“Who’s that?” Courtney said on the phone.
“Nolan again,” Trudy said. “He wants a MacGuffin, too.”
“Well, at least he’s the devil we know.”
“We don’t know him that well.”
“Hey,” Nolan said. “Your dad can vouch for me. We’ve been in the same department for two years.”
“That is not a recommendation.”
“What?” Courtney said.
“Dad can vouch for him.”
“Push him out of the cab.”
“Her dad can vouch for me, too,” Reese said, sounding about twelve.
“I have to go, Court,” Trudy said, before they started punching each other on the arm. “It’s going to be a while.” She handed Reese his pen back and started to put the wrapping paper back in the bag one-handed and then looked at it more closely in the lights from the street. “Oh, hell.”
“What?” Courtney said.
“I got birthday paper,” Trudy said. “I need Christmas paper, and this is birthday—”
“Trudy,” Courtney wailed.
“Maybe you can fake it,” Reese said, with badly concealed exasperation. “If it’s just a bunch of animals, it could be anything.”
Trudy held up the paper. It said Happy Birthday over and over and over. “No animals. Just ‘Happy Birthday’ in red.”
“Well, then you’re screwed,” Reese said, sounding bored with the whole thing.
“No, she’s not.” Nolan held out his hand. “Give it here.”
“You’re going to fix this?” Trudy said. “How are you going to fix this?”
Nolan wiggled his fingers. “Gimme.”
She handed the paper over and watched while he took out his pen again and wrote Jesus under every Happy Birthday.
“You’re a grave disappointment, but you’re also a genius,” Trudy said, giving credit where it was due.
“Did he fix it?” Courtney said.
“Yes,” Trudy told her.
“Make him help you get the Mac.”
“Goodbye, Courtney,” Trudy said, and hung up.
“So you’ll go out with me again?” Nolan said, handing the paper back.
“Not a chance in hell.” Trudy put the paper in the bag with the cow.
“Okay, lunch,” Nolan said. “Lunch isn’t really a date.”
“Oh, give it up,” Reese said, and let his head fall back against the top of the seat. “I have lost my patience with you.”
“Well, look for it,” Nolan said. “Maybe it fell off the sleigh.”
“Man, I don’t know about you,” Reese said.
“I’m a man of mystery,” Nolan agreed. “Another reason Trudy should see me again.” He smiled at her in the dim light as the cab sped toward the warehouses. “So, meet me for coffee?”
“She doesn’t want to meet you for anything,” Reese said.
Yes, I do, Trudy thought.
“So, coffee,” Nolan said, warm and solid beside her.
“Gimme, gimme, gimme,” the voice on the radio said.
Kill me now, Trudy thought, and put her head on her shopping bags.
* * *
The streets grew dark as the cab left the city proper and turned into the warehouse district, and ten minutes later they stopped outside a deserted building, the parking lot lit by one lamp, high over its main door.
Reese opened the door and got out, holding the door for Trudy, who slid over on the seat and peered out at the darkness.
“There aren’t a lot of people here buying MacGuffins,” she said, staring at the empty lot.
“They probably sold out of them while you were trying to decide if I was a rapist,” Reese said, sounding peeved.
“We could turn around and go back,” Nolan said. “I’ll buy the coffee.”
Trudy took a deep breath and got out, her three shopping bags bumping against her knees.
“Want me to take those for you?” Reese said.
“No,” Trudy said as Nolan got out behind her.
“You are not a trusting woman,” Reese said.
“I don’t think they make those anymore,” Nolan said to him. “Tell you what, since you found the warehouse, I’ll pay for the cab.”
“Keep the cab,” Trudy said, and turned back to Reese.
“The Macs are in here,” Reese said, and opened the door to the warehouse.
There was light inside, but Trudy stopped at the door to wait for Nolan. He talked to the cabbie, and then he turned and came toward her and the cab drove away.
“Hey, I told you to keep the cab,” she said, and Nolan took her arm.
