A Grizzly Discovery

10

I woke up Monday morning to the sound of my phone going off, but it wasn’t my alarm.

It couldn’t be my alarm. The vet clinic was closed on Mondays and I always made sure that it was off so I could sleep in. I’d stayed up late the night before, telling Charlotte and Sophie what Jason and I had discussed, and trying to figure out if Bee was telling the truth when she said she’d been in the house the whole time but had been hiding in a pile of fresh laundry before because it was warm and my voice was too loud and scratchy to listen to.

The tune was also that of an incoming call. Someone was phoning me.

I reached around in a half-dazed state until my hand found the phone, and I vaguely looked at the call display before pressing accept. It was Chief Gary.

“Hello?” I answered, trying to sound like I was already awake and failing miserably.

“Hi, Angela? Sorry to wake you,” came Chief Gary’s voice on the other line.

“No, don’t worry, I was already awake,” I lied. “What’s going on?”

“You’re going to want to come down to the vet clinic. I’m afraid somebody vandalized it last night.”

Instantly my blood went cold. “What?” I had expected him to be calling about the phone Jason was going to hand in to him. The first thought that ran through my head was that thank goodness we didn’t have any animals staying overnight right now.

“Yeah. There are some broken windows, and it looks like your computer’s all smashed up. I’ve got a few guys covering the place for now, but you’re going to want to get down here.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” I replied, hanging up the phone and throwing on whatever clothes I could find lying on the floor. This wasn’t a time to be worried about my appearance. I texted Jason as I ran through the living room.

“What’s wrong?” Sophie asked as I rushed through the living room toward the door.

“Someone broke into the vet clinic,” I replied.

“Oh, crap!” Sophie exclaimed. “I’m coming with you.”

The two of us rushed out of the house and Sophie drove like a maniac to make it down to Main Street in about three minutes. She double parked on the side of the road and we pushed past the crowd of people mingling in front of the vet clinic to have a look at the carnage.

As soon as I saw the front of the office, my heart sunk. The front window had been completely smashed; shards of glass lined the tiled floor inside and the sidewalk outside. Yellow police tape was strung across the hole, and a police officer I didn’t recognize was trying to keep people back.

“I’m so sorry Angela.”

“Who could have done this sort of thing?”

“Don’t worry dear, things will fix themselves up.”

“The police will definitely find the people who did this.”

I tried to thank the people offering me their good wishes, but I could barely even speak. All I could do was look at the shop. Sophie pushed past everyone and led me to the front door. We walked into it, and when I saw the word WHORE spray painted in big, red letters against the wall my mouth went dry.

Who would do this sort of thing?

Suddenly, a solid hand slipped into mine. I looked up to find Jason standing next to me, his face grim.

“Are you all right?” he asked, and I nodded.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. I wasn’t here when this happened. I just got a phone call from Chief Gary about it a few minutes ago.”

“What’s the damage?” Jason asked, and I opened my mouth to tell him I wasn’t sure yet when Chief Gary himself came over and answered instead.

“A few thousand dollars,” he told Jason. “There’s the spray paint, and the broken window. Also, the main reception computer was smashed up, and a bunch of files from the cabinet were tossed around. I’ll need Angela to tell me if any of them are missing.”

“Oh, Karen will know that a lot better than I will,” I replied.

“Ok, I’ll talk to her about it. It looks as though the vandal or vandals tried to get into the back room, but they didn’t manage it.”

“That’s a relief, at least,” I replied. The back room was where all of the expensive equipment, as well as all the drugs, were kept.

“Do you have any idea who could have done this?” Chief Gary asked me, and I shook my head no.

“I do,” Jason replied. “Matt Smith.”

Chief Gary looked a little bit surprised.

“Him? What does he have against Angela?”

Jason explained to Chief Gary about Matt Smith’s attempt to buy the property, and my negotiation with the property owner to put it off for six months.

“Would he really do something like this, though?” I asked. “I mean, it’s one thing to get mad and complain about me, but to actually break into my vet clinic and vandalize it? That’s a whole new ball game.”

“Remember that he threatened you that night outside the restaurant,” Jason reminded me.

“What was that?” Chief Gary asked, interested. Jason explained the situation to Chief Gary.

“I wish the two of you would have told me,” Chief Gary said. “I don’t like this man threatening Angela.”

“It’s fine, really,” I said, trying to hide how shaken up I really was about this. Jason wrapped his arm around my shoulder and I leaned into him. Having him here made me feel so much safer.

“It’s not fine, Angela,” Chief Gary said. “This might just be some kids deciding to have a laugh. But it might be a lot worse, as well. I want you to be careful in the future, ok? I’ll be sure to have a chat with Matt Smith.”

“I will,” I promised Chief Gary, who nodded and went back to speak with another one of his officers.

“Can we go into one of the exam rooms?” I asked Jason. “I feel like half the town is staring at me here.”

“Of course,” Jason replied. Sophie followed us in and I sat down on a chair in the corner. Jason grabbed me a cup of water from the sink and handed it to me.

“I think it looks a lot worse than it is,” Sophie told me when the door was closed. “I hated the color of those walls anyway.”

Despite everything, I cracked a smile. “Fine, you get to choose the color we paint them next, as long as it’s not something weird.”

