Author's Note: Sorry for the lateness, my internet was down the whole weekend.
"I don't like it," Heather says. "Grocery stores and gas stations are one thing, but a bank? There's no way she can handle it."
Courtney stashes Duncan's spare pistol in the waistline of her skirt. "For the fiftieth time, I used to work in a bank. Even if I hadn't, after four month with you all, I think I know more or less what I'm doing."
"You sure?" Harold asks from the driver's seat. Their car maneuvers through the streets of downtown Tulsa at a steady speed, testing the escape route. "Because it's really no trouble to wait with me in the car again…"
"The woman says she's ready, then she's ready," Al says. He pulls a box of bullets out from under the backseat and offers them to Courtney along with the smaller pistol he'd gotten her their first day in Tulsa. "I have the utmost faith in you, chica."
Courtney doesn't look at Al when she takes the box and the gun.
"I still say Alejandro and I should have given this a seal of approval before we tossed her a brand new piece and told her to have our backs," Heather says from the front seat, pulling Al's Browning Automatic out from its hiding spot between the door and her seat. She tosses Duncan the second BAR they'd picked up as Courtney loads her new gun.
"I just gave it my ok, love," Al repeats.
"Ah, yes," Heather says sarcastically, "I completely forgot how despite the fact all of our lives are on the line, this isn't a democracy of any kind."
"Enough! Both of ya," Duncan says, taking the box of bullets from Courtney. "I say she's in, she's in."
Heather sighs. "Like I said."
The four load up as Harold drives them to their prime position.
"Remember, no sleight of hand this time," Duncan says to Courtney as he finishes loading his rifle. "We get in, have the tellers give us the money from the registers, and get out."
"No vault?" she asks.
Duncan shakes his head. "Not worth it this time, doll. We're carrying heavy ammunition in the middle of a crowded city. The cops are going to be on us the second we get in the door. We got to be in and out faster than they are."
"If you're trying to get me rared up, it's working," Courtney says, grinning slyly.
He grins back and pecks her on the lips. "Good. Let's go."
Duncan steps out of the car and holds his hand out to Courtney. She gets out and leans against him like they practiced. Her body hides the shape of the BAR.
The bank is twice the size of the one she used to work at, bigger than any of their targets before. Duncan had said that if they pulled this off, they'd all head up to Chicago to celebrate.
Courtney puts one foot in front of the other and focuses on her lines. Heather and Al hang back in the car as Duncan opens the door for her.
"Knock 'em dead, doll," he whispers and kisses her on the cheek as she passes him.
Courtney walks in and takes stock of the room. Marble floors and high arching ceilings. A dozen tellers standing behind protective steel bars. About seventy customers, divided in lines. The bankers in a separate room, up the marble stairs and to the left. No coppers. Two desks but only one secretary by the door, her old job.
It's Courtney's job to give the signal. But there are so many people. The bank looks too big to be robbed by just four criminals. Courtney's pistol digs into her hip.
The blonde secretary looks up from her writing, eyes tired, and says, "Welcome to Tulsa National Bank. Do you need assistance today?"
Courtney counts to three in her head. Now or never.
"Yes."
She pulls her pistol out and fires two shots at the ceiling. Screams ring out. Duncan bursts through the doors, rifle raised, shouting that everyone lower themselves to the ground.
"If ya'll want to live," Courtney calls, laying her accent on thick, "I suggest ya give us yer money." She points her pistol at the secretary.
The woman holds her hands up and stands. "H-How much do you want?"
"All of it, ya dolt," Courtney mocks, batting her blackened eyelashes at her. "And I suggest ya make it snappy. My partners ain't in the most patient mood today."
The doors slam open again as Heather and Al run in, Al with his BAR and Heather with a pistol in each hand. They each carry a few empty burlap sacks. Al stays to barricade the door and Heather knocks a patron to the floor who isn't getting on his hands and knees fast enough.
"Why don't ya come 'round that desk and help me out?" Courtney says to the secretary as Heather tosses Courtney a few empty sacks. The woman shakily does as Courtney tells her and Courtney hands her the sacks with her free hand. While Duncan points his weapon at the row of tellers and Courtney trains her pistol on her, the secretary holds the bag out to the tellers who start filling them with stacks of money.
