Moonlight Masquerade

by Jude Deveraux

  She was still on her stomach when it suddenly sounded as though hail was coming down. She got to her feet, pulled the jacket close around her, and yet again waited to be discovered.

  Instead, the three men began running across the room.

  “What is it?” asked one of the first men.

  Sophie put her ear back to the door and heard shuffling, as though some things were being moved around.

  “Nuts!” the new man said. “Someone is throwing nuts down the chimney.”

  “Who would do that?”

  “Squirrels!” the new man said. “Or kids playing Halloween pranks. How did I get hooked up with idiots like you two? Turn off the lights and follow me outside. I’ll give them a thrill they won’t soon forget.”

  “Reede!” Sophie whispered as she heard the men running, then the door slammed shut. Instantly, she left the closet. The house was pitch-dark, and she had to rely on memory to find the door. It took only a few more seconds to get outside, and she was glad that the rain had stopped.

  As she ran toward the shed, she didn’t look back to see where the men were or if they saw her. When she reached the back of the little building, the mare looked up placidly, unperturbed. Better yet, undiscovered.

  The first thing Sophie saw was the saddle on the fence. Great, she thought. Bareback.

  Her childhood hadn’t included riding lessons with a saddle, much less trying to outride criminals while hanging on to a horse’s mane.

  “Good girl,” she said softly as she walked toward the animal. “We’re going to go get Reede and get out of here. Please don’t do any of that rearing that you do with him. Pretty please?”

  The mare was docile as Sophie climbed up the railing and managed to throw her leg over. But when she got on, she realized that the reins were hanging to the ground. As she slid off, the big jacket she’d thrown over her top got caught on the wood. She flung it off, picked up the reins, took a breath to get her courage up, then remounted the horse.

  Her experience in riding was what she’d seen on TV, so she clicked and used her heels to urge the horse forward. Maddeningly slowly, it left the comfort of the stall to step into the cool night air.

  There wasn’t much light but Sophie could tell where the men were by their cursing. They were to her left, so she went right, urging the horse around the far end of the house. For all she knew there were trees and shrubs blocking the away.

  “I’m going to kill those things!” she heard one of the men shout. They were so focused on the roof that they didn’t hear or see the horse slowly walking through the mud.

  But Reede did. By the time Sophie got to the far end of the house, Reede was crouched down on the edge of the roof and waiting for her.

  “What took you so long?” he asked.

  “They asked me to tea,” she shot back.

  In the next minute he leaped. Her eyes widened as he jumped from the low edge of the roof and landed behind her on the horse. She managed to hold the animal steady until Reede was situated.

  When she heard him grunt in pain, she turned to look at him. “Are you all right?”

  “Fine, although I don’t think I’ll ever be able to father any children.”

  “Maybe you’ll just have to work harder at it,” Sophie said.

  Reede grunted a laugh, reached around her to take the reins, then urged the horse forward. They rode slowly and in silence for a while until they reached deep woods.

  “I couldn’t get back,” Reede said, his voice serious, apologetic. “I never would have—”

  “I heard them say that they’re planning to rob the McTern party,” Sophie said. Against her back, she felt Reede’s body tighten.

  “Tell me everything they said.”

  She did. As quickly as she could get the words out, she told Reede all that she’d heard.

  “And you didn’t see this man?”

  “Only his shoes,” Sophie said and told how she’d stretched out on the floor and looked under the door.

  Reede kissed her neck. “Smart as well as beautiful. I’m going to take you to Sara’s house. Her husband, Mike, is a former detective and I want you to tell him everything you can remember. I’m going to go get Colin, the sheriff.”

  “Do you think you’ll be able to find the bomb in time?”

  “We’ll have a lot of people searching.”

  The idea of people looking for a bomb scared her. “When it gets close to the time, the people have to get out. They have to! They’ll understand that, won’t they?”

