Cat Trick

6

Hercules was sitting next to the kitchen table like a statue of the Egyptian god Bast. “Hi, Fuzz Face,” I said. I hung my bag on the hook by the back door, and he trailed me into the living room.

I sank into the wing chair and propped my feet on the footstool. Hercules jumped into my lap. His nose twitched and he narrowed his green eyes.

“Hey, I was at tai chi class,” I said. I dropped my head and sniffed, feeling a little foolish because I was checking to see if I was offensive based on Hercules’s cranky face. All I got was the scent of line-dried T-shirt and baby-powder-scented deodorant. “I don’t smell bad,” I told him.

He put a white-tipped paw over his nose. “Yes, I know,” I said. “Cat’s noses.” Satisfied that he’d made his point, he stretched across my chest, resting his furry head just below the hollow of my throat.

Owen came down the stairs then, jumped up and sprawled sideways across my legs so his head was just below my knee and his back paws and tail were mostly on the footstool.

“Everyone comfortable?” I asked.

Owen meowed, rolling partway on to his back. Hercules rubbed the side of his face against my T-shirt and began to purr. The warmth from their two furry bodies somehow chased away that lingering pinch of homesickness I’d felt back in Maggie’s studio. I decided I wouldn’t call Boston after all. Instead, I pulled the phone closer and punched in Marcus’s number.

I got his voice mail. “Hi, Marcus,” I said. “It’s Kathleen. Call me when you have time. Please.” I recited my number in case he hadn’t memorized it, the way I somehow seemed to have done with his.

Both cats were staring at me when I hung up the phone. In Owen’s case, he was looking at me upside down. “I’m not trying to get information,” I said.

Neither one of them so much as blinked.

“I like Marcus,” I said. “I think he likes me. I don’t want this case—if it even is a case—to mess that up before I at least get a chance to kiss him. Plus I didn’t tell him about that bump on Mike Glazer’s head—and why am I explaining all of this to the two of you?”

Hercules lifted his head and cocked it to one side, almost as though he were wondering the same thing. Owen stayed sprawled over my legs, golden eyes fixed on mine, and I would have sworn from the expression on his upside-down face that he was laughing at me.

Marcus didn’t call me until the next morning. I was sitting at the table with a bowl of yogurt, homemade granola, and an apple—the one breakfast neither cat would try to mooch off me—when the phone rang. I left the dish on the table, confident that there was no way it would “accidentally” end up on the floor the way a plate of scrambled eggs and toast would.

“Hi, Kathleen. It’s Marcus,” he said when I answered. “I got your message, but it was too late to call you back last night.”

“Hi,” I said. How was I going to say this?

Suddenly I could hear my mother’s voice in my head. “Katydid, if you have to dance with a bear, put on your best high heels and tango.” It was her colorful way of saying get on with it. So I did.

“I forgot to tell you yesterday that when I checked Mike Glazer’s body for a pulse, I noticed a bump—at least I think that’s what it was—at the back of his head, behind his ear.”

“I saw it,” he said, “but thanks for calling me.”

I didn’t want him to hang up before I’d said everything I wanted to say. It was time to tango. “And I wanted you to know that I’ll stay out of your case, assuming there even is one.”

“I appreciate that,” he said. There was silence for a moment; then he added, “Does that mean you’re not going to bring me coffee?”

I laughed. “Not necessarily.”

“Kathleen, I know this is short notice, but would you like to have supper with me tomorrow night?”

Two furry faces were watching me around the kitchen doorframe.

“I would,” I said.

“Full disclosure: I’m cooking.”

“As long as you’re not planning on making something with sardines in hot sauce, I think I’ll be okay,” I said.

It was Marcus’s turn to laugh. “So does that mean that there won’t be any cats joining us?”

“Yes, it definitely does.” I glanced over at the doorway again. Owen and Hercules had disappeared.

“About six thirty?”

“I’ll see you then,” I said. “Have a good day.”

“You too, Kathleen,” he said, and he was gone.

I went back to finish my breakfast. Owen and Hercules were sitting beside my chair like two adorable, well-behaved cats.

“I’m not fooled,” I said, picking up my spoon. “I know you heard enough to figure out that Marcus invited me for dinner, and I’m not taking either one of you.”

“Rrrow,” Hercules said. It seemed he wasn’t happy that Owen had been to Marcus’s house and he hadn’t. Or he might have been trying to point out the piece of yogurt-covered apple that had just fallen off my spoon onto the floor.

