Chapter 22: "You're the Coolest Uncle!"
Three minutes ago.
The two of them sat in a booth near the back of the restaurant, knees touching under the table, talking in the easy, conspiratorial way of people who had thought this through and talked themselves into believing it was a good idea.
"Think about it," the man said, leaning forward, voice low. "Bars, convenience stores, gas stations — all of them have someone behind the counter with a piece. You rob one of those, you're getting your head blown off before you make it to the door."
"But restaurants?" The woman tilted her head, a slow smile spreading. "When's the last time you walked into a restaurant and saw a guard with a shotgun?"
"Exactly." He snapped his fingers. "Nobody expects it. It's the perfect spot."
"And look around this place." She glanced casually at the packed dining room — every booth full, every table occupied. "That's a lot of wallets. Between the register and the customers? We could walk out of here with more than some people make in a week."
"Plus," he added, leaning back with the satisfied expression of a man who believed he was a criminal mastermind, "restaurants carry insurance. Same as banks. The manager's not going to fight us. He just wants everyone out of here in one piece so he can file the claim."
"So we're doing this?"
"Are you kidding? I've been waiting for something like this."
They looked at each other across the table. She reached out and took his hand. He squeezed it.
"I love you, Pumpkin," he said.
"I love you more, Honey Bunny," she whispered back.
They kissed — deep, slow, like something out of a movie — and then they stood up, drew their guns, and got to work.
(A direct nod to the diner robbery scene in Pulp Fiction, the 1994 Quentin Tarantino film, featuring the characters played by Tim Roth and Uma Thurman.)
"Shit."
Rango muttered it under his breath, barely a whisper, as the gunshots of adrenaline hit the room. His eyes tracked the two of them — the man sweeping the register, the woman covering the crowd — with the calm, assessing focus of someone who had seen worse. A lot worse.
But his first thought wasn't about the guns. It was about the timing.
First time taking Emma out. First meal. And this happens.
He glanced sideways at Emma, who was sitting very still in the booth across from him, her dark eyes wide and fixed on the scene unfolding across the restaurant.
"Hey." Rango's voice came out quiet. Steady. The kind of tone designed to anchor someone. "Don't be scared, okay? Look at me."
Emma's gaze pulled away from the robbers and met his.
"They're petty thieves," he said, simply. "Two people who want money. They're going to grab what they can and leave. That's it."
Emma nodded — slowly, processing. Then she looked back at the man with the gun, who was currently pressing the weapon against the restaurant manager's chest while the woman emptied the register into a black trash bag.
"Won't they kill someone?" Emma asked, in a whisper so quiet it barely carried.
Rango followed her gaze, studied the scene for half a second, and shook his head. "No. People who are willing to actually pull the trigger don't rob restaurants. They rob armored cars. They rob places where the stakes justify the risk." He turned back to Emma. "These two are scared. They're just not showing it."
He reached across the table and gently took her hand — small, cool fingers wrapping around his — and held it firm.
"With me here," he said, looking her directly in the eyes, "nobody is going to hurt you. I promise."
The warmth of his hand seemed to settle something in Emma. Her shoulders dropped half an inch. And then — quietly, almost shyly — she leaned forward across the table, close to his ear, and whispered:
"Then are you going to catch them?"
Rango pulled back just enough to see her face. There it was — the spark. The hope. The very specific, very four-year-old fantasy of watching her uncle do something heroic, right here, right now, in a pizza restaurant on a Tuesday afternoon.
He smiled. And then, gently, he shook his head.
"Catching bad guys is the cops' job," he said, softly. "My job right now is to make sure you're safe. That's what matters."
Emma held his gaze for a moment. Then she sat back, just slightly disappointed — the way kids looked when the answer was reasonable but not the one they wanted — and turned her attention back to the robbers with quiet, watchful eyes.
Rango let out a small breath. He understood it. The desire to be the hero. If it were just him and Ted, he wouldn't have hesitated for a second — would have put a stop to this before it even got started. But Emma was here. Emma, who was four, who was sitting three feet away, who had already lost one parent to violence and didn't need to see more.
