Arctic Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

if her life
hadn’t been taken from her.
    “There’s a new sushi bar that just opened down
the street.” Mary said cheerfully. “A bunch of us are going there
for lunch, you wanna come?”
    “No thanks.” he said, shaking his head and
chuckling a little. “I prefer my food cooked.”
    “Okay,” she replied and got her cash drawer from
the vault and prepared to open her window.
    Jenkins opened the doors to the bank, then went
to the back to bring out some coffee and cookies for the customers.
When he returned, two men in old, torn green army jackets and
tattered jeans were standing at the center island filling out
deposit slips. One had dark, greasy hair pulled back in a ponytail
and the other had a shaved head with four or five earrings each
running from his earlobe up through the cartilage. Neither looked
like they had bathed in days.
    He slowed a step as he approached, not liking
what he was seeing. Nonchalantly, he put the coffee and cookies on
the counter next to the men and sized them up the best he could
without staring. He greeted them with a cheery “Good Morning.” One
ignored him completely while the other raised his head briefly and
just grunted a sour “’mornin.”
    When he lifted his head, Jenkins noticed tiny
beads of sweat on the man’s forehead. It was warm outside, but not
that warm. Jenkins felt his stomach twisting into a tangled mess of
knots; he knew they were in serious trouble. Jenkins smiled and
slowly turned around. “Mary, I forgot the napkins, I’ll be back in
a few.” He called out. He hoped that by telling these two guys why
he was leaving it would keep them from panicking and give him time
to trip the silent alarm.
    He had taken three steps when he heard the front
doors slam open. He turned to see two men come storming in the
bank. One pulled out a handgun and the other carried a sawed off
shotgun. They were shouting for everyone to get down. Jenkins
quickly turned around, he had to get to the teller windows to send
the alarm. He turned but stopped dead in his tracks, finding
himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
    “Going somewhere old man?” The bald headed man
said snickering. He spun Jenkins around and shoved him toward the
teller windows.
    “For all you geniuses out there, this is a
robbery.” The man with the shotgun yelled. He was wearing a long,
black trench coat and had his hair oiled back, playing a very poor
Neo wannabe from the movie Matrix . He took out pillowcases
and tossed them to the man with the ponytail.
    Ponytail man went down the line and threw a
pillowcase at the first two tellers but stopped when he got to
Mary. He threw the last pillowcase to the end teller then turned to
Mary and held it open. “Trick or Treat.” He said with a slick
smile.
    Neo stood in front of the tellers and shouted.
“Dump your cash drawers into the bags. Be smart and don’t do
anything stupid like give us any of your specially marked bills or
be a hero and trip any silent alarms. Be smart and nobody gets
hurts.”
    Jenkins was at the end of the counter and
noticed that Ponytail was paying particular attention to Mary. He
kept reaching across the counter and touching her hands as she
emptied the drawer and each time she would swat them away like an
annoying fly. Good for you he thought; don’t let the creep
intimidate you.
    “You sure are pretty. Maybe you and I could
party a little huh?” Ponytail said as he reached up and tried to
touch Mary’s hair. She hit it away hard. “Buzz off jerk.”
    Suddenly he reached out and grabbed her by the
hair and nearly pulled her halfway across the counter top. She let
out an involuntary yelp, just as much from surprise as from the
pain. “Me and you is definitely going to do some partying.” He
shoved her back and turned, wearing a big, sadistic smile then he
yelled to the man with the shotgun. “Hey boss, I like this one, can
we keep her? I think she wants to play.”
    It was a defining moment for Albert Jenkins as
he