Hooked On A Feline

chapter 11

I was sitting at the kitchen table with Owen on my lap, eating a toasted bagel topped with tomato slices when Marcus called with the news. “You were right,” I said.

“It might have been better if I’d been wrong.” I heard the squeak of his desk chair. “Now I have two murder cases and no idea if they’re connected or not.”

“You’ll figure it out,” I said. Owen bobbed his head seemingly in agreement. “Owen and I have faith in you.”

He laughed. “Well, then, how can I go wrong?”

Midmorning I got a call from Mike Bishop’s office. It was the office manager, Caroline. I’d been expecting to hear from her ever since I’d talked to Maggie.

“Hi, Kathleen,” she said. “I see from our records that you were coming back for a recheck on the tooth where we did the root canal. I don’t mean to push you but I was wondering what you want to do.”

“I don’t really know,” I said, dropping onto the footstool. “What are my options?”

“Well, there are several endodontists in Minneapolis. We could forward your records to one of them and I’m sure they would check the tooth for you. Is it giving you any trouble?”

Owen came down the stairs and over to me, looking quizzically at the phone.

“It’s not. I don’t have any pain at all now.”

“Then you’d probably be okay not having it checked. It was just something Dr. B. liked to do.”

“He was very conscientious,” I said.

“Yes, he was.” Caroline cleared her throat. “So I could just send your records over to your regular dentist. I can tell you that we know of an endodontist who is planning on setting up a practice here in Mayville Heights, probably this winter. If you did have any problems down the road and you didn’t want to drive to Minneapolis, that would be an option.”

Owen jumped onto my lap and pushed his face close to the receiver. I shifted him sideways and he gave me a sour look.

“I’m not sure what to do,” I said. “That tooth gave me so much trouble before the root canal—”

“You’re afraid something’s going to go wrong again.”

“Yes,” I said. “I know how silly that sounds.”

“It’s not silly at all,” Caroline said. “I have a suggestion. Why don’t you stop by the office sometime? Lorraine is here. You could ask her any questions you have. That might help you make up your mind.” Lorraine was one of the dental assistants in the practice. She was kind and very reassuring.

“I could stop in on my way to the library just before lunch.”

“We’ll see you then,” she said.

Owen looked from the phone to me as I hung up.

“I’m going to stop at Mike’s office,” I said. “Teeth stuff.”

He made a face. Owen hated having his teeth cleaned.

“Maybe I’ll learn something useful.”

The cat gave a noncommittal murp and followed me out to the kitchen.

“What do you think?” I asked. “Is Marcus right? Is there some kind of connection between Mike’s and Leitha’s deaths or is it just one weird coincidence?”

He seemed to think about my words for a minute; then he blinked his golden eyes at me. Okay, so he wasn’t sure, either.

I poured a cup of coffee, and when I turned around again, Owen was sitting on my chair, eyeing the laptop that was on the table. Roma had sent the photos from the concert and I wanted to take a look at them. Apparently, Owen did as well.

I set my coffee on the table, well away from the computer, scooped up the cat and sat down. He looked over my shoulder at the toaster and then looked at me.

“We don’t need toast and peanut butter,” I said.

The photos were terrific. There were two of Marcus and me from the side. We were holding hands while I leaned against his arm. There were three of Roma and me singing along with the band, arms across each other’s shoulders. In one of the shots Eddie had taken of Mary and Marcus dancing, he’d caught her in midtwirl.

“I think that’s my favorite,” I said, pointing at the screen.

Owen’s response was to put a paw on the keyboard and suddenly we were looking at an image of Maggie. “Merow!” he said. It was clear which photo was his favorite.

Roma had included several shots of the band. I smiled as I scrolled through the pictures and felt my throat tighten over an image of Mike and Harry grinning at each other as they played.

It wasn’t fair. Mike had been one of the good guys. When I got to the library, he should be there flirting with the ladies in the Seniors’ Book Club and laughing about some family scandal he’d uncovered with Abigail.

“We have to find the person who did this,” I said to Owen.

He nuzzled my chin. He was in.

I decided I’d eat once I got to the library, so I packed my lunch and drove down to Mike Bishop’s office. Caroline was at the reception desk.

