Fat Cat At Large

EIGHTEEN

The next morning, Chase arrived downstairs before everyone else, carrying a plastic bin that contained Quincy’s new treats. After she put it on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator, she busied herself in the kitchen, starting the coffee and getting out supplies for the day’s baking. She was eager for Anna to get there so she could tell her about the treats—and about Doris’s jacket.

When Anna finally came in, Chase had to look twice. She wore her usual vibrant sweater, this one of bright teal with turquoise swirls, but the rest of her was drab and colorless. There wasn’t a hint of bounce in her step. Even her usually brilliantly shining gray hair was limp and lackluster. Chase wasn’t sure whether to sympathize or to leave her alone.

Anna surveyed the bowls, the mixer, and the pans Chase had spread on the granite counter, and dropped to one of the stools, where she started swiveling back and forth, a dull expression on her face.

“I have something to show you.” Chase’s own voice sounded unnaturally bright to her, trying, as she was, to combat Anna’s gloom. She presented the plastic container of cat treats and opened the lid so Anna could see them.

Anna leaned over and sniffed. “They don’t smell too appetizing.”

“They’re not for you, silly. They’re for Quince. These are healthy cat treats. Dr. Ramos says he should have only these from now on, and his diet food.”

“Poor Quincy.”

“He loves them! And you’re to stop giving him desserts.” Chase knew she was becoming shrill. Anna was being unreasonable.

Anna shrugged, glanced away, and picked a couple of cat hairs off her pants. The swiveling stool had developed a squeak.

“You’re driving me nuts,” Chase said, then softened her voice as she put the cat treats into the refrigerator. “Is there anything I can do?”

“Do you know about Julie’s trial?” She quit swiveling.

“Yeah, that’s gotta be hard on the family.”

“It is! Bill is beside himself.” Finally, a spark from Anna. “He has such ambivalent feelings toward Marvin to begin with. And, on top of everything, his own son is giving him a hard time.”

“Marvin is his stepson, right? But he had a child with his second wife, Marvin’s mother?”

“Yes. His only natural child.”

“What a mess.” The coffeemaker quit making its gurgling noises and Chase poured Anna a cup.

“Julie says it could drag on for weeks.” She took the steaming mug and inhaled the strong coffee aroma, giving Chase a weary smile. “Thanks.”

“So, you and Bill? You’re . . . ?”

“Yes. We are.” Her smile deepened. “I was hoping he would, maybe, propose soon. I so wanted to surprise you with a ring.” She frowned and started swiveling the squeaky stool again.

“That would be a huge surprise, since I didn’t even know you were seeing anyone.”

“I’m sorry to have kept this a secret. Julie didn’t want me to broadcast it, since she’s working on his stepson’s trial. There’s also the fact that his wife hasn’t been dead that long, barely a year. I didn’t want to tell anyone. It just seemed a little . . . icky.”

“Oh, Anna.” Chase gave her a hug from behind, resting her chin on Anna’s dear, gray head. That effort didn’t hurt her back a bit. “I’m so sorry you’ve been going through this alone. We shouldn’t keep secrets from each other. And there’s something else I have to talk to you about.”

Chase felt Anna stiffen. She went on. “About firing either of these girls. We can’t do that.”

“And why not? We hired them. We can fire them.” Anna got up and stepped away.

Chase took a deep breath. “Am I not a full partner?”

“Of course.”

“Then you need to consider what I think.”

Anna nodded and was about to say something else.

Vi came in and interrupted any further discussion. The changeable woman was, once again, her disheveled self rather than the usual suave, smooth Violet Peters. She even had a small stain on her dark blue satin blouse. Chase couldn’t remember ever having seen a blotch on Vi’s clothing. Her buttons today were two shades of pink. Sometimes Chase thought her clothes were a notch or two down from designer stuff, but those buttons made up for that.

Vi said perfunctory good mornings and passed through to the salesroom to don her smock and open up.

Chase raised her eyebrows at Anna, but she had turned her attention to beginning the day’s baking.

Chase retreated into the office to go over the books from two days ago. She turned on the computer and glanced at the news page that came up.

She did a double take. The headline hit her.

PROMINENT FINANCIER FOUND DEAD; FOUL PLAY SUSPECTED

The victim’s name, Torvald Iversen, jumped out at her from the verbiage below the bold print. Chase let out a sharp yelp. Two seconds later, Anna opened the door.

“Are you all right?”

Chase pointed at the screen. “He’s dead!”

Anna peered at the screen.

“You want to sit and read it?” asked Chase.

