David Handler - The sour cherry surprise

“You did so. You e-mailed me to come right away.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Bella, you said it was urgent.”

“Mitch, I said no such thing. I may be crazy, but I’m not nuts.”

“Well, if you didn’t e-mail me then who did?”

“That was me,” answered Molly Procter, who was standing in the kitchen doorway holding a glass of milk and a slab of Bella’s marble cake. The freckle-faced little beanpole still wore that same bent pair of wire-framed glasses. And those dumb floppy socks of hers. And still seemed preternaturally wise and calm for her nine years. The only thing different about her were those angry red finger marks around her neck and arms. “I came out here and e-mailed Mitch while you were at yoga,” she confessed to Bella, her rabbity nose twitching. “I read through some of your old e-mail exchanges so it would sound true.”

Bella looked at the girl in bewilderment. “But, Molly, how were you even able to-?”

“You told me your password once. It’s Morris, your husband’s name. Because that’s the one name you know you won’t ever forget.” To Mitch, Molly said, “Sorry if I scammed you, but a phone call wouldn’t have worked. You’d have said no for sure. I knew this was the only way you’d come. And you just had to come.”

“Why, Molly?” Mitch demanded.

“To save her,” she replied, munching on her cake.

Mitch shook his head. “Okay, will someone please tell me what the hell’s going on?”

And so Molly did. She told him about how Des had hollered at her to make a run for it. How she’d escaped out the kitchen door as Des fought Clay for his gun, which had gone off twice and shattered the glass but missed her. How she dashed around front to the lane, which was teeming with state troopers who’d heard the shots and wanted to know what was going on. How she ran right by them and straight into Jen’s house to tell Jen’s mother. “If I’d told the troopers myself they would have held me there,” she explained. Then she’d dashed out the door of their house and run straight for Big Sister to e-mail him.

Bella picked up the story from there. She’d come home from dinner with her yoga mates to find Molly there. When Molly told her what had happened she phoned Des’s friend Yolie Snipes. Yolie came right out to question Molly, then advised them that Molly may as well stay put on Big Sister for now. Sour Cherry had already been completely evacuated except for Emergency Services personnel.

“Mitch, the situation could not be worse for Des,” Bella informed him, her face etched with concern. “Clay Mundy and Hector Villanueva are holding her hostage in the Procter house. They’re armed, dangerous and desperate. They’ve already killed Molly’s father.”

“Clay kept telling Des that they didn’t,” Molly said. “But she doesn’t believe him, and neither do I. They killed my dad.”

“And now they’re going to kill Des unless the authorities back off,” Bella went on. “They want safe passage out of there. They intend to take Des with them. Once they’re safely across the border in Mexico they say they’ll release her.”

“Like hell they will,” Mitch said grimly. “Molly, where’s your mom right now?”

“She’s safe,” Bella answered. “Des is the only one there with them.”

“Okay, I get the picture…” Mitch said. “But in the immortal words of Harry Longbaugh, better known as the Sundance Kid, who are these guys?”

Molly repeated what she’d heard Des tell Clay in the kitchen-that the Feds were convinced he and Hector were big-time drug traffickers who’d turned her home into a crystal meth stash house. The meth was hidden down in the root cellar, Molly believed, because Clay had ordered her never, ever to go down there. When she asked him why he’d smacked her so hard that her ear rang for a whole day.

Mitch was genuinely shaken to learn that Clay Mundy had struck this little girl. He went to Molly and hugged her. Or tried.

“Now is not the time to get all feely, Mitch,” she scolded him. “Des needs us.”

He released her, glancing over at Bella. “Not to be negative, but do we know for a fact that Des is still alive?”

“No, we don’t,” Bella had to admit. “No has spoken with her. Or seen her through any of the windows. The hostage negotiators keep asking Clay to put her on the phone, but he refuses to.”

“She’s alive,” Molly said insistently.

“How do you know that?” Mitch asked her.

“Because she has to be.”

“They don’t know if she’s wounded or she’s tied up someplace or what,” Bella said fretfully. “Which Yolie told us creates a very troubling, uh, what did she call it, sweetie?”

“A hold fire scenario,” Molly answered promptly. “They’ve got this big huge SWAT team in place but right now it’s a standoff.”

Bella nodded. “Yolie said if it lasts much longer they may have to resort to bean bags.”

“That means they fire a charge from a shotgun that won’t kill anyone,” Molly explained. “It stings and distracts the perpetrators while the SWAT guys storm the building.”

“But it’s very risky,” Bella pointed out. “Because they don’t know exactly where in the house Des is.”

“Mitch, I know where she is,” Molly said. “Just before Des went for the gun Clay was talking about showing her the stash of drugs in our root cellar. First, he wanted to tie her up with a rope. I swear that’s what he did. Tied her up and threw her in the root cellar. That’s why no on has seen her through the windows.”

“Makes sense. What did Yolie say when you told her?”

Molly lowered her eyes. “I didn’t.”

“She sure didn’t,” Bella added disapprovingly. “This is all news to me.”

“Why didn’t you, Molly?”

“Because it’s my fault Des is in trouble,” the girl explained. “See, I accidentally left my library book over there. And it was due back. You have to return them on time. It’s really important.”

“It’s not that important.”

“It is, too, Mitch! And don’t you ever say otherwise because you are totally wrong. When I went over there to get it Clay wouldn’t let me leave. So Des got in the house with this totally lame story about us going to a Connecticut Sun game together. She put her life on the line for me. I can’t let anything happen to her, Mitch. I just can’t.”

“So why didn’t you tell Yolie where you think she might be?”

“I don’t think it. I know it.”

“I repeat, why didn’t you?”

“For the same reason I didn’t tell her that I also know how to sneak Des out of there right under Clay and Hector’s noses.”

“And this reason is…?”

“Because you’re the one who has to save her, Mitch. You two love each other. You belong together. Duh, don’t you know that?”

“Molly, this is a serious life and death situation. We’re talking about real life here, not some dumb old Hollywood…” Mitch caught himself, sighing inwardly.

Molly peered at him quizzically. “Not some dumb old Hollywood what?”

“Nothing. I was just about to say the very words that a certain green-eyed individual used to say to me at times like this. Allow me to appreciate the irony of the moment.”

“Mitch, you have to decide. Are you going to save Des or aren’t you?”

“Neither. I’m calling Yolie right now and telling her everything.”

Molly rolled her eyes at him. “Oh, you are not. Come on, will you? We’re wasting valuable time.”

Mitch barged past Bella into the kitchen and dug around in the cupboard under the sink for the box of Cocoa Puffs he’d left hidden there behind the drain cleaner and furniture polish. Returned to the living room with it and plopped down in the easy chair, munching on a chocolaty good handful. That was one of the really great things about Cocoa Puffs-you never had to worry about them getting stale. “Okay, go ahead and tell me what you want to tell me. And I’ll listen. But I’m making you no promises, understood?”