“Nice try,” I mumbled around a mouthful of granola. “But it’s not as though your brother had a five-course meal when he was visiting Marcus.” I glanced down at Owen, who was still in well-behaved mode. “And it’s not like he’ll be visiting again anytime soon. Emphasis on soon.”

Hercules poked the chunk of apple with a paw and then made a cranky face when he ended up with yogurt on his fur. He held up the sticky paw and glared at me, a sour expression on his face.

“It’s only a bit of yogurt,” I said. “From soy milk. Look.” I held up my spoon and licked the back of the bowl. “Lick it off your foot. You might like it. Abigail made it.”

He looked uncertainly at his paw, glanced over at the sink and then focused on me.

I shook my head. “No,” I said. “I’m not washing your feet again.”

He made annoyed noises in his throat. I figured he was probably muttering “Bite me” in cat. Then tentatively, he licked his paw. Then he licked it again. Then he looked up at me and made a hacking sound, like he was about to bring up a fur ball—or that tiny dab of yogurt.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” I said in exasperation. I stood up, went over to the cupboard and got the container of stinky crackers. “Here. Maybe this will get rid of the taste.”

Owen meowed, reminding me—as if I could forget—that he was here, too. “Yes, you can have one, too,” I said, leaning over to set the sardine cracker on the floor in front of him.

I went back to my breakfast, and it occurred to me that if I could keep Owen and Hercules from popping up—literally—somewhere they weren’t supposed to be and outing themselves and their talents to the world, I should be able to keep a police investigation from coming between Marcus and me.

Usually on Fridays I didn’t go down to the library until noon, but I’d changed shifts with Mary because of the upcoming food tasting, and since she hadn’t called, I was assuming she still wanted the time.

Eric dropped off Susan just as I was unlocking the library doors. “Hi, Kathleen,” the twins yelled, waving from the backseat. I waved back as Susan hurried up the stairs.

“Did you hear?” she asked.

“Hear what?” I said as I keyed in the code on the alarm pad.

“If you have to ask, then you didn’t.” She smiled. “The pitch to Legacy is still a go. One of the Scott brothers is coming for the tasting and the art show.”

“That’s good news,” I said.

“Yeah, it is,” Susan said, unzipping her jacket as she followed me inside. “Most of the work is already done. What’s the worst that can happen?”

Given that Mike Glazer’s body had been found in one of the tents that was going to be used as part of the presentation to Legacy Tours, I was pretty confident that the worst had already happened. “I forgot to ask you,” I said, switching on the downstairs lights. “What’s Eric making for the tasting?”

Susan grinned at me. “Three kinds of pudding cake—chocolate, apple spice, and lemon—and little mini muffins—cheddar and spinach, cinnamon streusel, blueberry, and ham and Swiss.”

I groaned. “You’re making me hungry.”

“Eric said you’d say that.” Susan held up her fabric tote. “That’s why he sent a little care package.” She held the top of the bag open, and I looked inside. It was actually a big care package, assuming all the food was staying at the library.

“Your husband is wonderful,” I said.

“Yeah, he is pretty great,” she agreed as we headed for the stairs. “He snores, but I kick, so it all works out.”

I dropped my things in my office while she headed for the staff room. The coffee was started, and Susan was putting a selection of muffins on a glass plate when I got there. There was a metal crochet hook skewered through her updo.

“Susan, why do you have a crochet hook in your hair?” I asked.

She pushed her dark-framed glasses up on her nose and put two mugs on the table. “I couldn’t exactly leave it lying around the house,” she said. “The boys would put someone’s eye out with it.”

She was right about that. The twins were scary smart. Literally. They generally used their smarts to do something involving heights and electrical appliances.

“I didn’t know you crocheted,” I said.

Susan gave a snort of laughter. “I don’t. Abigail is trying to teach me how to make a scarf, but let’s just say it’s not going well and leave it at that.”

I looked at her, eyebrows raised. She sighed and inclined her head toward her bag, hanging on the back of a chair at the end of the table. “Take a look,” she said.

I set the bag on the table, reached inside and pulled out a tangle of soft, cranberry-colored yarn that filled both my hands. “It’s not that bad,” I said. “All you need to do is wind this into a ball and you can start your scarf.”

She turned from the counter, coffeepot in her hand. “Kathleen, that is the scarf.”

My cheeks reddened. “Oh. Well, it’s soft.”

Susan filled my mug and pushed it toward me. “It’s a mess.”

