2

"Get out! Now!" I yelled, advancing a few steps closer to the front of the truck. The driver locked eyes with me through the windshield, too distracted to notice Leonel dashing along the side of the vehicle. With his firearm drawn, Leonel came to a stop right outside the driver's door, aiming up at him. Leaning forward, the driver engaged the handbrake, diesel fumes filling my nostrils.

Although I couldn't see him, I knew Martin had positioned himself behind the truck. My current task was to maintain the driver's focus. My rifle could easily penetrate the glass, and he likely knew that. Despite my command for him to exit the truck, he remained seated, staring at me with fear etched on his face. It was fine as long as he didn't pose any threat to us.

Then, over the rumble of the engine, I heard Martin's voice. "Three, two, one..."

A deafening blast shattered the silence of the night. Smoke billowed from behind the truck as the driver was flung sideways, disappearing from view. The fool hadn't even bothered to fasten his seatbelt.

“All clear?” I called back to Martin. Though we’d accounted for every variable we could, we hadn’t been entirely sure that the charge would be enough to blow open the reinforced doors. At the same time, we didn’t want anything so strong that it risked torching the cash. But Martin knew what to do if the first blast didn’t work. We always had a Plan B.

“Give me a minute,” Martin called back.

Leonel and I exchanged glances. Would it have killed him to give us more info?

Movement caught my eye. The chickenshit driver had reappeared, and he had something in his hands. My finger tightened instinctively on the trigger before I saw what he was holding.

It was a fucking shotgun. What kind of an armored truck driver packed a weapon more suited to picking squirrels off of tree branches?

The driver fumbled with his laughable weapon and then he coughed.

Shit.

It took my brain a half second to resolve the alarm spreading through me. The driver had coughed because of the smoke filling the cab of the truck. A quick glance confirmed that the wall separating the front from the back of the truck remained intact. So how was the fuck cab filling up with smoke?

My pulse tripled as I realized the driver had rolled down the window.

Shit, shit, fuck.

I trained my sights on the driver, but my gaze went to Leonel. He was coughing, too, the ski mask not offering much protection from the acrid smoke. He’d taken a couple of instinctive steps back after the blast, but he was still too close to the truck.

“Look out!” I thundered, and in that split second, I knew I’d fucked up. I should’ve taken out the prick of a driver first. My shot pierced the glass, taking out the driver, but he’d got his off first, and Leonel fell to the ground with a cry.

Martin rounded the corner of the truck, almost tripping over Leonel. “What happened?”

“Little fucker tried to be a big man,” I growled, dropping to my knees.

Leonel was clutching his chest, and I yanked off my mask in order to see better. Martin whipped out a flashlight, and we both stared down at the blood darkening Leon’s shirt. His breathing was ragged as he gasped in pain. It was obvious he was trying to keep from shouting, but that was the least of my concerns. The driver was dead, and I was determined that Leonel wouldn’t end up that way, too.

“Hospital,” Martin said briefly. Slinging the strap of my rifle over my shoulder, I slid my hands under my wounded friend. With Martin on his other side, we lifted him off the ground. His cry of pain wrenched at me, but there was another sound behind it I liked even less.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Martin said, meeting my eye. He’d heard it too—the sound of another engine coming up the road fast. Somehow, I doubted it was an innocent civilian out for a late-night drive.

All thoughts of the armored truck and the cash inside gone, we moved as quickly as we could through the woods. I was torn between wanting to just grab Leonel and haul ass to our car and wanting to be gentle because of his wounds. I settled for a fast walk, nearly a jog, and Martin kept up. He talked to Leonel as we carried him, reassuring him that he was going to be okay. I wasn’t sure how much he heard over the moans and gasps he was trying to stifle.

Martin pushed Leonel at me when we got to the SUV and I held him while Matt opened the door and pushed down the seats in the back. Shoving aside our equipment, I laid him in the back, Martin climbing in next to him. “Hang in there,” he said.

I drove without lights, thankful that we’d cased this area so many times that we knew every mile. Still, I was less careful than I should have been as I raced to the hospital.

Leonel’s cries of pain made me favor speed over caution on a night where both were clearly needed.