Part 10 (2/2)
”That's the second time you mentioned a Steve. Who's Steve?” McCrae asked, leaning his elbows on the table, which J.P. seemed to take as an invitation to rub his back. ”Another writer?”
”No, he's a New York City police homicide lieutenant. We've worked together before, on other cases,” Maggie told him, feeling some pride as she spoke, whether that pride was in Steve or in the fact that she ”worked” with him, she was not anxious to consider at the moment. ”Not only that, but he was just here a while ago, to ask if I knew Francis, because he's been a.s.signed as primary on the case.” With Alex's eyes on her, but pretending not to notice that, she confided, writer to writer, ”You were right, Bruce. Francis was murdered.”
McCrae sat back, and then slammed a fist on the tabletop, rattling the plates. ”I knew it!”
”Not that he was supposed to know it,” Alex said in an undertone as he dabbed at his mouth with his napkin. ”I do believe now is the moment you're to swear him to secrecy, my dear.”
Maggie shrugged. Alex was jealous, that's all. He liked to be the big guy, the guy in charge. The great Regency sleuth. Yeah, well, tough beans. ”Bruce can help, Alex,” she told him as he handed her a plate and motioned that she should follow him into the kitchen. ”Think about it,” she said as she loaded the plates into the dishwasher. ”Bruce writes mysteries. I write mysteries. Jemima is an ex-cop turned top-notch defense attorney. You're a ... well, you're nosy. Put us all together, and we make a pretty decent team. Steve could do worse than to have us on the case. And, hey, for once I'm not a part of the case. Thank G.o.d. I mean, think of the novelty of it, just for starters. I love being on the outside looking in-because I sure wouldn't want to think that I could be the target of some nutcase with a rat supply.”
”Yes, about that,” Alex said, taking hold of her shoulder as she started to return to the living room, as leaving those two lovebirds alone wasn't in her plans for the afternoon. ”I think we should discuss that particular conclusion a bit more.”
Maggie turned to him. Slowly. Looking up at him through her mascaraed lashes. ”No. Oh, no. You're not going to tell me that-”
”Maggie? Alex? You'd better get in here!”
”She sounds upset,” Alex said, motioning for Maggie to lead the way.
Maggie didn't move. ”I got one, didn't I? I got my own personal rat-and you can take that one any way you want to.” Her mind was ticking over in double time. ”My bra. You grabbed that package out of my hands so fast I-that's why, right? You thought it was another rat? Or maybe something even worse? And that's why you've been sticking to me since-since we got home! You've known since then?”
”Maggie! It's Sterling. He doesn't look so good.”
Alex was out of the kitchen before Maggie could fully digest J.P.'s last words, because her mind was too full with the humiliating idea that Alex had taken her to bed last night, stayed with her last night, because he was worried about her.
No! She wouldn't think that way. Too Stupid To Live heroines thought that way in bad romances, and the author then spent three hundred pages trying to get the hero and heroine to for crying out loud, talk to each other. She was not a TSTL heroine, d.a.m.n it. Alex had not taken her to bed. She'd walked there, on her own, knowing what she was doing, what they both were doing-succ.u.mbing to the inevitable.
But that didn't mean she wasn't going to kill him, first chance she got!
”Maggie! Bring water and towels!”
”Oh, s.h.i.+t-Sterling?” Maggie flew into action at Alex's command, grabbing a clean kitchen towel and running for the living room, only to stop when she saw Sterling sitting on one of the couches, looking like he'd been run over by a truck. Several times.
His wig and beard were hanging askew, his bell-tipped Santa hat clutched in both his hands. There was black street dirt all over him, as if he'd been rolling around in a slushy gutter, and the right shoulder seam had been ripped open. He had the beginnings of a black eye and his bottom lip was split.
And he was smiling.
”Sterling? Honey, what happened to you?” Maggie asked, pressing the towel to his lip.
”Nothing too terrible, actually. I was accosted on my way home,” he told her, taking the towel from her and dabbing at his own lip. ”But I prevailed, and very little the worse for wear.”
The door flew open and Socks skidded into the room, fairly breathless. ”He all right? I've got his chimney safe downstairs, but I couldn't come up with him because Mr. Bolton in Six-B needed me to-wow, he's going to have a s.h.i.+ner, isn't he? Well, maybe not-but that eye isn't going to win him any beauty contests. Who'd mug Santa?”
”I lost my bell, Maggie,” Sterling told her, slowly pulling off his wig and the connected beard. ”But it did make a formidable weapon, I will say that. They didn't get any of my silver.”
