Previously, Zack and Sydney outrun the police and the threat by escaping to Calgary. There, they secure a new car after the Subaru dies and come up with a plan for their next moves.
Sydney and Zack zipped around the city in the new Corolla. There was a whirlwind of stops around the city: business stores, used computer stores, pawn shops, thrift shops, a drug store, a YMCA where both Zack and Sydney dyed their hair in the bathroom, and a residential house in the south end of the city. Someone from the internet that Sydney had to talk to.
They had spent about half of the Canadian money they had, their stash was down to just under a thousand dollars.
Zack sat in the passenger seat of the Corolla and flipped down the sun visor. He put on the non-prescription reading glasses he had picked up at the store and studied his new, darker hair colour in the tiny mirror. He straightened his tie and tried a relaxed smile.
He needed to be calm and confident.
“Hi there. I’m…” he checked the fake badge they’d had made up, “Ryan. Head auditor for TNCB.”
No. Zack breathed a deep breath and shook his head. Calmer, more confident. There could be no doubt.
“Good afternoon, my name is Ry—”
Zack didn’t notice Sydney approach and he jumped as Sydney opened the car door and slid into the driver’s seat. She had a bulging fabric dollar store bag full of black market computer stuff that she tucked into the floorspace behind Zack’s seat.
“Did I startle you?” she asked.
Zack pulled off his black rimmed glasses. “Yeah. Just…trying to get into character.”
Sydney nodded as she buckled up and started the car. Her hair was also dyed darker, and her skin around her scalp and neck was a little bit stained.
They wound through the cookie cutter neighbourhood, only getting lost once in the maze of streets and avenues that all started with the same neighbourhood name before merging onto a main thoroughfare and towards the highway. The drivers around them all drove too fast. The tall buildings of downtown loomed in the distance, and the rolling hills around the city were filled with boxy homes, all built just the same.
Zack stared out of the window, watching all of the people zipping around the city in their cars. Where were they going? What were they doing? He always liked to imagine who the people in cars were. He made up stories in his head about each one. One woman ignoring the distracted driving laws and screaming into her cellphone could be some big shot CEO dealing with an upcoming merger. A family he spied obviously singing along to something on the radio had to be on their way to the airport for a big trip. Another man, stoic and bored in his trash filled car was driving to a job that he hated. Zack knew exactly how he felt.
A loser, just like he was. Had been.
Not far outside of the city, Sydney slowed down and pulled into a rest stop.
“What are you doing?” Zack asked.
Sydney let the car come to a stop and slammed the shifter into park. The turning indicator made an annoying tick, tick, tick, as they sat there in silence for a moment. Sydney stared out of the windshield, biting her lip.
“Syd?”
She turned and looked at Zack. “Why did you do it?”
Zack fought down the surge of anxiety that he felt. “Do what?”
Sydney sighed. “Rob the bank. Why did you do it?”
Zack took a minute and looked out past the speeding cars and into the endless fields of Alberta. “I…needed the cash. I was struggling and I saw a way out.”
Sydney shook her head. “Tell me the truth, Zack.”
Zack felt a heavy weight settle in his chest. His vision began to blur and he couldn’t quite stop the quiver of his chin. He opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was too constricted.
The tick, tick, tick of the indicator filled the tense silence.
“Look. If we are going to do this, I need to know. You’ve already blown up my enti—”
“Because I didn’t want to be a fucking loser anymore, okay?” Zack blurted, wiping away the tears that finally tumbled down his cheeks. “I was a nobody. All I wanted was to do something that people respected. Something that was cool. My whole life, I have been not good enough, and I was sick and tired of it. I just fucked up, left and right, until I landed the only job I could still get—a bank teller at True North. I was bullied my whole life. I cheated my way through high school. I got expelled from university. I thought this could be my chance to really be something.”
Tick, tick, tick.
“Could you turn off that goddamn turning signal?” Zack whispered.
Sydney’s face flushed and she flicked it off. They sat in the car, parked at the rest stop and watched the parade of cars.
“Damn, Zack,” Sydney finally said. “I’m sorry. I…I didn’t know.”
“Whatever,” Zack said.
Sydney reached out and grabbed his hand. “You’re not a loser, Zack. In fact, I think you’re cool. We wouldn’t have made it this far if you were a loser.”
Zack frowned, but he didn’t pull his hand away. “You’re just saying that.”
Sydney squeezed his hand and smiled. “Maybe. What do you say we do some cowboy shit?”
