The Amateurs by Marcus Sakey Page A

you’re right—it would look better if you hit me. I’ll make a move to stop you, one of you club me. Tie us up, take the money, head out the back. Jenn will be waiting in the car. Poof.”
    “And you?”
    “Eventually someone will come and untie us. Johnny will be pissed, but he won’t call the cops. He won’t want them digging around. And since there’s nothing to connect us, it doesn’t really matter how he goes about getting his revenge.”
    “And life just goes on.”
    “Easy as breathing.” Alex sipped his wine. “See any flaws?”
    “Not offhand.”
    “Me either.” Alex said. “It’s not the kind of thing any of us would normally do, but that’s part of what’s so brilliant about it.”
    “And you’re serious.”
    “Yeah.”
    “So what, you want me to say right now, sure, let’s rob your boss?”
    “I know it’s scary. But the meeting is the day after tomorrow, and we go then or not at all. And I can’t do it alone. So, yeah, right now, all of us. In or out.” Alex paused, then said, “Ian?”
    “In.”
    “Jenn?”
    She smiled slightly, the skin around her eyes crinkling. “Me too.”
    “Really?”
    “Yeah,” she said. “He who risks nothing has nothing, right?”
    “How about it, Mitch?” Alex spoke gently. “Want to screw Johnny Love?”
    He looked around the table, at Ian’s fingers piano-tapping on the table, Jenn with the corner of her lip drawn in, Alex waiting. Then he said, quietly, “No.”
    Alex seemed surprised. Smug fucker. No wonder there had been a weirdness to the air all night. They’d all been waiting to run through the formality of roping in good old Mitch. “No,” he said again. “This is stupid.”
    “Why?”
    “Because . . . because, man. What do you mean, why? This isn’t one of our games.”
    “Treat it like one.”
    He shook his head. “I’m not doing it, and I’m not going to sit here and let you try and convince me.” He said the words without thinking, and they fell heavy. There was a moment of silence, and then really only one thing to do. He stood slowly, pushing his chair back as the others watched. The music kept playing, the carefree notes weirdly incongruous to the situation.
    Alex said, “OK. I understand.”
    “Good.”
    “Can you do us one favor?”
    “What?”
    “Just keep quiet about it, OK?”
    “You’re doing it anyway?”
    The three of them looked at one another, and one by one, nodded. That feeling of being an outsider bit deeper. All along he’d thought they were a team. Now the others were going ahead without him. The thought was almost enough to make him sit back down, but his pride burned. “Fine.”
    Alex looked at Jenn. “We’re going to need you inside.”
    She nodded. “What about the car?”
    “We’ll leave it out back, doors unlocked, keys in. Whoever gets in first drives. It’s riskier, and we won’t have a lookout, but that’s the way it is.”
    Mitch stared, unbelieving. They were so calm, so matter-of-fact. The plan sounded good, but what plan didn’t? To actually do it, go in waving guns? Not only that, but for Jenn to be right in the thick of it . . .
    They’re playing you, said a voice in his head. Alex is, at least. He’s counting on your feelings for her.
    So what? asked another voice. She’ll still be there.
    He opened his mouth, realized he had nothing to say. Just stood, palms sweating, watching his friends walk away from him.
    “We’ll need masks,” Jenn said. “And gloves.”
    “Yeah.” Alex paused, looked up at him. “Look, Mitch, don’t take it the wrong way, but maybe it would be better if you didn’t hear this.”
    It was all messed up. Somehow the whole world had turned upside down.
    And suppose they pulled it off? Would the four of them ever go back to being what they had been? He’d have drawn a line, stepped away. He could see it, a slow-motion tease of the future. For a while they would still get together on Thursday nights. But the brunches, the dinners, the