industrial section of Las Vegas.
What if something went wrong? He watched the garage one hundred yards away. He did not want to be near it in case something went wrong. Nothing appeared suspicious. Everything had gone smoothly. Every detail of preparation had come off cleanly.
He checked his watch then the cell phone on the seat beside him. His hands were sweating inside the two pairs of surgical gloves he wore. The car's air conditioner kept him cool. He kept himself calm. He had been through this before. Twenty-five years ago. No one will die this time. But what if she didn’t make it? What would he do? He didn’t know. It was the one event he did not plan for. He needed Jessie like he needed air. To get him through the rest of his life.
His phone trilled.
“Yes,” he said.
“ETA seven to ten.”
“Thank you.”
Two Knives drove along a back service ally, stopping at the rear of the garage which bore a small painted sign: AAA Armored Repair. It was a rectangular cinder block building. One story. The garage had three auto bays each with an electronic door in the front and rear. He unlocked the building, parked his car in one of the bays then closed the rear electronic door. The garage was clean and empty. It had a small office and a bathroom. He went to a work table, switched on a scanner, listening as Las Vegas police dispatches echoed clearly.
A horn sounded two quick beeps in front of the building.
Two Knives hit a switch, the door rose, a motor revved and a U.S. Forged armor-plated Ford van edged inside, the electronic door closing behind it. Jessica Scout stepped out and studied her watch.
“Nineteen minutes since I left.”
He tossed Scout two pairs of rubber gloves. “Every second counts. You know what to do.”
Scout unlocked the truck's side door, entered, then slid three canvas bags to him. All together, they weighed about forty pounds, he figured, carrying them to the work table. The cash was wrapped in blue plastic, three packages of 100s, 50s and 20s. They covered the table with the bundles, laying each one flat.
“Three million seven hundred thousand,” she said. “Unmarked.”
He then took a metal detector wand and slowly passed it over the cash several times. No transmitters. He took one bundle, pulled up his pant leg and rubbed it against his moist skin. Then he took an ultra-violet lamp and illuminated his leg. Nothing. No chemicals. He carefully packed the bundles into white plastic medical containers, with lids cautioning:
DANGER DO NOT OPEN
MEDICAL WASTE
CONTAMINATED CADAVER TISSUE
He sealed the containers, placed them into three small, black suitcases then loaded them into the car's rear seat. Then he grabbed a utility knife, a roll of silver duct tape and a small box. His eyes met Scout's. “Ready?”
She nodded and climbed into the back of the truck. He taped her ankles together, then her knees, then her wrists avoiding the rubber gloves, then her mouth. Again he looked in her eyes and stroked her hair.
She was prepared. Scout rolled onto her stomach.
Two Knives pulled her Glock from her holster. Examined it. He removed the safety, chambered a round, placed the muzzle against Scout's back, laying it nearly flat while pressing it slightly into the fleshy part of her hip. The bullet would graze her. His finger slid around the trigger. Two Knives saw Scout's pretty half-turned face, blinking in anticipation.
Just enough to bleed, he instructed himself.
She nodded.
He fired the gun. Scout lurched, grunting. A small tear, edges blackened with powder appeared on her uniform. Blood soaked the wound. He examined it. A small charred gash. Her skin was ragged and torn. He cut the tape from Scout's mouth and wrists making sure some blood was on the remnants. The used tape with her blood, hair and fibers from her uniform would be left in the truck.
“OK?”
“It burns a little, but I'm fine”
“I’ll patch it up.”
Two Knives opened the first aid kit. Scout removed her shirt. She jerked when he dabbed iodine in her wound, more so than when she was shot. He dressed her wound.
“We're almost through. Stand up.”
Scout undid her utility belt, letting it drop to the floor. Two Knives dropped the Glock in the truck. Scout undid her pants, handing them to him. He ripped them near the zipper.
“We're coming up on half an hour,” he said, scooping up the knife, tape and kit, dropping them in the trash as he rushed to the small office. Scout, now stripped down to her bra and panties, gathered her hair as she hurried to the garage’s washroom.
In the office, Two Knives changed into new, pressed slacks, pin-stripped shirt, Gucci shoes and a conservative jacket. He combed his neatly trimmed silver hair, then slipped on a pair of wire-rimmed glasses.
Taped to the bottom of the desk was a brown envelope with several passports, driver's licenses, credit cards, cash. He tucked it into his breast pocket. Then he gathered everything from the work table and tossed it in the trash, except the radio scanner. That went in the car. He left a window down so he could still hear it. He opened the trunk. A wheelchair was folded inside. Next, he inventoried the entire garage, nothing was left. Nothing. He closed the doors of the Forged truck then unfurled a white nylon sheet that he cast over the van, pulling it down at spots where it was uneven. He checked the printed note he had taped earlier to window of the front door.
‘CLOSED INDEFINITELY DUE TO DEATH IN FAMILY.’
“Ready,” said the old woman who’d stepped from the washroom. She was wearing a light-knit knee-length sweater over a flower print caftan, flat-soled shoes. An emerald scarf hid her neck, her gray hair reached to her shoulders, framing her face, which was sallow and frowning under large, dark glasses. She was wearing rubber gloves and clutching her brown purse. She was hunched as if she were ill or enduring pain as she walked to the car’s front passenger seat.
Two Knives grabbed the trash from the washroom then tied three large garbage bags from the garage and tossed them in the car's trunk. He hit the switch for the electronic door, drove the car outside, stopping to close the garage door before they drove off down the rear alley.
Several blocks away, he stopped to drop the trash bags in a warehouse dumpster. He knew the schedule. This dumpster would be emptied the next morning.
They were well along Interstate 15 southbound, which paralleled The Strip, by the time their portable scanner crackled with the first dispatch of an armored car heist at a casino on Las Vegas Boulevard.
“So far, so good,” he said, tossing the scanner out the window as they neared the Exec Air Terminal at McCarran.
Scout said nothing. She was looking west to the mountains.