“He’s coming back,” he said, and his voice sounded different as he looked over her head into the warehouse.
“Why is he leaving at all?”
Reese came back to the door. “Come on in. You’re letting the heat out.”
Trudy took a deep breath and stepped over the threshold into the warehouse, dragging Nolan with her since he wouldn’t let go of her arm.
The place was a cavern filled with rows of shelving crammed with boxes, a giant version of the old toy store. High above, industrial lighting made the center space by the door bright, but the rest of the place was dark. It wasn’t silent, though. There was a radio somewhere blaring “The Little Drummer Boy.”
“Rum-pa-pum-pum,” Trudy said, not at all reassured.
“Over here,” Reese said, and led them away from the door, Trudy pulling Nolan along, since he still wouldn’t let go. “You can leave your Mac here.” He dropped his bag with the Twinkletoes in it. “I’m leaving my bag here.”
“Where are the MacGuffins?” Trudy said, keeping a tight hold on her own bags.
“And who are they?” Nolan said, and Trudy looked back to see three men now standing in front of the door. They looked a lot like Reese, young and dudelike in denim jackets, but they weren’t smiling.
Uh-oh, Trudy thought.
“Wait here,” Reese said, and went over to confer with the men.
“You know, I don’t feel good about this,” she said to Nolan.
“Good instincts,” Nolan said, not taking his eyes off the men. “Come here.”
He tugged on her arm, and she let him pull her over to the closest row of shelves.
“Be with you in a minute,” Reese called back, and Trudy nodded to him, and then Nolan jerked her arm and she tripped after him between two rows of shelves and into the darkness.
“What are you doing?” she said.
“Shhhh.” He kept going, tugging her deeper into the gloom of the unlit shelving.
“What do you mean, ‘Shhhh’? What’s going on?”
“Quiet.” Nolan pulled her down another side row and then across another one, effectively losing them both in the darkness.
“Stop shushing me. I don’t like—”
He stopped and cupped her face with his hands and whispered, “Trudy, please shut up.”
“Why?” Trudy whispered back.
He leaned closer and whispered in her ear. “Because I think Reese is a bad guy. And I think he wants your MacGuffin. And I think those guys out there are his minions. So we should—”
“Minions?” Trudy said, so startled she spoke out loud.
Nolan put his hand over her mouth. “And we don’t want them to find us,” he whispered. “Not unless you’re prepared to give up that MacGuffin.”
Trudy shook her head, and he took his hand away and bent to her ear again. “Then we should hide it here. They’re going to find us, and we can tell them the box is here and let them spend the rest of their lives looking for it—”
Trudy shook her head again. “No.”
He slapped his hand over her mouth and whispered, “Listen. I’m not a toy collector, I’m an undercover cop.”
Trudy pulled back, trying to see him in the dark. “I don’t believe it,” she whispered back. “An undercover cop who teaches Chinese lit?”
“I’m a well-educated undercover cop.”
“This
is your explanation.” She shook her head and started to move away, and he pulled her back.
“Look,” he whispered in her ear, “we knew the bad guys were operating from the university lit department, and I really do have a degree in Chinese. And some literature. Hey, I’m a good teacher.”
Actually, he was, Trudy remembered. That was another thing that had made her want to go out with him, competence. And now he was telling her that there was a toy-theft ring operating out of the lit department. “‘The bad guys.’ Is that really cop talk?”
“It’s too dark to show you my ID. Want to feel my badge?”
“You have to be kidding me.”
“Your buddy Reese—”
“He’s not my buddy,” Trudy said, and then she heard Reese call her name from the center space of the warehouse and stepped closer to Nolan.
“Listen to me,” Nolan said. “They’re toy hijackers and they want that doll. If things get bad, give it to them.”
Toy hijackers? “No.”
She heard him draw in his breath in exasperation, but she didn’t care.
“This is for Leroy,” she whispered. “His rat daddy ran off with the rat nanny, and his mother is in meltdown, but he knows Santa is bringing him a MacGuffin. He’s getting it.”