Anna pulled a chair over and they both consumed the short, uninformative article. Iversen had been found dead in the morning at his home by his cleaning lady. She usually arrived when he was gone, but this time she had found his body close inside the front door, partially blocking her entry. A quote from her was included (“I tried and tried to push the door open, and when I did, I almost threw up”), but there was no comment “at this time” from the officials.

“I’m calling Detective Olson,” Chase said, and pulled up the number he’d reached her from on her cell. But there was no answer.

“I imagine he’s busy right now,” Anna said. “He’s probably working on this case since it has a tie-in with Gabe’s, don’t you think?”

Chase nodded. That made sense. Chase decided she would go over the receipts later. She was a little too rattled to do it just now.

She and Anna shut Quincy into the office and both worked in the kitchen for a few minutes before Vi came in.

“What was the matter? The customers have left and I came back to see what’s going on.”

“Oh, you heard me yell when I saw the news?” Chase said. “I was surprised to see a report that Torvald Iversen is dead.”

“Oh.” Vi paled. “On the Internet? Isn’t he the one who . . . ?”

“The one who’s been accusing me of murder. Yes. I can’t say I’m sorry he’s dead.” Chase immediately regretted her last statement, recalling that Vi had denied knowing him once before, the day he’d made her so nervous she’d knocked over a stack of dessert containers. “Now he can never admit he killed Gabe.”

“He . . . he killed Gabe?” Vi looked shocked.

“Why else would he keep insisting I did it?”

“That’s a good question.”

The chimes on the front door tinkled and Vi left to greet the customer.

“What do you suppose is wrong with her?”

“I’m as puzzled as you are, Anna. We were going to have a talk with her, and with Ted, but I don’t think that’s happened either, has it?”

“Do you think that’s a good idea? Maybe we should stay out of their personal lives.”

“But Vi works for us,” Chase said. “We should try to help her. That reminds me, we still need to talk, we two, about our other employee.”

“Laci?”

“Yes. I know she and Vi can’t work together without tangling, and Vi is the much better salesperson. But . . .”

“We should get rid of both of them.”

Chase blew out a breath of exasperation. Why was Anna so obtuse sometimes? “No, I don’t think we should. We can work all this out. And if we’re going to make an extra effort to help Violet, then we have to do the same for Laci. They’re both our employees. They’re part of the Bar None family.”

“I suppose you’re right. But can we help Laci, somehow, without her working here?”

Chase shot Anna an exasperated look.

“All right, I’ll make more effort.” Anna returned to the kitchen, allowing Chase to catch a whiff of the tangy scent of the Lemon Bars that were browning in the oven before the office door swung shut.

There, she’d done it. She’d spoken her mind about Vi and Laci. They would keep employing them and would get them settled down so they could work together by the holidays. That was over two months away. Relief washed over Chase. She was sure she was doing the right thing.

Later that afternoon, Detective Olson returned Chase’s phone call.

“I read about Iversen,” she said. “That’s why I called you.”

“You have information about his death?”

“Not really. It’s just that, well, he’s been so vehement in accusing me, I figured maybe he killed Gabe. Was it suicide?”

“Is that what you read? Was that on the Internet?”

“No, it didn’t say suicide. It said foul play. But if he was remorseful about killing Gabe, suicide would make sense.”

“It’s pretty hard to bash your own head in.”

“He could fall on something sharp.”

“Didn’t happen. His skull is crushed, and the murder weapon has been removed. You don’t need to concern yourself with Iversen’s death. But I have something to tell you about the jacket you found.”

“Is it Doris’s?”

“Yes, but—”

“So she did kill him.”

There was a pause at the detective’s end of the call before he continued. “As I was trying to say, the stain is tomato sauce.”

“Tomato sauce? There was all that blood.”

“Not everything you saw on the floor of the condo was blood. A bunch of it was sauce. It either spilled or was thrown. I suspect Naughtly threw it at his wife, from the amount on her jacket.”

“Is there a serial killer?”

“I wouldn’t say that. But I will caution you to be careful what you say to people who knew Gabe. That’s why I told you some of this. I want you to stay safe. Keep away from his acquaintances and relatives.”

Chase deflated after the phone call. It would be hard to avoid all of Gabe’s acquaintances and harder to avoid his relatives, since her employee was dating one relative and another was a regular customer.

It seemed like Doris hadn’t killed Gabe. Whoever had would probably have blood on their clothes. Too bad Hilda Bjorn hadn’t seen anyone run out of the condo covered in blood. It didn’t look like Iversen had done it either. In fact, Chase would bet her missing money that the same person killed both of them. Evidence against this was that the murder weapons were so different. They were both probably weapons of convenience, though, the nearest weapon to hand. That seemed to make sense. A small point for it being the same killer.

Not only should she stay away from people connected to Gabe, she should keep away from potential murder weapons.