”You should have given it to them, Sterling,” Maggie told him, looking at his rapidly bruising cheekbone. ”They could have had weapons. Knives. Guns. Didn't anyone try to help you?”
”It's New York, Little Mary Suns.h.i.+ne, remember? A good mugging is like street theater to most people,” J.P. said, gathering up her purse and jacket. ”Bruce? You ready to go, sugar?”
Alex had been very quiet, Maggie realized. She knew that particular silence-it was the one that did not bode well for whoever had attacked his friend if the Viscount Saint Just found him. ”Alex? Shouldn't they stay?”
”I think we know all we need to know from them at the moment, my dear,” he answered dismissingly as he continued to look at Sterling. ”Bruce? I believe you'll be hearing from Left-tenant Wendell by this evening. Please tell him everything you've told us. And do take care, mind how you go.”
J.P. slipped her arm though McCrae's. ”Oh, don't worry about that, handsome. He won't be alone.”
”I've got to have a talk with that woman about the concept of playing hard to get,” Maggie said as Alex helped Sterling to his feet. ”Do you hurt anywhere, Sterling? Do you want to go to the emergency room? Alex, don't you think we should take him to the emergency room, get him checked out?”
”Certainly,” he agreed. ”Are you in need of medical treatment, Sterling?”
”No, thank you very much, and all of that,” Santa Sterling said, heading for the door. ”I think a good soak will be enough. But what of my lovely uniform, Saint Just? It's fairly well ruined, isn't it?”
”That doesn't matter, Sterling,” Maggie told him sternly, ”because you're not going back out there again. It's too dangerous, if this could have happened in the middle of the day, with people all around.”
”Oh, no, Maggie, I must do my duty,” Sterling told her. ”I gave my word, and the little children are depending on me.”
”Ah, sweetheart, I know, but-”
”He'll be fine, Maggie,” Alex told her, opening the door for his friend. ”You just go strip out of that ruined suit, Sterling, and I'll be there directly to run you a tub.”
”You're going to run his tub for him? The great Viscount Saint Just?” Maggie asked as the door closed behind Sterling. ”To quote a line from some cartoon-Fractured Fairy Tales, I think-'Now there's something you don't see every day, Chauncey.' ”
Alex smiled thinly. ”I do ask, from time to time, that you develop Clarence's character more fully, in the hope he might one day join us here. The complete gentleman's gentleman. How I miss him.”
”Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Maggie said, waving away that old argument-as if she could plan having one of her characters poof into her life ... their lives. ”I mean it, Alex. Sterling isn't going back out there.”
”He would be greatly disappointed if we were to deny him the pleasure,” Alex pointed out. ”But not to worry your head about such things. I already have an idea.”
Maggie held out her hands in a cla.s.sic ”whoa” gesture. ”No. I know what that means. You're planning to find whoever mugged Sterling and ... and cane them, or something ... make their guts into garters ... whatever. And that's not happening. We've had this discussion, Alex, and you can't do that, remember? That's called taking the law into your own hands, and we frown on that here in the real world. I ... I won't allow it.”
Alex smiled in a very kind, maddeningly condescending sort of way. ”Maggie. My dearest girl. It would be impossible for me to locate a few random thugs in this large metropolis. I would have absolutely no idea where to begin.”
”You promise?”
”I promise. Now, if you'll please excuse me, I need to run Sterling's bath, and then make a few calls.”
”Oh yeah?” Maggie said, walking after him. ”Who to? To whom? h.e.l.l-who are you calling?”
”Why, Vernon and George, of course. It has occurred to me that they will make exemplary bodyguards. Is it street smarts? Yes, I believe that's the term. Vernon and George should have them in abundance, don't you think? Or, to put it another way-it takes one to know one? If there are suspicious characters wandering about, eyeing Sterling and intent on anything nefarious, those two exemplary young gentlemen will quickly send them about their business, don't you think?”
”You're kidding. You're going to have them guarding Sterling? They'd scare everyone away and Sterling wouldn't make a cent.”
Alex stopped, seemed to ponder this for a moment. ”Yes, I see your point. George would do well enough, but Vernon could prove a problem.”
”People nicknamed Snake often do prove to be problems,” Maggie pointed out, trying not to smile.
”Yes. I'll have to think on that. In the meantime, if you would please get in touch with the good left-tenant? I do believe it's time we all spoke again. In fact, I believe it would be easier, and very possibly better for us, if he meets Bruce McCrae here as well. For some time this evening-if the good left-tenant is free, that is. We probably should speak to him about your rat.”
”You got that in one! And, just to put us both on the record here, you're lucky I'm speaking to you at all. Hiding the rat from me like that. The more I think about it, the madder I get. What were you thinking?”
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