Androshorts: The Arse man

"Mr and Mrs Brown, Alex will see you now," he said across the foyer, indicating they should stand from their chairs and come into my cubicle. "Nothing," he whispered to me, "I predict that you're naked under those clothes..."

I took a very dramatic shocked deep breath, but all had to be forgotten for a while as I was due to discuss changing the Brown's mortgage policy for something longer term.

An hour later The Browns left, happy with the new option I'd printed out for them and a promise they'd come back the same time next week with their choice.

I showed them out of the cubicle and saw them to the glass doors that opened automatically. I walked back to my little box and finished off the paperwork saving it all electronically for next week.

"Coffee Miss Clarke?" There was Steve with my dark blue mug.

"Thank you Steve!" I said and made a point of knocking the corporate cardboard coaster to the floor. "Oh silly me," I said and put a hand to my mouth and bent forward to pick it up, happy that in doing so it would confirm what he'd already guessed short of him seeing my bare bottom - but only just mind you. Fuck but I felt naughty!

"You dirty girl," he furrowed his brow and handed my mug over.

I stood my ground grinning cheekily, sipping from my cup.

"I don't know what you mean Steve," I said shocked.

"Don't worry about it Alex," he said looking me up and down and dropping his voice an octave or so to a positive whispered growl, "Think of it this way, today it'll take me half as long to undress you with my eyes..."

I giggled. Fuck! That look, the voice - whether he was gay or not, he'd really turned me on!

"Oh Steve," I giggled, "you are a one..." I turned to one side finishing my coffee. I'd already checked that no one could see into my booth and putting an index finger to my lip slowly raised my short skirt turning slightly so he could see the cheeks of my shapely bare bum. "Tah-dah!" I whispered to him.

He growled, raising one side of his upper lip.

I dropped my skirt down and walked to the kitchen and made us both another coffee.

I looked in the mirror by the door that we would use to check our turn out before our work day and I saw that my cheeks had a heightened colour and my heart was pounding. I'd just flashed my bottom to a colleague, a male colleague, and it had turned me on to fuck.

But then as my pulse rate lowered I figured that he'd seen a small portion of my bottom and had he stood on the beach during my last holiday to Corfu he'd have seen a lot more of it, with just a line of black cloth of my string bikini to interrupt his gaze.

Our cheekiness carried on over the days and weeks; Steve knew that all of our messing around was hidden from the view of the counters and the CCTV. He would go out of his way to let me know he was staring and I'd bend over whenever I felt like it. We'd joke about bums and make racy innuendo - including that one - (in your end - oh! Geddit?) about bums and sex, me feeling brave enough because of Steve's sexuality.

A couple of months later it was announced that Steve was due to move on and I told him I'd miss our little cheeky chats about my 'panties' - not knickers he insisted. Women in 'Carry On' films and seventies sit-coms wore knickers, and drawers, and bloomers; and he said that from his close inspection I was definitely wearing panties, unless I wasn't wearing anything at all of course.

It was Steve's last week and we'd already arranged a card and a small collection for him. On that fateful Wednesday afternoon I was just returning from the restroom into the foyer when I saw the first man. The security door had just closed behind me, and our eyes met.

It was one of those 'things' - don't ask me how I knew it was wrong but I just did. Steve was talking to an old chap, one of our regulars who was desperately trying to get his head around his three online passwords and Steve must have explained it to him seven or eight times. We all reckoned he only came in to have a chat with Steve because he was gay as well. I could see that Steve was watching the new man as well.

The suspicious man was wearing a long camouflage jacket that looked too big for him. I backed up to the security door and was about to punch in my number when the shouting started and there was a loud bang that had all of our ears ringing.

A second man had entered the branch and had fired a gun into the ceiling, hitting one of the girls in the upstairs office in the leg we were to find out later.

"ALRIGHT!" shouted the second man who was carrying a small pistol, "no one moves! GET DOWN ON THE GROUND NOW!"

I dropped to the ground and saw that Steve had done likewise. The old man was having considerable difficulty so the first man, who had pulled a sawn off shotgun from under his jacket, clubbed him with it and he dropped like a stone, blood pouring from his face.

"HAND OVER..." The first gun man was walking towards the counters pointing his revolver and was stopped dead by the whizzing sound of the steel shutters dropping down in front of all four cubicles and the jangling of the alarm bells. "NOOOO!" screamed the first man and he pounded on them impotently.

