Page 24 (1/2)

Maggie was aht You&039;d think a girl in a rumpled plaid field hockey skirt with a look of desperate villainy in her eye would stick out on the street, and that every person she passed would turn and point and scream, "There she is!" But in fact all she had to do was spend fiveat the Gap She put her hair up under a baseball cap and threw a lightweight hoodie and a backpack over her jersey and suddenly she was invisible, or close enough No one gave her a second look No one shouted for the police

Even when she walked into the bank building, right past the security guard

As she surveyed the red marble lobby of the bank - the rank of ATMs on her left, the four teller s on her right, people strea their happy safe norain that this was going to be the last ti she would ever do

She had spentherself she had no choice There were sos, after all, that you couldn&039;t just steal She needed to find a place to stay, for at least one ht She needed a car Sure, you could steal a car, but she didn&039;t kno to hotwire one and carjacking seemed too risky It would be too easy to hurt somebody that way

She needed ether then she could leave town Drive off into the sunset Find some place where nobody kneho she was and start life over Do it right this time

But first, she needed money She&039;d chosen the bank for a pretty siet in trouble for a robbery, it seemed to make sense to rob the place where all the money was

This would only take a minute, she told herself And then she would be free

She waited until one of the teller lines emptied out Then she headed over to theand slass The teller was maybe forty-five years old, pretty in a coie couldn&039;t stop staring at it

"What can we do for you today, ie pulled off her baseball cap and dropped it on the floor Then she unzipped her hoodie and let the teller see her jersey, with the teao and her number on the front "Do you knohat this uess oing off, a bell ringing in the back of the bank More people screa for the revolving door behind her She figured that was for the best The teller tried to duck under her counter Maggie punched the bulletproof glassthat separated theain and one piece fell away to thunk on the floor behind theThen she reached over across the counter and dragged the teller back up to her feet

"Just give o away Nobody needs to get hurt, okay?"

There was a dull iie spun around and saw the security guard standing there He had a wooden baton in his hand, and he was pulling it back for another swing

"Seriously?" Maggie asked "That&039;s the best you&039;ve got?"

The baton caie had plenty of tirab it as it cauard in the storip His face went pale and he sluet his breath back