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Scarlett’s frown indicated she wasn’t as excited as she could have been. Her next words confirmed this. “I think you’re nuts.”

“No, but it’s brilliant! We apply for a job, get hired, and that way we can look around, see for ourselves what’s going on, and give the kind of advice these people need and deserve.”

“And how are we going to get hired? We’re both senior citizens. And if you hadn’t noticed, job offers for our age bracket are pretty much non-existent.”

“We’ll do it like in that Nancy Meyers movie.”

“The Holiday? We switch places with some ditzy rich blonde?”

“No, the one with Robert De Niro and Anne Hathaway, where she hires him as her senior intern.” She spread her arms. “We’ll be senior interns atGlimmer! How cool is that!”

Scarlett’s initial reluctance to recognize the brilliance of her plan slightly melted. “That would be cool,” she admitted. “But how do you know this senior internship isn’t something that only exists in a Nancy Meyers movie?”

“Oh, who cares? If it doesn’t exist, it should exist, and if they won’t accept us, we’ll simply accuse them of ageism, and threaten to sue. And if that doesn’t work, we can always ask Dan to get in touch with whatever bozo is in charge of Advantage and put in a good word for us.”

“Mh,” said Scarlett, but Vesta could see she was warming to her idea. “I’ve always wanted to see what a company like Advantage looks like on the inside,” she said.

“And now you’ll get the chance.” She spread her arms. “We’re going to help out three people, Scarlett. Three unhappy souls. Now what can be more gratifying? And if we pull this off, we could make it a regular thing: drop in on the people writing us, and get some background information before writing up a column.”

“It almost sounds too good to be true,” said Scarlett wistfully, as she gave her friend a look of suspicion. “What’s the catch? Cause there has to be a catch, right?”

“No catch,” she assured her friend. “We’re simply going to spread some sweetness and light. Just like we always do. Only now we’ll do it as Dear Gabi!”

CHAPTER 6

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Marge Poole had just placed a copy of the latest bestseller—Heart ofa Turtle Dove—on the rack when a light cough made her jump. She clutched a hand to her heart. “You startled me,” she told Mrs. Samson, her oldest and best customer.

The elderly lady was holding a letter in her hand, and had a sort of feverish look in her eye. The same look she got when she was the first to snatch up a particularly spicy new novel that had just been added to the library’s collection.

“What have you got there?” asked Marge.

“It was in my mailbox just now,” said Mrs. Samson. “Even though it’s addressed to you. I hope you don’t mind, but I read it before I realized it wasn’t for me.”

“Addressed to me?” asked Marge with a frown as she accepted the letter from Mrs. Samson’s hand. “Who could have sent me a—” But then she recognized the handwriting. It was Tex’s. She quickly took out the letter and scanned it. Her heart sank like a stone. “But this is…” It was an old letter. One Tex had written when they first met in college. Back when his writing was still more or less readable, before medical school had its full effect, intent as it is on teaching young doctors how to stop writing in a legible way and adopt some obscure scrawl.

“It’s pretty spicy,” Mrs. Samson commented. “I especially like the way he compares certain parts of your anatomy to a peach. A ripe peach,” she added for good measure. Her eyes were shiny and very, very bright.

Color crept up Marge’s cheeks, and she felt her face and neck burn. “But how did—how could—where did this…” And then she remembered. Tex was clearing out the attic. He must have found a box of these old letters and… An image flashed before her mind’s eye of a troop of girl scouts gathered around the pile of stuff her husband had put out on the sidewalk. And more in particular a box of… letters! “God, no,” she groaned, closing her eyes in abject dismay. “Tell me he didn’t…”

“Looks like your husband wants the whole world to know how he feels about you,” said Mrs. Samson. “The hot stud.”

“Yes, well, these letters weren’t meant for the whole world to see.”

“There’s more?” asked Mrs. Samson, not hiding her excitement. “Can I read them?”

“These are my private letters, Margaret,” Marge explained. “They were never meant to be seen by anyone other than myself and my husband.”

“He’s got mad skillz, your husband,” commented the old lady. “This stuff is hotter thanFifty Shades of Grey. Are you sure his name isn’t Christian Grey?”

“Yes, I’m quite sure,” she said as she tucked the letter into the envelope again. She then placed a hand on Mrs. Samson’s shoulder. “Would you mind watching the library for half an hour, Margaret?”

“Oh, sure.” The old lady gave her a shrewd look. “On one condition.”

“Name it.”

“Give me another one of your husband’s hot letters to read? They’re so good.”

She grimaced.“I’ll see what I can do.”

She grabbed her phone, dumped it into her purse, hiked the latter up her shoulder, and was off on a light trot out the door.

She was a woman on a mission now: to retrieve as many letters as she could before the whole street got a collective heart attack and branded her with a scarlet letter!

As she hurried home, the first person she saw was Marcie Trapper. Her next-door neighbor was standing next to the mailbox, reading a letter, her cheeks flushed and her face contorted into a sort of crazy grimace. Before Marge could duck out of sight, Marcie looked up, and the two women’s eyes locked.

And as a grin slowly crept up Marcie’s face, Marge felt her legs go a little wobbly. She tried to remember what Tex had written in those letters of his, but it was such a long time ago—more than twenty-five years—that she simply couldn’t. If Mrs. Samson’s letter was anything to go by, though, it was pretty hot stuff!

“Now why is Tex sending me a letter postmarked twenty-seven years ago?” asked Marcie. “And full of some pretty sexy stuff? Is he having a MeToo moment?”

“No, he is not. If you look closely, you’ll see that the letter is actually not addressed to you, Marcie,” said Marge, trying to keep her cool, which under the circumstances was a tough proposition. “That letter was addressed to me, and was accidentally posted in your mailbox this morning.”

Marcie frowned at the letter.“Oh, I see,” she said with a touch of disappointment. “Marcie or Marge. It’s almost the same thing.”

“So can I have it back, please?” asked Marge, holding out her hand.

“Just a moment,” said Marcie, yanking the letter out of her reach. “When Tex writes, ‘I want to put my hot hands on your juicy, ripe—’”

“Yes, yes, yes!” said Marge. “I know what he wrote.” Even though she didn’t.

“He should have been a writer,” said Marcie. “He’s got the talent, you know.”

“Yes, I know,” said Marge. “Now can I have my letter back, please?”

Reluctantly, Marcie placed the letter in her hand.“But why did he post it in my mailbox, is what I would like to know. And I’m sure Ted would like to know, too.”

“Tex didn’t post it.”

“Oh, so you did?” asked Marcie, clutching a hand to her chest to gather her dress around herself, just in case Marge tried any funny business.

“No! Of course not!”

Marcie seemed hurt by this comment.“Nothing is impossible, you know. I mean, we have been neighbors for a long time, and I like to consider you a friend. And sometimes, between friends… feelings will develop. Feelings that are…” But when Marge just stared at her, she quickly collected herself. “Forget what I said.”

“Tex is clearing out the attic,” Marge said.

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me, Marge,” said Marcie, a little snippy.

“He must have accidentally put a box of these old letters outside, where a troop of girl scouts found it, and started distributing them along the street.”

“A troop of girl scouts did drop by earlier,” said Marcie, nodding. “I bought cookies from them. Very expensive they were, too. And not very tasty either.” Then she brightened. “Oh, I see what must have happened. They probably thought Bambi Wiggins accidentally dropped these while doing her rounds, and decided to give her a helping hand by putting them in their designated mailboxes.”

“Exactly,” said Marge, glad to have finally gotten the message across.

“Ted never wrote letters like that to me,” said Marcie, and there was a touch of disappointment in her voice. “You’re a lucky lady, Marge Poole.”

“I know,” said Marge. Though truth be told, she didn’t feel very lucky, knowing that perhaps a dozen more of her neighbors were reading her private letters at that exact moment, and probably wondering whether to file a MeToo complaint against Tex!

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Hampton Cove’s Christian Grey wannabe, meanwhile, was at work in his office, patiently listening to Ida Baumgartner, who was claiming against better advice that the red bump on her arm was skin cancer, and demanding that Tex launch a full investigation into the suspicious bump before it was too late!

And as Tex took a closer look at the offending bump, which was clearly a simple mole, and had no ambition, nor had it ever had the ambition, to be anything other than a simple mole, suddenly Ida took a letter out of her purse and started reading in a loud declamatory voice,“I want you. I’ve never wanted a woman more than I want you. I think about you day and night, and my dreams are even hotter than my thoughts. Oh, to feel your lips on my lips. To feel your burning body against mine! I count the days until we meet again… Marge!”

Tex, who’d been listening with mild interest, jerked up at the mention of his wife’s name. In fact he jerked so hard he felt a sudden twinge in his back and exclaimed, “Ouch!”

“Ouch, indeed!” Ida snapped. The older lady sat eyeing him with a disapproving eye, clutching her purse in her lap. “What’s the meaning of delivering a letter of such clearlypornographic nature in my mailbox, Doctor Poole?”

“But, but, but…” Tex stuttered.

“I found this piece of filth just before I set out for our appointment. At first I thought it must be some kind of joke, but then of course I recognized your handwriting, which is very distinctive. If you want to make advances, young man, I must warn you that I don’t take kindly to this kind ofunwanted attention!”

“But, but, but!”

“In fact I had a good mind to take this letter to the police, and file a complaint against you for sexual harassment!”

“But, but, but!!!”

Ida’s face softened. “But then I saw the date on the letter, which is dated twenty-seven years ago. And obviously since my name isn’t Marge, but your wife’s is, it soon became clear to me there must have been some terrible mistake. Either that, or you have gone completely mad!”

“But how did—I mean, where did… How could this…” He took the letter from his patient’s hands and studied it. And then it hit him. The attic! His cheeks flamed even as his Adam’s apple performed a series of light somersaults in his throat. He must have accidentally put out a box of hisletters, and somehow some prankster must have thought it funny to put them in mailboxes all across the neighborhood. “Oh, God,” he muttered, and groaned freely. And so he quickly proceeded to put Ida in possession of the sordid facts pertaining to the case.

Ida, who, in spite of her many ailments, was a tough cookie, showed that she also had a heart. She patted him lightly on the knee.“No need to be alarmed, Tex. It happens to the best of us. But mind that you don’t do it again, you hear? Not everyone is as liberal-minded as I am. Some people out there might take offense.”

He informed Ida that the suspicious spot was not suspicious at all, but all the while his mind was spinning out of control. How many letters were there? And how many neighbors had received them? Dozens? Hundreds? He remembered he’d been very active back in the day when he was courting Marge, the loveliest girl he’d ever met, and today still the most wonderful woman he’d ever known.

She’d be furious if she found out. Mad as a wet hen, in fact. And rightly so!

CHAPTER 7

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Margaret Samson, left alone to run the library in Marge’s absence, enjoyed the privilege of being able to stamp people’s library cards and give them reading advice in the process. An avid reader herself, she knew her way around the library, which was like her home away from home, its librarian a personal friend.

So when a man walked up to her, asking if she could give him some tips on what to put on his To Be Read pile, she kindly asked what type of book he favored.

“Oh, anything that adds a little spice to my life will do,” he said with a grin.

He was a handsome man, with a full crop of dark hair, graying at the temples, which gave him the distinguished look of a surgeon onGrey’s Anatomy, while at the same time sporting the build of a lifeguard. He was casually dressed in jeans and a sweater, and had one of those strong jawlines she liked so much in a man.

“I think I’ve got just the ticket for you, young man,” she said, as she reached for her phone and pulled up the letter Tex had written to his wife. “Now tell me if this isn’t spicy,” she said as she handed him the phone.

He scanned the letter, and much to her satisfaction almost immediately quirked an eyebrow.“Hot stuff,” he said appreciatively. “Who wrote this, you?”

“Nah,” she said. “You know Marge Poole? The librarian?”

“I’ve seen her around,” said the man. “Blond? Willowy?”

“Yeah, I’d describe her as willowy,” said Margaret as she eyed the man closely. “Why? She your type, Mr…”

“Rapp,” said the guy. “Gary Rapp. She could be my type,” he said. “But I thought she was married to some doctor?”

“Not for long, she won’t be,” said Margaret with a low chuckle.

“Trouble in paradise, huh?”

“Isn’t there always?” She might love a good Happy Ever After in the romance novels she read on a daily basis, but she was no fool. No woman likes it when her husband of twenty-five years puts the love letters he once sent out for trash collection. That’s just wrong. And besides, Tex had always struck her as an idiot.

Just then, the lady under discussion walked in, a harried look on her face.

“Hey, Marge,” said Margaret. “I want you to meet Gary. Gary, meet Marge.”

“Hey, there, Marge,” said Gary, putting that unctuous spin in his voice only the best ones can. “Margaret was just telling me what a great librarian you are.”

“She was? Why, thanks, Margaret.”

“Did you get your letters back?” asked Margaret, darting a quick look to Gary to see how he would respond. The man’s eyes lit up at the memory of that letter. Clearly his interest was piqued. Oh, how she loved to play matchmaker!

“Not yet,” said Marge. “But I’m going to.”

“Marge’s husband put his love letters in the trash,” Margaret explained, and watched Marge wince. “Now I’m asking you, what kind of a husband does that?”

“I’m sure it was just an innocent mistake,” said Marge, as her eyes flicked to Gary and away again.

“If a woman wrote me a letter like that, I’d treasure it for the rest of my life,” Gary assured them.

“It wasn’t actually me who wrote it,” said Marge.

“Oh?”

“See, Tex wrote the letters and I wrote him back, and I put the ones he sent me in a box and kept them, while he managed to lose the ones I wrote him.”

Margaret shook her head and tsk-tsked freely.“Lost them. How about that?”

“I hope you get them all back,” said Gary. “It’s terrible when you lose a personal memento like that. Especially through no fault of your own.”

“Yeah, it’s not a pleasant experience,” said Marge. “But let’s not dwell on it.”

“No, let’s not,” Gary agreed.

“Gary likes to read spicy novels,” said Margaret, sensing that the conversation might come to a standstill. “Exactly my kind of novel, in other words.”

“Oh, you read romance?” asked Marge.

“Yeah, I do,” said Gary, giving her a half-smile. “Unusual for a guy, I know.”

“Oh, no. You’d be surprised how many men actually read romance.”

“You’re kidding. Really?”

“Really. So you’re not alone, Gary.”

“Maybe you could show Gary around the library?” Margaret goaded. “He’s in search of some fresh reading material, and no one gives better advice than you.”

“Of course. Absolutely,” said Marge, always ready to assist a customer.

And as they went off, chatting amiably amongst themselves, Margaret nodded knowingly to herself. The first hurdle a couple must take had been successfully taken. The part where they meet for the first time and feel that spark. And that a spark had been felt was a certainty for this old hand at the romance game.

Tex Poole would rue the day he put those letters in the trash!

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One of the perks of being a reporter is that you don’t have to punch in at nine o’clock or out at five. And since Odelia’s husband was a detective and he, too, could be flexible with his work schedule, the couple now stood in the entrance hall of the daycare center where they had just dropped off Grace.

Fortunately for them, their little girl was a sociable and happy child, who loved nothing better than to make new friends. And as they waved goodbye to their darling sweetheart, Grace didn’t even give them the time of day, engrossed as she was in a deep conversation with a friend, mommy and daddy already forgotten.

What the two toddlers were saying to each other, exactly, was a mystery to anyone, as it amounted to nothing more than disjointed sounds and nonsense words. But apparently, and in their very own way, they managed to communicate.

“I hate to leave her here,” said Odelia, who only now noticed how her husband had a big smile on his face. So big, in fact, that he looked a little ridiculous.

“We can’t always ask your gran to babysit, babe,” said Chase. “Or your mom and dad. They have their own stuff to do.”

“Yeah, I know. But still.”

He placed an arm around her shoulders.“And look at the bright side: they say that kids who go to daycare and learn to socialize end up doing a lot better in school and also in life.”

“I guess,” she said. But she still missed her baby girl. If possible, she would take her along everywhere she went, but she knew that simply wasn’t possible.

“Cheer up, babe!” said Chase, that rictus grin apparently a fixture on his face. “Grace is healthy, happy and she’s got a great future ahead of her and so have we!”

