Car doors banged shut in front and behind. Banger gripped his piece with one hand and undid his seat belt with the other, ready to bolt out the door, but a man’s face was in the window, a punk he’d never seen before, yelling, “Grab the ceiling.”
A. J. had his hands up. “Banger,” he yelled, “do what they say.”
Banger pulled up his gun from below the window opening. There was a bright flash and a loud report. Banger slumped, exhaled, and didn’t move again.
Inside his head, A. J. screamed, Oh, my God. They killed Banger. A . 45 was pointed at his left ear.
“Listen to me,” A. J. said. “I don’t know you. I didn’t see nothing. Take what you want. I got six hundred bucks-”
A. J. didn’t even hear the gun go off. He twitched, but that was all.
THREE
The van’s rear cargo door blew open, and Rudy Giordino jumped down from the back. His right leg buckled, but he had played ball in high school and had good balance. He came out of the stumble into a dead run.
His head was clanging from the tossing he’d taken in the back, but his instincts were intact. He ran under a black sky, across the flats and parallel to the road.
His blood whooshed across his eardrums and he still felt the aftershocks of gunfire.
Christ. Guns had gone off in the cab.
They’d been jacked.
Rudy Gee ran, flashing on his gun, lost under the cascade of boxes in the back of the truck. He thought about Marisa and Sparky and how he wasn’t supposed to die yet, not gunned down out fucking here. He had so many plans. He was still a kid.
It felt good to run. He was making distance, could almost hear the cheering in the stands.
Behind him, a guy name of Victor Spano took careful aim with his. 45, bracing against the side of the van. The dude was making it too easy, running in a straight line.