Magic by Moonlight (9 page)

Closing his eyes, he nodded once. “All
right. I know you’re more than capable.” Then he closed his hand on
her outer arms and drew her close to him. “Be careful,
ma
chérie.”
And he kissed her, hard and fast.

She blinked, tried to catch her breath, gave
her head a shake. “Don’t let them hurt her, Al. I’m counting on
you.”

“You have my word as a Musketeer, Mary
Catherine. No harm will come to your aunt.”

As soon as he said it, she knew it was true.
Amazing how much faith she’d come to have in him. She looked at his
face, dark eyes blazing into hers, one last time, then crouched low
and made a dash to the toolshed. She didn’t pause, but yanked the
door open and ducked inside. Then she peered back toward the house
to see how Al was doing, and caught her breath.

He gave a hop, reaching overhead to catch
hold of a tree limb. Then he swung back and forth, faster and
faster, his body sailing higher into the air each time, and
finally, on the biggest upswing yet, he just let go.

His momentum carried him higher, and he
flipped in midair before catching hold of the edge of the flat,
tar-coated roof. Carefully, he pulled himself up and crept toward
the widow’s walk at the center.

M. C. couldn’t believe it. He could have
broken his neck. Shivering, she glanced through the shed’s dusty
window toward the guys in the car, but they hadn’t moved. Didn’t
seem as if they’d noticed a thing amiss.

She flicked the lighter to see in the
darkness and foraged for the tools she needed. It didn’t take long
to find them. She let the lighter go out, pocketed the shears and
the tape, and carried the length of hose in one hand. As an
afterthought she pulled out her gun with the other. Just in case.
Then she crept out of the shed and across the lawn, keeping low,
using the hedges for cover. When she ran out of hedges, she dropped
to the ground and crawled right up to the car, which the fools had
left running. Hadn’t anyone ever told them how dangerous that could
be? She ripped off some tape with her teeth, stuck the hose into
the exhaust pipe, and wrapped it up tight. Then she took the other
end of the hose with her as she wriggled on her back underneath the
car. Right under the driver’s seat, she found the air vent, and she
stuck the hose right there.

Then she shimmied out again and made her way
to the backyard, all without once being seen.

She smiled to herself. She was good.

But Al was better.

When she looked up she saw a length of rope
dangling from a hidden corner of the roof. He’d left her a way
inside.

What a guy.

*

When she crept down the attic stairs,
praying none would creak and give her away, she wished to heaven
she knew where everyone was. She got to the second-floor hall and
started down it on tiptoe, passing each closed bedroom door with
her ears straining and her heart in her throat.

Then one opened just as she moved past, and
she was pulled inside. A big hand covered her mouth, and the room
was utterly dark. She struggled...but briefly. That wide chest
behind her; that scent. She stilled, waiting. The hand left her
mouth, and she whispered, “Al?”

“
Oui, ma chérie.
Who else?”

“Did you find them? Is my aunt all
right?”

“She is fine. In the next bedroom. De Rocci
is with her. As far as I can tell there are two others in the
house, one at the front door, one at the back. It would be best if
we could eliminate them at the same time.”

“That way neither has time to warn the
other.”

“Or to warn de Rocci,” Al said. “The men in
the car?”

“They’ll be sleeping by the time we get
downstairs.”

She couldn’t see his frown, but knew it was
there, all the same. “I’ll explain later. Trust me, Al, they’re not
going to be a problem.”

“I do trust you,” he said. “It is odd, being
in battle with a woman at my side. But even more strange to feel so
certain she is equal to the task. You are...you are a special
woman, Mary Catherine.”

“Glad you realize it,” she said. “Now let’s
get this show on the road.”

“I’ll take the back door,” he told her. And
she had no doubt he’d already checked the two men out, and decided
the guy by the back door was bigger, or meaner, or more dangerous.
Not that she minded.

“Let’s make it quick and quiet, okay?” She
didn’t wait for an answer. “Meet you at the bottom of the stairs.”
Then she ducked out the door and headed down.

