Trouble With Harry

by Myla Jackson

  Having come from the 1920s, Harry had to reconcile the concept of women and independence. The norm for the Twenties had been for women to marry, raise numerous children, and let their husbands provide for their welfare. Only the really poor families relied on both parents working to support their families.

  Women had come a long way since then. Edie was a prime example. She lived alone, supported herself and made her own decisions.

  Harry liked her independence. Liked her ability to stand up for herself. With the exception of her self-image. She was beautiful and she didn’t see it in herself. Her father must be completely blind or mean-spirited.

  Beautiful, intelligent, independent and feisty Edie. If Harry were the marrying kind, Edie would be his first choice. Her pale skin and the dusting of freckles framed by that fiery red hair stirred him like no other. Even in this dark, smelly alley he could drive nails into the wall as hard as he got just thinking about her. But the chill of the night air was seeping into his skin. The sweats he wore weren’t much protection against the damp fall air in New York City. And the jacket wasn’t doing enough to keep Harry warm.

  While rubbing his hands together, he heard the sound of a car engine roaring off the walls of the buildings around him. He froze and inched his way out of the tight corner he’d wedged himself into between the building and the giant trash container.

  At the end of the alley, a long black car stood. A fleeting thought to the shape and size of cars floated through Harry’s consciousness. How different from the spindly contraptions of the Twenties. He hoped to get to drive one someday, imagining all that speed and power at his control. But for now he had bigger worries to handle. He had to get Mitch back, keep the stone and get the hell out of here without getting himself and Mitch killed. He stood and brushed the dust off his backside, still hidden behind the trash container.

  All the time he’d been waiting, he hadn’t come up with any other plan than to trade himself and the stone for Mitch’s life. As long as he stayed with the stone, he had a chance to steal it away. If they threatened to kill him, he’d threaten to destroy the stone. Simple, right? He prayed his little plan would work. First thing was to find out who and what he was up against.

  With a deep breath, he stepped out into the alley. Let the show begin.

  A man had climbed from the driver’s seat. In the dim light from the street lamps, he appeared to have dark hair and dark skin like a Middle Easterner. “Did you bring the Stone of Azhi?” the man said, his voice heavily laced with a foreign accent.

  “I brought it.” Harry kept close to the shadows. Standing in the middle of an alley without cover left him open as a target. But he had to get Mitch. “Where’s Mitch?”

  The guy jerked his head to the side. “In the car.”

  “Show me Mitch and I’ll show you the stone,” Harry said.

  The man leaned toward the back window. It slid downward exposing another man of the same coloring as the first. They talked in low, hushed tones Harry couldn’t hear their words, but they sounded foreign. Then the back door opened, and the other man got out. He reached into the car and hauled another man to his feet. In the dim glow from the light over the back door to the museum warehouse, Harry could see the man had a lighter complexion and pale hair compared to the others. When he lifted his head and stared across at him with light blue eyes, Harry breathed for the first time in the past two minutes.

  Mitch stood barefooted on the dirty pavement and wearing the same khaki slacks and pullover shirt he’d been wearing the night before. A large bruise colored the side of his jaw. His lips twisted in a wry smile.

  Harry exhaled a long sigh of relief. They hadn’t killed him and they hadn’t done too much damage. Yet. If he didn’t handle this exchange well, they could all end up dead and Edie would still be tied to her bed until her father rescued her. He was glad he’d left a message on her father’s answering machine. Hopefully, he’d check his machine before morning, but not before Harry got through the next few minutes. That’s all he needed was Edie to show up in the middle of a shooting. Not that a shooting was the likely outcome of this little tryst. Think positive, Harry.

  The blond man smiled and winced, reminding Harry of his friend Will. “Hey Harry. About time you showed up.”

  “Wouldn’t have come if Edie hadn’t insisted. For some strange reason, she thought you were worth saving.”

  The two men on either side of Mitch frowned and glanced around at Harry’s words.

  “You didn’t bring her here, did you?” Mitch glared at Harry.