“It’s not that bad,” I said, turning the clump of wool over in my hands. “It’s just kind of twisty.”

She filled her own cup and put the pot back. “It’s supposed to be that way. It’s one of those spiral scarves—you know, with a ruffled edge.” She made a circular motion with one finger.

“Well, at least you got that part right,” I said.

Susan started to laugh. “Honestly, Kathleen, I appreciate the fact that you always say something nice, but that is not a spiral scarf. It’s not any kind of scarf. It’s a tangle of yarn that might make a good bird’s nest, but that’s about it.”

I handed the scarf back to her and she stuffed it back in her bag. “Maybe you’d be better at knitting,” I suggested, eyeing the muffins, wondering which one I should try first.

“Maybe I’d be better at buying a scarf,” she said. She pointed at the plate. “Try that one. It’s ham and Swiss. I think you’ll like it.”

I bit into the muffin and made a little moan of happiness. “Could we just keep the doors locked and maybe stay here and eat muffins all morning?”

Susan shook her head. “We have a ninth-grade English class coming for a tour at nine thirty. You have five minutes to eat as many muffins as you can, and then it’s time to get this show on the road.”

It turned out I could eat three of the tiny muffins in five minutes. Then Susan and I went downstairs to open the building for the day.

It was a busy morning. It seemed like half of Mayville Heights had run out of reading and viewing material, and the ninth-grade class had dozens of questions about the reference section. I was glad I’d asked Abigail to come in early. Things finally eased off about twelve thirty.

I found Abigail still in the reference section, reshelving some books. “You were great with that class,” I said. “Thank you.”

She smiled. “It was fun. They asked some great questions.”

I smiled back at her. “They were trying to stump you.”

“I know.” Her hair, red-gold shot with streaks of silver, was in its usual braid, and she flipped it over her shoulder. “That’s exactly the kind of thing I used to do when I was that age, so I can pretty much guess what the questions will be.”

“Susan told me you’re trying to teach her how to crochet.”

Abigail laughed. “You’ve heard the expression ‘all thumbs’?” she asked.

“I have,” I said, reaching down to line up the spines of three dictionaries on a lower shelf.

“If we could get to that point, I’d be happy.”

“She showed me the scarf,” I said.

Abigail shook her head. “I have no idea what the problem is. She’s working at it and I’m watching every stitch. I glance away for a second or two, and it goes from a scarf to something that looks like Medusa’s head.” She brushed lint off the front of her sweater. “That doesn’t mean I’m giving up, though.”

“I didn’t think you would,” I said. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a woman coming toward us.

Abigail caught sight of her and smiled. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said to me. “I want you to meet my friend Georgia.”

Georgia Tepper was about my height, with jet-black hair cut shorter than Maggie’s. She had long, strong fingers, I noticed as Abigail introduced us and we shook hands.

“Georgia is one of the vendors for the food tasting,” Abigail said.

“You’re Sweet Things,” I said, realizing I’d heard Maggie mention her name—and rave about the maple cream cupcakes she’d made for the reception after the final concert of the Wild Rose Summer Music Festival. I’d been in Boston and missed the festival.

Georgia smiled. “Yes, I am.”

Abigail nudged me with her shoulder. “And she’s doing some of the baking at Fern’s, too.” Fern’s was the fifties diner where I’d had breakfast with Burtis Chapman. “You’ll love her devil’s food cupcakes.” She knew about my penchant for anything chocolate. “With dark-chocolate frosting and bittersweet shavings,” she added with a sly grin.

“You’ll be my first stop,” I promised Georgia.

“Wait a minute,” Abigail said. “Does that mean the food tasting is still on?”

Georgia and I both nodded.

“That’s great,” Abigail said. Her gaze shifted to Georgia. “So you’re not dropping out?”

“No, I’m not,” she said. She flushed and gave me an embarrassed look. “I was thinking about not doing the tasting, but I’m a new business and this is a great opportunity for me.”

“And now that Mike Glazer is . . . well, gone, things should run a little more smoothly,” Abigail said. She shrugged her shoulders and looked from Georgia to me. “I mean no disrespect, but from what I heard, he was making everything—the food tasting and the art show—difficult.”

“I know,” I said, nodding slowly. “I heard that he was . . . challenging to work with.”

Georgia’s cheeks got pinker. “Mr. Glazer had some very strong ideas about how things should be done. He said that chocolate was so last year. He wanted me to make something trendy like peanut butter jalapeño cupcakes.”

