The Thief Who Stole Midnight (3 page)

"Ow! Stop it!" he said. "What are you doing? Are you crazy? You can't go running into the apartment like that. What if the burglar's still here? What if he hears you?" He asked, pulling her back. "Ow! Stop kicking me!"

"I'm calling the cops," Maddie said, stretching to grab the phone. "Get off me."

Her fingers stretched and she just managed to grab the receiver, before he dragged her as close to the front door as the phone cord could stretch.

"Fine. Call from here. In case we need to make a run for it," Mike said, panting, using his body to pin her down.

"I thought you were a pacifist," Maddie grunted, as she elbowed him to try to get more breathing room.

"I am," Mike said. "But I'm also a protective husband. And right now, I'm protecting you from yourself."

Maddie raised an eyebrow at that, but she made the call.

"All circuits are busy now. Please try your call again later,"
said the automated voice on the other end of the phone line.

"Well that's not helpful."

"No wonder crime is so freaking high in Chicago." Maddie said, glaring at the phone.

As Mike shifted his weight, the receiver accidentally slipped out of her grasp and shot back into the living room, crashing against the media center and cracking the glass-fronted cabinet door.

Maddie gasped in alarm. Mike quickly pulled her all the way out into the hallway, and the two of them listened intently.

"That should have gotten the burglar's attention." Maddie whispered. "If he's still here."

"I don't hear anything," Mike said. "Do you hear anything?"

Maddie shook her head. "So that means he's probably gone. Right?"

Mike shrugged his shoulders, uncertain. Then he stuck his head back into the apartment and hollered out. "Hello? Mr. Burglar? If you're still here, give us a sign. We don't want to intrude."

"But we have a highly trained attack dog with us and we're not afraid to use him!" Maddie yelled from behind Mike.

Nothing but silence.

The two of them looked at each other, then back at the apartment.

"Speaking of our highly trained attack dog, where is he?" Maddie asked.

Mike started whistling, softly. "Apollo, where are you, boy?"

"Apollo! Come here, boy. Wanna go outside for a walk?" Maddie asked.

Apollo, a big, red Doberman, wiggled out from his hiding spot under the couch and wagged his tail. Then he ran over to them, whined, and let out a string of farts.

Maddie coughed and tried to wave away the stink. "Great. He's doing a bang-up job of defending the couch." Maddie choked out, pulling the neck of her sweater up over her mouth and nose.

Mike started laughing -- until the smell wafted over to him. He made a face and hid his nose behind his hand. "Oh, man, that's just lethal. Jeez, Apollo."

Apollo looked at them with his big, expressive eyes, and then slunk back under the couch.

Maddie was just about to go into the apartment, when Mike grabbed her arm and pulled her back.

"Where are you going?" he hissed.

"I'm tired of standing in the hall. Besides, I have to use the bathroom."

"What if the burglar's still in there?!" Mike asked, gesturing with his head.

"I hope he is," Maddie said. "I'm gonna kick his ass and get our stuff back." She was getting angrier by the minute. "This is the new millennium, buddy. Robbers beware."

As she tried to move forward, Mike pulled her out of the apartment doorway so hard, he lifted her feet off the floor.

"Hey! Let go of me!" Maddie said, kicking and flailing.

"Ow! When did you turn into G.I. Jane?" Mike grunted, moving his legs out of the way and adjusting his arms for a tighter grip.

"I am not going to let some sleazoid get away with everything we own." Maddie said.

She elbowed Mike in the solar plexus and he finally dropped her.

"If you don't do something, I will," Maddie said, holding his gaze in an old-fashioned stare-down.

Now, you may think by this time, they were both yelling, but they were doing what all married couples with kids have perfected -- fighting in whispers.

Mike finally hung his head, defeated. "Fine. Never let it be said that I stood by and let the mother of my child defend my home. I'll go in there." He bent down and took off his shoe. "If I'm not back in thirty seconds, I want you to take Apollo and run," he said, brandishing his shoe like a club.

"That's your plan? You're going to suffocate him with your Dr. Scholl's?" Maddie opened up her over-sized shoulder bag, rooted around and pulled out a giant metal hair spray canister.

