Cat Striking Back

29

KIT RAN UP through the hills shying at every sound, dodging every changing shadow as the moon came and went, the land pale one moment and inky the next-and empty. Nothing moved. She could see nothing crouched, waiting. Where was Tansy? Had she headed home by herself, so small and alone? She could almost hear the smaller cat crying out to her. She didn’t understand their strange connection, she only knew it was like the bond between sisters.

She couldn’t remember her own sisters, she didn’t know if she’d ever had sisters or brothers. What would that be like, to grow up in a real family, with siblings to play with and squabble with, all of them connected by a bond that was like no other?

Racing through a black valley, her heart pounding, she bolted up the side of a hill as the moon showed itself. She could hear the coyotes, off to the south near the Harper ranch. When she reached the crest, almost winded, there was Tansy high above her, poised atop the next hill, the pale little cat rearing up to look. Another cat lay beside her, just as pale, but very still.

Sage. It was Sage. He didn’t rise or move. Flying up the hill to them, Kit was cold with fear. Oh, what was wrong? Sage was like her own brother. Once, she’d thought he would be more than a friend, that he would be her mate. Now he lay unmoving, his head resting against Tansy’s paws.

She slowed and padded silently up to them; she couldn’t stop shivering. Sage moved a little, then, and opened his eyes to look up at her.

Tansy mewed, “That man…He threw a hammer at Sage, he hurt him bad.”

Kit crouched next to Tansy, her nose to Sage’s nose, feeling his quick, shallow breathing.

“I found him just above that house where they’re digging, I wanted to go for help but he’s so…He insisted on going home but then he hurt more and was weaker, and I don’t know what to do.”

Kit touched Sage’s shoulder gently with a careful paw. When she stroked his side he jerked away, catching his breath. She didn’t touch him again. She thought of Dr. Firetti and the animal hospital but Sage hated that place, even though John Firetti had saved his life. And the hospital stood so far across the hills, clear at the other side of the village, too far for Sage ever to walk there. How could this have happened, after all the pain he’d already suffered, the broken and crushed bones, his long recovery in a cast, his long time among humans as he tried not to fear the human world? How could this be fair?

But life wasn’t fair, and that made her all the more angry. “I’m going for help. The road is just down there, Lucinda and Pedric can drive that far, and we-”

“No,” Sage said. “I don’t want humans, I don’t want a doctor, I don’t want to be inside a building.” He tried to scramble up, then lay back. “I can walk, I just need to rest awhile.”

Kit imagined broken ribs, bones puncturing vital organs if he moved, internal bleeding, all the terrifying things she had learned about in the human world and wished she hadn’t. She was reaching to touch his back leg, to see if the old, healed injury had been damaged, when a rustle in the grass made her spin around.

Dulcie stood there. She looked at Tansy, looked at Sage’s still form, and then crouched over Sage as Kit had done. When she felt him as Kit had, he flattened his ears and gritted his teeth but didn’t flinch. “Can you get up?” she asked softly.

“In a little while.” He lay quietly looking at them as Tansy snuggled beside him, her face next to his, shivering against his stillness. Around them the hills were silent, even the yipping of the coyotes had ceased. Above them the moon went in and out of the clouds, throwing running shadows across the frightened cats, and Kit licked tears from her nose.

But at last Sage stirred, and rose, leaning against Tansy. “I want to go home. I want the clowder, I want my own cave.” Limping, he started away up the hills. Slowly the three females walked with him, supporting him as they made their way toward the fallen mansion that was home, his and Tansy’s home.

ON THE STREET of the robberies, lights burned in all four houses and in the neighbors’ houses, where people stood in their yards in little knots asking questions of one another and watching as officers secured the four yards with crime tape. Police cars crowded the street, their radios cutting through officers’ voices. Two detectives and three officers worked the houses, searching, photographing, lifting prints, vacuuming for trace evidence. One burglary might not have commanded this degree of attention. Four, with a possible link to murder, was another matter. The Becker house, where Charlie had released Joe and Dulcie and Kit from the closet, seemed to have fared the worst, stripped of all the smaller furnishings.

Juana had emerged from the Longley house when she took a call from the dispatcher. Glancing up at Charlie, in the roadster, she gave her the thumbs-up then stepped over to the car and punched in a single digit on her cell phone, turning on the speaker.

Max was saying, “I’m on my way, just turned off Ocean.”

“You’ll like this,” Juana told him. “Prints from all four burglaries match those from the swimming pool.”

Max chuckled. “Very nice. Charlie’s okay?”

“She’s right here.” She handed Charlie the phone.

“Fine,” Charlie said. “I’m fine.” Down the block, lights turned onto the street, moving toward them, and in a moment Max’s pickup double-parked beside a police unit. As Charlie hurried to the driver’s window, and Davis returned to the Longley house to finish lifting prints, behind Clyde’s and Ryan’s backs, Joe Grey slipped out of the roadster and through the shadows, and into the house behind Juana.

WHAT HE’D LIKE to do was stroll casually up to Davis and say, I told you so! I told you there was a body at the bottom of the swimming pool! And I had a pretty good idea, all along, that our burglar was the same guy!

But of course Davis had listened to him, as the detective always did. She might complain about the anonymity of the phantom snitch, but she paid attention. And now, with the matching prints, with burglary and apparent murder linked together, both detectives would be working different aspects of the case. Following Juana into the master bedroom, he slipped under the dresser to watch her lift prints in the adjoining bath, handling with gloves the cosmetic bottles, the toothpaste tube, though these were items the burglar probably hadn’t handled. The bath was done in shades of cream-colored marble; countertop, floor, shower, and the walls were painted a pale cream. Slipping up behind Juana, Joe used his nose to work the scene in his own way, sniffing for the elusive medicinal scent that so resembled catmint. If the smell was of a medicine, and if he could find one bathroom among the four houses where it was stronger, that might be the best lead yet. It was the combination of crimes that was the teaser.

Did this guy kill the woman because she knew he was planning the burglaries? Maybe she confronted him and threatened to call the law? Or had it been an accident, had she found out and confronted him, he’d lost his temper, hit her, and she fell? And then he was too scared to call for help, didn’t want to tangle with the cops? Maybe he had a record, maybe he was on parole. So he’d hauled her out of there, hosed down the pool, loaded up the body, and…and what?

Where was the body now? He had to stash it somewhere before he proceeded with his burglaries. Or was the corpse tucked away in his RV all the time, while he loaded the stolen goods in with it?

He watched Juana leave the room, then he trotted into the bathroom to sort more carefully through the scents. If the scent he was looking for was medicine, maybe he should check all the bathrooms. Here he smelled lemon soap, mint toothpaste, spicy shaving lotion-he thought he caught the catmint scent but, mixed with everything else, he couldn’t be sure. He checked the other two bathrooms, then headed for the Watermans’, intent on covering all the bathrooms in the four houses if he could avoid the two detectives and the officers, who wouldn’t take kindly to a tomcat walking through the evidence.

IT WAS AN hour later when, having accomplished his task but gained nothing, Joe saw Clyde coming up the street, peering among the bushes looking for him. The time was well after midnight, pushing dawn, and Clyde was yawning. Joe, scrambling up a pepper tree, didn’t intend to go home. Vanishing into the roof’s shadows, he raced away over the neighbors’ roofs toward the hills. Kit’s hasty retreat, and then Dulcie taking off so fast, had left him increasingly uneasy as he prowled the four houses. Kit was so charmed by that half-grown kitten-if Kit had gone after her, Dulcie would have followed; and a sharp nervousness filled his belly, a shaky unease that sent him flying toward the dark hills.