The second gunman waved his shotgun around the room stupidly,

"WHAT WE GONNA DO?!" he shouted at his comrade.

"YOU!" shouted the first, I looked up to see he was gesturing at me.

"W...what?" I stuttered, this was really scary.

"Open these shutters."

"I can't..."

"I SAID FUCKING OPEN THEM!" he pointed his pistol at me. I whimpered and closed my eyes.

"They can't be opened from outside!" I shouted. My training as a manager taught me that, they had to be reset by the security company with a passcode.

"FUCKIN' OPEN THEM!" he pulled me up by my arm, and pushed the gun in my face. I could see Steve flinch from his place on the floor. This had all happened so fast. Now it was happening I wasn't really sure what Steve was supposed to do in the case of a hold-up. "You in there!" he shouted at the shutters, "If you don't open the shutters someone out here gets fucking shot!"

"I told you, they can't open them." I stuttered. "They have to be reset by the security company." I also knew that opening them up was not an option for the bank either.

He bashed on them with the butt of his pistol and it went off, sending a bullet into the wall we shared with 'Boots the Chemist' next door. Just through the noise of the alarm bells I could hear the whoop of police sirens, and an ambulance for the girl shot in the leg I found out later.

"Time to go Col," said the second and he made for the glass doors and pushed at them. Nothing. He bashed them with his shoulder, and they moved slightly. "FUCK!" he screamed at the seemingly locked doors.

I wanted desperately to tell him that if he'd pulled the door towards him, it would have opened with just a little effort but I was so scared I couldn't. The shutters had automatically taken out the electronic door openers, no more no less.

"Open the door..." said the first then stopped talking.

The street out the front cleared of shoppers and I saw police cars move into place and the same armed policemen I'd met months before hiding behind them.

The first gunman pulled me in front of him,

"Right..." he said thinking about what he was going to do, "Right, someone get me a phone."

"There aren't any out here." I said, "That one just goes through to our head office. We aren't allowed mobile phones on the floor while we're working." That was also true.

Considering our two hoodlums had been working up to this job allegedly for three months now, they showed remarkably little planning. We were all to find out later that a third criminal, the brains of the operation, had planned the raid but had blabbed to a police informant. The planner had been arrested shortly after the security scare had started and wouldn't tell which of his many partners in crime might carry out the raid.

The old boy on the floor didn't look well; there was a large patch of blood staining the carpet,

"E... e... Excuse m... m... m.. me... ss... sss... sss... sir," I looked around at who was stuttering. I couldn't believe it, it was Steve. Some fucking brave security man he was!

"What!" shouted gunman one.

"M... M... Mister Mo... Mo... Morgan," he finally spat out, "nee... nneeeeds f... f... first aid." Steve pointed to my cubicle and the green boxed hanging from the wall.

"F... f... fuck 'im," said gunman one with a leer, "You fuckin' phlid!" he joked.

"Yeah," said gunman two, his confidence boosted by his friend's toughness.

"To everyone in the bank," came a calm sounding female voice, "please come out quietly and lay you weapons on the ground, no one else needs to get hurt."

"I'M GONNA FUCKIN' SHOOT HER IF ANYONE COMES CLOSE!" screamed gunman one. He pushed the barrel of his pistol hard into my throat and I felt the tears run down my face. "I FUCKIN' WILL!" He screamed.

"Fuck sake Col!" said gunman two looking really scared, "This is serious shit man!"

The voice came back,

"There's no need for that now, we know it was an accident but one of the staff upstairs was wounded by your first shot..."

The two gunmen looked at each other, gunman two went pale.

"Yeah..." shouted gunman one after a few moments, "and three more are gonna get shot unless you give us our money and a car... bitch!"

"Colin, no one else needs to get shot. You need to stay calm and we can all get out of here safely. My name is Ali..."

He looked scared that the police knew his name, and made to speak but couldn't after a second he called out,

"They know your name!" burbled gunman two.

"FUCK OFF ALI!" Shouted gunman one and pushed the gun further into my throat.

"Please..." I hissed feeling the sight on the gun scratch into my flesh.

"What? You're my fucking ticket out of here princess," he hissed into my cheek. I could smell his foul breath and the cigarette he must have smoked while contemplating his attack. "Shut the fuck up princess," his speech made his three or four day stubble scratch across my cheek and I nearly threw up.