Al came behind her, and he squeezed her hand
at the base of the stairs before they turned in opposite
directions. M. C. drew her gun and crept into the living room. It
was dim, but not all that dark, despite the fact that the lights
were all out and the curtains drawn tight. She could see the guy
fairly well. He was looking outside, expecting visitors from there,
not from within. She crept closer, lifting her gun. She was almost
right behind him when she heard a dull thud, a low grunt from the
back of the house, followed by what had to be a body slumping to
the floor. The goon heard it too, and spun. But she clocked him
with the pistol butt before he came to a stop, and he sank to the
floor like a limp noodle. M. C. pocketed the gun, yanked out the
duct tape, and used it to tie him up. A little more over the mouth.
Perfect.

She headed back to the stairway and met Al
at the bottom. “Done?” he asked.

“
Fini,”
she replied. He grinned at
her and they took the stairs together. “Now what?”

“Now, I go back to the roof, and you to the
door of your aunt’s room.”

“Ah, we enter from two directions.”

Al nodded. “But take care. Do not stand
directly in front of the door, Mary Catherine. I’ve no desire to
lose you now.”

She caught her breath. Silly thing for him
to say. He’d be going back when this was over. Losing her was
inevitable. She gave her head a shake to rid herself of that
thought. “Don’t worry. I’ve done this sort of thing once or
twice.”

He nodded, and headed up the attic stairs.
She gave him a minute to get into position, then strode up to her
aunt’s bedroom door and, standing to one side of it, reached out
and knocked.

“What is it?” de Rocci growled.

“Mr. de Rocci? It’s M. C. Hammer. I brought
that tape like you said.”

She heard footsteps coming nearer, a voice
cussing. “What the hell—how did you—?” The door was flung open. De
Rocci stood there, gun in hand, looking up and down the hall.
“Where are my men?”

“They sent me up,” she said. She hoped she
sounded convincing.

De Rocci eyed her, glancing beyond her
nervously, and finally gripped her arm, pulled her into the
bedroom, and closed the door behind her. She had a brief moment to
notice her aunt, tied to a chair in one corner, a gag over her
mouth. The poor thing was wide-eyed with fear. But then all hell
broke loose. De Rocci pointed his gun at M. C, yanked her weapon
from her waistband, and demanded, “Give me the tape!” Before she
could react, the window behind him shattered as Al swung through it
like some kind of superhero.

Al landed in a ready crouch, his sword
appearing in his hand so suddenly that she never saw him draw it.
De Rocci whirled and fired. Aunt Kate sent a fierce look at his gun
and muttered something from behind her gag. It was all over in a
heartbeat. The bullet slammed into Al like a sledgehammer, knocking
him to the floor. His sword skidded across the hardwood, bumping M.
C.’s feet and stopping there, and before de Rocci could turn
around, she had that baby in her hand. But she hesitated, trying to
remember what the hell to do with it. De Rocci’s weapon was aiming
at her as her fist clenched on the cool hilt.

And Al yelled, as if through grated teeth,
“Parry! Dodge! Thrust!”

She sliced de Rocci’s gun hand, and he
dropped the weapon, cursing furiously. He lunged forward to
retrieve it, but she lashed his rear end with the flat side of the
blade, and he went sprawling on his face.

Al grabbed the fallen gun and held it on de
Rocci. “Enough,” Al managed. “It is over.”

“Al!” M. C. dropped to her knees where he
was. He’d pulled himself into a sitting position. His shirt was
soaked in blood. She reached for him.

“Not yet,
chérie.
Untie your aunt,
and use the ropes to bind de Rocci tight. Do it now. Hurry.”

She nodded, understanding his urgency. He
was going to lose consciousness soon, and he wanted to know she was
safe before he did. She rapidly untied her aunt’s hands and feet.
“Are you all right, Aunt Kate? Did he hurt you?”

Kate nodded yes, then shook her head no,
then reached up to undo the gag while M. C. rushed across the room
to truss Guido de Rocci up like a Christmas goose. When he started
cussing at her, she pulled the duct tape and smacked a strip across
his mouth. “You’re going down, de Rocci,” she told him. “For a
long, long time!”

There was a thud behind her and she turned,
her heart aching as she saw Al lying on the floor, limp and
unconscious. She ran to him, fell to her knees again, and yanked
the T-shirt up so she could see the damage.

“Don’t panic, Mary Catherine. The bullet
didn’t hit his heart,” her aunt said softly. “It was headed that
way, but I managed to give it a nudge.”