“Hi, Kathleen,” she said. “I’ll let Lorraine know you’re here.”

I took a seat in the waiting room. Lorraine appeared a couple of minutes later. She smiled when she caught sight of me. She was short and curvy and seemed to smile all the time. She had gorgeous red curls that she generally wore in a high ponytail. Before today I didn’t think I’d ever seen her in the office with her hair down.

“How are you?” I asked.

Her mouth twisted to one side. “Still a bit in shock like everyone else.” She looked around. “It seems so quiet in here. I’m still having trouble with the idea that the concert was the last time I’m ever going to see Mike.”

She swallowed and I reached over and put a hand on her arm for a moment.

“The concert was incredible,” I said.

Lorraine’s smile returned. “It’s funny. That Thursday Mike was just about bouncing all around the office and I chalked it up to him being a bit wired about Johnny Rock performing again. I had no idea we were going to see the band. I can’t believe he managed to keep it all secret, because trust me, he was lousy at keeping secrets.”

“But we really should have guessed,” Caroline said.

Lorraine and I both turned to look at her.

“What makes you say that?” I asked.

Caroline gestured at the computer. “Mike was insistent that he had to leave on time on both Wednesday and Thursday. I had to schedule anything that had the possibility of running late for earlier in the day. More than once he missed lunch to get caught up. I can’t believe that it never entered my mind that the band was getting back together.”

Lorraine went over my options again and I decided to have my records sent to my regular dentist for now. “I don’t think you’re going to have any problems with that tooth,” she said, “but if you do, any of the endodontists in Minneapolis are good.”

I thanked her for her help and headed for the library. Mary was at the circulation desk. I hadn’t seen her in a couple of days.

“You’re early,” she said.

I held up the cooler bag. “I had a stop to make, so I thought I’d have lunch here. Maybe out in the gazebo.” I pulled out my phone and brought up the photos of her and Marcus. “Eddie took these,” I said. “Roma is going to send you copies.”

“I look pretty good,” Mary said. “And that guy of yours is a real hottie.”

I felt my cheeks getting red. “I’m just going to pretend you didn’t say that,” I said.

Mary laughed; then her expression became serious. “I heard the news about Leitha Anderson’s death. And I’ve already talked to Marcus.”

“Was there really anyone who would have wanted Leitha dead? I know she was—”

“Arrogant, rude, condescending?” Mary finished. “A lot of people might have wished she wasn’t around, but as far as actually killing her? I don’t think so. There’s a big difference between wishing someone were dead and actually making it happpen.” She picked up a pen and tapped it on the desk. “Leitha just had a way of getting under people’s skin. The day she was here, the day she died, she was annoyed at me because I could show the Finnamores had very little to do with settling the town. And Lordy, she was constantly nitpicking with Mike when he was alive because she wanted him to settle down and make little Finnamore babies.”

“Do you think it bothered him?” I asked.

Mary gave a snort of laughter. “Not in the slightest. I remember her complaining that he didn’t think about how his choices in his personal life affected her. She was always disappointed because Jonas wasn’t a biological Finnamore—or as she put it, a ‘real’ Finnamore—like anyone cared. Before she died she was even butting in on where Lachlan was going to go to college and what he was going to study.”

“It really mattered to her?”

“You’d better believe it did,” she said, tapping the pen again for emphasis. “She wanted him to go into medicine or business, which is what the Finnamore men do. The Finnamore name and its legacy were the most important things to Leitha. From what I’ve heard, it was the same way with Leitha’s grandfather, so she got it honestly. The two disappointments in the family were Mike working on people’s teeth and Jonas becoming a college professor and PhD. Those were not the career paths she had chosen for them.”

I shook my head. “It sounds exhausting.”

“I think in some ways it was more exhausting for her.”

“What happened to Lachlan’s parents,” I asked. “I know they were killed in an accident but I don’t know any of the details.”

Mary shook her head. “That was before you got here. It was heartbreaking. They were on their way back from Minneapolis and hit a patch of black ice that spun them into the path of a furniture delivery truck. Colin was killed outright. The driver of the truck and Ainsley were badly injured. The truck driver had to have his left leg amputated below the knee, but he did recover. Ainsley spent months in a coma before she died. Lachlan was just eleven. Luckily, he had stayed with Jonas. And I have to give credit where credit is due, for all of Leitha’s abrasive ways, she rallied around the child just the way everyone else did.”