I retched, partly down to the barrel of his revolver pushing into my throat but more than that, his stench and my proximity to it.

"Please..." I gasped again.

"Please WHAT BITCH!"

I didn't know what he wanted me to say, and I felt my knees tremble.

Gunman two came across to us.

"Fuck sake Col, this is getting' out of 'and mate."

"No it ain't," said gunman one, "we're walking out of here with this pretty princess in front of us and no cunt's gonna stop us."

"But Col, they got snipers, they got boys who take the eyebrows of a badger at 500 yards mate."

"Fuck off you spineless twat, we're getting out of this and she's coming wiv' us. To shoot us, they'll have to fuckin' shoot her first." I thought I was going to faint.

The voice of 'Ali' came through the speaker on the police car again. In a slightly different voice she said quite simply, "OK, we're ready when you are."

"Ready for what?" said gunman one.

"I dunno!" hissed gunman two, "p'raps they're ready to talk now."

"I ain't talking to no cunt," he took a deep breath, "NOT 'TIL THERE'S A FUCKIN' CAR PARKED OUT FRONT WIV' THE ENGINE RUNNIN'!"

"But Col! We won't get twenty yards! I ain't dying in a hail of gunfire just so you can look good in the Crimewatch re-enactment."

For a brief moment Col took the gun out of my throat,

"We gotta stay strong mate, int' we? We'll just walk out of 'ere wiv her up front..." he pushed the gun back into my throat and I squealed.

"N... N... No." came that stuttering voice again, "Y... y... you m... m... mustn't hurt L... L... Lexie, she... she... she's a M... Mu... she's a MMummy." At each completed word Steve blinked hard and gave his head a shake.

I looked to my right and Steve had stood up quietly and unseen.

"Wassup then fuckhead?" said gunman one, "You wanna go in her place do ya?"

Steve stepped towards us his right arm crooked across his chest and a slight limp to his right leg. It finally came to me, Steve was a security specialist and one hell of a fucking actor!

"Y... Y... Y... Yes," he said getting closer and giving his head a major twitch, "My M... M... Mum w... w... w... will be p... p... proud of me." He twitched his head again.

"Aaawww, you want Mummy to be proud of you do ya?" Giggled gunman one, "Yeah, you're taller than this skinny little slag anyway!" With that he threw me to the floor and I landed with a thump by the old boy laying on the ground still weeping. I was on the floor... and out of the way.

I looked up at Steve and he grinned down at me. Then things started to happen at speed.

Gunman one had his pistol raised and pointing at the limping actor/security man's chest. As he took a further slow limping pace towards the gun, Steve stumbled a bit. But from his new slightly lower position his hands flew like lightning, and Steve bent the revolver towards that bad guy, then snatched it from gunman one's hand and punched him hard in his solar plexus and he dropped.

Still spinning on the right leg he'd so recently been limping on, Steve smashed the pistol into the side of gunman two's head - twice, snatching the sawn-off from his lifeless fingers as he slipped to the floor unconscious next to his still gasping colleague now retching on the floor.

"Now," said Steve quietly and the security door behind us opened and three shouting police officers rushed in and our two hapless bank robbers were pounced on and cuffed while Steve stepped over them to the old boy and started to do first aid.

"You OK Alex?" he grinned at me. I nodded my head but began to cry at the same time.

The front door opened and more police and a paramedic came in, the old boy was taken care of while Steve came across to me and put his arms around me and lifted me up with no effort. I felt like Whitney Houston being picked up by Kevin Costner and I clung to him crying like a scared kid.

He carried me through to the back office whispering into my ear.

"It's OK Baby," he purred his face touching mine, "all fine now, Steve's got you." I suddenly felt warm and safe.

Eventually he put me down in a chair and we sat quietly his arm around me the whole time 'treating for shock he was to tell me later, while the a tiny policewoman who introduced herself as Ali shook hands with Steve and sat next to me.

"Well done Alexa, all safe now. Young Steve here is worth his weight in gold." She grinned and put a hand on my shoulder, "we'll just take a few notes, get you checked over by the paramedics and then get you home. We've had Nicky picked up from school and dropped him off with your Mum, he's having a great time playing policemen with one of my boys."