She frowned at her hubby.“Is everything all right with you, babe?”

“Of course! Everything is great! Everything is amazing! Wonderful!”

“Easy there, tiger. You’re starting to sound like Tony Robbins there.”

“Oh, wow. What a compliment. What a great thing to say! You’re making me so happy right now!” And he actually gave her two thumbs up to go with the crazy smile.

She shook her head, but decided not to pry. If she didn’t know any better, she would have thought he was high on some illegal substance, but she knew Chase wasn’t into drugs. He didn’t even smoke or drink. Most likely he was trying to make her feel better about leaving Grace at the daycare center. Which was so sweet of him.

“It’ll be fine,” she said, glancing back at their little girl one last time. She said it as much to Chase as to herself, trying to drown out the little voice that told her she was a bad mother for putting her kid in daycare. “It’ll be just fine.”

CHAPTER 8

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When you’ve lived in the Poole household for as long as I have, you come to expect the unexpected at every turn of your existence. And let me tell you: a quiet existence it is not!

Take today, for instance. When I woke up at the foot of Odelia and Chase’s bed that morning, little did I know that it wouldn’t be a day like other days. Oh, sure, it started out that way, with Grace letting all and sundry know that she was awake and expecting to be fed posthaste, and Chase and Odelia occupying the bathroom to get themselves ready to face another day.

“Why don’t humans simply lick themselves clean, Max?” asked Dooley when Odelia came hurrying out of the bathroom, her wet hair wrapped in a towel on top of her head, and went in search of some necessary undergarments.

“I don’t think they’re quite limber enough to reach every part of their anatomy,” I said, having given this matter some serious thought in the past. “And also, they don’t have the patience to apply their tongues to so much acreage.”

Humans are busy people, you see, always rushing off somewhere and trying to squeeze as much activity into every single minute of every single day as humanly possible. They lack the patience to spend hours grooming themselves, like cats do.

Ordinarily Dooley and I ride with Odelia to work and spend the day in her office, or out and about interviewing people, and sometimes even solving the odd mystery. Today was going to be different, though, as Odelia explained to us once Grace had been fed and dressed and ready to go to the daycare center.

“I have an important matter to discuss with you guys,” she announced, taking a seat on the bed next to us.

“You’re not going to get a divorce, are you?” Dooley asked anxiously.

“Now why would I get a divorce?” said Odelia with a puzzled smile.

“Because Chase accidentally sent your love letters to all the neighbors, and now you’re madder than a wet hen and you’re not going to speak to him again?”

There had been a slight contretemps in the Poole household, when Tex had put his old love letters to his wife out for trash collection. Instead of a trashman, though, a troop of girl scouts had discovered the letters, and now the entire neighborhood was privy to Tex’s private thoughts in re his erstwhile affections toward his future wife. Suffice it to say Marge was not amused.

“Writing letters is not exactly the done thing anymore, Dooley,” said Odelia. “In fact Chase never wrote me any love letters at all. Whatever he had to say to me, he said in person.”

What she didn’t mention was that Chase is not exactly the type of person who carries his heart on his sleeve. Or writes love letters. So when I picture their courtship, I can’t imagine it consisted of more than a few lusty looks and grunts of appreciation from Chase’s side. We may be living in the age of the modern man, who cries when he cuts himself peeling a potato, but Chase is more akin to the man of yore, back when men were men and the dinosaurs still walked the earth.

“Okay, so Gran has asked me to loan you to her for an important mission and after careful consideration I’ve decided to say yes.” She paused, so we could absorb this message, then continued, “The mission has to do with her Dear Gabi column, and you’ll act as her eyes and ears throughout. Think you can do that?”

“Oh, absolutely,” I said, and would have asked her about a million questions about this ‘important mission,’ but unfortunately this was all the time she had.

“Gran will pick you up around… now,” she said, checking her watch, and just as she spoke these words, Gran’s voice sounded from downstairs.

“Are you guys ready!” the old lady bellowed. “Cause I am!”

And so our unusual adventure began. Why Gran hadn’t selected Harriet and Brutus to assist her in this important task was beyond me. Perhaps she felt that Harriet was so busy getting ready for her photoshoot that she wouldn’t be able to focus on the job at hand. Whatever the reason, moments later we were riding in the car with Gran and Scarlett, and our destination was: Advantage Publishing.

“We’ve been selected as Advantage Publishing’s first-ever senior interns,” Scarlett announced proudly. “It’s going to be a blast!”

“How much are they paying you?” asked Dooley.

“They’re not paying us anything,” said Gran. “We’re interns, and interns work for free.”

“We do get a free subscription toGlimmer,” said Scarlett. “And free coffee.”

“So you’re going to work for these people and not get paid?” I asked, trying to get to the bottom of this strange conceit.

“We’re doing this for the good of our readers,” said Gran. “Giving something back to our loyal audience.”

“And also, Dan is paying us for our time,” said Scarlett.

“Yeah, there’s that,” Gran admitted.

Advantage Publishing was housed in a new building in a semi-industrial zone that houses many such buildings and companies. It all looked very snazzy and ultra-modern, just as you would expect from the publisher ofGlimmer andGlitter, but also ofFish& Tackle, the amateur fisherman’s friend, and of course Cat Life, coincidentally the magazine that had selected Harriet as its cover model.

Upon arrival, Gran and Scarlett received a pair of neat badges, but when it came time to announce myself and Dooley, it appeared some wires had gotten crossed. The receptionist stared down at us, then up at Gran, then stared at us some more.“But… pets are not allowed in the building,” she explained.

“These are not pets,” said Gran. “These are emotional support animals.”

“Yeah, we need them,” said Scarlett. “For emotional support,” she added.

“You wouldn’t take a blind person’s guide dog away from them, would you?” said Gran. “We need these cats. Without them we won’t be able to function.”

“Oh-kay,” said the girl, then took her phone and walked away for a few moments, busily talking into her phone, and presumably asking advice from one of her higher-ups. When she returned, she had a big smile on her face. “It’s all right, Mrs. Muffin. You can bring your emotional support animals into the building now.” She then gave me a pointed look. “They are… potty trained, aren’t they?”

“Of course,” said Gran. “Max and Dooley are highly-trained professionals.”

“What have we been trained at, Max?” asked Dooley as we proceeded to the bank of elevators.

“Didn’t you hear? Going to the potty,” I said, as we hurried to keep up with Gran and Scarlett.

“I just hope they have a potty to go to,” he said, panting a little.

It was a big building, all concrete and glass, with many floors and plenty of people occupying those floors, all busy working on their respective computers. Soon enough, though, we found our desks—or at least Gran and Scarlett found their desks, with Dooley and myself being relegated to a corner of said desks.

Then again, if you’re going to be an emotional support animal, which we now apparently were, you have to learn to take these little setbacks in stride.

“So what is our mission?” I asked once Gran had placed a minor potted plant on top of her desk—her way of staking her claim, I guess.

“Our mission is twofold,” said Gran as she started wrestling with her office chair, putting it higher, then lower, then adjusting the tilt of the backrest, then cursing loudly while she pulled levers and yanked and turned and kicked at the plethora of knobs the thing contained. “Do you see that woman over there?”

I scanned the horizon, and located the woman she referred to.“The pretty blond one?” I asked.

“Bingo. Her name is Natalie Ferrara and she’s pregnant.”

“Good for her,” I said, nodding. “Who’s the baby daddy?”

“That’s the problem,” she said. “Her boss is the baby daddy, but the moment she told him about the baby, he said he didn’t want to be the daddy. In other words, he dumped her, and now he wants her to get an abortion.”

“Ouch.”

“And so Natalie is very upset and wrote to Gabi asking her for advice. Which is why we’re here. To assess the situation and figure out how to proceed. The second part of our mission is that guy over there. His name is Tom Mitchell and he’s in love with a colleague who doesn’t give him the time of day. So we need to figure out who this colleague is, and if we can bring them together somehow.”

“Tough mission,” I said. These Cupid missions are always difficult to pull off.

“And there’s a third person,” said Gran, pushing her glasses further up her nose as she searched around. “But I don’t see her right now. Maybe she quit. Her boss gifted her a copy of theElements of Style, which she took to mean he doesn’t think she can spell. Her name is Doris Booth and this is what she looks like.”

She showed us a picture on her phone, then flicked through to pictures of Natalie Ferrara and Tom Mitchell, which she had obviously found on the internet.

“So I want you guys to hang around, discreetly listen in on conversations, and then report back to me with any office gossip relevant to our three targets. Is that understood?”

“Absolutely,” I said. Now that I had a deeper understanding of our mission, I was feeling more relaxed. It seemed like something we might be able to pull off.

“Now if I can only get this stupid chair to behave,” she grumbled annoyedly.

CHAPTER 9

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It was an interesting experience for me to be part of a large office like this. I had been in office settings before, of course, but Odelia’s office is a small one, only occupied by herself and her boss Dan Goory. And then there’s Chase, who has several colleagues. But Advantage Publishing was clearly one step up from the police station, scale-wise, I mean. Gran had cleared a portion of her desk, and now Dooley and I had a nice overview of the office from our new vantage point.

“This place is big, Max,” Dooley marveled. “I’ve never seen so many people working together before. What do they all do all day? And why are they so busy?”

“Publishing several magazines is a lot of work, Dooley,” I said. “All those pages have to be filled with copy and pictures, and then those pictures and articles have to be put in the right place so you’re going to need editors and layout people.”

“Odelia could work here,” said my friend. “It would be like a promotion.”

“I think Odelia likes the freedom she has working for theGazette. In a corporate environment like this you always have some boss to answer to.”

We glanced in the direction of a glass cubicle in the corner of the large office space, where Michael Madison ruled his empire with an iron fist, according to Gran. We could see him seated behind his desk now, talking to Natalie. When she left his office, she looked both sad and upset, and Michael Madison looked angry.

“I think they had a fight about the baby,” said Dooley.

“Yeah, I think so, too,” I agreed.

“Poor Natalie. Pregnant and unloved.”

“She may be pregnant, but she’s not unloved,” I said, and gestured to Tom Mitchell, who sat eyeing Natalie fervently, with a sort of puppy dog look on his face. “It wouldn’t surprise me if Natalie is the colleague Tom is secretly in love with,” I announced.

Gran had noticed the same thing, and whispered,“I think you just might be right, Max! Which would make our job a whole lot easier!”

“How do you mean?” asked Dooley.

“If we can get those two together, it would solve two problems in one go!”

“Quiet, you guys,” said Scarlett. “Someone’s coming!”

And indeed there was. A young man with a floppy hairdo was heading in our direction. He was pushing a cart loaded with items that looked like mail. When he finally reached us, he gave us a curious glance, before addressing Gran.

“Vesta Muffin and Scarlett Canyon?” he asked.

“That’s us,” said Gran.

“You’ve got mail,” said the kid with a grin, and dropped an envelope on Gran’s desk. “Contracts, probably,” he explained. “Just sign them and drop them off with me. I’ll make sure they get where they’re supposed to be. I’m Danny, by the way. I work in the mailroom.”

“Yeah, I thought as much,” said Gran.

“You guys are part of this new senior intern program, aren’t you?”

“Yep, that’s us,” said Scarlett.

“You don’t look senior to me,” said Danny, as he gave Scarlett an appreciative look. “How old are you? Forty? Fifty?”

Scarlett giggled.“Hasn’t anyone ever told you? A lady never tells and a gentleman never asks.”

“Then I guess I shouldn’t have asked.”

“I won’t tell if you won’t,” said Scarlett, batting her eyelashes at the kid.

She was dressed to impress on her first day on the job. For the occasion she was wearing an actual business suit, which made her look more like a high-powered executive than an intern. In fact she looked as if she owned the place.

“Scarlett is my age,” said Gran, dropping a bucket of ice water on this budding office romance. Danny stared at her for a moment, then at Scarlett, and finally shook his head. “That’s impossible. You look at least twenty years younger.”

“Why, thank you, Danny,” said Scarlett.

Gran, who was grinding her dentures, now growled,“Don’t you have places to be, sonny boy? People to see?”

“Hold your horses, granny,” said Danny, then directed a wink at Scarlett and was off to deliver more mail.

“Twenty years younger, my ass,” Gran growled.

“Now let’s not forget why we’re here, Vesta,” said Scarlett. “And befriending the mailroom boy may work in our favor. Guys like Danny know everyone and everything about a place like this.”

“You’re right,” Gran reluctantly admitted. “Go on. Seduce him if you must.”

“I’m not going to seduce a kid like that—are you crazy!” Then she sighed. “He is yummy, though, isn’t he? How old do you think he is? Twenty? Twenty-five?”

“More like fifteen.”

“Oh, nonsense. If he’s old enough to work here, he’s old enough to…”

“Let’s not forget why we’re here, Scarlett,” Gran admonished her friend.

“Touch?,” said Scarlett with a grin. “So how do you want to work this?”

But before they could decide on a strategy of campaign, a young woman joined us. She was the office manager, and was there to teach Gran and Scarlett the ropes. Turns out they’d been hired to assist the office staff in some minor and less appealing tasks. Such as there are: updating customer lists, checking addresses, correcting listings for the accounting department… All in all, not exactly the most exciting work! But Gran and Scarlett set themselves to it with gusto.

“And what are we supposed to do?” asked Dooley, once the office manager had left.

“We’re going to do what we do best,” I said. “Which is to snoop around!”

And so we hopped down from the desk, and made our way over to Natalie’s desk, which was closest to the big boss.

As we approached, we drew a lot of attention from the office staff, who had presumably never seen a pair of cats before. But since word had spread that the two new interns had brought along their emotional support animals, at least no one tried to evict us.

We took up position next to the window, which coincidentally put us within hearing distance of Natalie Ferrara, hoping to glean some information that would make Gran and Scarlett’s task a little easier.

“She seems sad, Max,” said Dooley.

And she did. So sad, in fact, that I could detect at least fifteen Kleenexes in her wastepaper basket. She was talking into her phone when we arrived, keeping the volume low so no one else could hear.

“The least you can do is cook dinner, Luke. No, we’re not going to order out again tonight. Do you know how much this is costing me?” She listened for a moment, then closed her eyes and shook her head. “Just… do it, all right?” And then she hung up, stared before her for a few moments, and got back to work.

“Boyfriend trouble?” Dooley suggested.

“Could be,” I said. “Though I doubt it. She’s obviously still crazy about her boss, otherwise she wouldn’t be crying her eyes out all day.”

“Poor girl,” said Dooley. “Her boss doesn’t deserve her.”

But since there was nothing more to learn here, we moved on to Gran and Scarlett’s second target. Tom was also tapping away at his computer, but as we settled in next to his desk, the same mailroom kid arrived, looked left and right, and lowered his voice as he addressed the bespectacled young man.

“Guess what,” he said. “Natalie is pregnant.”

“What?” said Tom, clearly taken aback by this piece of news.

“I’ve got it from a reliable source,” announced Danny. “And guess who the father is.”

“I have no idea,” said Tom, frowning darkly at this bearer of bad news.

“None other than Mad Madison himself!”

Tom almost fell from his chair, but recovered quickly.“You’re crazy.”

“No, it’s true! Susan from accounting was in Madison’s office this morning, and caught the last snatches of a phone call. Something about an abortion. And when she checked closer, turns out he was talking to Natalie.”

“So? She’s his PA. He could have been talking about anyone. Or asking her to check something for research purposes. No reason to assume she’s having his baby.”

“That’s what I said. But listen to this. Couple of days ago Susan saw a bill from some posh hotel in town. Room booked for two in Madison’s name. So just out of curiosity she called the hotel to double-check, and they told her Madison took that room, all right. Him and some young babe. Blond and blue-eyed.” He arched a meaningful eyebrow. “Remind you of someone? Oh, and also, it wasn’t the first time either. Turns out they’ve been having regular dates in that same hotel for the past couple of months. And when I passed Natalie’s desk yesterday, I saw a card for some abortion clinic on her desk with Madison’s handwriting on it. It said, ‘My treat! Just do it!!!’ When Natalie saw me checking it out, she quickly covered the card with a copy ofGlimmer. But I know what I saw, buddy. Your girl is having an affair with the big chief—and got herself knocked up in the process!”

