Forever and Always Read Free

little about anything she did.
    â€œAs you pointed out, she’s only six. Will you be able to say that when she’s eight, twelve, or sixteen?”
    â€œI have no objection to sending her away to school when she’s fourteen. Right now, she’s too young.”
    â€œFourteen is too late. Her character will already be formed. About all any school would be able to do that late would be teach her French and a fondness for expensive clothes. She needs to go this year.”
    Trying to reason with Norman was a waste of time. Sibyl stood. “Let me make something very clear. You will not send Kitty to boarding school this year. There’s no point in yelling at me or telling me that you control the money, therefore you’ll make the decisions. This is one decision you will not make. If you try, I will stop you.”
    â€œHow? There’s nothing you can do.” Norman was surprised by her defiance yet scornful of it.
    â€œThere is a great deal I can do, much of which you would find extremely distasteful.”
    â€œDon’t try to threaten me. You can’t—”
    Sibyl heard raised voices in the bank, but she had more important things to think about than what might be happening outside Norman’s office. Norman, on the other hand, seemed eager for a distraction.
    â€œSomething’s wrong. Stay here while I see what it is.”
    Sibyl was furious he would use any excuse to avoid talking about Kitty’s future, but she’d said what she’d come to say. She would deal with the future later. She was surprised when the voices became louder. Usually Norman’s presence put a damper on things. Curious about what was happening, she got up and left the office. The sight that met her gaze caused her to freeze in her tracks. Cassie was struggling to escape from one man. A second man was talking to the teller. The third and fourth were confronting Norman. All four men were masked and holding guns.
    They were in the process of robbing the bank.
    The fourth man turned in Sibyl’s direction. “Don’t do anything foolish, ma’am, and you won’t get hurt.”
    Sibyl was too shocked to do anything, foolish or otherwise.
    â€œYou can’t rob my bank,” Norman was shouting. “You won’t get away with it.” He started forward, but the man pointed the gun at his forehead.
    â€œWe’re not greedy,” the man said. “We’ll leave you enough to buy food for your family.”
    Norman started to argue, and the man’s voice turned hard.
    â€œIf you play it smart and shut your mouth, I’ll leave you alive to make more money.”
    â€œWe have a marshal now,” Norman said. “He’ll hunt you down.”
    â€œWe’ll be hundreds of miles from here by the time he gets back from Tucson.”
    â€œColby Blaine can follow you like a cougar follows a deer,” Norman boasted. “That man is better than an Indian.”
    Sibyl couldn’t believe Norman was throwing around threats, which were bound to put the robbers’ nerves on edge. Why didn’t he shut up?
    â€œIf Colby doesn’t come after you, I will.” Cassie did her best to knee her captor in the groin, but he was too quick for her.
    â€œHow’re you doing with the teller?” the man confronting Norman asked the bandit at the teller’s window.
    â€œI’m about done here. I’ve got all the money they keep up front. Where’s the safe?” he asked the teller.
    â€œIn the office.”
    Sibyl couldn’t blame Horace for revealing the location of the safe—not that a short search wouldn’t have located it—but she was certain Norman would fire the young man the moment the bandits were gone. Jobs weren’t easy to find for a young man with a wife and a small child, but Norman wouldn’t take that into consideration.
    The man holding a gun on Sibyl spoke. “While everybody out here