Page 404 of Devil’s Disciples

“Because Ghost was one of the sincerest men I’ve ever met. So is Goose. If they trust you enough to place their lives in your hands, I trust you, too. I may not like your mouth or your attitude, but I trust you.”

He stared. It seemed he was perplexed. After a moment, he lowered his arms. “How’d you know Ghost?”

“We had breakfast together every day. We had a lot in common.”

“How do I know he trusted you?” he asked. “Maybe he just let you eat breakfast with him because he was lonely or some shit.”

Saying what I wanted to say was a huge risk. Goose and I hadn’t discussed it. But, I was a big girl, and big girls often took big risks.

“Did you talk about everything?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer. “Were you really close?”

“Brothers,” he replied. “We were like brothers.”

“So, he told you about all the work he was planning on doing? The jobs?”

“If he was planning on doing a job, I knew about it.”

“Well, convincing you that he trusted me ought to be easy, then.”

His eyes thinned. “Why do you say that?”

“Because,” I explained. “If he told you everything about his jobs, and I tell you about a job that he told me about, you’ll know he trusted me enough to tell me, right?”

He blinked a few times. “He didn’t tell you about shit.”

“Bakersfield,” I said. “A man who sold kiddie-porn. Ghost was planning on doing that job, but he died before he did it. After his death, I researched it, went there, and did the job.”

His mouth fell open. As did three others. Goose’s was the only person besides me that wasn’t in utter shock.

“You did the Bakersfield job?” Cash blurted.

“Is that enough proof for you?” I asked.

Cash looked at Baker.

Baker shrugged. “She had just as much right to it as anyone. Like it or not, there wasn’t a label on it. If Brother Ghost told her about it, and obviously he did, it was free for the picking when he died.”

Cash swallowed hard. “I still want to see you open a bank vault.”

“Well,” I said. “When you work up enough guts to do a job with me, I’ll open it for you. How’s that?”

148

Goose

Reno, Tito, Cash and I were relaxed on the sectional with our legs propped on the edge of the coffee table. Ally sat beside us in a chair she’d taken from the clubhouse dining table. It was the first time I’d seen her wearing jeans, and I liked what I saw.

Baker ended his instructions regarding our upcoming bank job, advising Tito to find a small-town bank with transaction accounts in excess of 50 million. Such banks, he said, are required to keep ten percent in cash reserves. Although they could keep the reserves in the Federal Reserve Bank, most typically kept a good portion of cash in the vault.

Ally looked at him as if he was completely bonkers. She then glanced at each of us, seemingly searching for anyone else that agreed. After receiving nothing more than errant looks, she shifted her focus right back to Baker.

“Back to something you said in the middle of your instructions,” she said. “Is there a reason you only use one car? The getaway car?”

Midway through stroking his beard, Baker paused. With his beard clenched in the web of his hand, he lowered his chin and looked right at her. “Is there a logical reason I’d use more?”

Ally was asked to attend a meeting in the clubhouse to plan a bank job. I hoped she’d reveal methods, procedures, and past experiences that would make me proud to have recommended her, not argue the advantages of using a convoy of escape vehicles.

I lowered my head in shame and let out an inaudible sigh.