“She’s not my girl,” said Tom, looking distinctly shaken by this news.

“But don’t you see?” said Danny. “This is your chance, buddy boy! Obviously Madison dumped her ass the moment he found out she’s pregnant. You could be her rebound, buddy!”

“You’re crazy, Danny.”

“No, I’m a genius. The two are often confused.” He placed a hand on his colleague’s shoulder. “This is your moment, Tommy. Your moment to shine!”

“Clearly she’s still in love with the guy,” said Tom miserably. “Just look at how red her eyes are. And how often she’s been going to the bathroom. She’s been crying her eyes out over Mad Madison. So why would she be interested in me?”

“She will be if you’re the only decent person in this place. Madison is a jerk, and now is your chance to prove that you’re a friend to her, not an idiot like him.”

“I don’t think so,” said Tom, slumping lower and lower in his chair.

“Go over there now. Just talk to her. Show her a friendly face!”

But Tom sat there shaking his head, still stunned by this news.

So Danny finally rolled his eyes and continued his round.

“What does this mean, Max?” asked Dooley.

“This means we were right, Dooley. Tom is in love with Natalie, and if we can manage to bring these two together, Gabi will have solved two cases in one go.”

“Gabi? Who’s Gabi?”

“Dear Gabi. TheGazette’s advice columnist? The reason why we’re here in the first place?” And since he seemed to have a hard time understanding the intricacies of our assignment, I explained the whole thing to him once more. I must have been talking too loud, though, for when I looked up, I saw that half the office was looking in our direction, amused smiles on their collective faces.

Natalie even directed a watery smile at Tom, which he returned with some extra wattage added for good measure.

Now wouldn’t that be something? That their shared interest in two caterwauling interning cats would bring these sundered hearts together?

CHAPTER 10

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Vesta was trying to extract a decent cup of hot chocolate from the coffee machine in the office canteen when Natalie Ferrara walked in. The girl still looked pretty shook up, which wasn’t surprising considering the trouble she was in.

“I can’t seem to work this thing,” Vesta grumbled as she punched a few buttons to no avail.

“Let me help you,” said Natalie, and applied her gentle touch to the machine. “You need to be an old hand at this,” she explained with a smile.

“I think you probably need a college degree to get it to spit out what you want.” She eyed Natalie from the corner of her eye. “Are you all right, sweetie? You look a little under the weather, if you don’t mind me saying so.”

Natalie swallowed, then shook her head.“It’s my brother. He lost his job and got kicked out of his apartment, so he’s been staying with me. And he’s a good kid, you know, but I live in a small flat, and it’s not been easy sharing the space.”

“I hear you,” said Vesta. “I’ve been sharing a place with my daughter and her husband, and it’s been an adjustment for all of us. I used to live alone, and giving up my own space was tough at first. Lucky for me they’re both great people.”

“You’re the new senior intern, aren’t you?”

“Vesta Muffin. And you’re… Natalie? Madison’s PA?”

Natalie nodded, offering Vesta a weak smile.“So how are you getting on? Settling in all right?”

“Oh, sure,” Vesta assured the young woman. “I’ve been working for my son-in-law for years, you know, as his receptionist. Tex is a doctor, and I’ve been handling his roster of patients. So I never really retired.”

Natalie frowned.“Tex Poole?”

“That’s the one.”

“A friend of mine is one of his patients.”

“Best doctor in town, let me tell you. If you’re ever in any trouble, he’s the person to see.”

Natalie nodded, and much to Vesta’s surprise, tears had appeared in the girl’s eyes. She quickly turned her face away, and wiped at her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s this whole business with my brother, you see. It’s been pretty rough.”

“Yeah, I can imagine,” said Vesta. Though the business with the boss’s baby was probably having an even worse effect on the young PA. She placed a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “If you want to talk about it, I’m a good listener,” she assured her.

Natalie nodded, but didn’t speak. The machine had finished sputtering and spitting and had managed to produce something that looked like a hot cup of chocolate. Vesta took it and tried a sip. “This is some pretty good stuff,” she said.

Natalie smiled.“You sound surprised. You shouldn’t. Madison takes good care of his staff.” Her smile faltered. “At least he tries to.” And then she murmured an apology and quickly left the canteen, without even having taken a cup of coffee.

“Poor girl,” said Vesta, shaking her head.

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

Scarlett was taking her mission seriously. She had grabbed a sheaf of documents from her desk and headed over to Tom Mitchell’s desk. The kid looked up when she approached, and plastered a polite smile on his face.

“Hi, there,” she said as she came walking up. “I’m hoping you could help me out with this. Someone from accounting gave me this printout, and I’m having trouble understanding what it is exactly that they want me to do.”

“Well, let me see,” said Tom as he took the stack of paper from her and placed them on his desk. He frowned as he studied the columns and columns of names and numbers. “So these are…”

“The names and addresses of subscribers who canceled their subscriptions,” Scarlett supplied as she glanced in the direction of Natalie, who had just returned to her desk. From where Tom was sitting he had a perfect view of the PA, and also of Michael Madison, whose office was just beyond Natalie’s desk.

“So what is it that accounting wants you to do with these?” asked Tom.

“They want me to cross-check this printout against this printout,” said Scarlett, and dumped another stack of paper on Tom’s desk. “These are the people who took advantage of the digital subscription offer, which is cheaper than the paper one.”

“Okay, so what you want to do is—”

“Is thatGlimmer?” asked Scarlett, pointing to the young man’s computer.

“Yeah, I’m working on an article about spring cleaning,” said Tom. “Why, do you readGlimmer?”

“Do I readGlimmer! I only devour the magazine, and have done since just about forever. In fact my mom subscribed toGlimmer, and before her my grandma. You could say the Canyons madeGlimmer what it is today.”

“Loyal reader, huh?” said Tom. “I wish there were more of you.”

“Readership is dropping?”

“Yeah, circulation numbers are down across the board.” He smiled. “Which is why it’s important to keep loyal readers like yourself happy and renewing their subscriptions. I’m Tom, by the way. And you’re one of the new senior interns, correct?”

“Oh, how silly of me. Totally forgot to introduce myself! Yeah, my name is Scarlett, and me and my friend Vesta are Advantage’s newest hires. Yay!”

“Welcome aboard, Scarlett. Glad to see a new face around here.”

“Yeah, it means things can’t be so bad, if Advantage is still hiring.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but you are an intern, right? So not paid?”

“Yeah, Madison got a good deal when he got us. Lots of experience, and free of charge!”

At the mention of the name Madison, a cloud passed across Tom’s visage, but it soon passed. “I think you’ll fit right in. We’re a great little bunch here at Advantage.”

Scarlett noticed a post-it on Tom’s desk. On it he had scribbled ’15 Ways to Spice up Your Love Life.’ “If you need any help with that, just holler,” she said. “I can think of way more than fifteen ways to spice up your love life.”

A blush spread across Tom’s face. “You can?”

“Oh, absolutely. In fact I could show you ways no one has ever tried before except me.” She leaned in. “I have an adventurous streak when it comes to enjoying the pleasures of the flesh.”

Tom gulped a little.“Do you now?”

“There’s things a man can do to a woman that will guarantee she will hang on to him forever, Tom.” She spoke earnestly, looking deeply into the man’s eyes. She had taken a seat at the edge of his desk, and was thinking that if only he’d get rid of those glasses he’d improve his attractiveness with at least a factor of ten.

“Things… a man can do to a woman?” he asked, adjusting his glasses.

“If you want, I could show you,” she suggested, shifting her position on the desk. She’d popped a button or two on her blouse, and as she leaned in, there was a certain wiggling going on, and a certain jiggling, causing Tom to redden even more as he was granted a certain measure of insight into certain assets.

He cleared his throat.“I could use a few p-p-pointers, f-f-for sure.”

“Well, that’s settled, then,” she said, leaning back again. She could see that the kid was suffering from an acute case of vertigo, and didn’t want him to pass out on the office floor. “Why don’t we get together this afternoon, and I’ll share some of these insights with you, mh?”

“A-a-absolutely,” he stuttered. “Too kind.”

“No problem. See you later, Tommy.”

“See you later… Scarlett.”

CHAPTER 11

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Dooley and I had returned to Natalie’s desk, and decided to stick around for a while, picking up any clues we might gather as to the young woman’s state of mind. I could see that Scarlett was ‘working’ on Tom, using her not inconsiderable charm to educate the young man on the ways of how to seduce a member of the opposite sex. But if Gran’s plan was to be successful, we also had to disentangle Natalie’s complicated love life, which probably was a lot harder to accomplish.

And as we settled in for the duration, a woman came stalking through the office with purposeful step, darted one scathing look at Natalie, then waltzed into Madison’s office and slammed the door. Moments later the blinds were dropped, and Madison and his visitor were obscured from view.

“Oh, God,” Natalie groaned. She clearly had recognized this visitor.

Gran, who didn’t miss a trick, came hurrying up. “What’s happening?” she asked.

“Madison’s wife just arrived,” said Natalie.

“Bad news?”

“Very.”

Which is when the screaming began. We couldn’t understand what was being said, but whatever it was, it wasn’t happy or kind!

“Madison’s marriage is in trouble, is it?” asked Gran.

“Oh, absolutely. Wouldn’t surprise me if Deith is planning to divorce him.”

“They’ve got kids? Madison and his wife?”

Natalie hesitated for a moment, then shook her head.“No kids.”

“At least there’s that. The moment kids are in the picture, it’s that much harder.”

Natalie darted a quick look to Gran, clearly wondering what she knew, but said nothing.

“He’s something of a player, though, isn’t he, Madison?” Gran continued to pry. “I mean, I don’t know the guy, of course, but he looks like a real playboy.”

“He’s very loyal… to the woman he loves,” said Natalie.

“Which isn’t Deith?”

But Natalie wasn’t to be drawn out so easily. “I wouldn’t know about that,” she insisted.

“Oh, come on. You’ve been the guy’s PA for how long now?”

“Five years,” said Natalie, fiddling with a ring on her finger.

“So you must know the guy inside and out.”

“I take care of his professional life, not his personal one.”

Gran nodded.“Of course you do, sweetie. Of course you do.” She gave Natalie’s arm a gentle squeeze, causing Natalie to cast down her eyes and bite down on her bottom lip. Her emotions were clearly very near to the surface, and she was afraid they would come spilling out under Gran’s gentle nudging.

The door to Madison’s office opened again, and his wife came stomping out, slammed the door behind her, and stalked off through the office once more, drawing all eyes to her, and causing people to start whispering furiously the moment she had passed.

“Looks like that divorce is happening sooner rather than later,” Gran said.

Hope momentarily flashed across Natalie’s face, and when Madison called her into his office, there was a pep in the young woman’s step, causing Gran to comment, “Poor thing. She’s still hung up on the guy, even though he’s treating her like crap.”

“If Madison gets a divorce, maybe he’ll marry Natalie?” Dooley suggested.

“Never,” said Gran. “Guys like Madison don’t marry their secretaries.”

“I thought Natalie was his personal assistant,” I said.

“Different name, same job,” said Gran, shaking her head.

She returned to her own desk, and so did we. And as we settled in, Scarlett came tripping over, a triumphant smile on her face.“I’m going to teach Tommy how to seduce a woman,” she announced. “Natalie won’t know what hit her!”

“Trust me when I tell you it’s not that easy,” said Gran. “That girl is still hung up on her boss. So much so he’s got her pining for him, and hoping against hope that he’ll take her back and make an honest woman out of her.”

“Yeah, but he won’t, right? And once she sees that, she’ll snap out of it.”

“It’s going to take more than a few seduction techniques to make that girl fall out of love with Madison. She’s head over heels, that one.”

“Yeah, so is Tommy,” said Scarlett. “Smitten like a kitten.”

Dooley eyed me curiously.“I didn’t know kittens could be smitten,” he said.

“Only in the springtime,” I said, causing Dooley to frown. Look, I know my answer wasn’t satisfactory, but I had Natalie and Tom’s happiness on my mind. No matter how experienced I might be as a detective, this matchmaking business was a whole other ball of wax! Navigating the complexities of human emotions and human relationships is a lot harder than cracking a murder case, let me tell you!

Just then, another person came stalking through the office. He was a tall man with thick dark hair and a noble sort of face. He was making a beeline for Madison’s office, and didn’t bother to knock or announce his arrival before entering.

We could see him planting his hands on Madison’s desk, a departure from the norm of regular social behavior the big boss did not appreciate, judging from the furious look on the latter’s face.

“So who’s this bozo now?” asked Gran, a touch of frustration in her voice.

Lucky for us Danny the mailroom boy was on hand to enlighten us.

He must have heard Gran’s outcry, for he materialized next to our desk and said, a glimmer of enjoyment in his eyes, “That, my dear ladies, is Gary Rapp.”

“Who’s he?” asked Gran bluntly.

“Gary is a fashion editor. Or rather was. Madison fired him last week. And my best guess is that he didn’t take kindly to being summarily dismissed like that.”

“So why did Madison can his ass?” asked Gran.

“Turns out Gary likes the ladies more than the ladies like him,” said Danny, a little cryptically. When both Gran and Scarlett looked up at the kid with expectant looks on their faces, he elucidated, “For his job Gary spent a lot of time on photoshoots. Turns out he couldn’t keep his hands to himself on many of these occasions. So when several models filed an official complaint with HR, Madison had no choice but to get rid of the guy. That kind of behavior might have been condoned once upon a time, but unfortunately for Mr. Rapp, times have changed.”

“Good riddance,” Gran grunted. She then turned to Danny, who clearly was the fount of information she had hoped he was. “Say, Danny. I heard a rumor that big boss Madison managed to get one of your colleagues pregnant. Any truth to that?”

Danny wiggled his eyebrows meaningfully.“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t.”

“I’m guessing maybe it is. So who’s the lucky lady?”

Danny directed a meaningful look at Natalie’s back, and Scarlett and Gran gasped in shock. “No way,” said Scarlett.

But Danny nodded.“Yes, way. Though now rumor has it that Gary might have had something to do with it.”

“Gary Rapp is Natalie’s baby daddy?” asked Gran.

“Shh! Not so loud!” Danny admonished her. “But yeah. It’s the latest rumor that’s been doing the rounds. Though my money is still on Madison.”

“People are betting who the father is?” asked Scarlett.

“You didn’t get this from me, but if you want in on the syndicate, just say the word. As of ten minutes ago, odds on Gary are five to one, Madison is ten to one.”

“Looks like Madison’s got the better odds, huh?” said Gran, nodding.

A loud noise had us all look up. Gary Rapp had slammed the door on his way out, with Natalie looking on with a fervent look on her face, cheeks flaming red.

Danny cursed under his breath.“Looks like Gary’s stock has just gone up. Now I’ll have to go and make the rounds again.”

And indeed, several hands went up, beckoning the office boy. People had evidently closely witnessed the scene, and were ready to change favorites!

“I think it’s disgusting,” said Scarlett. “Betting on a girl’s happiness like that.”

“Welcome to the world of office politics,” said Gran. “Where fortunes are made or lost in the blink of an eye. Or the arrival or departure of a current favorite.”

CHAPTER 12

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Tex should have been in the office, but instead he was trolling through the neighborhood, collecting the letters a troop of girl scouts had delivered the day before. Marge had told him in no uncertain terms what she thought of a man who put his love letters to her in the trash, and this was his chance at redemption.

Harriet and Brutus were trailing him, and making sure he collected every last one of the letters. They were under strict instruction not to let Marge’s husband out of their sight, since she didn’t trust him any further right now than she could throw him. Whatever that meant.

Brutus thought it was a strange expression. Why would Marge want to throw Tex? He even thought it was probably physically impossible for a diminutive woman like Marge to throw a tall man like her husband. Unless she had suddenly developed superhuman strength, or had joined the ranks of the Marvel universe.

“Promise me you’ll never write me any love letters, snuggle bear,” Harriet now told her mate.

“I promise, sweet cheeks,” said Brutus.

“I mean, imagine if our personal thoughts were distributed amongst all of our friends—or even worse, a bunch of complete strangers. It’s too horrible to contemplate!”

“You do know that cats can’t write, don’t you, lemon drop?” asked Brutus with a touch of concern. “We don’t have the opposable thumbs to hold a pen.”

