Read Online The Front by Mandasue Heller - Free Book Online

‘They’re all twenties.’
            Plunging his hand back into the bag, he pulled out another bundle.
            ‘Wow!’ Sam squeaked. ‘How much more is there?’
            ‘Hang on!’ Mal laughed, putting his hand in and pawing the rest of the money out.
            Suzie’s jaw dropped as she saw the huge pile of notes. Mal and Sam looked at each other in amazement. Then, whooping joyfully, each grabbed a handful and waved it in the air ecstatically. Only Ged seemed troubled. He sat forward, his hands clenched so tightly between his knees his knuckles turned white.
            ‘Man, oh man!’ Sam laughed. ‘There’s got to be nine, ten grand here. Let’s count it.’
            Mal picked up the bag and gave it a shake. ‘Hang about. There’s something else in here.’
            A large package fell to the floor with a dull thud. It was wrapped in plain brown paper, bound tightly with string, and there was something written on the top right corner.
            Sam craned forward, his eyes on stalks. ‘What is it? What’s it say?’
            ‘Will you just wait!’ Mal laughed at Sam’s impatience. He picked the package up for a closer look. ‘It’s just initials. An S and an M. That’s all it says.’ He turned it over in his hands with a shrug.
            ‘Open it, then!’ Sam was itching to get his hands on it. ‘It’s probably more.’
            Unravelling the string, Mal carefully unfolded the package. ‘Holy shit,’ he whispered when he saw what lay inside.
            ‘What? What is it?’ Sam was becoming frantic. ‘Is it more?’
            ‘It’s more, all right,’ Mal told him, his voice husky as he fondled the three bulky wads. ‘A whole lot more.’
            Sam whistled quietly. ‘We’re rich, man. We’re bloody rich.’
            ‘Aren’t we forgetting something?’ Ged spoke so softly it took a moment for his words to penetrate their bubble of euphoria.
            ‘What’s that, Ged?’ Mal looked up dazedly. ‘What did you say?’
            ‘I said, aren’t we forgetting something?’
            ‘What d’y’ mean?’
            ‘Lee?’ Ged didn’t much care for the bloke, but this was outrageous. ‘He’s lying back there, dead or dying, and you two are drooling over the bloody money like a pair of vultures. If you had a brain between you you’d be thinking about the police. Don’t you think someone would have heard the shots and called them by now?’
            Mal clutched at the money possessively. ‘Oh, come on. No one saw us. You’re just being paranoid.’
            ‘Jeezus!’ Ged snorted. ‘I don’t believe you. They might not have seen us, you idiot, but Lee’s still lying back there with a bullet in him. How long do you think it’ll take for the police to identify him and start looking for his associates – and that’s us, in case you’ve forgotten? And just think for a minute, man. How did we get back here?’
            Mal shrugged. ‘In the car. What’s the big deal?’
            Ged nodded slowly. ‘That’s right. In the car – Lee’s car. If the police start sniffing about it won’t take them long to trace it, and it’s sitting right outside your bloody flat covered in our prints. How incriminating is that?’
            Mal and Sam exchanged a worried glance. They hadn’t thought of that.
            ‘Do you think I should go and move it?’ Mal asked.
            Ged looked at him coldly. Not so cocky now, was he? ‘Did you have gloves on?’ he asked.
            ‘No,’ Mal admitted, feeling stupid. ‘Should I go and wipe the wheel down, or what?’
            ‘What about your masks?’ Ged reached into his pocket, breathing a sigh of relief when he felt his.
            ‘Mine’s in the car,’ bleated Sam, his face losing its colour again.
            ‘Where’s yours, Mal?’
            ‘It’s cool . . . I got rid of