So he stayed put. For now.
At the register, the male robber finished sweeping the cash into the trash bag in under a minute — fast, practiced, like he'd done this before or at least rehearsed it enough times to believe he had. He hefted the bag, checked the weight, and gave the woman a nod and a wink.
She adjusted her grip on her gun and kept it aimed at the crowd. Covering the door.
Then the man turned, swung the trash bag over one shoulder, and started making his way between the tables. Strutting. Actually strutting, like he owned the place, the gun in his free hand dangling loosely at his side as he stopped at each booth and gestured for wallets, phones, jewelry — anything of value.
Rango watched him coming and felt something flicker in his chest. Irritation, mostly.
Greedy, he thought. The register wasn't enough. Now you're going table to table.
He considered his options for about two seconds. Then he quietly reached into his jacket, pulled out his wallet — which contained a little over three hundred dollars in cash, because Rango had lived in America long enough to know that most legitimate transactions went on a card — and set it flat on the table in front of him.
Consider it a tax on not wanting to deal with this right now.
The man reached their booth a minute later, trash bag slung over his shoulder, riding a high that was equal parts adrenaline and stupidity. He glanced down at Rango, then at the wallet on the table.
"Smart guy," he said, with the kind of grin that suggested he thought he was intimidating. He picked up the wallet, flipped it open, glanced at the cash inside, shrugged, and dropped it into the bag without comment.
He was about to move on to the next table when something caught his eye.
His gaze locked onto Rango's wrist.
The watch. An antique Vacheron Constantin — the kind of piece that even people who didn't know watches could tell was expensive just by looking at it. The kind of thing that, in the right light, practically glowed with old money.
The man's eyes went wide. Then a slow, greedy smile spread across his face.
"Well, well, well." He pointed the gun at Rango's forehead — casually, like he was pointing at something on a menu. "Well, look at that. Rich boy, huh? Take it off. The watch. Hand it over."
Rango felt the cold press of the barrel against his skin. He didn't flinch. Didn't blink. Just looked at the man with an expression that was, if anything, mildly annoyed — the way you'd look at someone who'd just cut you off in traffic.
The watch was a gift, he thought. From Cobb. In Africa. Worth more than this guy will make in two years.
The Curator had seen it once and assumed it was a fake. But this guy — this petty thief — had clocked it immediately.
Figures.
The robber noticed Rango wasn't moving. His smile tightened. He glanced around, spotted Emma sitting across the table, and without missing a beat, swung the muzzle away from Rango and aimed it directly at her head.
"I'm gonna say this one more time," he said, his voice dropping low and flat. "Take. Off. The watch."
Emma went very still. Her eyes — those dark, sharp eyes — fixed on the gun with a kind of frozen alertness that no four-year-old should ever have to wear.
"Uncle..." she whispered.
Rango looked at her. Then back at the man.
"Okay," he said. Calm. Easy. Like he was agreeing to pass the salt. "It's yours."
He unclasped the watch and set it on the table. As he did, he gave the robber a long, quiet look — the kind of look that said I see you. I'm remembering your face. And we're going to have a conversation about this later.
The man didn't notice. He was already pocketing the watch, riding the high.
"And the pockets," he said, jabbing the gun toward Rango. "Turn 'em inside out. Come on. All of it. You rich guys always have something hidden."
Rango stared at him.
Because his pockets did, in fact, contain something. Two somethings, actually.
A golden brass knuckle duster engraved with a Holy Cross.
And a Colt revolver that had been blessed by the Pope.
"Turn them out!"
The man pressed the gun harder against Emma's temple, his finger tightening on the trigger just enough to make it click. The message was clear.
Rango looked at the gun. Looked at Emma. Looked back at the man.
And then, very quietly, with just the faintest edge of something dangerous underneath it, he said:
"Pussy."
The word hit the man like a slap.
It was a small thing — barely even an insult, really, in the grand scheme of things. But something about the way Rango said it — the tone, the timing, the flat, almost bored delivery — landed in exactly the wrong place in exactly the wrong way. The robber's face went red. His jaw clenched. The gun swung away from Emma's head and snapped back toward Rango, arm shaking with sudden, irrational fury.