“I know that, love sponge. But still. Just for my own peace of mind, promise me you’ll never, ever put your personal musings about our relationship on paper.”

“I promise,” said Brutus fervently, and he meant it, too.

“Thank you, Mrs. Jackson,” said Tex as he accepted the letter from the older lady.

“You have very nice handwriting, Doctor Poole,” said Mrs. Jackson. “I could understand nearly everything you wrote. There’s just one passage that wasn’t clear to me. What did you mean by ‘I want to be your Tampax?’”

Tex swallowed once or twice.“I’m sure you must have misread, Mrs. Jackson.”

“I don’t think so. I distinctly remember reading it and wondering what it meant. I even asked my friend Mrs. Jones, and she said it probably referred to a tampon. And I said you couldn’t possibly be referring to a tampon, since the rest of your letter was very sweet, but also very sexy, if you know what I mean. And tampons may be a lot of things, but they’re not sexy or sweet, are they now?”

“No,” said Tex. “No, I guess not.”

He was sweating profusely, Brutus saw, and he felt for the guy.

“This is probably the most humiliating thing I’ve ever seen,” he told his girlfriend. “Poor Tex. I feel for him.”

“I’d feel more for him if he hadn’t put those letters out for trash collection,” said Harriet, and Brutus could see his girlfriend was as implacable as Marge had been. And suddenly he felt relieved that cats couldn’t write. Imagine having the whole world made privy to your personal thoughts about tampons and such. He shivered as Tex said his goodbyes to Mrs. Jackson, and slumped off.

“Only two more to go,” the good doctor announced, trying to put on a brave face. But Brutus could see that his heart wasn’t in it.

Clearly this was not the doctor’s finest hour.

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

Odelia, who’d finished up an article on the best herbs and spices to make the perfect pumpkin soup, waltzed into her uncle’s office down at the police precinct.

Uncle Alec looked up when his niece entered and looked relieved to see her.“What brings you here?” he asked as he leaned back in his chair and intertwined his hands behind his head.

“Boredom, to be honest,” said Odelia, dropping down on a chair. “Dan’s got me writing articles about pumpkin soup now.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Nothing’s happening in this town, Uncle Alec. Nothing at all!”

“I know,” said her uncle, but instead of looking bored, he looked relieved. “What?” he added when he saw the look on his niece’s face. “It’s a good thing when the police have nothing to do. It means no crimes are being committed, and everyone is happy and going about their business without bothering anyone else.”

“No neighbors threatening to kill each other? No wives threatening to shoot their husbands?”

“Nothing at all,” said Uncle Alec. “And that’s exactly the way it should be.”

“If nothing is happening, I’ve got nothing to write about,” Odelia grumbled. “And if I’ve got nothing to write about, we don’t have a paper.”

“I’m sorry, honey. But you can’t expect me to make up some imaginary crime, just so you and Dan can fill your paper, do you now?”

“No, I guess not,” she said reluctantly. She idly swiveled in her swivel chair. “Guess I’ll have to write a couple more articles about how to make the perfect pumpkin soup.”

“What’s your gran been up to? Chase told me she’s interning atGlimmer?”

“Yeah, she and Scarlett are trying to heal a broken heart, apparently. Max and Dooley are on the case, so I’m going to hear all about it tonight.” She grimaced. “Fat lot of good it’ll do me. I can’t write an article about a secretary who’s pregnant with her boss’s baby, or some guy who’s in love with his colleague.”

“No, I guess not,” said Uncle Alec. Then he brightened. “Marge told me about that letter business. Now there’s the perfect story for theGazette. It’s got romance, it’s got human interest, some excitement, the whole shebang.”

“It also has my mom and dad involved. Mom already warned me not to write an article about those letters, or else she’ll never invite me over for dinner again.”

“Yeah, I guess it is all very personal—not to mention very painful for everyone involved.” He couldn’t suppress a grin, though, and soon they were both laughing, as they imagined Tex going door to door to try and get his precious letters back!

“If this had happened to anyone else, Dan would have me writing all about it,” she said. “But seeing as it hits too close to home…”

Just then, her uncle’s phone chimed, and he gave it a furtive look, then glanced through the window in the direction of Town Hall, located across Town Square.

“Message from Charlene?” asked Odelia.

Her uncle nodded.“She’s got a new… project she wants to discuss with me.” He got up with some effort and put his phone in his pocket.

“What project? Something important?”

“Nah, nothing special. You know, just some project. The usual stuff.”

She had a feeling her uncle wasn’t being entirely honest with her, but decided to let it go. Everyone has a right to a private life, much though she would have loved to pry into this love affair between the town’s mayor and chief of police.

Gah. Now that was exactly the trouble when you knew everyone in town: you started to be hampered in your ambitions as an investigative reporter!

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

Alec slipped into the Mayor’s office and quietly closed the door behind him. On the desk, the Mayor herself was seated, dressed in a long overcoat. A mysterious smile was playing about her lips. He knew that smile. It meant she was up to something!

“You wanted to see me, Madam Mayor?” he asked politely.

“Yes, Chief Lip,” said the Mayor. “There’s an urgent matter we need to discuss.”

“Is that a fact, Madam Mayor?”

“A matter of life and death, in fact.”

“Oh, my. That sounds important, Madam Mayor.”

“Come here, Chief Lip,” the Mayor summoned. “And be seated.”

The Chief approached the desk, licking his lips as he did.“Yes, Madam Mayor.”

“Did you read the article?”

“I did, Madam Mayor.”

“Then you know the drill. Get down, Chief!”

The Chief got down.

“On the floor! On your hands and knees!”

The Chief proceeded as instructed.

“What are you going to do with me, pray tell?” he asked, looking up at the figure towering over him.

In one swift motion, Charlene threw off the overcoat. Underneath, she was dressed in a black leather outfit. It was a shiny thing she had found on some internet site specializing in BDSM outfits. And as he marveled at how well the getup suited her, she extracted a whip from the recesses of her costume, and slashed the air with it. It made a delicious cracking sound.

“Now kneel, you scum!” the Mayor bellowed, cracking the whip once more.

And so kneel he did.

Just then, the door opened and Charlene’s secretary Imelda entered. When the older woman caught sight of the two of them, Charlene in her leather outfit, and Uncle Alec on the floor, that whip held high above the Mayor’s head, she goggled for a moment, then quickly stepped back again, murmured an apology, and closed the door.

Charlene sighed.“Oh, Alec. I thought you locked the door?”

“I did,” said Alec.

“Looks like I’ll have to get it fixed again.”

He grinned up at her, and she returned the grin, then cracked the whip again.“You’re going to get punished for this, you know that, right?”

“Can’t wait, my love,” said Alec softly.

CHAPTER 13

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Marge was bored. Afternoons were usually her busiest time, with plenty of her regulars coming in and checking out their favorite books. Now, though, she hadn’t seen anyone for the past hour. Not even Mrs. Samson, who came in every day. Maybe reading that letter Tex wrote yesterday had spooked the old lady.

Thinking about that letter had Marge silently fuming again. Tex had apologized, but only after she had made it clear how humiliating the experience was, or how hurtful that he would simply throw out the letters that had established their relationship in the first place. How unthinkingly unkind.

Tex had assured her he hadn’t wanted to throw out those letters. That they must have accidentally ended up on the sidewalk. Or maybe Chase had put them out, thinking it was just some old junk. Still, it was perhaps a sign? A sign that their relationship had seen better days and wasn’t what it used to be?

And as she turned the events round and round in her mind, who would suddenly walk in but Gary Rapp! The same guy who’d been in yesterday, making such flattering and complimentary comments. Now here was a man who knew how to make a woman feel good about herself. A man, in other words, who was the exact opposite of Marge’s husband, who simply took her for granted, and even went so far as to throw the foundation stone of their marriage into the garbage.

“Well, hello,” said Gary as he approached the desk. He was carrying the books she’d given him yesterday.

“You finished those already?” she asked.

“I’m a fast reader,” he said with a warm smile. “And I have to say, you weren’t kidding when you told me I’d love these. I did, and now of course I was wondering if you can give me some more good advice.”

“Absolutely,” she said. “I can show you a few more that I’m sure you will like.”

And as she took him to the romance department, she became aware of his presence behind her, and knew he was checking her out. It supplied her with a frisson of excitement. It had been so long that a man had looked at her like that, she’d completely forgotten what it felt like. And she had to admit it felt good!

She showed Gary a few books she thought he would like, and he took them all. Then he turned to her.“Could I perhaps entice you to have dinner with me?” When she opened her mouth to protest, he quickly held up his hand. “Just to talk some more about books, I promise you. I know you’re married, and coming between you and your husband is the furthest thing from my mind.”

“I can’t, Gary. I’m sorry.”

“I understand,” he said, graciously accepting her refusal. “If you change your mind…”

“I won’t,” she assured him.

“Clearly you have a husband who makes you happy,” he said. She wavered, and he continued, “Which is exactly what you deserve, Marge. A woman like you deserves a husband who treats her like a queen. Makes sure she’s feeling loved and taken care of every moment of every day.” He took her hand. The warmth of his touch seeped into her hand, and instead of pulling back, she thought it felt good to be touched like that. With reverence. With respect. “Just promise me you’ll think about it,” he said.

She found herself nodding.“Thanks, Gary. You’re very sweet.”

“Not sweet,” he corrected her. “I think smitten is a better word.”

And like a kid of fifteen, she actually blushed!

Oh, how silly she was being!

He leaned in, then, but before their lips touched, she broke the spell by turning her head away.“I couldn’t,” she said quietly, and so instead he kissed her hand.

What a perfect gentleman, she thought once he’d left. She felt all fluttery, and her legs had turned to jelly.

Just then, her phone chimed, and she picked up.“Yes, Tex?”

“I got your letters back,” he announced, sounding a little breathless. “Every last one of them.”

“Well, that’s good,” she said absentmindedly, looking at the hand where Gary had placed that kiss. She could still feel the touch of his lips.

“And I promise you this will never happen again, Marge.”

“It better not,” she said.

“Though I think Mrs. Jackson made a copy of one of the letters. The one about the tampon? She seemed really intrigued by it. Couldn’t stop asking questions.”

In spite of herself, she had to smile.“Oh, Tex,” she sighed.

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Harriet listened to Tex explaining to Marge about their letter retrieval expedition. She was thoroughly bored with the entire incident by now. How silly humans were. And how petty. Just because a couple of letters had escaped into the wild they had to go and make a big fuss about it. Who cared about some old letters from thirty years ago? And besides, it wasn’t Tex’s fault, was it? In fact it could have happened to anyone.

“Humans,” she told her boyfriend. “They just love to make a mountain out of a molehill every single time, don’t they? Drama, drama, drama.”

They were back at the house, with Tex pacing the living room, and Harriet and Brutus on the couch. Which is when Harriet caught Brutus staring at her for some reason. Her heart stopped.“What is it? Is something wrong with me, precious?”

“There’s something on your nose,” said Brutus.

Her heart stopped—or at least that’s how it felt.

“What is it?! Tell me!” she demanded.

“A spot,” said Brutus. “Just a tiny spot, really.”

She uttered a wail of despair, then flew off the couch, and up the stairs. In the bathroom, she jumped the sink in one swift movement and moments later was staring at her reflection in the mirror. And that’s when she saw it. A big red spot had appeared on the bridge of her nose.

“Nooooooooooo!” she cried in agony.

It wasn’t a small spot, like Brutus said. It was a big spot. In fact the spot was all she could see, as it seemed to cover her entire face!

It was red, it was angry, and it looked as if someone had slashed her face with a sharp razor.

And with her photoshoot only days away, it was the worst possible moment for this horrible blemish to appear on her lovely visage.

Brutus, who’d silently snuck into the bathroom, glanced up at her. “It’s not so bad, is it?” he asked—the traitor!

“It is bad!” she wailed. “It’s horrible. It’s a tragedy—the worst thing to happen to me ever!”

“It’ll pass,” he said. “Just you wait and see. This time tomorrow it’ll be gone.”

“No, it won’t. It’ll keep on growing and growing and growing—like a pumpkin. And just when I’ve got to be ready for my shoot, I’ll look like a monster! A terrible, hideous monster!”

“No, you won’t. And besides, these photographers have all kinds of tricks to deal with these contingencies. I’ll bet he’s got a cream or whatever to cover that spot right up. And then of course there’s Photoshop.”

She was only partly reassured by his words.“It’s the end of the world,” she told him in a quiet voice as she prostrated herself across the sink. “The end of my life!”

CHAPTER 14

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Interesting things had been happening at Advantage Publishing all day long, and the number of people in and out of Madison’s office was growing by the minute. The man certainly led an interesting life!

And all throughout the events that unfolded, Danny kept us informed.

Shortly before lunch, a man named Wayne Piscina had been fired. According to Danny some old homophobic and racist tweets had surfaced, which led to a big furor online, and Wayne, who worked as an assistant photographer, had to go.

Next, a rumor circulated that Advantage Publishing and Madison himself were being sued by a model. The model’s name was Ona Konpacka, and according to Danny the woman’s face was permanently disfigured because of a botched cosmetic procedure. Danny showed us pictures of the woman, and it has to be said she was gorgeous. Now, apparently, not so much—though there were no pictures to indicate the damage that was done. No before and after.

“Apparently she had a bad reaction to some fillers that were injected into her face,” Danny explained to an eager audience of four. “The fillers permanently altered the shape, and now she won’t leave the house. Her career is ruined, her life is over, and she’s suing Advantage Publishing and Madison for millions.”

“But why? It’s not Madison’s fault that the surgeon botched the procedure,” said Scarlett, who kept touching her face as Danny related this horror story.

“Oh, but she’s suing the surgeon, too, of course, and the clinic. But she says Madison personally told her to get the procedure, since he wasn’t happy about the way she looked, and said she could stay relevant only if she had some minor alterations. And also, he was the one who recommended this particular clinic.”

“Poor woman,” said Scarlett as she studied Miss Konpacka’s face. “Imagine having your face destroyed by some horrible butcher. She’ll never work again?”

“As far as I understood, the structure of her face is so different now even her own mother doesn’t recognize her anymore,” said Danny. He seemed to relish relating the details of this latest example of a cosmetic procedure gone wrong.

“A boyfriend once told me to get fillers, and I declined,” said Scarlett, gently fingering her lips. “Thank God I did. Though I had some minor work done, I never did fillers.”

“And you better not,” said Gran. “Look what happened to this model.” She glanced over to Madison, who was pacing his office, screaming something into his phone, which was one of those wireless models, with something stuck in his ear.

Up and down his office he went, and even though we couldn’t understand what he was saying, it was obvious the man was under tremendous pressure.

Natalie was also studying her boss, and I thought I could detect from her body language that she felt for her former lover and baby daddy. Now that he was in trouble, she was clearly eager to kiss his head and make the trouble go away.

And behind Natalie, Tom was staring at the PA, and it was pretty obvious what he was thinking: that he wanted to be the one to shower the girl with kisses and make all her trouble go away. But from the young man’s demeanor, it was also clear he didn’t think that would ever happen.

Danny had left, to spread some more gossip around the office, and take bets, and Scarlett and Gran, even though they should have been correcting spreadsheets, were conferring about the next step in their rescue operation.

“This place is better than any soap I’ve ever seen,” said Scarlett. “Better thanThe Bold and the Beautiful orGeneral Hospital. We should have gone back to work a long time ago. This is so much fun!”

“If you remember, I never stopped working,” Gran pointed out.

“Being Tex’s receptionist doesn’t count,” said Scarlett.

“It does, too. It’s hard work having to listen to Tex’s patients all day.”

“I worked for Tex, and I don’t remember it as work. Tex is a sweetheart, and the kindest, best employer ever.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” Gran admitted. “Tex is a sweetheart. Not like Madison, who seems like some kind of ogre.”

They eyed the big boss for a moment, then returned to the topic at hand.

“So what do you reckon Tom’s chances are?” asked Gran.

“Zero,” said Scarlett. “The kid’s nice, but he’s got as much charm as a dish towel.”

“Yeah, and judging from the way Natalie keeps looking at Madison, I don’t think she’s ready to move on.” She sighed deeply. “Looks like this mission of Dear Gabi on the Road is going to be a bust, honey.”