M. C. frowned when she saw Al’s wounds but
didn’t avert her eyes. She tried to wipe the blood away to see the
injury better. “What are you talking about? What nudge?”

“Don’t forget who I am, Mary Catherine,”
Aunt Kate said. “I pushed the bullet upward. So it would only hit
his shoulder, the fleshy part, if my aim was any good.”

“Al doesn’t have any ‘fleshy parts.’ “
Dabbing more blood away, M. C. caught her breath. Her aunt was
absolutely right. The bullet had gone into his shoulder. She pushed
a cloth tight to the wound to stop the bleeding. “I can’t believe
it,” she muttered.

“How can you still doubt? M. C, you managed
to conjure yourself a Musketeer, and you still don’t believe in
magic?”

M. C. stroked Al’s face with one hand,
pressing a cloth to the wound with the other. “If there were really
such a thing as magic...,” she whispered.

“What, Mary Catherine? Tell me.”

She closed her eyes. “He’d stay.”

But he wouldn’t stay. It was over now, and
she was safe. And it would soon be time for Al to return to his own
time. His own duties. His own life. M. C.’s eyes burned
inexplicably, and her stomach churned, and her heart felt as if it
was breaking just a little bit.

“Call the police, will you, Aunt Kate? And
the D.A. And an ambulance for Al.”

Aunt Kate nodded, reaching for the phone.
“We won’t need the ambulance though. A scratch like that we can
tend right here.” M. C. opened her mouth, but her aunt shook a
finger. “Don’t you go doubting me again, young lady.”

Lowering her head, M. C. sighed. “I
won’t.”

Between the two of them, Aunt Kate and M. C.
managed to get Al into the bed. He came around while they were
doing it, argued a bit, but finally resigned himself to submitting.
He was outnumbered anyway. Sirens were screaming closer by the
second, so at least de Rocci and his goon squad wouldn’t be sitting
around the house much longer.

M. C. rolled her eyes and shook her head a
lot when Aunt Kate used one of her concoctions on Al’s wound, but
the stuff seemed to stop the bleeding almost immediately.

Frowning, she leaned over the jar and
sniffed. “What’s in that stuff, anyway?”

“Some healing herbs, disinfectant, and
cobwebs, dear. Now run into the bathroom and bring me some gauze
and tape.”

“Cobwebs?” M. C. asked with a gasp.

Al, who’d been lying back on the pillows,
sat up a little, eyes widening with alarm. “Cobwebs?” he
echoed.

Aunt Kate sighed heavily. “Fine, I’ll get
the bandages myself.” And with a huff she headed off to the
bathroom.

M. C. sat down on the edge of the bed, and
instinctively stroked Al’s dark hair away from his forehead. “Are
you really okay?”

His mischievous grin appeared to reassure
her, though she could still see the pain reflected in his eyes. “I
have been far more grievously wounded than this, and survived, Mary
Catherine. But if you wish to sit there and worry for me, I won’t
object.” With his uninjured arm, he reached up, ran his hand slowly
over her cheek. “You are beautiful when you are worried.”

She lowered her eyes. “You never give up, do
you, Al?”

“Never. And now,
chérie,
you are no
longer under my protection.”

She met his gaze, let him see for once that
she felt the same way he did. “Unfortunately, you’re lying in bed
with a hole in your shoulder at the moment.”

“It is of little importance. I will not be
using my
shoul
der, ma petite.”
His fingertips danced
over her temple, and she shivered.

Licking her lips, she noted, “We have an
audience.”

Then there were footsteps thundering up the
stairs, and the bedroom door burst open. Uniformed officers lunged
inside, weapons drawn.

“And more arriving all the time,
non.
?”

“Afraid so,” M. C. said. Then she turned to
face the cops. “You can put those down. The bad guys are
gift-wrapped and waiting for delivery.” And she nodded toward de
Rocci even as she was reaching into her pocket for the tape. “That
one’s the baddest of the bunch, and this tape will prove it.”

Holstering his gun, the first officer
stepped forward. Another came behind him. “You’d best run outside
and check on the two in the car. I don’t think the carbon monoxide
has killed them yet, but...”

The second cop was gone before she could
finish. The first one reached for the tape, but M. C. pulled it
back. “I’d just as soon put this in the D.A.’s hands myself, if
it’s all the same to you.”