Free 14th Deadly Sin: (Women’s Murder Club 14) by James Patterson Page B

as soon as he had it. Last thing he wanted was for Donna to approach the store and get shot.
    The men in the pig masks were coming toward him quickly. Their timing was good. There were no pedestrians, and the few drivers were focused on getting through the next traffic light. Blau saw that each of the men had a gun. He had to outthink them. He had to use his brain.
    Blau raised his hands.
    When the men were six or seven feet away, Blau said, “I’m not armed. I’ll give you whatever you want. Just don’t hurt me.”
    “OK, man. We don’t want to hurt anyone,” said one of the robbers. He seemed to be in charge. And he seemed to be a youngish man. His voice was young.
    Blau tried to take in everything about him so he could give a good report of the robbery after it was over. He thought the guy who had talked to him was about five ten. And Blau saw from his hands that he was white. He couldn’t describe the man’s build because of the boxy shape of the Windbreaker, but he thought he might be able to recognize the guy’s voice if he ever heard it again.
    Blau said, “What do you want? My wallet is in my back pocket. Take it. I’ve got a few hundred in cash in there. And my watch is pretty new. Take that, too.”
    Blau was still holding the keys in his hand. There was nothing he could do about that.
    A different one of the three men said, “Let’s go into your store, OK, Mr. Blau?”
    They
knew
him. They knew who he
was
. Blau felt faint. He’d never had a gun pointed at him before. He almost said, “Do I know you?” but shut the thought down.
    If the guy thought Blau knew him … He thought of Donna. He prayed she wouldn’t show up now. She wouldn’t be able to handle this.
    Blau said, “OK. I’m going to open the door now, and let’s do this fast before customers come in.”
    “Lead the way, Mr. Blau,” said one of the masked men. “Let’s go.”

CHAPTER 32
     
    BLAU FIDDLED WITH the gates and the keys and the double locks. His hands were shaking and he could smell his own sweat. He thought there was every chance he could be living his last minutes on this earth. He got the front door locks open, and then the door creaked and swung wide, and then he hit the lights so that when his wife showed up, she could see through the plate glass window. See that this was a holdup.
    Please, Donna, don’t come into the store.
    One of the fucking armed robbers complained, “Hey. We don’t need no steenking light, man.”
    “I have to see so I can open the
safe
,” Blau said. “Believe me, I want you out fast. I’m happy to give you the money, all right? Just trust me, OK? I’m working with you.”
    Blau didn’t wait for a reply. He walked deliberately and quickly past the block of folding chairs, all the way to the back of the store where the lines were painted on the floor, delineating aisles leading to the teller windows. Next to the windows, on the far right side of the wall, was the security door that divided the store into the public space and the office area behind it.
    The safe was in the office. Blau turned his back to the robbers to open the door, telling those shits, “After I give you the money, you can go out the back door. Be safer for you.”
    The men, maybe they were boys, the way they were all jumpy, were crowding into the office area with him. One of them, the smallest pig, was getting anxious, looking around, saying “Let’s go let’s go let’s go.”
    Blau turned his eyes away from the credenza where he kept the shotgun and pointed out the wooden cabinet below the counter.
    “The safe’s in here,” he said.
    The one who had been saying “Let’s go” was now saying “Come on come on come on.”
    Blau’s hands were out of control. He could barely hold a key, and both the key and the cabinet lock were small. He poked at the lock until he finally got the key into it, turned it, and opened the lower cabinet where he kept the old cast-iron safe. Taking no chances, he angled his body