  “Yes,” he said, smiling at her. “We’ll make sure everyone is safe. It’s my guess that Mike will bring in some undercover people for tonight. As for you, I want you to stay home. You’re not to go to the party. I want you to—”

  “I know his voice,” she said softly. “I didn’t see the man’s face, but I saw his shoes, and I heard his voice. I’m the only one who can identify him.”

  “But—” Reede began. “You can’t—” He didn’t seem to know what else to say as he urged the horse forward. When they reached the road, they broke into a gallop, and they thundered across the asphalt, then turned into a lane and finally reached what looked to be a very old house. It had been renovated, but the air of age still clung to it.

  Reede didn’t immediately get down, but held her for a moment, his front to her back. “You look good without the mask,” he said. “You’re even prettier without it—and I didn’t think that was possible.”

  “What do you look like under the mask?”

  “If I take it off my whole body splits in half. Sophie . . . ”

  “Yes?”

  “You did well tonight. I’ve never seen anyone more courageous than you were. Walking across that tight-rope of a beam, then leaping onto the ladder was wonderful. And I’m sorry I left you alone in that closet. I couldn’t figure out a way to get back to you that wouldn’t endanger you. I—”

  “It’s all right,” she said, taking pity on him. “If I hadn’t been in there I wouldn’t have heard their plan.”

  “That’s true,” he said. “On the other hand you wouldn’t now be facing a bunch of lunatics with guns. I wish I’d shown myself and scared them off.”

  Turning, she put her hands on his shoulders and looked into his eyes. “You did what was right,” she said. “If you’d jumped out at those men, they would have shot you.”

  “But then the whole town wouldn’t be in jeopardy.”

  So this is how a true hero thinks, Sophie thought. He puts other people before himself.

  They locked eyes for a moment and they would have kissed except that the door to the house opened and out stepped a man. He was slim but he had a way of moving that made a person notice him. “You two gonna stay out here all night?” the man asked in a raspy voice. Reede got off the horse and held up his arms to Sophie, and she easily slipped into them. “This is Mike. Sophie.” They nodded at each other. “Can I borrow your car? I need to go see Colin and arrange a search party.”

  Immediately, Mike became alert. “Who’s missing?”

  “No one, but a bomb has been placed. Sophie knows everything and she’ll tell you.”

  As Mike opened the door wider to let her in, he tossed his car keys to Reede. Sophie started to go into the house, but Reede held her hand and pulled her back. “You’ll be careful tonight, won’t you?” he said.

  “You saw that I’m a scaredy-cat.”

  “I saw that someone only has to tell you that you can’t do something and you tighten up that pretty little mouth of yours and do it. Just don’t do that tonight, okay? Stay with me, and as soon as you identify this guy, you’re out of there. All right?”

  “Yes,” she said softly, looking up at him. The rain had stopped but the sun wasn’t out. It was gray and hazy. Reede gave her cheek a quick kiss, held her hand for a moment, then he was gone.

  Sophie was doing her best to pretend to be calm, but she wasn’t succeeding. Sara Newland was being very nice to her, as was everyone else she was introd
uced to, but she was still frightened. There seemed to be a dozen young women from Edilean, all of them about her age, going in and out of the room where Sara was adjusting Sophie’s costume. She couldn’t keep the names straight: Tess, Jocelyn, Gemma, Ariel. Faces and names seemed to run together.

  It had been hours since Reede had left, and since then she’d told her story many times. A handsome FBI agent by the name of Jefferson Ames spent thirty minutes going over her story. “We think these guys pulled a bank job in Baltimore about three years ago. They’ve laid low since then, and not put any of the money in circulation. We figured the leader was hiding nearby, and Edilean is close,” Agent Ames said. “Tell me again what his shoes looked like.”

  Sophie was so busy answering the same questions over and over that it was a while before she paid attention to the dress Sara had her put on. It was green silk, with a low, square-cut neckline. A narrow drape of a dark plum color went over her left shoulder. The dress was high waisted, with an ornate sash that tied under her breasts. Sophie quit answering questions when Sara clasped a necklace around her throat. It was heavy and big.

