million

Part II

"This is fake," the teller told us. "Fake money."

My father groaned. "I knew it," he said. "It was a scam."

The lady asked if she should call the police, but my dad said not to worry, he'd drop by the station. I sighed and looked out the window. Just as I did, I thought I saw a face disappear into the trees. Had someone been watching us, or was my imagination running wild again? But the eyes, the eyes had seemed so real, hollow, empty, and boring into my soul...

"Let's go home," Dad said, startling me out of my reverie. "The girls are probably there by now, worrying. We'll go to the police station after we fill them in."

The drive back to the apartment seemed to take forever, not only because of the lunch hour rush, but because I knew that Mom and Cass were probably scared out of their wits.

Finally, I opened the door to apartment 516. I heard my 11-year-old sister yell, "Mom! They're home!" and there was a flurry of activity and Mom rushed into the room and embraced my father and I. "Bryan, Luke, I was so worried that something happened!"

"We went to the bank--" my dad started, but I interrupted him.

"The money is fake! We need to go to the police with this or the scammers will come and kill us all!"

Cassie whimpered, and Pilot jumped up and licked my hand. Mom came and laid a hand on my shoulder. "Calm down Luke. We'll figure this out, don't worry."

"Luke's right, though," my dad told her, "we should go down to the station right away."

Mom sighed. "The car isn't working right, and the station isn't too far away, so we could walk--"

"I don't want to go," Cassie interrupted. "That sounds scary."

I shrugged. "I could just go with Dad, and we'll call if we need you guys to head over." I picked up the heavy box of laundered money and headed to the door. Dad followed me out of the apartment building, and we walked down the sidewalk in silence.

A few blocks down, I suddenly heard heavy footsteps pounding on the concrete behind me, and I felt something heavy smash into the back of my head. Then everything went dark.