They slammed hard into the floor of the lift, scaring the shit out of the two men in it. Luke handed Frankie the file he had been clutching like a lifeline.
“Do not lose that.” The sound of flesh meeting flesh was pulled away by the wind as Luke knocked the guys out and took control of the lift.
Hand poised over the controls, he asked giddily, “Going down, madame?”
“Please, sir,” she said, laughing a bit hysterically and tipped an invisible hat to him.
And in what was possibly the slowest escape from a heist they ever had, they started their way down 15 stories.
With six floors to go, Frankie pointed towards the street. “We've got a problem.”
Surrounding the front door were four police cars parked hurriedly on the curb. Three cops were waiting next to the cars speaking into the walkie-talkies strapped to their shoulders.
“Okay,” Luke said while he thought. “Where's the car?”
Frankie pointed about four cars away from the cops. “Right there.”
“Well, okay then.” He pursed his lips, rubbing his neck. “Uh….fuck.” Luke stopped their descent with a lurch.
“Yep.”
“Do you think the ones inside would come out if we dropped one of these fuckers,” he kicked the window washer closest to him, “off the lift?”
She looked less than impressed. “Seriously?”
“Well, I don't know.” He knew there was a definite whinge in his voice, but he couldn't stop it. “We gotta get them to move.”
“Where's Riley? You have B-team on the job. Which we are still talking about, by the way. Where'd you put her?”
“I didn't think we'd need her. She wasn't called in for this.”
“Fucking Christ. I have no idea how you're not dead.” She said with her phone to her ear. “Hey. Where are you?”
“Oh, us? We're stuck six stories off the ground in a hanging death trap.” She said this hotly with a disdainful look at Luke. “We need you to pull away some heat. However you wanna do it is fine. Corner of 8th and Harrison. Just do something quick. We've been sitting here too long already.”
She slid her phone away and turned away from Luke. “Two minutes out.”
“Oh, come one. Don't be like that. You know this shit always happens.”
She spun to face him, voice rising. “Exactly! It always happens. You told me–” She crossed her arms across her chest and took a deep breath before continuing just as angry but not as loud. “You told me that this was an in and out. Little to no security, easy payoff. And from what I've got, there's no payoff. We have the info I got, some bullshit list of fucking passcodes, and whatever the fuck is in this file.” She waved the folder, the papers fanning with the motion and the wind. Luke jerked forward, involuntarily reaching for it.
Hand raised halfway between them, he clenched his fist against the knee-jerk reaction. “That's the job.”
“I know it's the job, Luke. But it's a fucking file we went after.”
“No.” He gulped, eyes tracking her hold on the papers. “It's the job.”
Frankie froze with her next comment stuck in her throat.
An explosion rocked the street from around the corner. A small smirk forced its way onto Luke's face.
“Riley's here.” He started the lift going down again.
“The heist?” Frankie breathed to herself. Bracing her hands on the rail of the lift, she peered over the side. The cops were halfway up the street, like idiots, running straight into an explosion in nothing but their uniforms. She huffed a laugh. At both the thought of these cops trying to handle Riley and that they had what they started this all for.
The final job.
The retirement fund, as she'd been calling it in her head.
The lift slowly lurched to a stop at the second floor. “Well,” Luke said. “I guess this is as far as she goes. How you wanna do this?”
Frankie measured up the drop. “I'll lower you down as much as I can. And you better fucking catch me when I fall.”
“Let's do it.”
Luke made his way over the lip of the platform and, once he was hanging, Frankie laid down on her stomach, took hold of his hands, and started shimmying her upper body over the edge. When Luke felt he could land the drop, without warning, he let go. Frankie dropped him.
He landed hard on his feet, crouched low. Overbalanced. Then toppled and crashed onto his ass.
She heard him yell in his whiniest voice, “Jesus!”
Once he was standing, pushing away any attention he had drawn from his fall, he waved her down.
Frankie took a steadying breath and moved to hang from the edge the same way Luke had.
“On three!” Luke called up to her. “One. Two. Three.”
She was in free fall, trusting him to catch her, for all of five seconds. She crashed into him hard. They were a sprawl of limbs and bruises on the ground.
“I guess pillow works as much as catching does.” She said, stunned.
“Yeah, well, you're not exactly a feather. Get up. We gotta go.”
She nodded, and they were both up and running to the car. Luke fell into the passenger side, while she slid into the driver's seat. The smell of burnt rubber lived in the smoke they kicked up. And with the squeal of tires as they peeled away from the sidewalk creating their soundtrack, Frankie fishtailed out of there.
The car behind her and the ones in the other lane laid on their horns. Flooring it, she and Luke rode away with their future inside a folio folder sitting in Luke's lap.
It wasn't until they were walking into the warehouse that she saw he was limping. Frankie held her tongue until they approached the giant table on the warehouse floor, covered in blueprints and empty bottles. He tossed the file on the table, and she saw blood spotting the outside.
“So…” She leveled him a look as he sat down. “You gonna tell me why you're limping? And apparently bleeding, too?” She gestured to the bloody folder.
“I may have–” He took a swig from a bottle of whiskey that was sitting open amongst all the empty ones. “I might've landed wrong on the drop.”
“You might be a stupid fucker,” she said. “You definitely landed wrong on the drop. I'll get the kit. Do I need to call Destiny in for this?”
“Nah, I'm fine.”
She hummed a sarcastic assent. Walking over to their makeshift kitchen area, she opened up the cabinet to the left of the fridge and pulled down the tackle box that was their first aid kit. They were running low on sutures, but hopefully, she wouldn't need those today.
Slamming the kit down on the table with a loud thunk, she pulled a chair up to face him. Luke popped his hurt leg straight, bracketed by her legs. Frankie held her hand out, palm up, asking for his. He placed his right hand in hers, and she brought it closer to her face to examine. She could feel all the calluses and rough skin hewn from their line of work. Tutting, she reached with her free hand for the rubbing alcohol.
“You don't need t–”
“Punishment.” Frankie cut him off. “You hide an injury, you get alcohol.”
He grimaced and settled back down muttering. “Not exactly the way I want it.”
A hiss slid through his teeth when Frankie swiped the alcohol first on the already scabbed over scrapes on his palm and then over his split knuckles.
“What's wrong with your ankle?”
“Nothing. Probably just twisted. A bottle o' this,” he raised the whiskey to his lips. “And a good night of sleep, and I'll be fresh as a daisy.” He smiled wide at her and she watched his adam's apple bob as he swallowed another swig.
She pursed her lips unhappily and dragged his leg up onto her lap. Pushing his pant leg up, she none too gently yanked his shoe off so she could see the swelling. It wasn't the worst they'd had, but a bruise was already spreading across his skin in mottled purple and blue. “Keep it raised and you might be able to walk on it tomorrow.”
“Come on! We just pulled off a job after being made in the first five seconds! Stop being so pissy.” He dropped his foot from her lap and leaned into her space. Mugging at her, he shook the bottle in offer.
Frankie pushed him away. “You can keep that. I'm going take off these stupid clothes.” Luke looked at her high waisted pants and classy blazer all fitted specifically to her. The pinstripes were a good look, he thought. “You can have tonight, but don't think I've forgotten about B team. You're not getting out of that conversation.”
“Wouldn't dream of it.” He slouched in the chair with his fingers gingerly gliding over the folder on top of the pile of papers. “See you tomorrow, then.”
“Go home, Luke,” she said, walking out.
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