  Sophie put her hand on it, then excused herself to the agent and went to a mirror. “Is this . . . ? Are these . . . ?”

  “Rubies set in gold,” Sara said. “They’re from an ancestor of mine, the original Edilean. We found them in a secret room in this house.”

  Sophie put her hand on the jewelry. It had a timeless beauty about it that was stunning. She looked at Agent Ames. “These are what they’re after?”

  “What they want to steal, yes,” he said. “The pieces are so unique that it would be hard to sell them, so it’s my guess that they’d be melted down. The jewels are superior quality even if they do need to be recut.”

  The artist in Sophie was sickened at the thought of something so old, so beautiful, being melted down and sold in pieces. Being able to stop something like that gave her courage. “Tell me what I need to do to help you,” she said.

  Reede didn’t return until almost seven, and by then Sophie was so glad to see him that she had to work not to fling her arms around him. She saw him from the back. This time he had on a suit, but in the style that Jane Austen’s Mr. Darcy would wear. It clung to his body, showing off his muscular legs and his trim waist.

  She stood still, staring at the back of him, and he turned to her. As before, he wore a half mask that covered his eyes and nose, but left his beautiful lips exposed.

  He didn’t say a word, just strode across the big room, took her hand, and led her into a bedroom. When they were alone, they stared at each other, their eyes questioning, then Reede opened his arms and she went to them. He held her tightly.

  “Tell me what’s on your mind,” he whispered.

  “They don’t know what a coward I am. They keep telling me I’m very brave but I’m not. I want to hide under the bed and not come out until it’s all over.”

  “Me too,” he said.

  “You? But—” She pulled away to look up at him. His eyes were shining so brightly that she couldn’t resist elbowing him. “You love this! It gets you out of that apartment you hate, and you don’t have to stay in an office, and you—”

  He kissed her. It was a quick kiss and a familiar one, then he left her sitting on the bed. He picked up a plate that contained a turkey sandwich. “This yours?”

  “Yes.” She’d been too nervous to eat.

  Reede took a big bite of the sandwich. “How much have they told you?”

  “Not much,” Sophie said as she sat down beside him. “I answer their questions but no one answers mine.”

  “Someday you and Mike will have to talk about the FBI. I think you two will agree.”

  As Reede ate he told her what they’d been doing and how the enemy had been set up. With the FBI training ground so near they’d had a lot of volunteers to attend the party and put on the costumes Reede’s relatives had planned to wear. “And to put on the all-important jewels,” Sophie added. “What do you want to drink?” “Beer,” he answered. It took her only seconds to go to the kitchen and get a bottle and open it. She was aware that everyone, agents as well as Reede’s relatives, stopped talking and watched her. “I’m the freak of the day,” she said when she got back into the room and handed Reede the beer.

  “I think it’s more likely that they’re wondering when you’re going to murder me.”

  “For what? Making me cross that narrow beam? Or for taking me to an abandoned house full of thieves with guns?”

  Reede took a deep drink of the beer and didn’t answer.

  “There’s something that worries me,” Sophie said. “If this man has lived in Edilean for years, won’t he know a lot of the guests at the party? Won’t he be suspicious when different people show up?”

  “That’s why most of the people coming to the party have no idea what’s going on.”

  “But isn’t that—?” She broke off, not wanting to say the obvious.

  “Dangerous?” Reede asked. “Yes, but it’s worse for you. If these men had any idea that you could identify them . . . Sophie, I don’t want to think about that.”

  He set aside his empty plate and bottle, put his feet up and leaned against the headboard. When he put out his arm, it seemed natural that Sophie should sit beside him, her head on his shoulder.

  “Your job will be to talk to every male there,” he said. “Only you can identify the voice.”

  “But you heard the other two. You even saw them.”

