The Complete Honey Huckleberry Box Set
Page 51
“Duck, Honey.” Harry’s voice came out of the dark.
I fell to the floor next to Sledge and his assailant. Both were too quiet on the stone floor. I looked up to see Harry come out of the tower room with his gun pointed at Masud. “Give it up, Masud,” he yelled.
With me out of reach, Masud grabbed the driver with one hand and thrust him into the line of fire. With his other hand, he aimed his gun at Harry. They both fired at the same time. The driver and Harry fell with a thud.
I hunched over Sledge’s body, and Masud aimed his gun at me. “You tried to set me up. Now you are dead, too.” He kept the weapon aimed at me but turned his sloe eyes to cover the stairs where the noise was increasing.
I groped around for a rock or something, anything, to throw at Masud. Instead, I found Sledge’s gun in his hand. It was easy to pry it from his fingers; they lay loose and limp around the handle. I aimed the gun at Masud, who had become distracted with the arrival of who I had thought was to be our rescuers.
To my surprise, I heard Masud say smugly, “Ah, good. You found the house. You are too late though. Harry Armstead is dead. I have triumphed. We don’t need her.”
I thought he meant he didn’t need me, but when I looked to see who had arrived, I was horrified to see Janie in her long, white, flowing gown and shiny Ponds face staring down at me. One of the strangers had his hand over her mouth. Her eyes were wide with fear and astonishment.
I aimed Sledge’s gun at Masud. “Let her go,” I demanded. I didn’t know how to fire a gun, but Masud’s white shirt made a good target in the moonlight. How hard could it be?
Masud thwarted my plan by pulling Janie in front of him, and he hid behind her as he had earlier hid behind his dead accomplice and me. She was too scared to speak. Was she too scared to think?
“Janie,” I said calmly. “Are you a dead dog?”
Janie went down in a heap, a white cloud of gown at an astonished Musad’s feet. He tried to grab her, but her Pond’s-slicked neck just slipped out of his grasp.
He shot me anyway.
I had never been shot before. I had never shot a gun before. Both of those deficiencies in my life were erased in the blink of an eye.
I shot and killed Masud before the pain of the bullet in my right leg registered, but when it did, a red-hot haze filled me. It was through this blinding fog that I saw Masud’s body fall toward one of the men who had brought Janie into the tower. The dead Masud acted like a lead domino; his catapulting body pushed the man down the stairs, crushing him with his weight. I heard him cry out and then there was silence.
The second man looked at me with my gun still bravely held high. He raised his hands and backed away, backed down the steps, and I heard him running into the night. He didn’t know I was shaken to the bone by the recoil of the gun I had fired and paralyzed by the pain in my leg. I couldn’t have fired again if the queen herself had demanded it.
I heard Janie scream, and under me, I felt Sledge Hamra stir.
The red haze faded to black.
THIRTY–EIGHT
Next year I am going to be thirty.
I’ve always thought that when I reach thirty, I will Know It All. Somehow — in my mind — that meant that I would wake up on my thirtieth birthday and be wise and solemn, and life would hold no surprises for me. I didn’t realize that wisdom comes in increments, meted out by the jeopardies of everyday life. I had lived in a cocoon for so long — one of my own making, to be sure — that I had rushed through the pitfalls of living during the past year. Trying to fulfill my own prophecy of matured utopia, I had fallen over dead bodies, toyed with lovers, spurned authority, and disrupted lives.
And I had killed a man.
No one mentioned the dead terrorist as they gathered around my bedside at the hospital.
That Harry lived was one of the blessings of my life. Before I could dare to ask about him, he had appeared over my bed, his pale face swathed in the gauze bandage that covered the bullet crease near his temple. “Can you ever forgive me?” he asked. Then for the fourth time, “Will you marry me?”
That’s what Steven Hyatt asked me, too.
Steven appeared right after I came out of surgery. Masud’s bullet had damaged a bone in my thigh, but it hadn’t shattered, and there was not going to be permanent damage, I was told.
Steven’s thin face hung over my bed. I struggled with a drug-induced cotton mouth to get the words out. “Marry you? Where did you come from?”
“You think Evelyn wouldn’t call me after that E-mail of yours? I’ve been flying all night.”
“Where’s Janie? Where’s Sledge?” I was beginning to come out of the anesthetic, but I was still in a drug-induced world.