Abigail made a face. “Peanut butter and jalapeño cupcakes. For that fiery sensation that sticks to the roof of your mouth? I don’t think so. Trendy isn’t what people are looking for when they come here.”

“What are people looking for when they come to Mayville Heights?” I asked.

“Clean air, gorgeous scenery and charming eccentrics like me,” she retorted. Her stomach growled before I could answer. “And good food,” she added, patting her middle.

“Go have lunch,” I said. “Everything’s under control here.” I smiled at Georgia. “I’m glad we met.”

“Me too,” she said. “I’ll see you at the tasting. I’ll save you a chocolate cupcake.”

I headed for the checkout desk, where Susan was answering the phone.

Mary was just coming in. “Hi,” she said, walking over to me. “You can go for lunch anytime.”

“Thanks,” I said. “How was your morning?”

She set her quilted bag on the counter. “Very good. Burtis made some adjustments to the tents, and we have more than half the stalls set up in the second one.” She laced her fingers together on top of the bag. “Go have some lunch, Kathleen,” she said. “Susan and I have things under control.”

Susan leaned over, resting her head against Mary’s arm, and they gave me the same kind of faux-innocent look that Owen and Hercules sometimes used. It didn’t fill me with any more confidence than I had when the cats did it.

“That’s what scares me just a little,” I said, holding up my right thumb and forefinger about an inch apart.

They both smirked at me.

“I’m going upstairs to get my purse and my sweater,” I said. “I’ll be at Maggie’s studio if you need me.” I started for the stairs. “Don’t do anything outlandish to my library while I’m gone,” I warned. I was only half joking.

“Would we do that?” Mary asked. I knew she was pretending to talk to Susan even though she’d raised her voice a little so I’d hear her.

“Yes,” I answered, not bothering to turn around.

“Well, not on purpose,” Susan called after me.

I let that one go.

The sun was shining and there were just a few fluffy clouds, looking like puffs of cotton, floating in the blue sky overhead. I walked over to River Arts, glad to have the time to stretch my legs. Maggie was waiting for me at the back door. “Hi,” she said. “Roma called. She can’t make it. She has to do emergency surgery on a golden retriever. But she did get the keys to Wisteria Hill.”

“That’s good,” I said. “I’m so glad the place isn’t going to be turned into a subdivision.”

Maggie nodded. “Me too. So how was your morning?”

“Busy,” I said. “I think half of Mayville Heights was looking for something to read.”

“Good,” she said as we headed up the stairs to her top-floor studio. “That means the user numbers will be up, and Everett and the board will be so impressed, they’ll offer you whatever you want to sign a new contract and stay.”

Maggie was waging an unapologetic campaign to convince me to stay in Mayville Heights. Truth be told, it made me feel good that she cared so much.

“How was your morning?” I asked.

“Also busy,” she said, glancing back over her shoulder at me. “You must have heard by now everything’s a go.”

“I did.”

“Liam had to change the date to a week from this coming Monday instead of Sunday, but otherwise we’re still on schedule.”

“So Liam saved the day.”

“He really did,” she said.

We came out into the top hallway and started down to Maggie’s studio.

“And will he be appropriately rewarded?” I asked.

Maggie rolled her eyes at me. “Maybe by the town council, but not by me. I told you, there’s nothing serious between us. We’re mostly just friends.”

I stopped and put both hands on my hips. “Oh, c’mon, Mags,” I said. “Liam is funny, he’s smart, he’s working on a PhD and this proposal for Legacy Tours, he’s still tending bar and he’s majorly cute.”

“Majorly cute?”

“We had a ninth-grade class in this morning for a tour,” I said. “I picked up a few phrases to expand my vocabulary.”

She pulled her keys out of her pocket. “Yes, Liam is smart, and he makes me laugh, and he is, as you put it, ‘majorly cute,’ but we’re just friends. You’re wasting your time if you’re trying to play matchmaker.” She opened the studio door and I followed her inside.

“Why is it that all the times I told you that you were wasting your time playing matchmaker with Marcus and me, you just ignored me?”

The high worktable in the center of the room was set with two place mats and cutlery. I pulled out a stool and sat down while Maggie plugged in the kettle and started taking food out of her little refrigerator. “That’s different,” she said, moving between the table and the fridge.

I leaned an elbow on the paint-spattered tabletop and propped my head on my hand. “Why? Because it’s you?”

“No,” she said. “Well, yes, at least partly.” Her expression turned serious. “I’m good at this kind of thing. I got Roma and Eddie together.”