"Thank you," I mouthed, still not sure of my voice.

"I'll see she gets home Ali," said Steve and I smiled at him.

"No you won't, you have a debrief to attend!"

"Oh, so Alex gets to go home and I don't?"

"That's about it big boy," said Ali.

"Shit; ah well, goes with the territory." He knelt by my chair and gave me a hug. "Don't worry Alex, all safe now I promise." Gone was his camp public voice I was so used to.

"Thanks Steve," I said, "will I see you again?" My voice wobbled a bit as my rescuer and hero looked to be stepping out of my life.

"Of course you will," he beamed his cheeky grin at me.

I was taken home by police car, and the officer came in to make sure I was all OK. Nicky was impressed to find another policeman at Nanny's house and tried on his hat too. He was just starting to get tired and a little bit idle when the policemen all finished their tea, reclaimed their hats and handcuffs and batons and left with a promise they'd all come to his school and visit him again.

Mum cooked a huge fry up for us all and both Nicky and I were put to bed with hot chocolate. Mum being Mum had our clothes off of us and by the time she went to bed my and Nicky's clothes were washed, dried and folded. Even our underwear.

Mum had a spare set of most things for Nicky, a drawer full of stuff in fact, including his school uniform and a few changes of clothes for me and some nightwear. Conscious that I had rolled around on the floor and been grabbed by both of those obnoxious men she washed everything anyway.

Grandpa took Nicky to school, which for both of them was just the best thing ever.

Mum had switched off my bedside alarm and when she brought my clean clothes in on hangers just after midnight, she found my mobile and turned off the alarm on that. I slept late, waking up in a bit of a blur and Mum bringing me in a cup of tea before she went off to work.

"Mum?" I stared stupidly at the clock on my phone, "Nicky..."

"All taken care of honey," said Mum with that big beaming smile, "Daddy's taken Little Nicky to school which, I can tell you, is currently the highlight of both of their days, while you've been told to stay off work until Monday."

"But..."

"Nothing to do with me Darling," she said, "I'll be picking Nicky up from school and Daddy reckons we should eat out tonight. You know where everything is don't you. Ta Ta Darling."

She pecked me on the cheek, grinned, put her arms around me and hugged me. "Relax honey, you had a bit of a day of it yesterday."

"OK Mum, I will I promise." I smiled, got up and went into the kitchen to drink my tea and have some jam on toast.

I pulled on some shorts and a T-shirt (Mum and I are pretty much the same size) and finding a pair of her trainers I went out for a run around my former stamping ground when I was growing up.

The more I ran, the more I felt the tension that had been there drift away. I got to the old park - different from the new park that had skate ramps and solar powered play equipment - and I ran laps on the basketball court, my old basketball court and by the time I was done yesterday's work was yesterday.

I trotted home slowly, waving and smiling to some old friends and acquaintances then once home jumped in the shower. I put on my spare jeans and one of Mum's fitted T-shirts and walked to Nicky's school in time for turn out. Mum was already there and we all drove home happily. Once Dad got back we went to a local chain restaurant and had lots of food and laughs.

Once home I found I had a text from Tom saying that he'd just heard what had gone on at my branch and that I had been involved. He said he hoped I was OK and if I needed anything, just call.

Now I know I shouldn't have been bitchy but even I know Tom would have heard about the armed robbery at my branch within two hours of it taking place. Trust him not to text me or contact me until after his working day had finished.

I had another text message from Gemma telling me that I should come in to the branch tomorrow lunchtime as Steve was coming in for his card and present.

I wasn't going to miss that! I borrowed Mum's car and drove home and collected some of my clothes for the next day. My spare jeans were OK, but not like my pulling jeans! I had a pair of low rider stretchy ones that covered and shaped my arse to perfection, and I wanted my stretchy top that clung to all my curves my bra was going to create; if it was Steve's last day I was give him something worth letching at.

I got up early and got a lift into town with Dad after dropping off Nicky. I had a walk around the shops and grabbed a coffee. Next I went back to the branch and locked my few purchases in my car and made sure I could move it after lunch.

The branch was still closed of course so that the shutters could be reset and the damage repaired to the wall and ceiling. The girl that was hit by the stray bullet was still in hospital but expected to make a full recovery.

I let myself into the branch and met all of the girls and the one boy were there to see off Steve and they all shook my hand.