Zack nodded. He felt a small smile tug at his face. He had to admit that it felt good to tell Sydney, and he was a little surprised that she accepted him. Just the way he was. Maybe she was right.
Sydney shifted the car back into drive. “Let’s roll, Ryan, head auditor.”
They turned off of Highway 2 and drove along some secondary highways, delving further and further into the endless fields. Huge tractors drove around the farms and they cruised past homesteads tucked in the tiny oases of trees, planted to keep the famous prairie wind at bay. The traffic had slowed until there weren’t many other cars on the road at all, and Sydney, either in a better mood or trying to cheer Zack up, sang along to music on the radio.
They saw the sign for the town they had chosen, and Zack felt a twinge of nerves tingle up his arms. Sydney shared a glance with Zack as they moved into the turning lane and onto the main street.
“Welcome to Three Hills,” Zack mumbled.
“There are no hills in this place. It’s all flat,” Sydney said.
Zack grunted. They probably seemed like big hills to the locals, but Zack couldn’t have pointed out which of the hills were tall enough to give the town the name.
Sydney slowly drove down the quaint town streets, looking for a good spot to set up. It would need to be close enough to the bank to give support and the option for a quick exit if they needed it. She pulled into an angled parking spot in the town’s downtown. There were a few other cars there, but it wasn’t too busy. One abandoned pickup truck across the street idled. The driver’s side door was open wide, waiting for the driver to come back from a quick errand. Zack chuckled. They weren’t in the city anymore.
They had chosen Three Hills as the best option. It was a big enough town that it had a True North branch, and it was close enough to Calgary that Zack had thought that it might have some money locked up in their foreign currency room.
Zack straightened his tie and put on his glasses. He got out of the car and shrugged on his cheap sport coat and pulled the True North lanyard with Ryan’s ID on it over his head. Sydney popped the trunk, and Zack pulled out the small carry-on rolling luggage bag that they found at the thrift shop. He stooped down and looked at Sydney. “How do I look?”
Sydney smiled. “Like an auditor named Ryan.”
Zack laughed. He pulled the handle of the luggage up and strolled over to the bank. He pulled the door handle open easily and then walked into the bank.
The layout was similar to the bank he’d worked at, but it was a little different. Zack wondered if there were different styles, like houses that builders made differed slightly as you walked around the neighbourhood.
Two tellers behind the counter, a thin girl and an older overweight woman, looked at him as Zack strode over. “Hello. I am looking for the bank manager.”
The overweight woman grinned. “You’re lookin’ for Marv. His office is just there,” she pointed.
“Thank you,” Zack said. He took a small breath. They didn’t seem to think that anything was out of the ordinary. He walked to Marv’s office, his luggage clicking as it rolled over the tiled floor. He knocked at the door.
Zack spied a short squat man get up from his desk and waddle to the door. It opened and Marv stared at Zack. He had a spot of mustard on his lip and a napkin was still stuffed into his shirt. “Can I help you?” Marv asked.
Zack smiled and held out a hand. “My name is Ryan. I’m one of the head auditors from corporate. We are doing an overhaul of the foreign currency storage.”
Marv’s brows furrowed. “Audit? I didn’t get an email or anything. It’s my lunch break.”
Zack smiled. “I understand. I’ve had a lot of managers claim not to have seen the email, but I assure you, we sent it out. It’s really a lot of auditing jargon that most people delete. If you wanted to, you could look me up on the TNCB website, but I also have my identification here,” Zack said, holding out the badge that he wore around his neck.
Marv squinted at the badge. He took the napkin out of his shirt and wiped his face, thankfully cleaning up the mustard spot. “I don’t know about other bank managers, but I’m diligent. I never heard anything about an audit coming to my branch.”
Zack nodded and gave his best reassuring look. “In that case, I apologize. I know that sometimes TNCB likes to make these audits more like what we call ‘spot checks’ so we can have a clear understanding of what foreign currency storage looks like in the day to day.”
Marv glared at him. “Who’s your supervisor?”
Zack gulped. He shifted his weight and then stopped. He didn’t want to appear too nervous. “If you just wanted to check my credentials on the website, you can call corporate and they would verify everything for you.”
Marv grumbled, but he walked back around his messy desk and typed on his computer. Zack’s heart raced and he prayed that Sydney was as good at what she did as she said she was. Marv looked at him and then picked up the phone on his desk and tapped the keys. Zack prayed that the number he called was the dummy number they’d set up beforehand.