“That was an accident,” I protested. “People saw Roma with the mannequin you made and thought she was dating the real Eddie. He never would have gotten in touch with her if it hadn’t been for that.”

Maggie set a large bowl on the table between our plates. She’d made her pasta salad with sun-dried tomatoes. It was one of my favorites. “Exactly,” she said. “Roma ended up with the real Eddie because of the Eddie I made. The universe was working through me.”

I would have laughed at that, but I knew she was serious. “You said ‘partly,’” I said. “What’s the other part?”

“You and Marcus are perfect for each other. You’re yin and yang.” She added hot water to her teacup and brought it over to the table.

I groaned. “Oh, please don’t say we’re soul mates. I don’t want to lose my appetite before I’ve even had one bite.”

Maggie slipped onto the stool opposite me. “I’m not saying that,” she said.

I knew that didn’t mean she wasn’t thinking it. “I’m officially changing the subject,” I said. “Let’s talk about the art show or the food tasting or the Gotta Dance reunion tour. They’ve added three more stops to the schedule.”

I glanced over at the Matt Lauer doll perched on a chair by the windows. I’d found the eight-inch-high knitted doll wearing a dark blue suit and a gray fedora in the same store where I’d bought the I Matt Lauer T-shirt. It seemed as though the Today Show host had a lot of fans in Boston.

“There are rumors that as a former Gotta Dance champion, Matt’s going to join the others for a few dates to show off his moves,” I said.

“I know.” Maggie made a face. “But they aren’t coming anywhere close to here, and so far Matt hasn’t said for sure that he is going to be part of the tour.”

“Maybe that’s for the best,” I said.

“You’re just saying that because the beefcake didn’t win the crystal trophy.”

The “beefcake” was Kevin Sorbo, aka Hercules from the syndicated TV show Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, and Gotta Dance runner-up to Matt Lauer. I shook my head. “No, I’m saying it because I’m pretty sure if we went to see Matt Lauer in person, you would rush the stage and end up in jail, and I’d have to call my so-called soul mate to pull some strings to get you out.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Maggie said. Then she laughed.

I grinned at her across the table. “Okay, let’s talk about the art show and the food tasting. Things really are going okay?”

She set down her fork, and a shadow slid across her face. “Uh-huh. They’re just better overall. I’m sorry to say it, but Mike rubbed people the wrong way. Now Liam’s basically in charge. Alex isn’t going to have his fingers all over everything the way Mike did.” She shrugged. “Liam says it’s far from a done deal, though.”

“I’ll keep my fingers crossed,” I said. I speared another corkscrew of pasta. “I met Georgia Tepper this morning.”

“You’re going to love her cupcakes,” Maggie said, taking a sip of her tea.

“She said Mike told her chocolate was ‘last year,’” I said. I waved my fork at her. “This is good, by the way.”

Maggie smiled. “I’m glad you like it.” She frowned at her tea, got up and rummaged in the old pie safe until she found a small container of honey. “Yeah, Mike wanted Georgia to make some kind of ‘in’ cupcake with chili peppers or jalapeños. He told Mary white tablecloths were a throwback to the fifties, and I don’t know what the heck he said to Burtis to aggravate him.”

“Burtis is not someone you want to be on the bad side of,” I commented.

“True,” Mags said, drizzling a little honey into her tea. “But it was Georgia who almost took a swing at Mike with a serving tray.”

“You’re kidding,” I said.

She twisted her mouth to one side. “I’m not.”

Before I could ask her for more details, there was a knock on the half-open door and Ruby poked her head in. “Hi,” she said. “Got a minute?” She was looking directly at me when she asked the question.

“Sure,” I said, setting my fork down again.

“Could I paint Owen?”

“You mean the same way you’re doing with Hercules?”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

“That’s a great idea,” Maggie said, putting a little more pasta salad in her bowl. “Are you thinking of letting them go to auction as a set, or as two individual paintings?”

Ruby wrinkled her nose in thought. “I’m leaning toward listing them separately just because I think that’ll bring in more money for Cat People. What do you think?”

“Oh, definitely,” Mags said, waving her fork like a flag. “Are you going to do a frame?”

I leaned sideways so I was a little more in Ruby’s line of vision. “You can paint Owen. It’s fine with me.”

Ruby nodded and waved her hand absently at me. “I went with metal the last time, but I’m thinking about a black floater frame.”

Okay, so she wasn’t talking to me.

Maggie frowned. “What about charcoal instead of black?”