  “No, she’s safe and secure.” Secured to the bed. But Mitch didn’t need to know that.

  The two men pushed Mitch forward a few steps and stopped. Then a long, slender leg appeared in the car’s doorway, the skin as pale as the men were dark. At the end of the leg was an expensive-looking high-heeled crocodile-skin shoe. Another leg appeared and a woman followed, unbending from the back seat of the car. She was tall, lithesome and as blonde as an expensive bleach job could make her. But her eyes were every bit as dark as her male counterparts.

  “Enough talk, get the stone,” she demanded, her voice laced with a foreign accent her words spoken in the Queen’s English as if she’d been tutored by someone from Great Britain. “I want the stone.” Hers was not a request, more an order to the two men. Her classic face could have been etched in celluloid on a movie screen in the Twenties. She wore a slim black skirt with a matching jacket, a stark contrast to the platinum blonde hair.

  “I take it you’re Danorah,” Harry said.

  Her only acknowledgement was a slight dip of her head.

  Mitch frowned. “You know her?”

  “No.” Harry’s eyes narrowed. “But her reputation precedes her in the bloody trail she’s left around the city.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me?” Mitch raised a hand to the bruise on his jaw. “She’s quite a bit of work.”

  “I’m not letting go of the stone until I know Mitch is safe,” Harry said. “Me and the stone for Mitch.”

  Mitch shook his head. “Don’t do it, Harry. These guys don’t play fair.”

  “How do we know you have the stone?” the woman asked, her tones smooth and deadly.

  Harry pulled the object from his pocket and held it up between his fingertips. “Is this what you’ve been looking for? Or should I say, killing for?”

  Her eyes widened briefly like a greedy dog seeing a tasty treat waved before its hungry eyes. Then her cool mask slipped back in place. “What makes you think I can’t take the stone and kill you both?”

  “If you shoot me, I drop the stone and it shatters into a million pieces. Are you willing to risk it?” Harry knew how hard the stone was and was fairly certain it wouldn’t break even if he took a hammer to it. But Danorah didn’t know that and Harry hoped she wouldn’t guess and call his bluff. She looked like she wanted it. Bad. Well, let her sweat a little. He tossed the relic into the air.

  The woman gasped, her gaze following the path of the stone as light from a street lamp glinted off its smooth black surface.

  With ease, Harry snatched the stone from the air and held it high, ready to drop it. “What’s it to be? Mitch or the stone?”

  “We’ll shoot him if you run with the stone, so don’t try anything.” The woman’s ruby-red lips thinned and she turned to her henchmen. “Let him have his friend.”

  When the two men reached out to follow the woman’s orders, Mitch stumbled. Before Harry’s eyes, the scene turned into chaos. Mitch hunkered over and plowed into the man next to him knocking him off his feet. The goon’s 9mm pistol flew from his hands, skittering across the pavement to thunk against a brick wall.

  The woman screamed and backed away from the men as they fell to the ground and struggled for supremacy.

  With no time to think, Harry tucked the stone in his pocket and launched himself at the other man while his attention was directed toward Mitch.

  * * * * *

  The clock on Edie’s b
edside table flickered and changed. Eleven o’clock. Rendezvous time and Edie was still tied to the bed. She kicked her feet against the mattress, and then swung them high to kick them against the wall over her head, yelling through the tape as loud as she could.

  Someone somewhere had to hear all the commotion she was making. Hell, she could hear her upstairs neighbors whenever they were making love, why couldn’t they hear her when she was whacking against the wall like a lunatic?

  Edie banged harder. She had to get to Harry and Mitch. Her gut told her they needed her right now.

  What was that noise? Did she hear knocking? Edie stopped yelling and lay still.

  Bang! Bang! Bang! Someone was pounding on her door. Thank the Lord.

  Edie screamed long and loud, hoping the pitiful attempts could be heard through the tape and through her bedroom, living room and the front door. She stopped to listen.

  “Edie!” Her father’s voice drifted in to her.

  She almost wept in relief. Her father was here. He’d untie her and she could wish herself to the museum warehouse. Hurry up Dad! she yelled into the tape.