  “Jeff Ames said they’ll nab the two we saw in the house right away. We know they’ll be in costumes that cover them.”

  “With itchy fur.”

  “Right,” Reede said. “Agents will put on the costumes so the leader doesn’t know they’re missing. Jeff said I was to leave you and go identify them, but I told him what he could do with that plan.”

  Turning, he looked at her and put his hand to the side of her face. “It still startles me how beautiful you are. If we ever get out of here . . . ”

  He bent as though to kiss her, but Sophie pulled back. “I think it’s time you removed your mask,” she whispered as she put her arms up to untie it.

  Reede reacted quickly. One moment he was on the bed next to Sophie, the next he was standing and looming over her. “I better go . . . uh, check on everything.” He left the bedroom.

  Sophie sat there, blinking at the closed door. She was almost beginning to think there was something wrong with his face. Maybe in one of his heroic rescues he’d been wounded, scarred even. Maybe that’s why he didn’t like being in Edilean, because people stared at him. Maybe he preferred being in Third World countries because he fit in there. His scars or disfigurement weren’t as noticeable.

  Or maybe he just liked running around in a mask once a year. Sophie stood up, smoothed down the beautiful silk dress Sara had made for her, and went out to the living room. It was showtime.

  Three hours! Sophie thought. She and Reede had been dancing and talking to the other people at the party for three whole hours—and it seemed like twenty.

  Reede was better at socializing than Sophie was. While holding her hand, he went to every male at the party and said he was trying to guess which cousin was under the disguise. With this game he got each person to talk. Of course they ran into several people who were young FBI agents, and Sophie soon realized that was part of their verification of her as a witness. If she said one of them was the man she’d heard, she would have been discredited. But no one sounded like the man.

  At nine-thirty a helmeted man wearing a gladiator costume—which meant he had on very little clothing—took her away from Reede for a slow dance.

  “How are you holding up?”

  She couldn’t see his face, but she’d recognize his raspy voice anywhere. Mike. “You look . . . ” He had an incredibly beautiful body!

  “Don’t say it. This getup is Sara’s idea of a joke. Have you heard any voices you recognize?”

  “None. Have you found the bomb?”
r />   “Yes,” he said.

  Sophie gave him a smile of joy. “I’ve been worried.”

  “All of us have been, but we brought in some dogs and found it.”

  “Which building was it in?”

  “Welsch House. It’s one of the oldest in town. Sara got so mad when she heard where it was I had to send her home.” Mike whirled Sophie about to the music, then drew her closer. “So how are you and the doc getting along?”

  Sophie glanced at Reede standing by the far wall and talking to a man dressed like Daniel Boone. Nearby was a woman in a Martha Washington costume. “Good,” she said.

  “That’s all?”

  Sophie smiled. “Maybe better than that. We get on well and he makes me feel that I can do things.”

  “Not like home, huh?”

  Startled, she looked at him.

  “I see things about people,” he said. “I saw you on the day you arrived in town and now you look different. Your eyes have changed.”

  “A lot has happened in these few days,” she said.

  “And it’s my guess that even more happened before you got here, didn’t it?”

  Sophie’s face drained of color. Mike was a retired detective who had connections with the FBI. Had he been told of Sophie’s thievery? When this was over, would he arrest her?

  Mike was watching her intently. “I was talking about the beer incident,” he said softly.

  “Beer?” She had to think to know what he meant. “Oh, right. That.” She was so relieved that he wasn’t referring to a much more serious matter that she relaxed.

  “Sophie, if you need any help on anything—legal, criminal, whatever—let me know. Nothing will shock me.”

  “Shock you about what?” Reede asked as he cut in between them.

  “Sophie had some problems just before she arrived in Edilean. Maybe you heard about her nearly being run over and pouring beer over the driver’s head.”

  “I heard about it,” Reede mumbled.

  “Have you seen Russell?” Sophie asked. “He was there that night so he knows who the man is. I thought I’d ask him.”