“Oh, well. Better luck next time, I guess.”

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Vesta had wandered into the canteen for a refill. She couldn’t get over the fact that she could drink as much hot chocolate as she liked, and didn’t have to pay for it. Working for the man had its perks, and if she ever went back to working for Tex, the first thing she’d do was ask him to install a decent hot chocolate maker.

Danny was seated at the table when she walked in, and greeted her with a big grin.“Tommy tells me your friend has been trying to teach him how to seduce the ladies?”

“Yeah, Scarlett is good at that kind of stuff,” Vesta admitted. “Though she seems to feel it’s going to be a bust.”

“I’m afraid she’s probably right. I’ve been trying to get Tommy to ask Natalie out for months, and he’s been stalling me.”

“You know Tommy well, do you?”

“He’s my cousin,” said Danny, much to Vesta’s surprise. “In fact we live together. Him and his mom and his little brother.”

“You all live together?”

“Yeah, it’s a long story. My mom and dad died when I was little, and Auntie Mel has been my second mom ever since. So Tom and Harry, that’s Tom’s little brother, are like brothers to me. We all grew up together under the same roof.”

“So you know about his affections for Natalie, huh?”

The mailroom clerk rolled his eyes.“Do I? It’s all he ever talks about!”

“Looks like Natalie’s got a thing for the big boss, though.”

“Yeah, it’s been like that from the day she started here. But Madison is married, and he’s not about to get a divorce so he can make an honest woman out of sweet little Natalie.” He grimaced. “Which is eating Tommy alive, as you can imagine.”

“He does look very unhappy with the whole situation. How did he react when he found out Natalie is pregnant?”

“I just told him this morning. He did not take it well. Especially when I told him Madison is probably the father. He didn’t seem to believe me.”

Vesta, who didn’t like to admit defeat, frowned into her cup. “Okay, so what if you and me and Scarlett—we all make one final effort to get Tom to ask Natalie out. Do you think he’ll do it?”

Danny shrugged.“Honestly? I don’t know.”

“Let’s just give it another shot,” Vesta suggested. “And if it doesn’t work, we’ll drop it.”

“Deal,” said Danny, and held up his fist for a fist bump, which Vesta awkwardly obliged. Young people these days. What was wrong with a simple handshake?

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When Gran returned from the canteen, her eyes were shining, and she looked like a woman with a plan. Danny was trailing in her wake, and I just knew what was about to happen.

“Uh-oh,” I said.

“What’s going on?” asked Dooley, who had been napping next to me.

“I think they’re going to try to make Tom ask Natalie out on a date.”

“Oh, so that’s good, isn’t it?”

“I’m not sure.” I glanced in Natalie’s direction. The young PA sat ramrod straight at her desk, and was typing on her computer at a relentless pace, her fingers dancing across the keyboard. There were red spots on her cheekbones, and I had the impression she was a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

But Gran and Scarlett and Danny didn’t see it that way. And so we watched the small contingent move over to Tom’s desk. The kid listened, shook his head a few times, looked at Natalie’s back a couple of times more, and finally stood, urged on by the trio. He seemed to gather his courage, and made his way over to Natalie.

For a few moments, he stood chatting to her, then must have popped the question, for Natalie jerked her head around, to give him a look of utter astonishment. Moments later she shook her head, Tom slumped in response, and as he returned to his desk, we could see she’d taken the wind right out of his sails.

“I guess that’s a hard no,” said Dooley.

“Yeah, looks like,” I agreed.

Tom dropped down in his chair like a bag of potatoes, and all the claps on the back and words of advice couldn’t cheer him up. In fact he looked worse now than he had all day. At least before he was holding onto some measure of hope to buoy him. Now there was no more hope. The girl of his dreams had turned him down flat. And that, as they say, was that!

“Oh, well, at least he tried,” I said, as I put my head on my paws again.

“Yeah, at least there’s that,” Dooley said. “Did you know that a magazine likeGlimmer has a circulation of one million copies, Max? That’s one million people reading the magazine every single month. That’s a lot of people, isn’t it? Though not as much asGood Housekeeping, which has a circulation of four million! Four million people reading the magazine every single month. Can you imagine?”

I could, and somehow hearing all these numbers made me tired. And so while Dooley kept droning off names and numbers, I soon drifted off to sleep.

Odd, that. How a busy office can induce such a wonderful nap. Makes you wonder how sleeplessness can exist, in a world filled with offices like that.

CHAPTER 15

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After a long day of hard labor at the office, one expects to arrive home to a delicious meal, before settling in to watch one’s favorite show, and taking a well-deserved nap on the couch, surrounded by one’s loved ones.

Instead we arrived in what amounted to an atmosphere of sheer pandemonium!

Harriet was experiencing a major crisis, and the moment we got back from Advantage Publishing, we were all bundled into Gran’s car and taken, at a high rate of speed, to Vena Aleman, our local veterinarian.

“I’m dead!” Harriet lamented. “This is the end, I’m dead!”

“It’s just a spot,” Brutus was saying. “Just a minor, little spot.”

“It’s cancer—I just know it is. It’s cancer and it’s spreading!”

“It’s not cancer, Harriet,” said Gran, who was trying her darndest to keep her eyes on the road, while at the same time having to keep Harriet’s panic attack at bay.

“It’s cancer of the nose,” Harriet insisted. “And it’s spreading everywhere!” She directed a pleading look at her mate. “Brutus, I’m so grateful to have known you. The only regret I have is that we didn’t meet sooner. That we had so precious little time.”

“It’s not cancer,” Brutus insisted stubbornly, but I could see he was starting to waver. “Is it, Max?”

“I’m not a doctor,” I said, as I studied the spot more closely. “It could be cancer, or it could not. Hard to know for sure.”

“If a spot has a weird shape and a weird color it’s almost certainly cancer,” Dooley announced. “And this spot looks very weird to me, and it has a very weird color, too.” He placed a consoling paw on Harriet’s arm. “It’s been wonderful knowing you, Harriet. Rest assured we’ll always remember you with fondness.”

“Oh, God!” Harriet wailed. “I’m dying—this is the end for me! And just when I looked my absolute best!”

“You do look your absolute best,” Brutus said, nervously looking at Gran, hoping for some measure of reassurance from the old lady. None was forthcoming, though, for Gran had shifted into higher gear, and the car was hurtling along the road at breakneck speed, almost clipping a few pedestrians and even a couple of cyclists in the process.

“Just when my big break finally came,” Harriet lamented as she placed a paw to her brow and closed her eyes, “fate caught up with me. I was destined for greatness, but it simply was not to be. Promise me white roses, sweetness.”

“Plenty of white roses,” Brutus promised.

“And a funeral fit for royalty.”

“Absolutely,” Brutus said.

“Is she really dying, Max?” asked Dooley as Brutus took his mate’s paw and patted it consolingly.

“I doubt it, Dooley,” I said. “Harriet is one of those cats who will never die. She’s a diva, you see. And we all know that divas outlive us all, in spite of all the drama.” Or perhaps because of it. Ordinary folk like you and me keep all that drama inside, while the Harriets of this world let it spill out at every available opportunity, transferring the bulk of their tragedy onto the shoulders of others.

We finally arrived at Vena’s, and lucky for us, there was no one in the waiting room, so we were ushered straight into the doctor’s main office, where she patiently awaited us, a sardonic smile on her face. You can say about Vena what you will—and I know that in the past I’ve called her a vicious butcher, a cruel sadist and a cat’s worst nightmare—but the woman always keeps her cool.

“So what do we have here?” she asked now as Gran hoisted Harriet onto the operating table and Vena moved in to take a closer look at that suspicious spot.

“It’s cancer, isn’t it?” asked Harriet nervously. “How long do I have? Weeks? Days? HOURS?!”

And then the most amazing thing happened. Vena frowned as she studied the spot, then performed a sort of flicking motion with her index finger, and said,“There. All gone.”

We exchanged puzzled and confused glances.

“All gone? What do you mean, all gone?” Gran demanded.

“Just a bit of dried food,” Vena explained. She gave Harriet an admonishing wag of her finger. “Looks like someone hasn’t been grooming herself as thoroughly as she could have, mh?” She then directed a critical look at Gran. “And looks like some pet parent hasn’t been conscious of their basic duty of care.”

For once in her life Gran actually managed to look sheepish and apologetic.“I had a busy day,” she said. “So when Harriet told me she had a suspicious spot, I didn’t look any further but bundled her into the car and drove straight here.”

“Harriet ‘told’ you this, did she?” said Vena with a slight smile.

“Well, I mean she didn’t actually ‘tell’ me, of course,” said Gran, grinning nervously. “But… well, you know what I mean.”

“I do know what you mean,” said Vena with a wink at the old lady. “And now that you’re here, I think it’s best if I take a closer look at the entire clowder.”

And so, all because Harriet hadn’t bothered to lick her nose after her most recent meal, we were all subjected to Vena’s obnoxious prods and pokes!

Life isn’t fair sometimes. It really is not!

CHAPTER 16

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To say that Tex had lived through better days would be an understatement. Even though he’d managed to collect every last one of his letters, and had even offered them to Marge with the original ribbon wrapped around them in a nice bow, Marge had refused the present with untypical coolness.

And so it was that the good doctor sat in the kitchen, drowning his sorrow with a glass of apple juice, when Vesta walked in and found him like that.

Since she’d had to corral four cats through a thorough medical examination—never their favorite pastime—and had had to accept defeat at work that day, suffice it to say she wasn’t feeling like some Florence Nightingale of old. Still, the moment she caught sight of her son-in-law’s sad face, her mother’s heart bled.

“Don’t tell me you’ve got cancer, too,” were her first words as she started making herself a cup of hot chamomile tea—a habit before retiring for the night.

Tex looked up.“Cancer? Who’s got cancer?”

“Harriet thought she had skin cancer. Turns out it was a piece of dried food stuck to her nose.” She shook her head. “If all cancers were as easily removed as hers, our work at the doctor’s office would be a lot easier.”

“Marge refused to take back my letters,” said Tex sadly. He gestured to the little pile on the kitchen table.

“So you got them all back, did you?” said Vesta, picking up the collection and idly rifling through it.

“I did. Took me all afternoon, but I finally managed.” He sighed deeply. “I’ll never be able to face these people again. Even Ted Trapper stopped me in the street to tell me how much he admired my penmanship. And if I’d considered publishing my letters. Said they’d be a big hit in certain circles.”

“What circles? What is he talking about?”

“He says a lot of guys have trouble expressing their feelings to their prospective girlfriends, and my letters would be a great primer on the subject. His exact words were, ‘There’s gold in them thar hills, Poole!’”

Vesta grinned as she poured hot water from the kettle into her favorite‘Greatest Grandma in the World’ cup. It was the same cup Odelia had gifted her many years ago, when she was just a little girl. Vesta took great care of that cup, and didn’t let anyone else touch it. “Maybe he’s right,” she said. “Maybe there is gold in them thar hills. Good old-fashioned love letters may have gone out of fashion in this day and age of tweets and texts and WhatsApp, but I still think there’s nothing more romantic for a girl than receiving a long letter from a boy.”

“I guess,” said Tex, but clearly his head wasn’t in monetizing his letters, but in reconciling the girl he’d written them for in the first place—many years ago.

“Look, if you want to show how sorry you are, and get Marge to forgive you,” said Vesta, as she took a seat at the kitchen table, “you need to do something more than simply return those letters to her. You need to wow her, buddy. Show her how much you still care—you do still care about my daughter, don’t you?”

“Of course I do! Even after twenty-five years Marge is still the only one for me.”

“I believe you,” said Vesta. “But it’s not enough to say it. You have to show it. Make her feel your affection. And the best way to do that is by—”

“Buying her dinner? Giving her a foot rub?”

“—saying it with—”

“Diamonds? Lingerie?”

“—flowers!”

Tex stared at her.“Flowers?” he asked, as if the concept was alien to him.

“Buy Marge a nice bouquet of flowers. Or better yet, buy her several. You’ll see how she’ll perk right up.”

“Is that so?” said Tex. If anyone had perked up, it was him. Clearly the notion of not having to splurge on diamonds or lingerie appealed to his tightwad nature.

“You do know what Marge’s favorite flowers are, don’t you?”

“Um…”

“Oh, Tex. How long have you known my daughter?”

He gave her a sheepish look.“Long enough to know what kind of flowers she likes?”

“Roses, Tex. Especially the pink variety. So if Marge were to arrive home from work tomorrow, and find her house festooned with roses in every shade of pink, I think she’d forgive you that silliness with those letters of yours in a heartbeat.”

Which actually gave her an idea. If she could figure out what kind of flower Natalie Ferrara liked, and whisper the idea in Tom Mitchell’s ear…

“Where do I buy so many flowers?” Tex mused.

“Oh, Tex. Do I have to do everything for you? Just buy them online.”

“Online?” he said with a frown.

“Yes, online. You order them, and they deliver them.” She drained the last of her cup and got up. “Just do it.”

“But…”

“See you tomorrow, Tex. I’m beat. Who knew working all day was so exhausting?”

And so she left her son-in-law googling‘How to buy flowers online,’ and turned in for the night. She was feeling invigorated. This flower business could just turn this whole situation around. All Tom had to do was buy Natalie her favorite flowers, and maybe—just maybe—Dear Gabi could still work a miracle!

CHAPTER 17

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One house over, Odelia and Chase were reading in bed, though it was actually Odelia who was reading a novel, with Chase sitting and staring at her, which she could detect from the corner of her eye. When she finally looked up, and found him grinning at her like an idiot, she frowned.“Is everything all right, babe?”

“Never better,” Chase assured her. “In fact I feel so great I could sing!”

“Please don’t,” she implored, remembering how he’d once serenaded her, at the instigation of her dad, and had been hit by a disapproving shoe from their neighbor Kurt Mayfield.

“I feel great,” Chase repeated. “Life is just so grand, isn’t it? Life is amazing!”

She placed a hand on her hubby’s brow. He didn’t seem to have a fever. “I think you’re coming down with something,” she said. “Maybe you should see my dad tomorrow.”

“I saw your dad today.”

“I know. The letter business.”

He made a dismissive gesture with his hand.“That’s all taken care of. Your dad got his letters back, gave them to your mom, and all is forgiven and forgotten.”

Judging from the version of affairs her mom had given her, all was far from forgiven and forgotten, but there seemed no sense in bringing all that up now.“You’re sure you’re all right? You were acting weird this morning, too.”

“I like to think I’m finally acting like my true self,” he said, that big grin still plastered all across his face. “I’m finally coming into my own. Being the real me!”

If this was the real Chase, she wondered what had happened to the old one. She wanted him back!“You haven’t made a drug bust recently, have you?” And sampling some of those illegal substances?

“Nope. No drug bust. The streets of Hampton Cove are as clean and safe as they ever were. In fact no crimes are being committed in this town. We’re probably the most crime-free town in America right now. And it’s all thanks to a positive mental attitude.” He punched the air with his fist. “Yes, we can, babe!”

And to show them that she wholeheartedly agreed, Grace chose that moment to open her mouth and start loudly wailing.

At the foot of the bed, two cats stirred and opened sleepy eyes.

“When is that child ever going to start behaving like a normal human being?” Max lamented, not for the first time.

“Yes, when is she ever going to turn into a normal person?” Dooley wanted to know.

Odelia swung her feet from the bed, but Chase beat her to it. In a flash, he was out of the bed and picking Grace up from her own little bed and cradling her in his arms.“There, there,” he murmured softly. “Daddy’s here, my sweet little princess.”

There was something to be said for this new, improved Chase, Odelia thought as she watched him comfort their baby girl. It might be a little scary, as it was a far cry from the sometimes grumpy Chase Kingsley she’d come to know and love, but Grace seemed to respond well to Chase 2.0.

He gave her a dazzling smile.“All she needed was her daddy,” he said, as Grace mumbled something and went back to sleep. And as he put her to bed, he said, “Your dad was right. Never let them see you sad. Some great advice right there.”

She frowned.“Wait, what?”