  The sound of the doorknob rattling drifted into her bedroom and eventually was followed by the front door slamming open against the wall. Edie could just see her father through the open bedroom door.

  “What the hell? Edie?” Frank Ragsdale stopped just inside the door and scanned the living room’s wrecked interior. “Edie!”

  “In here, Dad! Hurry!” she cried out, her words nothing but a loud moan. Edie was touched by the worried expression evident on his face. She didn’t think he cared enough about her to be worried. She bumped her head against the headboard to make sure he heard her. As many times as she’d done it in the past hour, she was surprised she wasn’t unconscious. She’d have a dozen goose eggs to show for her efforts. Just wait until she got a hold of Harry.

  “Edie?” Her father leapt across the overturned coffee table and hurried toward the bedroom door. “Oh my God, Edie.” When he saw her state of undress, his eyes widened and his face flushed bright red. But he raced in—averting his eyes from her body—to untie her arms. “Edie, Edie. What happened? Who did this to you?”

  As soon as her arms were free, she yanked the tape from her mouth and yelled. “Ouch!” Maybe yanking the tape hadn’t been such a good idea. That hurt a lot more than she thought it would. Her face burned where the tape had probably ripped the outer layer of skin off. Harry would have hell to pay.

  “Was it that strange man you brought home? Did he do this to you? Did he…rape you?” Tears welled in her father’s eyes. “I’ll kill him if he did.”

  “No, Dad, he didn’t rape me.” She leaped to her feet, shaking feeling back into her numb hands.

  “Then what happened?” He leaned forward and retrieved her robe from the floor handing it behind him to avoid glancing at her nakedness.

  “I’m all right, Dad.” She snatched the scrap of silk from his hands. “No one raped me.”

  “How can you explain this mess? Did he tie you up and rob you blind? That’s what happens when you let strange men into your home. You can never be too careful.”

  “No, Dad.” Edie slipped into the robe and raced for her closet and something more substantial to wear. At times like this, she wished she had a Kevlar vest in her wardrobe. “Harry only tied me up to keep me from following him. He wanted to protect me.”

  “So he tied you up?” Frank Ragsdale strode across the floor and grabbed her shoulders. “I knew you were making a mistake when you let that man into your apartment. Don’t you know the dangers a lone woman faces in this city? Do you want to end up like your mother?”

  Always, her father compared her to her mother. Edie had had enough. She spun, knocking her father’s hands from her shoulders. “Yes, I want to be like Mother if it means feeling loved and beautiful. Yes!”

  Her father dug his hands into his pockets. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

  “I know what you meant, Dad. I just can’t go around hiding behind ugly clothes, afraid to date because I might attract the wrong man who’ll murder me in a back alley.”

  Her father winced, his eyes still as haunted as the day the police told him his wife had been found raped and murdered in a dirty alley in the city she’d loved and thrived in.

  “I’m sorry, Dad. I’m sorry Mom died and I’m sorry you’re alone. But I can’t go on living like I have, afraid to get out, afraid no man will find me attractive. I want someone to think I’m beautiful, and to love me because I’m me, not my mother.”

  “I love you, Edie.” Her father sank onto the side of the bed. “I’ve always loved you.”

  “You never tell me.” Edie sat next to him, anxious to find Harry, but unwilling to leave her father like this. “Instead, you tell me I’ll never be as pretty as her. No man will find me attractive.”

  “I loved your mother and what did it get me.” He buried his face in his hands. “She’s dead. She’s never coming back.”

  Edie’s chest tightened around the pain her father still carried. With a sigh, she slid an arm around his shoulders. “That was a long time ago, Dad. You have to get on with life. And so do I.”

  “But it’s so dangerous out there.” He gripped her hand in his and squeezed so hard he practically crushed her fingers. “Men are predators, they prey on unsuspecting beautiful women.”

  “Like Mom?” she whispered.

  His hand went slack and his shoulders sagged against Edie’s arm. “Yeah, like your mother.”

  “Is that why you wanted me to be ugly and unattractive?”