“Oh, Christ,” Nolan said under his breath. “I’ll get him another one, I swear. Just give them that one so we can walk out of here alive.”
“That’s not very heroic.”
“I’ll be heroic when you’re not here,” Nolan whispered. “Now I just want you out in one piece.”
“I’m not giving up Leroy’s Mac. What’s your Plan B?”
Nolan sighed his exasperation and then took her arm and drew her deeper into the shelves. “We hide.”
“Hide?” Trudy whispered back. “How—”
“Shut up,” he whispered, and she did, following him deeper into the darkness until they came to a wall. He took her hand and led her along the wall until he found a staircase, and then he took her slowly up the stairs, testing each tread to make sure it didn’t creak, which wasn’t really necessary since “The Little Drummer Boy” had given way to Brenda Lee singing “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree,” making her usual Christmas fortune in residuals.
When they reached the top, they were on a walkway, looking out over the warehouse beneath the windows of a darkened office. Nolan tugged her arm and she sank down with him on the metal platform as silently as possible, her shopping bags rustling.
“Now what?” she whispered.
“Now we wait for backup.”
“What backup?”
“The backup I sent the cabbie for. Shhhh.”
He was peering over the rail, but they were too far away to see into the lighted part of the warehouse.
“You’re really a cop?” Trudy whispered. “Why do I find that hard to believe?”
“I don’t know,” Nolan whispered back. “Why are you holding on to that damn doll when that could get us out of here?”
“What if you’re not a cop? What if Reese is your accomplice and you’re working together to get the Mac from me?”
“For our mutual nephew?” Nolan’s whisper sounded a lot tougher now, but that might just have been the exasperation in his voice. “Has it occurred to you that you’re trapped in a deserted warehouse with a bunch of thugs?”
“Yes,” Trudy whispered back. “Well, no. For all I know, that’s Reese’s glee club out there. Maybe it’s his bowling night. They’re all wearing the same jacket.”
“Be serious, Trudy. You’re risking your life for a doll so your nephew won’t be disappointed on Christmas Day in spite of the fact that his father is gone and his mother is in a gin coma.”
“Hey.”
“Shhhh. He’s already disappointed, Tru. His family’s gone. Give Reese the doll. When he makes a run for it, we’ll arrest him. He won’t get away with it.”
Trudy pushed him away. “First, my sister is not in a gin coma. Second, his family is not gone; he has me and his mother when she sobers up. Third, if I give Reese this doll and you arrest him, the doll becomes evidence and I never see it again. So no. Leroy is going to get this doll tomorrow morning. He is going to believe in Santa, since he can’t believe in men or nannies. When does your backup get here?”
“I don’t think you can indict all men because of one rat daddy.”
“Yeah? How many times have you lied to me tonight?”
Nolan leaned back against the wall. “Too many to count. But I’m still here trying to save your cantankerous butt. That should mean something.”
“I have only your word for that and as we know, you lie.”
“Okay. We’ll sit here and wait and hope Reese doesn’t find us.”
“That’s your plan? Hope he doesn’t find us?”
“You always this cranky?”
“Only when I’m cold, I’m tired, I’m scared, and men keep lying to me while I’m trying to get a kid the Christmas present he deserves.”
“Okay, fine.” Nolan shifted on the platform, his whisper savage in the darkness. “We’ll take the doll if we can get out of here with it. Just promise me that if he says, ‘The doll or your life,’ you’ll give him the doll.”
“No.”
“Trudy—”
“I can’t.” Trudy swallowed hard. “Leroy believes. Do you know how long it’s been since I believed in anything? In anybody? But Leroy believes that when he comes downstairs tomorrow morning, there’ll be a MacGuffin under his tree. He knows there will be because he believes in Santa Claus; he believes the world is a good place. And he’s going to keep on believing that because I’m taking this doll home no matter what.” She shifted against the cold wall. “Besides, nobody shoots anybody over a doll.”