"What is
that
doing in your purse? Do you know how bad hair spray is for the environment?" Mike said. "The chlorofluorocarbon emissions alone--"

"Mike, just shut up and take it!"

"What for?"

"So you can coif his hair. What do you think,
what for
? It's a full can. It'll hurt a hell of a lot more than your shoe. Do you have a lighter?"

"So I can give him a flaming coif? Are you out of your mind? What world do you live in?"

"I'm just trying to be proactive." Maddie snapped.

"Proactive? You're turning into Tony Soprano. You really need to cut down on your Netflix watching."

"Are you going or not?"

"I'm getting there! Don't rush me." Mike took a deep breath to center himself. Then he stopped and turned to Maddie. "Let's call the cops again."

"With what phone?" Maddie asked. "The one in the living room or the one in the kitchen? We're still going to need to go into the apartment."

"You have a point. Think anyone's home upstairs?"

Maddie climbed the stairs to the neighboring condo unit and pounded on the door. No answer. She came back downstairs and shook her head. "It's New Year's Eve. They're probably at a party."

Mike took another deep breath. "If I don't come back, promise to show the baby my picture."

"Every day," Maddie said.

"And Apollo."

"He's a dog."

"I know. But he'll get jealous. I don't want him to feel left out, just because we have a human baby."

Maddie sighed. As much as she loved Mike, the man was never going to budge from the hallway. "Do you want me to go? I'm sure it'll be fine. With all the noise we've been making, he's probably long gone by now." Maddie said, turning back to the apartment door.

"Step back, woman." Mike said, stepping in front of her and blocking her way. "There's no need to get pushy. I'll go."

He paused and looked at the living room.

"We'll have to go in, sooner or later," Maddie said, nudging him. "We need to get this place cleaned up before my mother gets here."

"I think we're supposed to leave it as is, so the cops can see it." Mike said.

"Who are you more afraid of?" Maddie snapped. "The cops or my mother?"

Brandishing the hairspray can like a club, Mike crept into the apartment. Maddie followed a few steps behind him.

Slowly, they tiptoed through the living room, Mike with his deadly can of hairspray and Maddie at his back, checking for hidden burglars…

Empty.

Then they checked the closet…

Empty.

 And the bathroom…

Empty.

As they were about to go through the kitchen door, there was a loud gurgling noise from the bedroom, followed by a repetitive, staccato spray of sound.

Mike and Maddie both froze and looked at each other.

CHAPTER SIX

"Bedroom," Mike mouthed at Maddie, pointing at the closed bedroom door.

"No kidding," she whispered back.

There was another burst of staccato noise, followed by a choking sound, from behind the door.

"Do you think he's okay?" Mike asked.

"Are you kidding me?" Maddie said, narrowing her eyes.

"It sounds like he's choking on something. What if he needs CPR? What if he dies? The cops will never believe us if we tell them we found a burglar in our house and he just happened to be dead."

"What if he's in there killing someone?" Maddie pointed out.

Mike looked at her, uncertain.

"He
burgled
us," Maddie said, frustrated. "Even if he is choking, I think we're allowed to let him die."

Mike gave her a look and listened as hard as he could. "I don't think he's killing anyone. I don't hear a struggle or anyone yelling for help," he said. Then he tightened his grip on the can. "Okay, I'm going in."

Maddie dragged Apollo out from under the couch, just in case, and pulled him close to her. Not that Apollo would actually do anything, but maybe he'd be a psychological impediment to keep the burglar in line. Even if he hadn't been much of one so far.

In a tight little group, they crept closer to the bedroom...

Step by step…

Mike carefully opened the bedroom door and jumped in, can at the ready, just as a powerful roar ripped through the room.

Mike instinctively stepped back and immediately pitched backwards over Apollo, who was hiding behind his legs.

"Ow!" He yelled, as he cracked his own head with the hairspray can. "Goddamn dog!"

"Language," Maddie said, covering the dog's ears with one hand and closing the bedroom door with the other.

Mike pressed his hand against his forehead, which stung like hell. "I'm bleeding," he said, showing her before wiping his hand off on his jeans.

"It's shallow. Stop rubbing it and it'll clot up."