It was good to hear the woman had had a heart after all. I hadn’t really seen that.

I dropped my things in my office and had my lunch outside in the gazebo. Marcus called to say he was on his way to Minneapolis to talk to the doctor heading the cardiac study again.

“I don’t know when I’ll get back,” he said.

“I love you,” I said. “Drive safe.”

I wasn’t that hungry when I got home, so I toasted another bagel, cut a slice of cheddar and poured a glass of lemonade, promising myself I’d eat extra vegetables tomorrow.

The house felt warm and stuffy. I took my food and the laptop and went to sit in the backyard. I was halfway through my bagel, looking at the concert photos again when Hercules came though the porch door. Literally. He walked across the grass, sat at my feet and meowed. I patted my lap. “You can come up.”

He meowed again.

“You’re perfectly capable of jumping,” I said. “It’s not that far.”

He still didn’t move.

“I guess you don’t want a bit of cheese, then.”

He was on my lap almost before I got the words out, his black-and-white face looming in front of mine. I broke off a tiny bite of cheese and handed it to him. He murped a thank-you and ate it. Then he poked at my legs until he was settled in to look at the computer screen with me.

I scrolled through the photos so the cat could see all of them and I told him about my visit to Mike’s office and about what I’d learned from Mary. He tipped his head to one side as though he were thinking about everything I’d said. Then he swiped a paw at the touch pad and a shot of Mike and Harry filled the screen. He turned to look at me as though he expected me to do or say something.

I studied the photo but saw nothing that would help figure out who had killed Mike. “I know you’re not trying to suggest that Harry is the killer, so I don’t see what you want me to see,” I said.

I moved on to one of the images of Roma and me, arms over each other’s shoulders. When I took a drink from my lemonade, Hercules managed to go back to the photo of Harry and Mike. I had a cat with computer skills that were better than those some people had.

I narrowed my gaze at him. “Quit it!” I said.

He gave a huff of impatience.

I broke the last little piece of cheese in half and gave one piece to him. I ate the other one. “Sometimes I wish you could talk,” I said.

He made an indignant meow.

“Talk in a language I understand, I mean.” I looked at the image on the laptop and thought about how much fun Mike and Harry had been having that night and how magical it had been to be there.

Hercules peered into my lemonade, wrinkled his nose and then began to wash his face, shooting looks at the computer and me from time to time. Whatever I was supposed to see, I didn’t. Or maybe the cat wasn’t trying to show me anything.

“The guys worked so hard to make it a surprise,” I said. “And if anyone did guess, those people kept it to themselves.”

“I’m pretty sure the old man figured it out, although he said he didn’t,” Harry had said when he’d told me about Mike being out at the house every Thursday night for weeks. “Monday through Wednesday he worked later at the office and Friday night he was checking out new music somewhere in the area. . . . Eventually, we worked things out so the others could join in on Zoom.”

Johnny had told me how odd it felt not to be getting together online with the others anymore on Thursday nights.

Thursday. Not Wednesday. Thursday.

“That’s not what Caroline told me,” I said slowly.

Hercules paused the face washing with one paw in midair. It almost seemed as though there was a look of anticipation on his face.

“Mike was insistent that he had to leave on time on Wednesday and Thursday. I had to schedule anything that had the possibility of running late for earlier in the day.” That’s what Caroline said: Wednesday and Thursday.

Hercules made a soft “mrr,” glanced at the screen and went back to washing his face with a murp. Had I stumbled on what he’d been trying to tell me?

A moth fluttered by only a couple of inches from the cat’s face. He leaped into the air, lost his balance and landed awkwardly—albeit upright—on the lawn. He gave himself a shake and looked kind of embarrassed. The moth was fine.

Was it possible that Mike Bishop was doing something on Wednesday nights that he didn’t want anyone to know about? I knew I needed to check with Harry and maybe the rest of the band to make sure he hadn’t been practicing on Wednesdays, too. Was I on to something? Or was my leap of logic as ungainly as Herc’s leap after that moth? Had Mike had a secret of his own?