“Your dad? I asked him for advice on being a dad, seeing as he was such a great dad to you? And he told me to become Mr. Positivity. Always exude cheerfulness and a positive mental attitude in front of the kid. And I have to say, it works like a charm.” He grimaced and rubbed his cheek. “It’s hard on the facial muscles, though, all this smiling. Guess I’m not used to it.”

Now it was her turn to smile.“You asked Dad for his advice on being a dad?”

“I did. I mean, you turned out such a wonderful person, so he must have done something right, right?”

“I guess so,” she said. “Though Mom might have had something to do with that, too, and Gran, of course.”

At the mention of Gran, Chase grimaced. Clearly his opinion of Gran’s parental skills wasn’t as high as it could have been.

“And of course every child has its own personality. I had mine, and Grace has hers, which is going to be different from ours. Not sure there’s a lot we can do about that—no matter how often we smile, or display a positive mental attitude.”

His smile faltered, but then was back in full force.“Tex raised you to be a strong, independent, wonderful human being, and I’m determined to do the same with Grace. And if I have to grin like an idiot every time she’s with me, then so be it.”

Odelia pressed a loving arm to her husband’s shoulder. “You don’t have to grin like an idiot to be a good dad, Chase. You are a good person, and a great dad.”

This time his smile vanished, and was replaced by a look of sheer anguish.“But what if I screw it up? I only have one shot at this, babe. And I don’t want to ruin it. I don’t want to look back on my life and realize I was a terrible dad.”

“You couldn’t be a terrible dad if you tried. And neither am I going to be a terrible mom. Are we going to make mistakes? Sure. But we’re going to learn from them, and be the best parents we can be. Same way we’re trying to be the best people we can be. Because that’s who we are.”

“Mh.” He didn’t look convinced. “If only my dad were still alive. He would have loved to be a grandad.”

“I’m sure he’s looking down on us from up there, knowing you’re doing a good job and being proud of you, babe.”

Chase let out a deep sigh, and folded his arms behind his head.“It’s tough having to be positive all the time. And not just on my facial muscles.”

“You just be you,” she suggested. “And I’ll be me, and we’ll both figure it out as we go along. How is that for advice?”

“Very wise,” he said, and planted a grateful kiss on her cheek. “Just like you.”

“And besides, my dad wasn’t exactly Mr. Positivity. If I remember correctly, he could be grumpy from time to time, especially when things didn’t work out at the office, or when Gran was being, well, Gran. And somehow I still ended up being a normal person and not an ax murderer, right?”

“Right,” he said with a grin. “I can definitely confirm you’re not an ax murderer.”

And on that positive note, she switched off her bedside light, and they turned in for the night.

CHAPTER 18

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Once our humans had finally gone to sleep—which took them long enough, I have to say—and they had extinguished the light, it was time for Dooley and myself to head on out for that most important time: cat choir time!

We had a lot to talk about, with our adventures at the office, and Harriet’s spot, which turned out not to be as life-threatening as she had thought, and I think we were all eager to relate our experience to our friends.

“Are you sure you should walk all the way to the park, Harriet?” asked Dooley. “Your paws are going to get dirty, and you have to keep them clean for your shoot.”

Harriet gave Dooley a sideways glance, to ascertain if he wasn’t pulling her tail. She should have known better. Dooley doesn’t have a single ounce of cynicism in him, or sarcasm, and was genuinely concerned about Harriet’s appearance.

“I can lick my paws clean, thank you very much,” she said. “And besides, that shoot is still days away, so I can afford to get a little dirty. Gran told me the people that run the shoot have an entire team ready and waiting to spruce me right up.”

“Oh, just like with movie stars, you mean?” asked Dooley.

“Exactly like with movie stars!” said Harriet, her excitement increasing with leaps and bounds now that she was talking about her favorite subject: herself. “They’re going to primp me to within an inch of my life before they’re through.” She sighed happily. “I’m going to look the very best I’ve ever looked. And that’s even before they apply all of that Photoshop stuff to the final results. This cover is going to be one for the books. One to save for posterity. Something to treasure.”

It was nice to see her happy again, after the cancer scare she’d had, but I couldn’t help but wonder if this shoot would actually happen. After having taken a peek at the inner workings of Advantage Publishing—a look behind the curtain, so to speak—they seemed to be a company facing a multitude of problems. Such as there were: a publicist quitting herjob, a fashion editor being fired for harassing his models, a former supermodel suing the company and its CEO for ruining her face, and an assistant embroiled in a scandal over some old tweets.

And then there was the mysterious fight with Mrs. Madison, and the general image I got from Mr. Madison was that of a man under extreme duress.

Would Advantage Publishing still exist by the time Harriet’s shoot was supposed to happen? Was the captain of the ship capable of righting his boat? Or was Advantage going under, mired in scandal? Or was this just par for the course? Just another day at the office?

One wondered how Michael Madison slept at night, with so much going on.

“So how was your day?” asked Brutus finally, when Harriet had finished extolling the virtues of herself.

“Oh, so so,” I said.

“Gran is trying to match a shy editor with a sad secretary,” Dooley explained. “The sad secretary is pregnant with her boss’s baby, who dumped her when he found out she was pregnant, and told her to get an abortion. And when the shy editor asked her out on a date, she turned him down, so now he’s sad, too.”

“What a fascinating life you lead,” said Harriet, a touch of mockery in her voice. She does do cynicism, and sarcasm, too, and does it well. “Full of excitement and stuff.”

“It was an exciting day,” Dooley confirmed, not picking up on the mockery. “Especially when Scarlett tried to teach the shy editor how to seduce a woman, and he got even more shy and all red in the face. And then there’s all the scandals.”

“Scandals? What scandals?” asked Harriet, her interest piqued. She does love a good scandal.

And as Dooley started listing all the trouble Advantage’s CEO was facing, Brutus fell back, and gestured for me to do the same.

“I don’t know what to do, Max,” he told me in a low voice once we were out of Harriet’s earshot.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Harriet wants me to be in the shoot with her. She says it’s important for the contrast. She calls it the beauty and the beast effect. But I don’t know. Do I really want to be the beast to her beauty? WhenCat Life hits the stands I’m going to be the laughingstock of the whole town. They’re never going to let me live it down.”

“I think you’ll find that these short bursts of notoriety pass very quickly,” I said. “It’s just one news cycle, Brutus. The next day something else pops up, and that picture will be yesterday’s news, that copy ofCat Life used to put at the bottom of the litter box.”

He gave me a look of astonishment.“My face is going to be at the bottom of a litter box?”

“At the bottom of many litter boxes all across the country, I’m sure. Or to wrap up a nice fat piece of codfish. Or even to light a fire in the stove.” I gave him a pat on the shoulder. “What’s more important: Harriet’s face is going to serve the same purpose. So there’s something to consider.”

His face lit up with a smile.“I better not tell her. She’ll be appalled.”

“Fame is fleeting, Brutus, and so is notoriety. So I wouldn’t worry about it.”

“Gee, thanks, Max. You certainly put things in perspective for me.”

“Glad to be of assistance, buddy. Now you be the beast to Harriet’s beauty, and have fun while you’re at it. It’s not every day that you get to be a photo model.”

I didn’t want to bore him with my private thoughts about the dark clouds gathering over the Advantage Publishing Company. It just might detract from his enjoyment, and Harriet’s, over being the belle of the ball for a day—or the beast.

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

On the other side of town, Alec Lip and Charlene Butterwick were panting heavily. They’d just tried out another tip from thatGlimmer article’15 Ways to Spice up Your Love Life,’ as written by one Tom Mitchell, and were frankly beat.

“I don’t know how people do it,” Alec lamented as he placed a hand on his painful back. “I think I’ve pulled a muscle—or ten.”

“Me, too,” said Charlene. She tried to move her leg and when a spasm shot through it, winced. “This Tom Mitchell, whoever he is, must be a sadist.”

“Or a masochist,” Alec supplied. “One of them BDSM fanatics.”

“You liked the whip, though, didn’t you?”

“The whip was fine, until your secretary walked in.”

“Imelda is very discreet,” Charlene assured her boyfriend.

“I’ll bet she is. So discreet the whole town will know about our escapades by this time tomorrow.”

Charlene frowned at this piece of news.“You think?”

“Absolutely. Her best friend is Dolores Peltz, and Dolores just happens to be the precinct’s biggest blabbermouth. So if she knows, everybody knows.”

“Oh, let them gossip,” said Charlene. “We’re consenting adults, and we’re doing nothing wrong.”

“No, I guess not,” said Alec, wiping the beads of sweat from his brow. “Still, it’s going to be weird when the chief of police and the mayor are the talk of the town.”

“It might help me with my ratings,” said Charlene as she gingerly crawled back into bed, from where they’d fallen when practicing this latest stunt. “Ouch,” she muttered when another twinge of pain shot through her leg. “I just hope I’ll be able to walk tomorrow.” A spicy love life was one thing, but not if it turned you into a cripple.

“I’m going to have a word with this Tom Mitchell,” Alec grunted as he stretched out on the floor, hoping to give his painful back some respite.

“He probably doesn’t even exist. TheseGlimmer editors all use fake names so they can avoid people complaining about the stuff they write.” She glanced down at her boyfriend. “Do you want to move on to number four on the list?” But Alec gave her such a look of despair that she quickly dropped the idea. To be honest, she’d had enough herself for a while. “How about I warm up a pancake and make us some hot chocolate?” she suggested.

“Oh, yes, please,” said Alec. He tried to get up, but failed. “Maybe a little later.”

They hadn’t wanted to turn into a boring old couple, but sometimes you simply had to accept the naked facts: they were a boring old couple, and there was nothing wrong with that.

So she turned on Netflix, and before long they were engrossed in the latest romantic comedy, this one of Brazilian origin. Tom Mitchell might not approve, but she didn’t care. By then, Alec had managed to crawl back into bed, and they watched the movie together, like the boring old people they were—and loved it.

CHAPTER 19

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

The next morning I woke up from an incessant ringing. At first I thought the ringing was in my ears, but when both Odelia and Chase’s phones started buzzing, I finally rubbed the sleep from my eyes and paid attention.

“Your uncle,” said Chase as he picked his phone from the nightstand.

“My uncle,” Odelia echoed as she did the same.

Grace, meanwhile, was wailing in distress, and demanding to be picked up and fed, and since it was now obvious that no more nap time would be enjoyed, Dooley and I jumped off the bed, ready to start our day.

We were working cats now, you see, with a commute to look forward to.

But that was before we heard Chase cry,“What?!”

We both turned, and watched the big guy hop out of bed, and hurry down the stairs, still only dressed in a pair of boxers.

“What’s going on?” asked Dooley.

“I have no idea,” said Odelia. “Chase was first to pick up.”

The ringing turned out to be the front doorbell, and when we heard Uncle Alec’s baritone, it soon became clear something terrible had happened. Uncle Alec might be a fun uncle to Odelia, but he’s also chief of police, and so when he shows up unannounced at some ungodly hour, he doesn’t come bearing gifts.

“Michael Madison is dead,” Chase announced the moment Odelia arrived downstairs.

“What?!” our human cried, echoing her husband’s earlier sentiments upon hearing this piece of unexpected news.

“I’m afraid so,” said Uncle Alec, looking more rumpled than ever. He was also rubbing his back and making painful grimaces as he did. “The janitor found him early this morning. Apparently he either fell or jumped out of a window.”

Harriet and Brutus had walked in through the pet flap, quickly followed by Gran—the latter entering not through the pet flap but the door—and when Gran saw her granddaughter’s consternation, instantly knew something was wrong.

“Who died?” she asked.

“Michael Madison,” said Uncle Alec, still rubbing his back.

“What?!” Gran cried. It seemed like the responsedu jour.

“Fell out of his window,” Chase supplied.

“Or jumped,” Odelia added. She’d been studying her uncle with a look of concern. “Back trouble?”

“Yeah,” said Uncle Alec. “I sprained something last night.” And when we all lifted an inquisitive eyebrow, he elucidated, “I was, um, doing some weeding.”

“Is what you kids call it nowadays?” asked Gran with a grin.

“Well, it’s all your fault, isn’t it!” her son suddenly burst out.

Gran held up her hands.“Easy, tiger. What’s my fault this time?”

“You and that magazine of yours.Glimmer, or whatever it’s called.”

“Not my magazine, but whatever,” said Gran.

“When Charlene heard you were an intern at Advantage, she took a subscription, just out of solidarity. And read an article by a guy called Tom Mitchell. 15 Ways to Spice up Your Love Life. So she’s got us going through the tips one by one, which is how we both ended up almost crippling ourselves.”

“Tom Mitchell didn’t write that article,” said Gran. “Scarlett did.”

Uncle Alec groaned.“I should have known.”

“And let me tell you that the response has been very positive,” Gran continued. “Hundreds of comments on the website, and plenty of likes and shares.”

“I’m writing a strongly-worded comment today, and I can promise you it won’t be positive,” the police chief grumbled as he hobbled in the direction of the door. “And you better get your ass over to that crime scene, Chase!”

“I thought it was an accident?” said Chase as he scratched his bare chest.

“Doesn’t matter what it was. It’s still a suspicious death, so there needs to be an investigation.” And he muttered, “I’ll bet Michael Madison read Tom Mitchell’s article and killed himself trying out those fifteen tips.”

While Chase and Odelia returned upstairs to take a shower and get ready, Harriet drew me aside.“Michael Madison isCat Life’s publisher, isn’t he?”

“Was,” I said.

“Oh, dear. Do you think my shoot will still happen? I mean, publishers get killed all the time, don’t they? And replaced by other people?”

“I’m sure your shoot will happen,” I said. “Madison’s death isn’t going to affect that. Advantage Publishing is bigger than one CEO who falls from a window.”

“Oh, phew,” said Harriet. She laughed. “Talk about a load off my mind!”

“But who’s going to take care of Natalie’s baby now?” asked Dooley. “Her baby is going to be born without a father.”

“Madison wasn’t prepared to be that baby’s father anyway,” I told my friend. “So his death isn’t going to make a lot of difference.” Though Natalie would probably be devastated, considering how hung up she still was on that man.

Odelia and Chase came hurrying down the stairs, grabbed a bite to eat from the fridge, and then we were off in Chase’s squad car. For the occasion, Harriet and Brutus also joined us, since Harriet wanted to make sure her shoot would go off without a hitch. And also Gran was in the car with us, for in spite of this tragic event, today was just another working day for her, same way it was for us.

When we arrived at the Advantage Publishing building, plenty of people stood gathered outside, and they weren’t enjoying a smoking break either. The area underneath Michael Madison’s window had been cordoned off, and I could see Abe Cornwall’s car parked nearby. The county coroner was already busy examining the body, and when we joined him, he looked up.

“So what’s the verdict, Abe?” asked Chase.

“He’s dead,” deadpanned the wiry-haired medical examiner, and got up with a slight creaking sound of the knees. “Wounds consistent with a drop from that window up there,” he said, pointing to a window on the third floor. “Death would have been instantaneous.”

“So what do you think happened? Was he pushed? Did he jump?”

“No defensive wounds as far as I can tell. He just fell on his head and died.” He shrugged. “Nothing more to tell, really, unless you want me to get technical.”

“Time of death?”

“Between two and five last night.”

“I wonder if there’s a camera,” said Chase as he glanced around.

“There’s a camera covering the parking area,” said Gran. “But that’s on the other side of the building. I doubt there’s any cameras out here.”

“No, I don’t see any either,” said Chase. “I’ll talk to security to make sure.”

And since there was nothing more for us to do out there, we moved indoors. The actual scene of the crime—if a crime had been committed, that is—was Michael Madison’s office. So the small gang gathered once more there. The window was still open, but there were no signs of a struggle as far as I could tell. Crime scene people were checking the office, and one of them beckoned Chase over and showed him something on a laptop.

Chase’s face hardened. “Suicide note,” he told us, and read from the screen, “‘I can’t do this anymore. I’m sorry. Goodbye, cruel world, goodbye.’ Looks like we’ve got a suicide on our hands, people.”

“He was under a lot of pressure,” Gran confirmed. “Trouble with his wife, with his mistress, personnel problems, numerous scandals.” She shook her head. “It must have all gotten too much for the poor guy, so he saw no other solution.”