"Gee, thanks for the sympathy. Remind me to call someone else if I'm ever dying." Mike grumbled.

"I'm sorry, honey. I'm just a little freaked." Maddie said. "Are you okay?"

"No." Mike looked up at her from the floor, closing and opening each eye. Good. There was only one of her standing there. "My head hurts, there's a burglar ransacking our bedroom with a chainsaw and our condo's been trashed."

"Actually, the burglar's asleep," Maddie said, glancing up at the closed bedroom door. "That was him snoring."

"Are you kidding me?" Mike asked.

She shook her head.

Mike stood up, clutching his head, and opened the door.

Sure enough, there was a medium-built guy, dressed in black and wearing a black ski mask, passed flat out on their bed and snoring loud enough to shake the furniture.

As Mike walked closer to him, the burglar would get absolutely quiet for a few minutes, then the silence would be broken by a weird choking noise, followed by intense snoring. Then he mumbled and turned on his side. Miraculously, the snoring stopped.

Mike and Maddie froze, waiting to see if he was going to wake up or not. When he stayed asleep, Mike inched closer. Curled up on his side like that, the burglar seemed kind of harmless. But the stench of booze coming off the guy was intense.

As Mike gave him a quick pat down, to make sure the guy wasn't carrying a weapon, he noticed that it wasn't like the burglar was exhaling fumes, as much as he smelled like he had washed his clothes in a beer keg and rinsed them in whiskey.

Apollo didn't agree with Mike's assessment of the guy being harmless. He took one look at the burglar and high-tailed it back to his hiding spot under the couch.

Maddie frowned. "Some guard dog he turned out to be. Too bad we didn't get a video of his fiendish Dobie behavior. We could have sent it to the insurance adjuster to prove he's not vicious."

When the insurance company found out Mike and Maddie had bought a Doberman, they tried to cancel their condo insurance. The adjuster finally compromised and agreed to let them pay a higher premium.

As Mike was thinking that a video of Apollo's passive nature wasn't a bad idea, the burglar rolled onto his back and the snoring started up again. His head was thrown back, mouth wide open under his ski mask. As Mike's attention focused on the burglar, the light of opportunity suddenly broke through the haze in Mike's head.
A video!

"Is this a God-given opportunity or what?!" Mike said. He wasn't prone to chortling, but this time, he chortled. Not only did he chortle, he rubbed his hands together with glee. This was going to be
sweet
, he thought to himself. This was going to be the best New Year's ever.

"I'm going with
or what
," Maddie said.

Mike looked over at Maddie and she was glaring at the guy with pure hatred on her face. And rage. Lots of rage. You could almost see the protective mother lioness come to the front.

Thank goodness little Sophie wasn't here, Mike thought, or Maddie would have torn the guy limb from limb and thrown him in the dumpster for violating the baby's psyche.

Then Maddie turned that gaze on Mike. He didn't know what she was thinking, but he was starting to suspect that it revolved around either homicide or torture and would be illegal in most states.

"Don't look at me like that," Mike said, frowning. "I'm the good guy here. And I'm not going to help you dump his body, so whatever you're thinking, knock it off."

"He was burgling us. He deserves everything he gets." Maddie frowned.

"You're looking at this all wrong, sweetheart," Mike said. "Not only did he not get away with robbing us, it's like Santa Claus dumped him here as a belated Christmas gift. This is definitely a lemon to lemonade moment."  

"Are you out of your mind?" Maddie stopped giving the guy the evil eye long enough to sort through her lingerie drawer. Then she threw a pair of pantyhose at Mike. "Here, help me tie him up."

"In a sec." Mike was busy searching the top of his own dresser. "Hey, Maddie, have you seen my Sony HandyCam? Or either one of the Flips?"

Maddie stopped, in the middle of tying the burglar's right wrist to the bedpost with a pair of pantyhose, and looked at him as if she were mentally reassessing his I.Q. "We have a burglar passed out on our bed. If I was your camera, where would I be?"

"Oh, yeah. Good point." The bag of loot was next to the bed, so Mike opened it up and started rummaging. "This bag is freaking enormous. I don't even know how the guy was managing to schlep it around. Maybe it was dragging it from room to room that exhausted him so much."