Wonder Guy (12 page)

“Howie,” screamed the young woman in the doorway. She trained her gun higher, on Greg’s masked face. She took a step back. “Look what you made me do.”

“I didn’t mean–” He went numb. What had he done?

Her features contorting into a Greek tragedy mask, she pulled the trigger.

He released the wounded thug, flung up his hand at super speed and caught the bullet, which became a flattened dollop of metal in his hand. He dropped it to the carpet.

The girl stared, at Greg, the dime-shaped bullet, her fallen partner.

The captive struggled against Greg’s grip.

“Run, Jenny,” he yelled to the girl. Her stunned look faded, but rather than take his advice and run, she knelt beside the fallen youth who’d taken the bullet she’d meant for Greg. She leaned over him, running her hands over his chest.

“Is he dead? Oh God, oh God. Are you okay, Howie? It wasn’t supposed to go like this.”

The older woman approached, cell phone in hand. “The police are on the way. I told them to send the ambulance.”

“He’s breathing.” The girl looked up, tears in her eyes.

Greg’s captive squirmed against his choking grip. “Let me go!”

The older woman wore a flowered dress, but a dressing gown lay across the end of the king-sized bed. She pulled free its long cloth belt.

Jenny turned her tear-streaked face toward the woman moving to hand the sash to Greg. “You weren’t supposed to be here. You said you were going out of town.”

“Jenny? Jenny Stevenson? What are you doing here?” The girl’s identity seemed to register with the older woman for the first time.

“You were supposed to be out of town. You and Mr. Zimmer. We needed some cash. No one was supposed to get hurt. Oh Howie.”

The thug in hand lashed out at Mrs. Zimmer when she handed across the tie. Greg shook him into dazed compliance.

Should he tie up the girl too? She had tried to kill him. She’d fired the shot that had laid Howie out on the floor, but she showed no sign of attempting flight, sitting beside her wounded companion as if her legs had collapsed under her. Superman and Batman always knew what to do.

The lady of the house sat heavily on the end of the bed. “We decided to catch a later flight. Why? Why would you do this?” She focused on the girl. “Why break in here? With guns? We’re neighbors. I used to babysit for you when your mother worked.”

“You wouldn’t understand.” Jenny’s bloodied hands pressed against a seeping wound in Howie’s chest. He wasn’t dead, at least. He moaned and stirred under the ministration.

“Why wouldn’t I understand?”

“You don’t know what it’s like! You’ve both got jobs. You can afford a vacation in Europe. My dad lost his job a year ago and my mother’s only got half the hours she used to have. We’re going to lose the house. We can barely keep food on the table. We can’t afford a new cheerleader’s uniform for me. You’re the one who insisted to the school board that the team needs new uniforms. You can pay for mine.”

“I had no idea.” Mrs. Zimmer stared at the blood with widened eyes and held her hands fisted in her skirt.

“You didn’t want to know. You could have figured it out easy enough if you paid attention.” Jenny spoke over her shoulder. She bent forward across Howie, brown hair veiling her face.

Greg hadn’t noticed the sound until now, but the wail of sirens grew louder. Two injured men, one bound felon, two emotional women. The last item filled him with more dismay than the rest combined. This situation had moved beyond the scope of superhero duty. Greg scanned the room with his x-ray vision, making sure the weapons were accounted for.

“Will you be all right now, ma’am?” He took a step back toward the broken window.

“Do you plan any more mischief?” Mrs. Zimmer asked the girl.

“I have to stay with Howie,” Jenny answered with a look of resignation.

“We’ll be all right.” The older woman told Greg. “Thank you for stepping in.” Her gaze strayed to the broken window frame. “Oh no. What am I supposed to tell the insurance people?”

Greg made his exit before he’d have to answer. The ambulance and police cars pulled up in front of the house as he jumped out the window and flew up and away out the back. The clear cold air slapped his face, breaking him free of the spell of confusion.

He hadn’t meant for Howie to be shot. He shouldn’t feel so guilty. He hadn’t pulled the trigger. Except, if he’d just held still, the bullet to his back wouldn’t have done any harm. Come to think of it, that girl might never have staged a break-in if her family wasn’t desperate, if her accomplices weren’t stupid enough to go along with her or if she’d had some guidance. No one would have been hurt if the Zimmers had left according to plan. The lines between criminal and victims were supposed to be more clear-cut. He told himself he’d done his part, but left feeling as if nothing at all had been settled.

* * * *

When Gloria got home from work, she stopped first at Aggie’s without waiting to change out of her business-appropriate blouse and blazer over her neat black skirt. She’d long been in the habit of going to Aggie’s before going home. It had to be a carryover from her middle school days when Dad had still been working and didn’t want her returning to an empty house. Back when he’d managed to lay off the drink until he got home, before his injury.

It had been a good arrangement then, and it still worked now. Aggie seldom went out in the afternoons, and when she did it took planning, making it an event Gloria always heard of well in advance. She could count on Aggie to be there, count on a welcome at the cluttered worktable where they’d shared countless projects over the years. They’d made everything from crocheted can holders and fingerless gloves, to ceramic whistles, to the current designer cell phone holsters, one of Gloria’s own ideas.

Her mentor did twice the work on the business end of things as Gloria did. She didn’t have to keep a regular day job, and had more time for it. Aggie was the one who had found their team of piecework seamstresses, recruiting at the senior center when they started getting more orders than the two of them could fill on their own.

“Hullo-oh” Gloria began speaking at the kitchen door before entering but stopped short in the doorway with the screen door bouncing against her backside. The story of her exciting lunch hour and the following rather tame office birthday party died unspoken.