“It’s a great drop,” said Harriet, who’d jumped up on that window.

“Can you please get down from there?” said Odelia, when she saw several of Abe’s CSI people freaking out at the sight of a cat jumping all over their crime scene.

“Too bad Michael Madison wasn’t a cat,” said Harriet as she jumped down again and joined us. “He would have landed on his feet and been just fine.”

“I guess that could be said about all humans,” said Brutus, the philosopher.

“When was the note written?” asked Odelia.

Chase checked the laptop.“Three o’clock.”

“Consistent with Abe’s time frame.”

Chase nodded.“Looks like a cut-and-dried case of suicide.”

An officer escorted a man into the office who was dressed in a uniform. I’d seen him hanging around the lobby the day before, keeping an eye on things.

“Detective,” said the security guard, touching his cap.

“Are there any cameras covering this side of the building?” asked Chase, not wasting any time.

“There’s a camera covering the fence, but it doesn’t cover the back of the building,” said the man.

Chase nodded.“Any cameras inside the office?”

“I’m afraid not. There’s a camera in the lobby, but not in the actual offices.”

The detective’s eye fell on the door, which had one of those electronic locks that can only be opened with a badge. “Could you pull up the badge activity from last night? See if there was anyone else in the building apart from Madison?”

“I already checked, sir,” said the security guard, “and the only badge that was used last night was Mike Madison’s. He arrived early yesterday morning and never left.”

“Who was the last person to leave, apart from Madison?”

“That would be Janice Wiskari, sir. She’s the cleaner in charge of this floor. She left at eleven last night.”

“And no one else entered?”

“No one, sir.”

“So Madison was all alone in here from eleven o’clock onward, until three o’clock, when he wrote that message,” Chase murmured as he fingered his chin.

“When can we allow people in, sir?” asked the security man. “It’s just that they’re all starting to arrive, and they’re getting antsy.”

Chase nodded, and walked out to confer with the security guy.

And since there was nothing further for us to do, Dooley and I wandered off, and soon found ourselves outside again, taking a closer look at that crime scene.

“Humans are fragile, aren’t they, Max?” Dooley remarked. “I mean, it’s not that high, and still Mr. Madison ended up dead? It’s hard to imagine.”

“Humans are fragile,” I confirmed. “Though some have been known to survive a fall from an even greater height.”

“It’s true,” he said. “I once saw a documentary about a woman who fell from a plane and survived. Planes fly very high in the sky, and she fell all the way down and lived. The plane did fly over a jungle, so the jungle must have broken her fall.”

“Yeah, Madison had no jungle,” I said, glancing at the mass of people smoking and talking and generally looking shocked—but also strangely pleased. As if this tragedy had supplied a modicum of excitement to an otherwise dull day.

Just then, I thought I saw movement in a nearby bush, and moved a little closer. And it was as I approached said bush that I saw what had caused the movement: it was a small, brown creature, with a pointy head and a round nose.

“Will you look at that,” said Dooley. “It’s a badger, Max.”

“A badger?” I said. “What is it doing here?”

“Maybe it got lost,” Dooley suggested. “Hi, there, badger,” he said. “Can we help you, sir?”

“Who are you?” asked the badger, eyeing us suspiciously.

“My name is Max,” I said. “And this is Dooley. We’re cats.”

“I know what you are,” said the badger, still continuing to be suspicious.

“Do you live around here?” I asked, trying to strike up a conversation.

“What’s it to you, cat?” asked the badger.

“Max,” I repeated. “My name is Max. And what’s yours?”

But my question was greeted with hostile silence.

“He’s not going to eat us, is he?” I asked Dooley. Since my friend watches the Discovery Channel all the time, he’s better placed than me to know about the habits of strange creatures like this.

“Badgers don’t eat cats,” said Dooley. “At least I don’t think so.”

“No, I don’t eat cats,” said the badger. “And cats don’t eat badgers—or do you?”

“No, we don’t eat badgers,” I hastened to say.

“We’re vegetarians,” Dooley said with an ingratiating smile. “We only eat kibble and wet food pouches supplied by our humans. And a piece of fish from time to time. Or a piece of sausage when our humans organize a barbecue.”

“You do know that your kibble and wet food and those sausages are made of meat, don’t you?” said the badger.

Dooley frowned.“Pretty sure that’s not the case,” he said. “You see, I love all creatures great and small, and would never eat them. That’s not how I roll.”

“There’s chicken in your kibble. Chickens are animals. So how can you call yourself a vegetarian if you eat chicken?”

“Pretty sure I don’t eat chicken,” Dooley insisted.

“God, you’re dumb,” said the badger, who wasn’t the most friendly badger I’d ever encountered. Then again, he was also the first badger I ever met, so maybe all badgers were like this.

“I’m not dumb,” said Dooley kindly. “I’m a vegetarian.”

Suddenly I got an idea.“You didn’t happen to see a guy fall out of a window last night, did you?” I asked, gesturing in the direction of the nearby building.

“Sure,” said the badger, much to my surprise. “Though he didn’t actually fall from that window.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, experiencing that tingle in my tail I get when a case suddenly presents itself to me.

“I mean he was pushed.”

“Pushed? You mean pushed by some other person?”

“He wasn’t pushed by a badger, if that’s what you mean,” said the badger with a touch of acerbity. “Yeah, pushed by another person. Plenty of screaming and shouting, too. Which is how I came to pop up from my burrow to take a look. I was just in time to see one person shove another personout of that window over there. And if that wasn’t enough, the person doing the shoving came out of the building a couple of minutes later, to check on the guy he dropped.”

“To see if he was still alive, you mean?”

The badger nodded.“Checked his pulse and then skedaddled.”

“Did you see this person’s face?” I asked, excitement making my heart race.

“Nah. He was wearing one of them black masks.”

“He? So it was a man?”

“When I say ‘he’ I don’t actually mean ‘he,’ you see. It could have been a she.”

“I see. And you’re absolutely positive about this?”

“Do I look like the kind of badger who would make up a story like that?”

“No, I guess not,” I admitted. He certainly didn’t look like the flaky type.

“Okay, so if there’s nothing else, I think I’ll take a hike now,” said the badger. “Badgers to see and things to do and all that.” And before we could stop him, he had disappeared into a hole in the ground.

“Hey, you haven’t told us your name!” I yelled after him.

But he was gone, with my voice echoing along the walls of the hole he’d dug.

“That’s a burrow,” said Dooley as he studied the hole. “Also called a den or a sett. Badgers are great diggers. That’s what they do. They dig. They use these dens to sleep during the day, and then they hunt during the night. Which is why he was up and about to watch Michael Madison fall out of his office window.”

“Or being pushed,” I said. “By a mystery person with a black mask.”

Dooley stared at me, dismay written all over his face.“So… he was murdered?”

I nodded thoughtfully.“That’s certainly what it looks like, Dooley.”

“Oh, dear. That’s not very nice.”

CHAPTER 20

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

We were all gathered in Uncle Alec’s office. I’d told Odelia that a credible witness had confirmed Madison was murdered, which put a completely different spin on things.

“It’s tough,” said the chief of police as he placed two beefy arms on his desk blotter. “A badger is not a good witness. A judge is not going to accept his statement. And neither is a cat. So frankly we got nothing.”

“We know it was murder,” Odelia argued.

“I know we know it was murder. But not officially we don’t. Not with a badger as a witness.” He frowned darkly in my direction, as if I was personally to blame for this dilemma.

“But we have to investigate,” said Chase. “If the guy was murdered, there has to be a murder investigation.”

“You know as well as I do that there needs to be a reasonable suspicion. What am I going to tell the DA? That a badger talked to my niece’s cat, who told my niece, who told me? He’s going to lock me up in the loony bin and throw away the key.” He shook his head. “No, we have to tackle this thing differently. We need to approach this from a different angle. An angle that leaves us out of it entirely.”

“And with us you mean the police,” said Chase.

Uncle Alec eyed his niece keenly.“You’re going to tell people you’re working for Madison’s insurance company. Investigating a life insurance claim.”

“That might be difficult,” said Odelia. “Since a lot of these people know me as a reporter for theGazette.”

“You could them you’re moonlighting as an insurance investigator?” But when Odelia gave him a look that said, ‘Are you kidding me?’ he relented. “Yeah I guess that wouldn’t fly. So what do you suggest?”

Odelia shrugged.“I’m a reporter, so why not use that as my cover?”

“Excellent thinking,” said her uncle, pointing a stubby finger in her direction.

“And since Gran and Scarlett are already undercover,” Odelia said, “we should be able to cover all of our bases.”

Her uncle rubbed his face.“I hope they don’t mess it up, like they usually do.”

“And what do you want me to do?” asked Chase.

“You’re going to coordinate the investigation, check alibis, ask around.”

“But not officially.”

Uncle Alec shrugged.“Just tying up loose ends. You know the drill.”

“Absolutely, Chief,” said Chase.

“So there’s going to be an investigation, only there’s not going to be an investigation,” Odelia summed things up.

“Exactly,” said the Chief. “And I hope this thing won’t come back to bite me in the ass. So the sooner you can crack this case and find me Madison’s killer, the better, you hear? Before people start asking questions, and the DA starts breathing down my neck or, God forbid, the Mayor.”

“I thought the Mayor was Uncle Alec’s girlfriend?” asked Dooley.

“She is, but she’s also his boss.” When Dooley stared at me, I added, “It’s complicated.”

“Human affairs always are,” he said, and not unjustly so.

“One thing I don’t understand,” said Chase, “is how the killer got in and out of the building without using a badge. Security is absolutely sure only Madison was in the building last night. So how did the killer move around undetected?”

“One of the mysteries you will have to solve, Max,” said Odelia.

“I know what’s going on,” said Dooley. “He’s the Invisible Man!”

“Unlikely,” I said with a smile. It was a real mystery, though.

How do you move around a building where every door is locked, and can only be opened with a personalized badge connected to the security system?

It was also the topic of conversation when we met up with Gran and Scarlett in a coffee shop around the corner from the police station. Odelia and Chase were there to brief the two older ladies on their new mission: to catch Michael Madison’s killer.

“So what can you tell me about potential suspects?” asked Odelia, her hand poised over her tablet.

“Oh, there’s plenty,” said Scarlett. “Take your pick.”

“There’s Tom Mitchell,” said Gran, earning herself an astonished look from Scarlett. “The kid is head over heels in love with Natalie, who is expecting Madison’s baby. So obviously Tom is the first suspect that comes to mind.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” said Scarlett reluctantly. “He’s so nice, though. I don’t think he’s a killer.”

“He could be nice and a killer,” said Gran.

“So Tom Mitchell,” said Odelia. “Who else?”

“Well, there’s Deith Madison,” said Scarlett. “We saw her storm in and out of her husband’s office yesterday, and there were a lot of harsh words spoken. So if I were you I’d have a long talk with her, cause that couple was not on good terms.”

“And then there’s Gary Rapp,” said Gran.

“Who’s he?”

“Fashion editor who was fired for harassing his models. He’s suing the company for wrongful termination, though there’s plenty of models who filed a complaint against him with HR.”

“Okay, so Gary Rapp. Upset with Madison after being fired,” said Odelia, writing all this down in her neat handwriting. “Did he have a badge to the building?” she asked, then reconsidered. “Never mind. Chase will find out. Next?”

“Next is Ona Konpacka,” said Scarlett, sharing a glance with Gran. “She’s a model who was permanently disfigured by the plastic surgeon Madison set her up with. The poor girl is a recluse now, and is also suing Madison and Advantage Publishing for damages.”

“And emotional cruelty,” Gran added. “After Madison terminated her contract,” she explained when Odelia looked at her expectantly.

“Okay, so we’ve got Tom Mitchell, Deith Madison, Gary Rapp, Ona Konpacka…”

“Let’s not forget about Doris Booth,” said Gran. “She was a publicist who quit her job when Madison gifted her a copy ofElements of Style, insinuating she couldn’t spell and was unfit for her job. She wrote a letter to Dear Gabi,” she explained, “but had already quit her job when we got there.”

“So we never got to talk to her,” said Scarlett.

“And a good thing, too,” said Gran. “We’ve had plenty to work with trying to match up Tom and Natalie.”

“You’re not still going to continue that matchmaking business, are you?” said Chase. “Not when a murder has been committed?”

“We could do both,” said Scarlett. “Solve Madison’s murder and get Tom and Natalie together.”

“It’s going to be a lot easier now that Madison is gone,” added Gran.

“Cold, Gran,” said Odelia. “Very cold.”

“I’m just being realistic!” Gran cried. She took a sip from her hot cocoa. “Okay, so who else is there? Oh, that’s right. Wayne Piscina!”

“Who’s Wayne Piscina?” asked Chase, who’d also been jotting down notes.

“He’s an assistant who got fired for some old homophobic and racist tweets,” said Scarlett. “And if I’m not mistaken, he’s also suing Madison and Advantage.”

“With so many people hating on Madison, it’s a miracle the man survived for so long,” Chase grunted as he wrote down Wayne’s name. “Anyone else?”

“That’s about it, I guess?” said Scarlett, looking to her friend for confirmation.

“Yeah, for now,” said Gran. “Isn’t that enough to get you started?”

“More than enough,” Odelia agreed. “And you’ll continue to dig around?”

“Oh, trust me, honey,” said Scarlett. “We’re going to dig like we’ve never dug before!”

“Funny, isn’t it, Max?” said Dooley.

“What is?”

“We’re all going to dig, just like that badger.”

“I know. And let’s hope we dig up something good.”

CHAPTER 21

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

“I’ve got one more suspect,” said Gran, once Dooley and I were installed in our old position on top of her desk at Advantage Publishing. “Natalie.”

“You can’t possibly think that poor girl had anything to do with Madison’s murder,” said Scarlett.

“She is pregnant with his baby, and he did treat her terribly. Telling her to get an abortion and breaking up with her. People have been murdered for less than what he did to that ‘poor girl,’” Gran insisted.

“Long list of suspects,” said Scarlett.

“I’m sure it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Guys like Madison create lots of enemies.”

“I can’t believe Natalie would do a thing like that, though, or Tom. They’re such a cute couple.”

“They’re not a couple yet, honey.” She frowned. “You don’t think…”

“What?”

“That they did this together, do you?”

“Are you crazy? They’re hardly on speaking terms.”

“Mh. I guess you’re right,” said Gran, then sighed. “Oh, well. Looks like we’ve got a couple to unite,and a murder to solve. No pressure!”

“I wonder if there could have been a ladder,” I told Dooley.

“A ladder?”

“Yeah, if the murderer got in through Madison’s window by putting a ladder up against the building.”

“The badger didn’t mention a ladder.”

“We didn’t ask.”

“If there was a ladder, he would have mentioned it.”

“Maybe not. Maybe badgers don’t think anything about ladders set up against buildings and used to murder people. Maybe they think it’s just par for the course.”

We both thought about this for a moment, and soon came to the same conclusion: we had to talk to that badger again. Which was going to prove hard, since he had disappeared down his burrow—or den or sett.

In the meantime Gran had taken it upon herself to talk to Natalie again, and try to find out about her involvement with the death of her boss.

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

“You’re kidding,” said Natalie, as she stared, wide-eyed, at Vesta.

“No, I’m not,” said Vesta as she shoved a cup underneath that recalcitrant coffee machine she’d been struggling with since the day she arrived at Advantage. “The police think Madison might have been pushed.”

“But I heard they found a suicide note?”

“Suicide notes can be faked.”

“Oh, God. This just keeps getting worse and worse!” the glorified secretary said, clutching a distraught hand to her face. She looked pale and drawn, which was no surprise. The man she professed to love had just been killed, and yet here she was, still showing up for work.

“If I were you I’d go home,” Vesta now told the girl. “There’s nothing you can do here.”

“I can’t go home,” said Natalie.

“Your brother still giving you a hard time?”

Natalie nodded.“We had a flaming row last night. When I arrived the place was a mess. He’d invited a couple of his friends and they’d spilled cigarette ashes all over my furniture, slices of pizza left upside down on my coffee table, beer soaked into my carpets. You should have seen the place, Vesta. It wassuch a mess. So I threw them all out and told Luke to clean up, which he refused.”

“I think you should kick him out.”

