Free Stick by Elmore Leonard

happiness in armed robbery. And Stick, fresh out of the Wayne County jail, feeling as lucky and confident as he did right now, had listened. He could have walked away from Frank and saved himself seven years.
    He could walk away from this place . . .
    A heavyset dark-haired guy in a pale blue suit and blue print shirt came in from the terrace, passed behind Stick and stood at the empty bar a few stools away. He rapped on the rounded edge of the bar with a car key and said, “Hey, Bobbi!”
    Stick turned to look at his profile. It was Lionel Oliva. Lionel ordered a rum and tonic. As he waited, lightly tapping his key on the bar, he called out to Bobbi, “Turn a music on. This place is dead.”
    Stick said to him, “How’s it going?”
    Lionel looked at him, stared a moment with no expression of interest and shrugged. He turned back to wait for Bobbi.
    Stick felt himself relax more as he sipped his beer.
    He could walk away clean. Go out to the parking lot. He’d noticed when he came in a Mercedes, a couple of Cadillacs, a brand-new Corvette he could get five grand for easy, even without a delivery order . . .  and not have to go up to the top floor of that condominium, try and talk Chucky out of it and worry about getting thrown off a fifteen-story balcony.
    The prize out in the parking lot was a Rolls Silver Shadow, light gray, that was about fifteen years old and in show condition. Though the ‘Vette would be easier to move. Get some plates off another car, drive up to Atlanta and unload it. Fly back tomorrow night, see his little girl . . .  Except a ‘Vette, the new ones, they say you had to punch a hole through the steering column and it was easy to butcher. The old-model Rolls would be a lot easier to get into and take off.
    Lionel walked past him with his drink, going out to the terrace. He didn’t look back. And they had stared at each other in Chucky’s place.
    Bobbi came over. He thought she was going to mention Lionel, but she said, “That tab you were asking about? I remember, it’s taken care of.”
    â€œWho paid it?”
    â€œYou were suppose to meet Chucky that time?” Stick nodded. “Well, when you didn’t come back I put it on his charge. Is that all right?”
    â€œThat’s fine. You can put these on it too, you want.”
    â€œChucky always forgets to sign, so we have a pen that writes just like his.”
    â€œI’ll have to thank him,” Stick said.
    â€œThat was his bodyguard was just here. So Chucky’ll probably be in.”
    â€œYeah? What’s he need a bodyguard for?”
    Bobbi said, “I make drinks, but I’m not dumb. You know as well as I do if you’re a friend of Rainy’s, and that’s all I’m gonna say.”
    â€œI don’t blame you,” Stick said.
    He watched her walk away and began thinking of his partner again, Frank Ryan: sitting in the bar telling Frank he was going to Florida to see his little girl—Christ, almost seven and a half years later he still hadn’t seen her . . .  No, he’d listened to Frank tell him that in the area of taking money that didn’t belong to you—as opposed to lifting goods you had to fence—the method that paid the most for “percentagewise” the least amount of risk was armed robbery.He’d said, big deal. After all that buildup. And Frank had said, “Say it backwards, robbery comma armed. It can be a very big deal,” and had even quoted actual statistics, saying they could follow his rules for success and happiness in armed robbery and make three to five grand a week, easy. That was when he should have walked out, right at that moment, when he didn’t have a dime, but was calm inside. Confident, reasonably happy. And most of all, free.
    He caught Bobbi’s eye. Coming over she said, “Same way?”
    Stick shook his head. He said,