Neither was Maggie.

Ruby nodded slowly. “That might work. I don’t want a frame that screams ‘Look at me!’”

I leaned a little farther sideways and waved my arms in the air, kind of like I was a flag person on a highway construction crew. “Hello,” I said.

They both looked at me then. “Do you need something?” Maggie asked.

“Yes,” I said, sinking back on my stool. “I need to tell Ruby that she can paint Owen.”

Ruby and Mags exchanged glances. “I did get that,” Ruby said. “Thank you.”

“Anything else?” Maggie said. I might have been imagining the tiny hint of impatience in her voice.

“I could bring Owen down first thing tomorrow morning before the library opens, if that works,” I added.

“That’ll work,” Ruby said.

I turned to Maggie and made a move-along gesture with one hand. “I’m done.”

“Thank you,” she said. No, that wasn’t impatience I was hearing; it was a tiny bit of sarcasm.

Mags and Ruby went back to discussing possibilities for framing the cat portraits, and I went back to my pasta salad. By the time they had settled on a charcoal frame, I was done eating. I stretched my arms up over my head, which caught Maggie’s attention.

“Do you have room for a cup of hot chocolate?” she asked. “I have more of those homemade marshmallows you like.”

I glanced at my watch. “Okay,” I said. It was chocolate. I didn’t need much persuading.

She looked at Ruby. “Rube? Hot chocolate? With marshmallows from the farmers’ market?”

Ruby smiled. “Mmm, that sounds good.”

Maggie got up to put the kettle back on and get out the mugs and cocoa.

“How’s the setup going for the art show?” I asked Ruby.

“Better,” she said, leaning her elbows on the table.

“Let me guess,” I said. “You had problems with Mike Glazer as well.” There seemed to be no shortage of people who did.

Ruby slid her bracelets along her arm and sighed. “Kathleen, I think everyone had problems with Mike. If he hadn’t died when he did, I swear someone would have smacked him with a two-by-four by now.” She shrugged. “Maybe me. Or Burtis. Wednesday night, Burtis was pounding in tent pegs with a sledgehammer and there was a moment when I actually thought he was going to take a swing at Mike.”

“It’s sad,” Maggie said. “He spent the last days of his life arguing with people.”

I thought about Wren Magnusson’s face when she came into the library. She seemed to be the only person who really felt bad about Mike Glazer’s death. “What was Mike like when he was younger?” I asked.

Ruby smiled a thank-you as Mags set a steaming mug in front of her. “I don’t know. He was older and we didn’t have any of the same friends.”

Maggie handed me a cup and sat down holding her own hot chocolate. I snapped the lid of the marshmallow container open and held it out to Ruby, snagging a couple for myself. They smelled like spun sugar and vanilla.

“He was the kind of guy everyone liked, pretty much,” Maggie said. “Popular, smart enough to do well in school without having to work very hard.” She reached for the marshmallows, popped one in her cup and after a second’s thought dropped in two more.

I leaned my forearms on the table and laced my fingers around my mug. “So when he came back a few days ago, he was different?” I said.

She nodded. “It was like he had something to prove.”

“Maybe he did,” I said.

“Small-town boy makes good?” Ruby asked. “You really think it was that old cliché?”

I shrugged. “Things become clichés for a reason: because they happen a lot.”

“So you don’t think he’d been taken over by a malevolent entity or replaced by an evil twin?” Ruby asked, eyes twinkling.

“Probably not,” I said.

Ruby told me a little more about some of the artwork that was going to be on display and then available for sale online. I really hoped everything worked out.

I finished the last of my hot chocolate and stood up. “Thank you. Lunch was delicious,” I told Maggie. “But I need to get back to the library.”

She wrapped me in a hug. “Anytime,” she said. “I wish Roma could have made it.”

“Maybe we could have dinner sometime next week.”

“Good idea.”

I tugged on my sweater and slipped my purse over my shoulder. “I’ll see you in the morning,” I said to Ruby.

She smiled. “Thanks for letting me paint the cats. Tell Owen I have fish crackers.”

I grinned back. “And Maggie right across the hall. Two of Owen’s favorite things in the same place. You might never get rid of him.”

I gave them both a little wave and headed out. As I came level with the tents set up by the Riverwalk, I felt a chill, like a cold finger trailing up my spine. What was going to happen when everyone found out Mike Glazer’s death hadn’t been an accident? Because no matter what Roma said, I couldn’t shake the feeling it hadn’t been.