Aggie sat at her usual spot at the table, but a man clad in a button-down plaid shirt and jeans, his grey hair pulled back in a neat ponytail, stood in front of her, his back to Gloria.

“Gloria.” Aggie peered around the man, speaking with her accustomed brightness, muted by a hesitant note. “I’d like you to meet Hank Luddell. He’s Susie Luddell’s brother. You know my friend who collects our orders from the Center. She couldn’t make it today and Hank said he’d drop them off.”

Gloria managed to insert a nod and a smile to Hank during Aggie’s flustered speech. The other woman sounded not at all like her usual laid-back self. Had she interrupted something?

Gloria shook Hank’s warm, firm hand. Kind of a fox for someone who must be at least fifty.

“Nice to meet you.” Hank smiled briefly, turning back to Aggie. “Guess I’d better get going. I’ll tell Sue you got the lot.” He nodded at a cardboard box sitting on one of the kitchen chairs.

“Thanks again,” Aggie spoke after him as Hank and Gloria maneuvered around each other. He headed out the door she’d just entered, while she went toward Aggie and the worktable. “You stop by any time.”

“Sure will.” Hank called, closing the door behind him.

“Wow.” Gloria dropped into the chair across from Aggie, next to the one holding the box. Finding Aggie with a gentleman caller constituted a major disruption to the natural order of things–at least as much as seeing a man fly. “He’s a cutie. What were you two talking about before I came in?”

Aggie blushed. Blushed! Gloria looked at her as if she’d never seen her before. She’d gotten used to Aggie just being Aggie–older yes, but a friend, someone who listened to her and cared about her, got her engaged in their various projects and took her dreams seriously. But now... Aggie didn’t actually look old, not as old as she must be to be Greg’s mom. She had a few gray threads in her headful of light brown curls and a few lines around her eyes and mouth, but mostly laugh lines. The figure in her wheeled chair might be a bit plump, but on Aggie, it looked good, like ripe fruit looks better plump. She was pretty–and blushing like a schoolgirl.

“Nothing much,” she answered, even as Gloria took in the totally new concept of Aggie as someone with a romantic life of her own. “We just got to chatting. He’s a nice man. Sue’s having foot surgery and he’s helping her out with all her errands.”

“That is nice of him.” Gloria turned to the box beside her, concealing her smile. “Not every man would take the time away from his wife and kids to help out his sister.” She started pulling out the blank holsters and setting them out on the table.

“Oh, Hank’s not married.” Aggie pulled a few of the blanks across to her side of the table. “He spent too much time on the road as a backup musician for a country rock band to settle down.”

“You learned a lot about him for such a short chat,” Gloria teased.

“Well, maybe.” Aggie’s blush deepened. She cleared her throat. “I finished a couple of prototypes for our windowed holsters today.” She handed one across to Gloria. “What do you think?”

“I think I’m not done talking about Hank.” Gloria grinned with intent to tease and took the prototype.

“Oh now. You stop. I just met the man–and don’t say anything about him to Greg either.”

“Why not? Greg’s a big boy now.”

“Yes. He is.” Aggie’s tone sobered, “But I’m still all the family he’s got. I want him to feel secure where I’m concerned. I’ll always be here for him, bar death or disaster.”

“Sure.” Gloria fiddled with the prototype, tugging at the stitching that secured the clear pocket to the main body of the holster. “If you suppose Greg would feel threatened by your flirting with a cute guy your own age.”

A business card–one of their own–filled the clear pocket of the holster. Gloria pulled it out and pushed it in again. It would be easy enough to change out the pocket’s contents. She’d have to come up with a set of sample mottos to insert. Would there be copyright issues if she used some common t-shirt slogans?

“It’s hard to know how Greg feels,” Aggie continued. “He’s such a man, keeps everything under his hat.”

“Huh.” Gloria hadn’t pictured him that way at all. Greg was Greg, like Aggie was Aggie. She liked teasing him because it was so hard to get a reaction, him being all Rational Reasonable Man. If he didn’t have a sense of humor and easy-going manner, she’d accuse him of being Mr. Spock.

“I can sound him out on the idea before it goes any further than innocent flirtation.” Gloria shot Aggie an arch look.

“Don’t you dare,” Aggie scolded. “Maybe it’s time we discuss your love life.” She sat back, crossing her arms over her breasts with mock severity.

“My love life is great.” Gloria lost her smile, and suddenly, returning to business matters-at-hand seemed by far the safest course. She held up the prototype. “This is perfect, and using them to display business cards is another great idea. I’ll make up some sample slogans to display in them.”

“You can’t fool me, young lady.” Aggie lifted a brow, but a hint of her smile remained. “But if you want to talk business, we’ll talk business. I like the ones saying, ‘I’m up and dressed, what more do you want?’”

Chapter 8

Greg flew back to the lab, hardly noticing the wonder of it. Recent events still preyed on his mind. What if the kid, Howie died? The possibility ate at him. He’d put the young thug in the path of the bullet, but he wasn’t the one who’d brought guns into play. Howie had fired the first shot.

Maybe they had expected to find the place empty, but they’d come with guns, come prepared to do violence. The ‘kid’ might not be more than seventeen, but he’d clubbed down the older man, terrorized the wife. Greg hadn’t meant him harm. If the kid had been hurt, he’d been hoisted by his own petard.

Arriving back at the Computer Science building, Greg made an effort to land lightly. The small crater of his original lift-off still dented the tar and gravel rooftop. Crap. He’d better drop an anonymous note in the custodian’s office before it rained again.

He’d expected the hero business to be cleaner than this. Even after
The Dark Knight
. Even after
Watchmen
. Comic book stories were pure fiction. Leaking roofs and potholes were real. Feeling responsible for injuries he’d inadvertently inflicted. That was real.