Five Days After the Explosion
Some High-End Casino in Nevada

Dennis Humphry, manager of a recently robbed Wells Fargo in San Francisco, was not having a good day at the tables. He had lost nearly six thousand to the house, and his current cards told him he would lose more if he called the four-hundred dollar bet on the table. But the gambling but was clouding his judgment, which would have told him Nevada was not far enough away from San Francisco to spend his ill-got quarter million.

He glanced at the person who pulled up on the chair to his left. The man was athletic and more muscular than Dennis was. He wore a Beggars and Thieves concert T-shirt and jeans, a look that was out of place in this casino. The man had a couple chips in his hands that he was letting fall from one hand to the other while holding Dennis' stare.

Dennis turned his attention back to the table.

Someone else sidled up on his right side. He looked right, then down at the woman standing beside him. She was only hip-high to him, but the smile she wore made him feel uncomfortable. It was as if she were a cat, he was a mouse, and she'd just cornered him for dinner.

Or maybe it was because she looked like she had been in a catfight. She sported a black eye, a swollen and split lip, and a deep cut from her temple to jaw. The knuckles on her hands had scabbed lacerations, and her left index finger was black and blue. The rest of her exposed skin was covered in scabbed nicks and faint bruises.

"Hi," the woman said to Dennis.

"Hi." He looked back at his hand and started counting out the four hundred.

"Are you sure you want to do that, Dennis?" she asked.

That got his attention. He stared at her for a moment.

"Have we met?" he asked.

Her smile turned dark. "Oh yes, we have, but you didn't notice I was there. No…" She cocked her head to the side. "You were too busy killing a man to notice me under the table. Oh, but I noticed you. I also noticed the bomb you and your friend set off to cover a robbery at your own bank. You were right, you know, the FBI would be looking very closely at you."

Hearing his own words from the night of the robbery sent a cold lump into his stomach. But he smirked to cover how scared he suddenly was. "I have no idea what you're talking about, lady. Leave me alone!"

"You don't, huh? Interesting, you see, because the serial numbers on the bills you gave the cage for these chips matched a recent bank robbery at your bank." She swiped her hand into his pile, pulling several off the table.

Dennis lunged toward her. A pair of hands grabbed his shoulders and spun him right off the stool onto the floor. Then, before the room stopped whorling, a foot in a black combat boot stomped down on his chest, and the end of a gun was shoved against his nose. He looked up the barrel at the man in the band T-shirt.

"No one tries to blow up my family and gets away with it, ass-wipe. Please, Dennis," the man told him. "I really want to pull this trigger."

Dennis didn't give this man a reason.

"Easy, Jack," the woman told the man.

Slowly he backed off. Dennis thought he was free until two other men and a woman in FBI jackets rushed in to take him into custody.

Jack frowned, watching the FBI lead Dennis through the casino. He holstered his gun, and around them, the activity that had briefly paused returned to normal.

"He was about to do something stupid, Matty," Jack told her.

"And so were you." Mathilda moved next to Jack. "Okay. That's the last one," Mathilda told him. "No, get to the airport and take care of our problem in Bolivia."

"Mathilda, Mac is still in the—"

"I will stay with him until you three get back, I promise. Now go. You promised me that you would once we had this last guy."

Jack walked away like a scolded dog.

Behind his back, Mathilda smiled. Jack included her in that family comment, and they were that, weren't they?