Nolan sighed. “I suppose it has occurred to you that you’ve lost your grip.”
“No,” Trudy said. “I’ve lost my faith. My grip is just fine.” She pulled the shopping bags closer. “Leroy gets the Mac and Courtney gets the Twinkle, and then we’ll put our lives back together.”
“Their lives,” Nolan said.
“Mine, too. My resolution for 2007 is to start believing in people again.” She leaned closer to him. “I might start with you if you help me get this doll home.”
He was quiet for a while. “Okay. I’ll try to help you.”
She pulled back. “I’ll try to believe in you, then. No guarantees, of course.”
“Okay, fine, I will help you,” Nolan said.
“Promise me,” Trudy said, gripping his coat. “Promise me that Leroy will have this Mac tomorrow morning.”
“Trudy—”
“Fine.” Trudy stood up, trying to keep her bags from rustling. “I’ll do it myself. Could you move? I need to get past you to the stairs.”
“I promise,” Nolan said.
She looked down at him in the dark. “Easy to say.”
“I promise,” he said grimly, getting to his feet. “But now you have to do what I say.”
“And why would I do that?” she said.
“Because you trust me.”
“Ha.”
“Then why are you listening to me?”
Trudy bit her lip. “I might trust you a little.”
“All the way, Tru,” Nolan said. “If I’m going to get you out of here, you have to do exactly what I say.”
Trudy felt him close, his body warm next to hers in the darkness. If she was going to start trusting people, he might be the place to start. “You never even kissed me,” she whispered. “What was that about? You never—”
He bent and kissed her, not gently, and she clutched at his jacket, wanting something to hold on to, putting her forehead against his shoulder when he broke the kiss because it had felt so right, everything about him felt so right.
The radio changed to “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.”
Our song, Trudy thought. “Okay. I trust you. What do we do next?”
“Pray,” Nolan said, sounding a li
ttle breathless. “Because we’re in a world of hurt here.”
“Well, then—”
Something moved behind him and Trudy saw one of the minions, just his face, for a second before Nolan jerked his elbow back and caught the guy across the nose. He turned and hit him again before he fell, catching him before he rolled off the platform. Trudy fumbled in her purse for her miniflash, but by the time she found it and turned it on, the guy was at Nolan’s feet, his arms tied behind his back with a belt, and Nolan was putting on the guy’s blue jacket.
“Turn that off,” Nolan whispered, and Trudy did.
“So you’re a cop,” she whispered back.
“Here’s the plan.”
“How did you know where to hit him?” Trudy said. “It’s dark as hell in here. How did you know?”
“You were looking at him,” Nolan whispered back. “I hit what you were looking at. We have to move now; this guy found us and the others will, too. So I’m going down there to distract them. You’re going out the door. If there’s nobody out there yet, run for the street.”
“I’m not leaving you,” Trudy said, holding on to his sleeve.
“Trudy, I’m safer with you out of here than I am with you in here. You’re a distraction. Now follow me until I get out into the light and they see me. Then run like hell for the door. Got it?”
She didn’t want to leave him, that was wrong. But he was probably right, she wasn’t going to be any help at all. “Okay.”
“One more thing,” Nolan said, and kissed her, and this time it hit her hard, he was going out there to save her, and she kissed him back with everything she had.
When she came up for air, she was dizzy. “Maybe we should stay here,” she whispered. “Hiding is good. We could do this until the backup shows.”
“They’ll come looking for this guy,” Nolan whispered back, nodding to the minion at his feet. “We’ll do this later.” He looked at her, shook his head, and kissed her again, and she relaxed into him, irrationally happy about the whole mess.
Then he stepped back and she sighed.
“Right. Later,” she said, and followed him down the stairs toward the light.
* * *
Nolan left her in the first row of shelves nearest the door, just steps away from the lighted part of the warehouse and the way out. “Watch until their backs are turned,” he said. “Then run like hell.”
It Must Be Christmas Page 4