"Hey, kitten," Duncan says, "ya know how ya can tell a copper from a regular ole jobbie?"
He turns from the teller and fires at a man on the floor reaching for his belt. The short string of bullets ricochet off the tile near his head. Everyone jumps. Women scream.
Courtney smirks. "Don't let 'em play hero, baby."
Duncan pecks Courtney on the lips. "Don't let 'em skimp on the money."
He winks then walks over to kick the gun away from the man on the floor as Courtney pulls out her other revolver, the one that was Duncan's spare. She points one gun at the teller and the other at the secretary despite not knowing how to shoot left handed.
"Move it along. Hurry up, we ain't got all day," she says firmly.
At the opposite end of tellers, Heather walks over with her pistol trained on the patron she'd knocked down before. She throws him her own sacks and starts him on the tellers.
The secretary finishes one bag of cash with three tellers and hands it to Courtney. "Please," she whispers, tears streaming down her face, "please don't hurt me."
Courtney takes the bag of money from her and tosses it to Al at the door. "Keep doing what yer doing and-"
She notices the woman's hand and stops.
"How long ya been married?" Courtney asks.
The woman fumbles with the second bag. "Please...please don't…"
"Keep doing what yer doing and answer the question," Courtney orders.
The blonde womans opens the second bag and holds it out to another teller to fill it up. "T-Two years."
Courtney snorts. "Yer husband approve of you working?"
The lady gives a small nod.
"...Really?" Courtney says. "He don't mind that ya work? At a bank, even?"
"It's the only job we have," the woman says. "Tyler got laid off from the factory last month. I hate it here. But we have so many bills... I can't lose this job."
Courtney looks her over. Thin and tall like the star of a moving picture, wearing clothes that hid rather than accentuated her figure, her blonde hair tied into a messy bun. "What's yer name?"
"Lindsay. Please don't hurt me..."
"Speed it up over there, Bonnie," Al calls in a deceivingly calm voice. "We're on a timetable."
Courtney ignores him, her eyes narrow on the secretary. "What's so terrible 'bout this job, Lindsay?"
Lindsay looks to the teller as he hastily fills the bag. She doesn't answer, but before Courtney can prod, she whispers something.
"Speak up so I can hear ya."
"Everything," Lindsay says, looking deeply into the sack of money. "I...I want to stay home with my little boy. He stays home with Tyler now, but I miss him so much..."
Lindsay squeezes her eyes tight, trembling. Courtney looks her over. She points to the next teller to start putting in money.
"If ya hate it so much, then leave," Courtney says. "Get another job or go home to yer kid. What's stopping ya?"
"It's easy for you to say," Lindsay mutters. Her eyes dart to Duncan then back to her bag. "You don't have to look at your child's face when he tells you he's hungry and there's no money for food. You and your husband have all the money you could want."
"He ain't my husband," Courtney says, glaring. "He's my... We're partners. And if he'd come here 'stead of Dallas... If he'd come to ya like I'm coming to ya now, and told ya he could take ya away from yer awful job and give ya a chance at happiness..." Courtney stops, momentarily losing the gun moll act. "You wouldn't do it. Would you."
Lindsay closes the bag and hands it over without meeting Courtney's eyes. "What kind of woman would do that?"
Sirens sing out in the distance.
"That's our cue, doll!" Duncan says, snatching a half-full bag of money from Heather's hands. "Time to go!"
Courtney recollects herself and points her pistols at Lindsay and the teller with renewed determination. "Dump the rest of it in then kiss the ground like the rest of 'em."
The teller dumps a last handful of money, then he and Lindsay get on the ground. Courtney tucks her second gun away to hold the sacks. She looks down at Lindsay and pauses.
"Maybe you're just in the wrong line of work."
Duncan grabs her arm and Courtney runs for the door with her partners. Just before she exits, she turns back inside.
"Ya'll have just been robbed by Bonnie and Clyde and the Barrow Gang," she announces and makes a small curtsy. "Have a nice rest of yer day."