Bear's Taunt. Ted's little trick — the one that got under people's skin in ways that went beyond logic. Rango had seen it work a dozen times. It worked again now.
The man's arm moved.
Rango moved faster.
He launched out of the booth like a spring releasing — one fluid motion, all speed and zero hesitation. His hand closed around the man's wrist — the one holding the gun — and twisted. Hard. The right way. The way that broke the grip without breaking the bone, because Rango wanted this guy functional enough to talk to the police, not screaming on a stretcher.
The gun dropped. Rango caught it before it hit the ground.
In the same breath — the same second — he turned, aimed, and fired.
Bang.
The bullet crossed the restaurant in a straight line and hit the female robber in the upper arm. Not a kill shot. Not even close. But enough. Her gun clattered to the floor, and the force of the impact knocked her sideways off her feet. She hit the ground hard, gasping, clutching her arm.
Rango didn't stop moving.
He kicked the man's knee — sharp, precise, the kind of strike that dropped someone instantly. The robber went down with a yelp, and before he could even process what was happening, Rango's hand was on the back of his neck, driving his forehead down into the table with a solid, meaty thunk.
Then Rango held him there. Face pressed flat against the tabletop, one hand pinning his neck, the other pulling the Colt revolver from his belt and setting it on the table right in front of the man's wide, terrified eyes.
"You want to know what's in my pockets?" Rango leaned down, close, his voice low and cold and absolutely calm.
Bang.
He slammed the Colt down on the table — not firing it, just presenting it, right there, inches from the man's face, unmistakable and enormous and very, very real.
"Now you know."
The man's lips trembled. His eyes, fixed on the revolver, couldn't seem to move. A bullet had grazed his ear on the way to the woman — close enough to feel the heat of it, close enough to hear his girlfriend groaning on the floor behind him.
"I — I — I'm sorry," he stammered, his voice cracking. "Please — please — don't—"
Rango looked at him for a long, unhurried moment. Then he let go, stepped back, and kicked the man away with a casual shove of his boot.
He snapped his fingers twice at the restaurant manager, who was standing near the counter with the expression of a man whose entire understanding of how the world worked had just been revised.
"Hey. You. Call 911. Now."
"Wh — yes! Yes, I'll — right now —"
The manager stumbled toward the phone, nearly tripping over a chair in the process.
Rango turned back to the trash bag on the floor, crouched down, and fished his wallet and watch out from the top of the pile with easy, unhurried movements. He checked the watch. Still running. Pocketed the wallet. Stood up.
Then he turned to Emma.
She was still sitting in the booth exactly where he'd left her. Perfectly still. Her eyes were enormous — not with fear, though. Something else. Something bright and electric and very, very alive.
"Were you scared?" Rango asked, and there was a note of guilt in it — genuine guilt. He crouched down in front of the booth so they were at eye level. "I'm sorry. I promise — promise — this kind of thing is never going to happen again. Not on my watch."
Emma stared at him.
And then her face broke into the widest, brightest smile Rango had ever seen on her.
"No!" she said, and before he could say another word, she launched herself out of the booth and threw her arms around his neck with enough force to actually knock him back a step. She buried her face in his shoulder, holding on tight, and her voice came out muffled and breathless and completely, utterly delighted.
"That was so cool! You're the coolest uncle in the whole world!"
Rango caught her. Held her. And for a moment, the restaurant, the groaning robbers on the floor, the sound of sirens already building in the distance — all of it fell away.
"Coolest uncle," he repeated, quietly. And something in his chest that had been wound tight for a very long time loosened, just a little.
He held Emma close, one hand resting gently on the back of her head, and let himself smile — a real one, the kind that reached his eyes.
Then, after a moment, he pulled back just enough to look at her face. And something flickered in his expression — something playful, something sharp, something that suggested the afternoon wasn't quite over yet.
"You think that was cool enough?" he said, quietly.
Emma blinked. And tilted her head.
"...What do you mean?"