There was an awkward moment as the phone rang. Zack could hear it faintly through the receiver. A muffled voice came up on the other side and Zack could only hope it was Sydney and not someone from corporate. This was one part of the plan that Zack had no control over. He had to trust that Sydney’s plan would work.
It was terrifying.
“Yeah, hi. This is Marv, manager at bank number one-seven-eight. I have a Ryan…” he pulled the phone away and muted it on his chest. “What’s your last name?”
Zack pointed at his ID badge. “Clements.”
Marv pulled the phone back. “Clements here. Says he’s here to conduct some kind of audit on the foreign currency.”
A pause. Zack bit his lip and wiped his palms on his thighs. Please, please, please.
“Yeah. Okay. How about some notice next time? Great. Thanks. Yeah, bye.” Marv hung up.
Zack held out his clipboard, with the fake audit form they’d created on it. “Good? Just sign here and I can begin.”
Marv sighed and took the clipboard. He signed with a flourish and then motioned to Zack to follow him. They crossed the foyer and through the half-door into the carpeted back end of the bank. Just like in Zack’s bank, the foreign currency room was set aside from the main vault. Marv stopped and motioned to the door. “Here it is. Let me know if you need anything else.” Marv walked away, back to his office.
“Thank you,” Zack said. He moved to the door and took out his fob, which was programmed for his original bank, and made a show of waving it in front of the electronic lock. The lock beeped a negative tone, the one that Zack recalled from working at True North when he had first got his keys and tried his fob on every door. Back before he had any access.
“Hey…Marv?” Zack asked.
Marv turned around, visibly annoyed, and marched back to the door. “What, your magic wand didn’t work?”
Zack waved his fob at the electronic lock again, with the same result.
“You are supposed to provide your own entry into the bank’s secure rooms. Protocol.”
Zack shrugged. “Technology. Could you help me out a little bit?”
Marv tapped his foot and gave Zack a look. “You auditor types are all the same. Poke around for dirt and expect us to clean up the mess, eh?”
It took everything that Zack had to smile and chuckle. “I get it. Lots of people put us auditors in the same category as lawyers. I’ll be as quick as I can be. Promise.”
The overweight woman called from the front. “Marv! You have a call!”
Marv harrumphed and pulled out his keys. “Just a sec!” he called.
“Here you go,” he said to Zack. Marv scanned the reader and the door opened. Marv hesitated for a moment and gave Zack a look that made Zack feel like he was one misstep away from his cover getting blown. He propped the door open for Zack and then walked back to answer the call. Zack wondered if it was Sydney calling with a fake request. Zack stepped inside and found the room to be almost entirely filled with bankers boxes. Zack peeked inside and found that the box he opened was full of old paperwork.
He was alone.
The room was dusty and musty, smelling like the forgotten artefacts of the past. Zack picked up the ledger that was chained to the desk and flipped through it. The last entry was over a year ago.
Quickly, Zack opened all of the drawers and cabinets, searching for a bag that was identical to the SecurBag he had inside of his small rolling luggage.
He found it, stuffed in a cabinet on the opposite side of the room. The bag was reasonably full. Zack swapped it with the SecurBag in his luggage and shut the door.
He made a couple of brief notations on his clipboard and then left the room to speak with the tellers. Zack started to sweat, and the pen felt slippery as he went through the questions that Sydney and he had created. He was anxious to get out of there.
What are the protocols surrounding the storage of foreign currency at this branch?
What security measures do you take to ensure this currency is accounted for and protected?
Have you ever had any breaches?
How frequently do you send foreign monies back to corporate?
The list went on. Zack licked his lips and wiped his sweaty forehead as he made remarks. Maybe this information would help if they had to do this again, but it was painful to go through, especially knowing that the real work was done. Just playing the part and waiting for the curtains to drop.
Zack thanked the bank tellers and Marv for their time and shook their hands before he left.
He walked out of the bank and back to the car. He opened the door and slumped into the passenger seat. Sydney looked at him expectantly.
Zack smiled and unzipped the carry-on and pulled out the SecurBag. He opened it and pulled out clear plastic bags of different cash that was kept together with rubber bands. There were Euros, Mexican Pesos, and even a small amount of American money in the mix, alongside the rarer currency similar to the ones they had seen from their first heist. Sydney even pointed out some Deutsche Marks, which had been out of circulation since the Euro was introduced in 2002.
“I’d say this is about the equivalent of eight grand,” Sydney said.
Zack smiled. “Like taking candy from a baby.”