In fact, her rebellious teenage behavior had been the catalyst for her father’s decision to move from St. Paul to Atlanta to be around family. She had thrown all kinds of temper tantrums about the move, but he’d ignored every last one of them.
Now, she could see that moving to Atlanta had been the best decision for both her and her father. For her, it had allowed her to become closer with numerous cousins she hadn’t known before. Now she considered Sebrina, Monica and Victoria not only her favorite cousins, but also her best friends. For her father, moving to Atlanta meant a chance to fall in love again and a second chance at marriage.
Yes, her wedding day would have been six weeks from now. She was glad she had found out the truth about Charles before the wedding and not after, to be honest. “I’ll call Dad later today to tell him again that I’m doing fine,” she said.
“That might be a good idea. I think he still blames himself for introducing you to the jerk.”
Like her father, Charles was a pilot for a private corporation in Atlanta. She knew the only reason her dad had introduced them was because he had truly liked the guy. She and Charles had hit it off, and before long, things had become serious. He lived in Atlanta and hadn’t had a problem with long-distance dating and neither had she. He had flights into St. Paul all the time, and they managed to see each other often.
After dating for eight months, he’d asked her to marry him. Since she’d always wanted to be a June bride, they set the date, and he planned to relocate to his company’s St. Paul’s office. They had even talked about buying a home in one of the newer housing communities on the outskirts of town.
One day, she’d made an unexpected trip to Atlanta and had decided to surprise him. With the house key he’d given her, she had let herself into his home. But the surprise had been on her.
The scene that followed hadn’t been pretty. Charles had discovered just what a hellion she could be when provoked, and the woman in his bed had been forced to flee in the night, practically naked.
Kennedy had told her father countless times that it hadn’t been his fault for introducing them, and it was true. She didn’t blame her dad for anything. He’d been fooled by Charles as much as she had. “I told Dad that he shouldn’t think that way, and I’ll be sure to tell him so again when I talk to him.” She checked her watch. “I have an appointment at the bank this morning for an auto loan. I’m finally getting a new car.”
“About time,” Sebrina said smiling.
“Leave ‘Faithful Bessie’ alone,” she said grinning. “She and I have been through a lot together.”
“And it shows,” Sebrina said, trying to contain her laughter.
Kennedy’s car had been a birthday gift from her father when she’d turned sixteen and had been brand spanking new twelve years ago. When her father had handed her the keys, he’d told her if she was good to her car, it would be good to her.
She had been good to her car and ‘Faithful Bessie’ hadn’t let her down through high school, four years of college, or the move to St. Paul. Lately, however, the upkeep was getting costly, and she knew she was doing ‘Faithful Bessie’ a disservice by still expecting top performance. It was time for the old girl to retire.
A short while later, just as Kennedy was leaving for her appointment at the bank, she noticed she had a flat tire. As she pulled her phone from her purse to call the emergency road service company to come and change it, she shook her head. Surely this would be the last of her mishaps for the day.
It was a beautiful spring day in April, and she hoped that whatever good thing was going to happen for her today would hurry up and occur.
Haddison Bracen Wolf stared across the room at the two men. After eleven years of working as an FBI agent, with seven of those years undercover as Addison Bracey, he was glad he’d decided to make this his last assignment. The job was definitely getting to him. Right now, he was tempted to blow his cover and beat the hell out of Andy Rydell and Vince Sherwin. Both were the scum of the Earth and a part of him regretted the role he’d played for the past three months in getting them to think he was just as dirty as they were. The only thing stopping him from giving himself away was that he knew it wouldn’t be long before they were behind bars, where they rightly belonged.
In the meantime, he had to stay focused and keep them all from getting into serious trouble. They’d laid low for a month now, but he could tell they were getting restless. That wasn’t good — the FBI was just about to wrap things up with the crime ring these two were part of. To help fund the ring’s operation, which specialized in domestic terrorist activities, the ring’s members had been hitting banks. The next robbery was scheduled in three weeks, and an FBI sting operation was already set up. Things should have been wrapped up months ago, but an informant’s tip had notified the FBI of a key player in the crime ring that the Bureau hadn’t known about. It was vital to find out just who the man was.
Bracey had been disgusted at the names he’d turned in to the Bureau so far— men highly regarded not only in their communities, but on a national scale, as well. But he wasn’t surprised. He’d learned from years of working undercover that nobody was as they seemed.
Bracey’s job was to befriend Andy and Vince and dig for information. Getting chummy with Andy had been easy enough, but he couldn’t say the same for Vince. The man didn’t trust him for some reason, and was determined to be a thorn in Bracey’s side. Or, even more pointedly, a prick in his dick. Vince had protested loudly when the boss had told them Bracey would be joining their team.
“I think we need to rob a bank today.”
Bracey’s attention was pulled away from his thoughts and back to the pair. “Why?” he asked nonchalantly of Andy. “Our next robbery isn’t for another couple of weeks. We have orders to keep a low profile until then.”
“I’m bored. Besides, I got word from someone I trust that this particular bank will be an easy job.”
Honestly? In this business, there was really someone Andy thought he could trust? Bracey knew that although Vince had been Andy’s partner-in-crime for years, the two men didn’t trust each other, either. Through an informant, Bracey had gotten word that a file with the names of some of the mob’s key players had been on the hard drive of the computer in this house. After their last robbery, when Vince and Andy had passed out after celebrating a little too hard, Bracey had managed to do some digging. When he found what he was looking for, he copied the file, then sent the names to the Bureau.
Everything had to be timed perfectly for the upcoming takedown, and he was hoping nothing went wrong. The stage was set for the Feds to catch the thieves red-handed at the next bank robbery, exactly two weeks from now. When the perps left the bank, believing they’d engineered yet another successful heist, both federal agents and local police would be waiting to apprehend them.
“I say we stay put, Andy,” Bracey said, knowing an impromptu bank robbery in broad daylight was definitely a bad idea.
“Nobody asked you, Bracey. I agree with Andy. If we do a job on our own, we won’t have to turn anything over to those bastards in the mob. We can keep everything for ourselves.”