“If I knew that was all it was going to take I would have broken in and vandalized the place myself,” Sophie replied. A moment later though, she turned serious. “I agree with Jason, though. I think it was Matt Smith.”

“Maybe,” I conceded.

“Maybe? There’s no maybe about it. Who else would do this sort of thing?”

“I don’t know, ok?” I practically shouted. A moment later, I lost control. Tears began to steam down my face as I sobbed in the chair. Jason was immediately at my side, rubbing my back.

“It’s going to be ok,” he murmured to me. “There’s no permanent damage. Insurance will pay for all of it.”

“I know… it’s just… this place is my baby. I built this vet clinic. It’s my business. It’s my life. I don’t like knowing that someone was in here, doing that sort of thing, purposely trying to wreck it all for me.”

“I know,” Jason replied. “It sucks. It sucks a lot. But Chief Gary is on the case, and we can always try and help figure out who did it, right?”

“Yeah,” I said through my tears.

“But right now, you need to call Karen. You need her to come and sort out the files, and tell Chief Gary what’s missing. And then you have to call the insurance adjustors. Can you do that?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“And then when you’re done, I’m going to get you a BLT from Betty’s to take-out and you can eat it at home, ok?”

I looked up at Jason and smiled. He was just so perfect. “Sounds like a deal to me.”

I got up from my seat, the list of things I had to do galvanizing me. Sophie came over and wrapped me in a big hug.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “Whoever did this, we’ll find them, and we’ll make them pay.”

“Thanks, Sophie,” I told her. Knowing I had such a great best friend and boyfriend really did make the tough situation easier to handle. Fifteen minutes later Karen was on her way, and I’d called the insurance adjustors who gave me a list of everything they’d need for the claim. Getting things done made me feel strong once again, and this time, when I stepped out of the room and saw the bright red slur spray-painted on the wall, it didn’t hurt at all. Someone thought they were getting the best of me. Well, they weren’t.

Five minutes later Karen showed up. I thanked her for coming in on her day off then sent her over to Chief Gary. He promised to be in touch later that afternoon, and then told me the best thing I could do would probably be to go home; anything else and the townspeople would be all over me trying to get as much information as possible. I figured that was a good idea.

“I’ll go get your BLT, and meet you back at your place,” Jason told me, planting a soft kiss on my lips. “You’re going to get through this.”

“Thanks,” I told him with a small smile. Having done as much as I could for now made me feel like I was more in control of things. I wasn’t exactly scared; to be honest, I wasn’t sure who would have done this. I still wasn’t sure that it was Matt Smith, although he was a pretty good candidate. I think a part of me hoped it was simply some kids deciding to play a prank, or something.

Sophie and I pushed past the crowd of people once again. I thanked a few well-wishers, then we made our way back toward the car.

“Hey, Angela,” I heard a familiar voice say, and I froze. Sophie and I turned around and faced Matt Smith, who had a crooked smile on his face. “I hear you got a nice dose of Karma this morning.”

Before I could reply, Sophie had stepped forward threateningly. “I can show you Karma if you’d like. Right in your stupid mouth.”

Ok, Sophie’s threat didn’t exactly make sense. But Smith certainly got the gist of it, and he laughed. “Oh yeah? You’re going to beat me up, are you? You weigh like what, a hundred pounds?”

“At least Sophie isn’t a coward, like you,” I replied. “Did you feel like a big man, breaking into an empty vet clinic and trashing the place?” I didn’t know why I’d said it. After all, I wasn’t even convinced that Matt Smith had been the guilty party. Maybe I just wanted to see his reaction. I got my answer in the form of a laugh.

“You think I did that? Well, you certainly can’t prove it. It’s too bad Willow Bay is such a charming city and no one has any security cameras around that might show the guilty party.”

“If we’re as backwards as you think we are, then it won’t surprise you to know I don’t believe in innocent-until-proven-guilty,” Sophie said with a small smile.

“Luckily for you, I make it a rule not to hit women,” Smith told Sophie, looking at her with disdain.

“Unfortunately for you, I make it a rule to only hit creeps,” Sophie replied, taking a step forward. To be honest, even though Smith had at least sixty pounds on Sophie, I would probably put my money on her in a fight. Sophie was scrappy. And while I knew I should probably be the mature one and stop her, I found myself just watching to see what would happen.

“Matt Smith!” I heard a voice boom from behind me, and before anything else could happen, Chief Gary was striding up the street toward us. “Good. You’ve saved me some time by being here. I’d like to speak to you about the vandalism at Healthy Paws Vet Clinic today.”

“You’re just the man I want to see as well,” Matt Smith replied. “This woman here was threatening me.”

“Why am I not surprised that you’re a total tattletale?” Sophie replied, rolling her eyes. Chief Gary simply sighed.

“You have no witnesses. I don’t think Angela will back up your story.”

“I didn’t hear any threats from Sophie,” I answered dutifully. I didn’t like lying to Chief Gary, but I certainly wasn’t about to tell the truth here.

“See? Now, I want you to come down to the station to answer some of my questions.”

Smith’s face fell slightly, and he glared at Sophie and I before allowing himself to be led toward the police station at the other end of the street.

As Sophie and I climbed back into the the car, I realized just how much I needed that BLT, and it wasn’t even ten in the morning yet. It was going to be a long day.