One Last Job

She smiled at him and he smiled back. It had been far too long since he had seen that smile. So many years of his life had left with her. So many vows of lifelong love, so much commitment, everything taken away in the blink of an eye. Yet, here she was now, sitting in front of him. All of his past words; his past actions, and past promises staring him in the face, proving to him that something went wrong along the way. The way she was looking at him, it was almost as if she was forcing him to question the truths of his promises, to wonder if he meant it all even now, when he couldn’t make good on any of them. When he finally broke the silence between them, it was not with the happy, optimistic words he had said countless times over in his head.

“I’m sorry,” he said, “this is all fucked up.”

“No kidding.” The uneasy chuckle in her voice didn’t mask the damage that had been done to her. The fact that she even managed the slightest chuckle in this situation proved that she was taking this harder than he was. He reached up and touched his hand to the thick layer of bullet-proof glass that was separating them, and waited for her to do the same. When her hand pressed against the opposite side of the glass, he thought he could actually feel heat. He knew it was just his imagination, just the result of him missing her touch and imagining feeling her skin on his every waking moment of his life. The truth of it was, and he realized this, the only feelings she could have for him wouldn’t generate any type of warmth at all. All she could possibly feel for him is hate. He knew he deserved it, but knowing that the hand on the other side of the glass wasn’t receiving the love he was trying to project to it still sparked him an anger that was reflective of his current situation.

“I miss you,” he said, almost pleading to her. He got no response. “Do you remember… before this all happened, how happy we were? Our daughter? Don’t you at least remember the girl we brought into this world?” That got a response. She stared at him with the cold, dead eyes that signified the loss he had just forced her to remember.

“What the fuck was the point! We knew what a shithole life was. We knew we were in no position to raise a child. Christ, we should have never even fallen in love. It was all business, before you. Any partner, man or woman, we got the job done then went separate ways. It’s just as much my fault as yours, but you were so damn charming I just couldn’t let our partnership end after one job.” Tears were practically pouring from her eyes as she remembered, like he did, all that had been lost.

“We both knew it was a bad idea, but yet we did it. We even took the nine months off, knowing it would be almost impossible to get back into the game. We didn’t want to put you at risk, not while you were pregnant with her. We thought we were lucky when we got offered a job two years after she was born.”

“You call it lucky? Lucky?! How can we be lucky? Look at us now! Seperated by the glass that we saw so many friends behind in the past. The one thing we vowed to never let between us is staring us right in our fucking faces. And you call it luck. Our daughter, the one human being that gave us some solidarity in our unbalanced fucking lives, is dead. And this is all because of your supposed lucky job. Eli, you don’t know how hard this is!”

“How could I not know?!” He slammed his open hand on the glass. It smacked a lot louder than he wanted to, causing the supervising guards to stiffen. He gave them an apologetic look before looking back to her, leaning in and lowering his voice. “You think you got dealt the shit hand here? Do you know what I have to deal with? Life isn’t any easier for me.”

“You don’t even care that she’s dead.” The contempt in her voice was palpable, and sent chills down his spine.

“I care. I care more than you know. It’s just, there’s so much more we have to worry about. We stole a small fortune from that bank. Now, who do you think wants it? The bank wants it back, and our bosses want it even more. Neither of us is safe. We can’t get back at those bastards that killed Christie if we’re dead. My focus right now is to stay alive, and yours should be, too.” She had no response to that. Once again, they were sitting in silence, staring at each other. It was right now, in this silence, that all the unspoken words ran through his mind.

He looked back, at their first job together. The thrill of working with her was more overwhelming than anything else he had ever experienced. When they got married, he knew it was a bad idea. They were too well connected to the wrong people, but they did it anyways. For four years they remained safe, and successful. If you were on the right side of the law, you wanted them locked up. If you were on the wrong side of the law, you wanted them to be working for you. It was an enviable position for them, to say the least. Even when their daughter was born, nothing got in the way of their happiness.

The last job, however, had changed all of that. Someone had set them up, and Eli had a good idea of who it was. The job was a distraction to get them out of the house, so they could kidnap their daughter, and ultimately kill her.

“What did we do wrong, Eli?” The sadness in her words pulled him from his thoughts.

“We trusted one person too many.” This was true. The hell that became their life after that job could be summarized by that one statement.

“I can’t do this anymore. I shouldn’t be here. We shouldn’t be here.” He agreed with the first part. They weren’t together anymore; the inches of bulletproof glass were proof enough of that.

“You know what we have to do, Liz. We can’t talk anymore. I’m going to find out who did this, and they’re going to get what’s coming to them. That much I can promise you. But, we can’t be seen together anymore.”

“Are you serious?” She stared at him with agony in her eyes. He wished she would turn away.

In response, he nodded. “And you know it’s the right choice.”

Her eyes widened with rage. “You ungrateful fuck. I took the fall for you! I’m sitting here, in shackles, because I love you! I could have given you up. I should have given you up.” This hurt him more than he thought it would. He knew this was going to happen. He was being ungrateful. She had, after all, sacrificed herself to save him. Yet, he also knew this is what needed to be done.

“I’m sorry. This is all fucked up.” He pressed his hand to the glass again. This time, her hand wasn’t there to meet his. He shook his head, taking one last look at her face. In it, he saw all of his regrets. He saw where his life went wrong, and when it went right. He didn’t question the years they had spent together. He didn’t even question walking out on her now. He knew he still had a purpose, and he needed to take advantage of his opportunities. What he saw, though, just before he stood up, was the face of their daughter, and he wondered if he was worthy of life still. He didn’t deserve to be alive while her body was buried in the middle of nowhere. He realized the blood would always be on his hands, even if he didn’t pull the trigger. He blamed everything on himself, and knew he had to kill the one who was responsible to repent for his mistakes.

He stood, breaking his gaze from her cold eyes. He turned and walked away, his thoughts drowning out her yelling and hitting the glass, yelling that he didn’t deserve to have the freedom to walk away. She was completely removed from his thoughts when the guards forced her back into the halls of the prison. He knew he’d see her again, in Hell, after he had carried out this last job.