“I’m here, Honey. You saved my life.” And Janie’s face replaced Steven’s.
“Too many people in here,” said an authoritative voice.
“Yes, Sister, we’re leaving,” I heard Harry say.
And Janie called out over her shoulder as she left, “Sledge is out of surgery and is doing well. I was right about him from the first, wasn’t I?”
And I was left alone with my tears.
My mother was wrong. That’s another thing about finally growing up. You get to say, “My mother was wrong.”
“Save your tears,” she had instructed. “People die every day. You can’t cry for them all. Save your tears for someone you care about.”
I hadn’t cared about Masud, but I cried for him.
EPILOUGE
“Telephone call for you, miss.” The attending sister handed me the receiver.
“Huckleberry, what? I can’t go off and leave you for a day or two without you getting in tall grass?”
“Bondesky?”
“In the flesh, Huckleberry. Heard you was worried about me. So, I came on home. You been up to shenanigans while I was gone, I hear. What? You can’t get in enough trouble here in Texas?”
“It’s wonderful talking to you, too, you old reprobate. You’re back in Fort Worth?”
“Yeah, where you should be. When you coming home?”
A different kind of haze enfolded me. A warm, white one that signaled security and love. This old man had loved me most of my life. He’d unobtrusively been my lifeline while I’d searched for my own. Maybe mother was right; more tears came to my eyes. I hurried to fill him in. “I’ll be able to travel soon, they say. Janie’s here with me. She’s writing a book, a murder of her own. I’m at the sanitarium where Harry’s mother is recovering. Not that she needs to recover now. Harry’s fine and safe. Bondesky, he wants me to marry him, and so does Steven Hyatt.”
“So, who will it be, Huckleberry, the knight or the showman?”
“I’ll tell you like I told them — neither. For now. I have to grow up first, but I’ll know by my birthday. I’ll be grown next year. I’ll decide then.”
“I’ll put money on it, Huckleberry.”
“Speaking of money, Bondesky . . .”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Margaret Moseley has been making her living as a writer since she was eighteen, beginning on the original Fort Worth Press in Fort Worth, Texas and continuing with work for ad agencies, television, and major corporations. Her stunningly original first book, Bonita Faye, was a finalist in the Edgar Award for Best New Novel and earned her wide, and richly deserved, acclaim.
Moseley was born in Durant, Oklahoma, raised in Fort Worth, Texas and for twenty years lived in Fort Smith, Arkansas. During her time in Arkansas, she was a personal friend of the Clintons and campaigned for them as an Arkansas Traveler at the time of the 1992 election.
She is the author of four additional mystery novels: Milicent LeSueur, The Fourth Steven, Grinning in His Mashed Potatoes, and A Little Traveling Music Please, all of which are being republished by Brash Books.
Moseley is married to computer guru and novelist Ron Burris. They live in Euless, Texas, with their rescued beagles Miss Sadie and Miss (The Terror) Matilda.
Table of Contents
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bsp; The Fourth Steven
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY–ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY–TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY–THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY–FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY–FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY–SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY–SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY–EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY–NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY–ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY–TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY–THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY–FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY–FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY–SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY–SEVEN
Grinning in His Mashed Potatoes
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY–ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY–TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY–THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY–FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY–FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY–SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY–SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY–EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY–NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY–ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY–TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY–THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY–FOUR
CHAPTER THIRTY–FIVE
CHAPTER THIRTY–SIX
CHAPTER THIRTY–SEVEN
CHAPTER THIRTY–EIGHT
CHAPTER THIRTY–NINE
CHAPTER FORTY
CHAPTER FORTY–ONE
CHAPTER FORTY–TWO
CHAPTER FORTY–THREE
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A Little Traveling Music, Please
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty–One
Chapter Twenty–Two
Chapter Twenty–Three
Chapter Twenty–Four
Chapter Twenty–Five
Chapter Twenty–Six
Chapter Twenty–Seven
Chapter Twenty–Eight
Chapter Twenty–Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty–One
Chapter Thirty–Two
Chapter Thirty–Three
Chapter Thirty–Four
Chapter Thirty–Five
Chapter Thirty–Six
Chapter Thirty–Seven
Chapter Thirty–Eight
Epilouge
About The Author