Every Tom Dick and Crazy
Chapter 24
"Get up, slowly." Kathy gestured at Mac. "Drop the purse on the sofa."
Instinctively, Harm stepped forward in front of Mac.
"Protecting the little woman?" Kathy snipped sarcastically. "You should have thought of that before hooking up with Commander Homewrecker."
Neither Harm nor Mac wanted to argue that point with her. There was no telling what could set her off further. Right now, they needed to figure a way out of this.
"Where is she?" he asked.
"Don't worry. She's going to get what's coming to her."
Harm smiled at Kathy, withholding his full flyboy charm. Feeling a little more confident that Meg was alive, wherever she was, he opted for a new approach. "Let's everybody stay calm. You said it yourself; Mac is a good woman, and a good Marine. You don't really want anything to happen to her. It's the others who need to be taught a lesson." Harm took one step closer to Kathy.
"You're absolutely right," he continued. "What happened to honor? Semper Fi? It's bad enough we have immoral women roaming the streets. They shouldn't be in the military as well." Watching the wheels turning in Kathy's mind as she weighed his words, Harm took still another step closer, holding his hands passively in the air.
Mac looked around almost frantically. She needed something she could use as a weapon, and a way to distract Kathy. Harm was mentally disarming her, but Mac wasn't kidding herself. There was no way that woman would let Harm get close enough to take the gun. Still scanning the room, Mac's eyes fell on a tall, narrow Moroccan teapot setting on the coffee table. It wasn't much, but solid copper probably would make a good thud. Stepping back slightly, she waited for the right moment to pick up the pot.
"Someone has to protect our armed forces. They're good men. Women like that don't deserve them. They don't deserve to live…"
"STOP. Step back!" Kathy shouted, suddenly snapped out of her thoughts. "You think you can use that grin on me to get what you want. Telling Commander Austin what she wanted to hear may have worked on her, but it's not going to get you anywhere with me."
Moving closer to the wall, Kathy waved her gun at Harm. "You heard me. Back up. Now."
"Take it easy," he offered, taking a small step backwards, trying to remain between Mac and the gun.
Mac had other ideas. Shifting slightly to Harm's left, she dipped to pick up the teapot, hoping Kathy was too intent on Harm and wouldn't notice. In the exact moment she grabbed the heavy pot, the doorbell rang.
"Military police. Open up, ma'am!" came a loud voice from the other side of the door.
Instinctively, Kathy turned her eyes from her target towards to the door.
Seizing the moment, "DUCK!" Mac screamed. Rolling over the hard table, she threw the copper pot at Kathy's extended arm.
More startled by the sound of Mac's voice than the pounding on the door, Kathy started firing blindly at the object flying in her direction.
Not knowing what Mac was planning, Harm could only react to her instructions. Diving at Kathy's feet, hoping to knock her off balance, his heart almost stopped at the sound of the gun discharging. Knocking the woman to the ground, Harm heard the door crash open at the same moment the gun hit the floor.
"Mac!" Pinning the struggling woman to the floor, he tried to turn his head, aware only that Mac was no longer standing behind him.
"We'll take it from here, sir." Harm heard the shuffling footsteps, then felt a single heavy hand on his shoulder.
"Mac?" Harm called again, practically lunging over Kathy and the MPs in the direction Mac had been standing.
"Over here." Mac was lying on her back between the sofa and coffee table. Slowly sitting up, her right hand gripping her other arm, blood dripped between her fingers, "The bitch had better aim than I thought," she smiled.
"We need an ambulance!" Harm called over to the MPs, who had Kathy restrained in handcuffs and were taking her out the door.
"Never mind that. We've got to find Meg!" Mac stood up carefully, brushing the blood away from her arm. "It's not that serious, just a scratch." She pushed her well-meaning husband's hand away.
"You sure?" he questioned shakily, his hand reaching for her arm once again.
"YES. Over there!" Mac pointed towards the door Kathy had come out of earlier.
Two steps ahead of Mac, Harm rushed through the bedroom, briefly scanning around the room before continuing to the bathroom. Spotting a fully naked Meg in the tub, he immediately turned his head. Closing his eyes and covering them with one hand for good measure, he called for help.
"Men, stay back. Mac, hurry." Reaching the tub in one long stride, his eyes still closed, Harm bent down, searching carefully for Meg's arm and a pulse. "She's alive. Call that ambulance."
"On its way, sir," a voice announced from outside the doorway.
Catching sight of Harm hovering over Meg, his hand over his eyes, Mac momentarily forgot the seriousness of the situation and let out a small snort. Always the Boy Scout. Rushing back to the bedroom, she grabbed the linens and turned back, bumping into Harm who had returned to the bedroom, his eyes open again.
"I was just going to suggest that," he said to his wife, glancing down at her still bleeding arm. He was worried, but knew better than to bring it up again. They needed to take care of Meg now.
"I'll check on her." Mac rushed past Harm into the bathroom. Placing the sheet over her body, Mac checked again for a pulse, then looked around the room. Spotting the bottle on the sink, she let out a huge sigh of relief. "She's been knocked out with chloroform."
Within a few minutes the place was crawling with MPs and paramedics. Meg was transported to the nearest hospital. Despite having had her arm cleaned and bandaged by a paramedic, Mac had finally agreed, since they were following Meg to the hospital anyway, to allow a doctor to check out her arm.
Rabb Flat0230
"Are you sure you're not in any pain?" Harm asked for the umpteenth time as he crawled into bed.
"It doesn't feel any worse than if I banged my arm into a filing cabinet." Mac rolled her eyes for the umpteenth-and-one time.
"You bang into filing cabinets often?" Harm teased, rolling over and kissing her nose.
"That's no way to treat a wounded hero." Mac wrinkled her nose.
"Hero? Who dove at an armed woman?" Harm placed his hand flatly on his chest in mock indignation.
"Who distracted the armed woman in the first place?" Mac shrugged one shoulder, convinced she'd just won her point.
"It was my overpowering skills…"
"You mean my great aim…" Mac interrupted, leaning over him slightly, her fingers doodling on his chest.
"Well…" Harm paused at the look in Mac's eyes. "I suppose the important thing is that Meg is well enough to be released in the morning and we caught Jack before she claimed her next victim." Snuggling down under the covers a little further, he pulled Mac more closely against him.
"I still can't believe she moved all those bodies from her apartment in a rolling footlocker and not a single neighbor ever noticed anything odd." Mac placed a tiny kiss on his shoulder, her fingers still doodling.
"That's why the bodies were always moved in the dead of night. She knew anyone important would be soundly asleep." Harm kissed the top of her head lightly.
"I just wish we had figured it out sooner." Mac burrowed her head into the crook of Harm's shoulder.
"It was good working together again. It's been a while since we were on the same side of the same case. It was kind of nice." Harm tipped his chin further against his neck, peeking down at his beautiful wife.
"Yeah, it was. Even if the case was brutal," Mac sighed softly.
"You want to try and do it more often? Maybe keep one eye on the lookout for an open billet at the embassy?" Harm was still staring down at her.
"No, sir. I have my appointment coming up on Monday with Dr. Hamilton. I'm reserve for a reason, remember? We're supposed to be working on a little Rabb." Mac grinned, shimmying up a little higher and placing a kiss on Harm's chin.
"Well, if we're supposed to get started on Monday, maybe we should get in a little extra practice." Harm spun Mac onto her back and rolled around over her, placing feather light kisses on her chin.
"Mm… I've always believed practice makes perfect"
The end for now.