Three months later

Willow Creek, Arkansas


The sky hung low and gray over the sleepy town of Willow Creek. It was the kind of place where everyone knew your name, where the post office shared a wall with the ice cream parlor, and the First State Bank had only one security guard and a part-time loan officer who doubled as a pastor on Sundays.


Clyde and Layla watched from a bench across the street, eating corn dogs and wearing thrift store disguises — she in a long auburn wig, he in a camo ball cap and mirrored shades.


Layla’s eyes scanned the building with clinical calm. “Two tellers. No cameras on the parking lot side. Sheriff’s office is six blocks east.”


Clyde chewed slowly, pretending not to listen as he watched the traffic pattern. “Lunch rush ends in fifteen minutes. We move at one-thirty. In and out, four minutes max.”


They’d spent two weeks watching, memorizing routines. This wasn’t the kind of job you could walk into blind. Not if you wanted to get away clean.


Layla leaned against his shoulder. “You nervous?”


He smirked. “I don’t get nervous. I get rich.”


She laughed. “That’s my man.”


At 1:32 p.m., the bell above the bank door jingled softly as they entered.


Layla wore a light tan trench coat and carried a pink diaper bag that hid a 9mm Glock. Clyde was in overalls, playing the part of a tired handyman. Nobody even looked twice.


Until she screamed.


“Everybody down! Hands where I can see ’em!”


Panic spread like fire. One teller fainted behind the counter. The other froze, eyes wide.


Clyde jumped the divider, pistol drawn. “Nobody moves, nobody dies. We’re here for the money, not the memories.”


Layla’s voice stayed calm, commanding. “Hit the drawer. Now. Don’t play with me, sweetheart.”


The teller — a young Black woman in her twenties — fumbled with the keys. Layla noticed the girl’s trembling hands. She noticed the baby picture taped to the inside of her drawer. Something caught in her throat.


The girl whispered, “Please... I have a kid.”


Layla hesitated — just for a second.


Clyde caught the flicker in her eyes. “We good, baby?”


Layla snapped out of it. “Yeah. We good.”


They cleared out the drawers, took only the loose bills, skipped the dye packs. Just like they’d practiced.


In under four minutes, they were back in the Chevelle, tires screaming against the curb.


They drove in silence for a few miles before Clyde spoke.


“You froze up.”


Layla lit a cigarette, hands shaking slightly. “She looked like me. Back when I was scared of everything.”


“She’s still alive. We didn’t come to hurt nobody.”


“I know,” Layla whispered. “But it’s starting to feel like we leave something behind every time we go.”


Clyde looked over, his voice low and serious. “You wanna stop?”


She shook her head slowly. “Not yet. Not until we can run for real.”


They hit the state line before sunset, switching plates at a truck stop and burning the fake IDs in a bathroom trash can. Another job done. Another town left behind.


But something lingered in Layla’s eyes — a crack in the armor.


And Clyde, though he didn’t say it, felt it too.