  Her father looked up, his face seemed to have aged ten years. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

  “But you did.” She swallowed the lump choking her throat and forced herself to hold back the tears threatening to spill down her cheeks. “All the times you made me feel ugly. They hurt.”

  “I’m sorry, Edie. I just didn’t want you to end up like your mother. I couldn’t stand to lose you, too.”

  “Oh, Dad. You have to take chances in life. Sometimes they don’t work out, but if you live in fear, you’ll never learn to love again. Do you think Mom would be happy knowing you stopped living when she died?”

  Frank Ragsdale stared into his daughter’s face and slowly shook his head. “She was so alive. So happy with her life and living.”

  “Yeah, and she wanted everyone around her to be happy, too.” Edith gave him a quick hug. “Look, Dad, I have to do something important or I’d stay and talk some more.” She grabbed a pair of jeans from the mess on her closet floor. “This conversation isn’t over.”

  “Are you going to that man?” Her father’s brows furrowed into a fierce frown.

  Edie pulled her jeans up around her waist and zipped. “That man’s name is Harry. And yes.”

  “Are you sure he’s the right man for you, Edie?” Her father glanced at the silk pajamas still tied to her headboard. “His methods are a bit unorthodox and, I gotta say, I’m not so sure I like it.”

  Unorthodox was putting it mildly, considering all that had occurred in the past two days. Edie smiled and turned her back to her father to slip into a black turtleneck sweater. “I think I love him, Daddy.” Did she really say she loved Harry? She pushed the thought aside. It was too new to her. She didn’t want to poke and prod at it. Not yet. No use getting mired in speculation about Harry.

  And how long had it been since she’d called her father Daddy? Since before her mother died. Edie’s heart swelled in her chest. She’d needed this talk with her father. And apparently he’d needed it to. For the first time in fourteen years, she felt like her father was back. The father she’d known before her mother’s tragic murder.

  “The man tied you up for heaven’s sake. Are you sure you want to go after him?” The look he gave her made Edie think he didn’t want her to be sure. He wanted her to change her mind and give up on Harry.

  “I’m as sure as I can be in this crazy world.” She strode over to where he
still sat on the bed and kissed the top of his graying head. “Now, I really have to go.”

  “What about this?” He waved his hand encompassing the disaster of her apartment.

  “It’ll wait. Harry needs me now.” Edie headed for the door grabbing her purse from the floor on the way out. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “Be careful, sweetheart. I love you.”

  Edie turned back and blew a kiss to her father like she used to when she was small. “I love you too, Daddy.”

  As soon as she stepped out the apartment door, she closed her eyes and said aloud, “I wish I was with Harry.” She’d waited to make her wish out of her father’s sight. Already ten minutes after eleven, there was no telling what could be happening to Harry and Mitch and she didn’t have time to explain anything to her father.

  Edie waited, and wasn’t disappointed by the ensuing rumble of thunder. She hoped Harry was all right and that she wasn’t going to put him in danger by appearing when she did. But she couldn’t stand by and do nothing. She had to know what was happening and help Harry in any way possible. Despite the stubborn, old-fashioned jerk Harry was for tying her to the bedposts, Edie loved him. Not that she wouldn’t give him a good piece of her mind when this was all over.

  When the floor trembled beneath her feet, Edie braced herself for the transfer and whatever awaited her wherever Harry was.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Shoot him!” The blonde woman screamed. “Don’t let him get away! I want that stone!”

  Harry hit the man in the gut with his best football tackle and as much force as he could muster in the short distance.

  The man’s gun went off, the shot angling wide, ricocheting off the building’s brick exterior.

  Momentum carried Harry and the bad guy three feet further before they crashed to the pavement, the foreigner taking the brunt of the impact.

  Harry had the advantage of being on top of the struggle, but the other guy had a gun and he wasn’t letting it loose. All Harry’s focus was on making sure that gun didn’t go off in his own face. “Drop it!” He grabbed the man’s wrist in both his hands and slammed it, gun and all, against the pavement. “Drop it!”