Curried Lobster Murder: Book 14 in The Darling Deli Series by Patti Benning

the other way. Her heart began racing. Had Antonio found Hector? Was she too late? She took off in the direction that she thought the shout had come from, and found herself in front of the closed door of a theater.
    Hesitantly, she reached out and grasped the door handle. She wasn’t certain that Antonio had gone in here—the shout could have come from further down the hall—but she couldn’t pass the room without at least checking to see if the door was unlocked. Bracing herself, she pushed. It swung open silently at her touch.
    She slipped inside the large room, letting the door close silently behind her, her eyes glued to the stage, which was only dimly lit by the night time lights. Two people stood on it. One was a hooded figure clothed in black—definitely not Antonio unless he had managed to change clothes in the space of a few seconds—and the other she recognized as Hector even from this distance. Hector was backing slowly toward the edge of the stage, his hands up.
    Now what ? wondered the deli owner desperately. She had found Hector in the nick of time, but had no way to save him. The theater was huge—there was no way she would be able to get down there in time, and even if she could, she had no weapons of her own. In the hand of the hooded figure she could clearly see the glint of some kind of blade. Is this what happened to Bobby Babcock? she found herself wondering, suddenly unable to get the gruesome image of the bleeding man out of her mind. She couldn’t let that happen to someone else, she just couldn’t.
    An idea was beginning to form in her mind, but she didn’t know if she would have the time to implement it. She knew that the stage lights would be extremely bright, and if she could figure out how to turn them on she might be able to catch the killer unawares. She knew that her plan was partially flawed, since Hector would be just as blinded as the person threatening him with the knife, but it was her only option, short of charging the stage herself.
    The only problem was, she had no idea where the switches for the stage lights were. There was likely some sort of control room, which was quite possibly locked. Even if she could find the right doorway, and it wasn’t locked, what were the chances that she would hit the right switches on the first try?
    She was out of time anyway. Hector had reached the edge of the stage, and could go no further without tumbling into the orchestral pit. It was a jump that he could easily make, but that would mean turning his back on the person who was slowly approaching him with the blade, which he was reluctant to do.
    Desperate to prevent another death, Moira did the only thing she could think of.
    “Hey, stop!” she shouted, her voice echoing in the huge, empty theater. Her ploy had the desired effect; the person with the knife lowered it a fraction of an inch and looked up, trying to find her among the dark seats. She had expected Hector to take this opportunity to leap down from the stage, but he appeared to be frozen in place.
    “Go on, move,” she muttered under her breath, but it was too late; the hooded figure was already turning back to him, evidently determined to finish what it had started before dealing with the new threat of Moira.
    The hooded figure was only feet away from the terrified Hector when a third form rushed in suddenly from stage right. The person, whom she recognized as Antonio, slammed into the hooded figure, knocking him or her off the stage. The deli owner heard the sounds of a scuffle and then a shout, and saw the hooded figure take off toward one of the exits.
    Concerned for both men, she hurried down to the stage to find Hector helping Antonio up. Her now-former prime suspect had a shallow cut on his upper arm, but otherwise seemed unharmed. The hooded figure had dropped his knife in panic as he fled.
    “You saved my life,” Hector was saying to Antonio in a shaky voice. “That psycho was going to kill me.”
    “It wasn’t