“I would, but he’s got nowhere else to stay.”

“He’s got friends. He can bunk with them.” And mess up their places.

“I couldn’t do that to him. He’s still my brother.” She sighed. “Before mom died, I promised I’d always take care of my little brother, and I won’t break that promise.”

“You know what I think? Luke knows you made that promise, and now he’s taking advantage of you.”

“I know,” said Natalie miserably. “And now with Madison gone, I don’t know what to do.”

“You’re still having the baby?”

The girl nodded wordlessly.

“Even though its dad is dead?”

At the sound of those awful words, Natalie burst into tears. Vesta handed her a tissue, which she used to dry her eyes and blow her nose.“It’s all just so terrible,” she said. “My baby is going to grow up without a daddy.”

“From what I understand, your baby was going to grow up without a daddy, whether Madison had lived or not.”

“I know this is stupid of me… but I was still hoping for a reconciliation, you know. Michael once told me he loved me. And a love like that—it can’t just go away, can it?”

It can if it was never there in the first place, Vesta thought.“I’m sure everything will be all right,” she assured the young woman as she patted her back consolingly. And as they walked back to the office, she asked, “Could you think of anyone who would hurt Michael, Natalie?”

“No one,” she said immediately. “The man was a saint. When you look at the kind of stuff he had to put up with every day—the man was an absolute saint.”

“Of course he was. A regular saint.”

[Êàðòèíêà: img_4]

Scarlett wanted to talk to Tom, with whom she felt she had built up a nice rapport the day before, but unfortunately he wasn’t at his desk. And when she asked his cousin Danny, he told her Tom was taking a sick day.

“He wasn’t feeling well this morning,” Danny said as he took a seat on the edge of her desk. “So I told him to stay in bed. And a good thing I did, considering what happened with Madison.”

“I thought Tom didn’t like Madison?”

“Who did? But he’s got enough to deal with right now, without having to look at Natalie crying her heart out because her precious boyfriend dropped dead last night.”

Natalie was back at her desk, and from the quaking motion of her shoulders, it was obvious she was going through yet another box of Kleenex.

“He took Natalie’s rejection pretty hard,” Danny said. “After he screwed up his courage like that, and finally popped the question, the way she turned him down flat—that was cold, Scarlett. That was cold of her.” He directed an equally icy look at Natalie’s back, clearly unhappy with the way the girl had treated his cousin. “I keep telling him to forget about her. There’s plenty of fish in the sea, right?”

“Plenty,” Scarlett confirmed, who knew from experience this was true.

“But no. He keeps insisting Natalie is the only one for him. The idiot.”

“Did you tell Tom about what happened to Madison?” asked Scarlett.

“I sent him a text.”

“And?”

“He’s shocked, of course. Just like we all are. I mean, I always thought Madison was hard as nails. The toughest boss I ever worked for. But turns out the man was fighting some inner demons that none of us knew about. And then he goes and kills himself. Just goes to show you never really know aperson, do you?”

“No, I guess you don’t,” said Scarlett, darting a glance at Madison’s empty office, which was sealed off by police tape.

“So you and Tom were home last night, were you? Didn’t go out?”

He gave her an odd look, then nodded.“Of course. Where would we go?”

“I don’t know. Out. Couple of young guys like you? Hitting the town hard?”

“Tom isn’t one for hitting the town hard, especially in the state he’s been in. And I may not look it, but I’m a homebody at heart. And besides, my aunt likes us all home safe and sound with her. She’s old-fashioned like that.”

Scarlett made a mental note for Odelia to check with Tom’s mom if she could confirm Tom’s alibi, but she had no reason to doubt Danny’s words. Tom may have been upset with Madison for the way he was treating Natalie, but the soft-spoken young man didn’t strike her as a cold-blooded killer.

And that this was cold-blooded murder was clear. Someone had taken great pains to make Madison’s death look like a suicide, and had planned this well, even making sure he or she weren’t detected by the building’s security system.

“Thanks, Danny,” she said. “And when you hear from Tom, give him my love, will you?”

“Will do,” said Danny, and was on his way again, pushing his cart.

The big boss might be dead, but life at Advantage went on. Soon corporate would put a new boss in charge, who would move into Madison’s office, and Madison’s death would be a minor blip on the radar of this multi-million-dollar business empire.

CHAPTER 22

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Looked like it wasn’t business as usual at Advantage after all, for around eleven a representative of management showed up, and told everyone to go home. In light of the circumstances, they had reached the decision that we couldn’t very well be expected to give of our best, and so we were all asked to leave, and Advantage Publishing was closing down for the time being.

“When are they going to reopen again?” asked Gran as we stepped into the elevator.

“No idea,” said Natalie, pressing a Kleenex to her nose. “I think it’s very decent of them, don’t you? To give us time to grieve?”

“Yes, very decent,” said Gran, though I didn’t think she meant it.

“It’s the stock,” Danny explained, offering a less roseate view of management. “It’s dropping like a rock. If this keeps up there won’t be any shareholders left.”

Natalie’s eyes widened. “Dropping like a rock because…”

“Because of what happened to Madison,” Danny confirmed. “You can’t have a CEO of a company jumping out of his office window and not expect an effect on the price of the company’s shares. People are unloading Advantage stock as fast as they can, and management is probably freaking out, wondering how they’re going to stop the bleed.” He cursed under his breath. “And to think we all got stock options. If this keeps up they’ll be completely worthless.”

“I don’t have stock options,” said Natalie.

“What do you mean? We all got them when we started. It’s in your contract.”

“It is?” said Natalie, who clearly wasn’tau courant with her compensation plan.

“You should talk to HR,” Danny advised. “Though now that the stock is in the toilet, maybe better don’t. It will only depress you.”

And so we found ourselves out on the street again.

“Well, it was great while it lasted,” said Gran as we sauntered in the direction of the car. I was still on the lookout for that badger, but I couldn’t see him.

“We’ll be back,” Scarlett assured her friend.

“You think? I’ll bet they’ll restructure the company, redesign the office, hire a new CEO, and this entire senior intern scheme will go right out the window.”

“Just like Madison,” said Dooley cheerfully, earning himself a grin from Gran.

“So how are we going to assist Odelia with her investigation now?” asked Scarlett.

“I don’t know, honey. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see what happens.”

And after directing a final glance at the building we got to call home for the past two days, we all got into Gran’s battered red Peugeot.

“Can you just hang on for a second?” I asked.

“Sure,” said Gran. “But make it fast, will you?”

“Where is he off to?” asked Scarlett.

“My guess is either wee-wee or doo-doo,” said Gran.

Dooley hurried to keep up with me.“So what is it, Max? Wee-wee or doo-doo?”

“Neither,” I said curtly. “I want to take one last shot at that badger.”

“You want to shoot the badger?” he asked, shocked. “But why?”

“I’m not going to shoot the badger, Dooley. I just want to talk to him.”

We arrived at that bush, and hunkered down at the edge of the burrow.“Hey, Mr. Badger!” Dooley cried. “Max has another question for you, sir!”

We waited for a moment, but when no response was forthcoming, I said,“Looks like we’ll have to do this the hard way.” And so I headed into the hole.

Before you draw the wrong conclusion, let me assure you that I’m no hero. I’m not some Dirty Harry or John Wayne who goes off to fight the good fight, guns blazing. But I needed to know about that ladder, and since the badger was the only witness we had, I saw no other recourse than to find him where he was hiding.

“Max! Come back!” Dooley cried.

But I just kept on burrowing down into that burrow.

If my calculations were correct, this was just a short pipe, which would end in a larger underground dug-out hollow, where Mr. Badger was taking a nap, since badgers hunt at night and sleep during the day, as Dooley had explained.

“Max!” Dooley yelled. “These tunnels can run thirty feet deep!”

Yikes! Now if I’d known that…

Unfortunately there was no way for me to turn around, so the only thing I could do was keep going!

Lucky for me, this particular badger must have been a lazy badger, for it only took me about ten feet to reach a larger cavern, and lo and behold: the badger was indeed taking a well-deserved nap… along with three more badgers!

To say my arrival was greeted with general confusion and upheaval is an understatement.

“Intruder!” one of the badgers screamed, causing the other badgers to wake up, and strike a defensive pose, which consisted of their forearms going up. And when you know that a badger has some very powerful and muscular forearms, you can imagine that I was having second thoughts about my rash initiative!

“I come in peace!” I quickly assured them. “Now which one of you is the badger I talked to before?”

“That would be me,” said the biggest badger in the room.

“Oh, hi,” I said, injecting as much warmth and reassurance into my voice as possible. “And is this Mrs. Badger and kids? So nice to meet you, one and all.”

“What do you want?” the badger grunted, clearly not one for small talk.

“Don’t be rude, Richard,” said the lady badger. “Is this how you welcome visitors into our home? Don’t mind my husband, sir,” she said. “He’s not usually this blunt. He’s got a toothache is all, and it’s affecting his mood.”

“You’ve got a toothache?” I said. “It’s just that I know a great veterinarian. She helped me get rid of a toothache not so long ago. If you want, I could introduce you.”

“Just ask the question,” the badger said.

But before I could, there was a sort of commotion behind me, and Dooley dropped in!

“Another intruder!” the same small badger yelled.

“It’s my friend Dooley,” I quickly explained.

“Oh, this is cozy,” said Dooley, dusting himself off.

“Well, hi there, Dooley,” said Mrs. Badger. “Welcome to our humble home. Richard?” she urged. “What do we say to our guests?”

“Welcome to our humble abode,” the badger grumbled unhappily.

“And now once again, but this time with feeling.”

“Look, this is wholly unnecessary,” I said. “All I want to know is whether you saw a ladder parked against the building last night. When the guy fell from that window?”

“Was pushed, you mean,” Richard grunted.

“Oh, that’s right. You saw a man getting pushed out of a window last night, didn’t you, darling?” said Mrs. Badger. “My name is Irene, by the way,” she said with a kindly smile in our direction. “And these two rascals are Bert and Ernie.”

“Bert and Ernie?” I asked. Somehow the names reminded me of something, though for the life of me, I couldn’t remember what. It’d come to me later.

“Say hi to the nice cats, children,” said Irene.

“Hi, cats!” said Bert and Ernie. The latter turned to his mom. “So they’re not intruders?”

“No, they’re guests.”

“Uninvited guests, but whatever,” Richard grumbled.

“Do you want a bite to eat?” asked Irene. “We’ve got some nice fat earthworms.”

“No, please,” I said when I spotted said worms, wriggling and squirming in a corner of the burrow. “We’ve already eaten. And anyway, we can’t stay.”

“And we’re vegetarians,” Dooley explained. “So we can’t eat worms.”

Richard rolled his eyes at this, and to avoid getting bogged down again in a discussion on what constitutes a real vegetarian, I repeated my earlier question:“So did you see a ladder planted against that building last night, Richard?”

“No, Max, I did not,” said Richard, as eager to get rid of us as I was to get out of there.

“No ladder?” I asked, not hiding my disappointment.

“What’s with the ladder?” asked Irene.

“No, it’s just that Michael Madison, the guy who runs Advantage Publishing, was killed last night, but the only person who was in the building, at least according to the security system, was the victim. So I figured the killer must have entered the building through one of the windows, and headed straight into Madison’s office, got into a fight with the guy, and shoved him out the window.”

“I told you, no ladder,” Richard said, fixing me with an intent look.

“Gotcha,” I said. “And no distinguishing features that could identify the killer?”

“No distinguishing features,” Richard said. Clearly he wanted us gone.

“Okay, I guess that’s that,” I said. I turned to the badger’s wife. “Well, thank you so much for your hospitality, Irene, but I’m afraid we have to leave.”

“So soon? How about a nice grub? They’re very tasty, you know.”

I threw up in my mouth a little, but I think I managed to hide it well. Until I saw a sly smile slide up Richard’s face.

“Yeah, why don’t you stay for dinner?” he said. “We’ve got some nice slugs.”

“Very slimy!” said Bert.

“Very yummy!” said Ernie.

“No, that’s all right,” I said, having trouble keeping my stomach under control.

Dooley was making retching noises next to me, which didn’t help.

“Or how about a big fat lizard?” Richard suggested.

“Gotta go,” I said, retching a little. “Thanks for everything, Irene!”

“Now see what you did, Richard?” I heard Irene tell her husband once we’d turned tail and were crawling out of that burrow again, in a hurry to reach the surface. “The one time we have guests, and you go and scare them away.”

“I didn’t scare them away. I offered them our best grub!”

“Oh, Richard. What am I going to do with you?”

“I don’t mind!” Bert said. “It means there’s more for us!”

Now that’s the spirit, I thought as I dug like I’d never dug before!

And soon we reached the surface, and took in big gulps of fresh air.

“There’s a reason cats aren’t badgers,” said Dooley, who looked a little green around the gills. “I never knew what it was before, but now I do. It’s very claustrophobic to be a badger, Max!”

“Yeah, and then there’s the diet,” I said, panting from the exertion.

But at least I had my answer: however the killer had entered the building, it hadn’t been by using a ladder. Of course this only added to the mystery.

So how had this person managed to get in and out of Madison’s office?

CHAPTER 23

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Odelia had arranged to meet Gary Rapp at the Steamy Bean, a sidewalk caf? that had proven very popular in recent months. It offered a nice view up and down Main Street, and was packed when we arrived, both with locals and tourists. Mr. Rapp was a local though, since he’d worked at Advantage Publishing for quite some time as one ofGlimmer’s more prominent fashion editors.

Until his services were no longer required, that is.

“Mrs. Kingsley,” said Rapp, as he got up to welcome our human with an unctuous smile. “So nice to meet a colleague. And can I say that your reputation precedes you? Your articles are always the first ones I read every week.”

“Thanks,” said Odelia as she took a seat. When the server came she ordered a soda, and Rapp ordered another alcoholic beverage.

“Who is this guy?” asked Dooley.

“Gary Rapp,” I said. “Disgraced former fashion editor.”

“Oh, right,” said Dooley, though it was obvious he still had no clue who the guy was. It was hard to keep track of the number of people Madison had crossed.

“I guess you heard what happened to Michael Madison, your former boss?” said Odelia.

“Yeah, I was shocked when I heard the news,” said Rapp, shaking his head. “Such a tragic story. Mind you, Mike had been under a lot of pressure lately, and the last time I saw him I could tell he wasn’t coping well. But still—to end his life like that. I already reached out to Deith, of course, to pay my respects. She’s heartbroken, as you can imagine.”

“I’m seeing her later,” said Odelia. “First I thought I’d talk to some of the people who knew Michael well. Though from what I heard your relationship with him got a little heated in recent days? Is that correct?”

“We didn’t part on amicable terms,” Rapp confirmed as he fingered his drink. “Some wicked gossip poisoned Mike’s mind against me, and he felt pressured into terminating my contract. I was fighting them in court, of course.”

“So the rumors about harassment aren’t true?” asked Odelia.

“Absolutely not!” said Rapp, looking thoroughly shocked. “I’ve always treated everyone with the utmost respect, and don’t let anyone tell you differently. But when you’ve got a high-profile position, like I had, you’re bound to attract all kinds of nasty gossip. And sometimes they’ll go after you if they feel slighted.”

“These models who accused you, they felt slighted, you think?”

“Absolutely. Not being given the cover of the magazine, for instance, or not enough coverage. That would be enough for some of these people to go after me.”

“Did you blame Michael Madison for your dismissal, Gary?”

“Of course not. I knew he felt cornered by these people and their lawyers. If he didn’t get rid of me they were going to tar him with the same brush. So he had no other recourse but to do what he did.” He took a big swig from his drink. “No, I never blamed Mike personally. He was my friend.Though it’s true he could have showed more backbone when push came to shove. He caved immediately. Which surprised me.”

“You felt betrayed by your friend?”

He gave her a keen look and smiled. It was a charming smile, and I could tell that he was probably popular with the ladies.“I see what you’re trying to do, Mrs. Kingsley, and it won’t work. Yes, I was surprised when he called me into his office and told me he had to let me go. And yes, I argued my case—fiercely. But since then I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and soul-searching, and I can honestly say I’ve made peace with what happened. It wasn’t Mike’s fault, and hey—” He spread his arms. “I’m still here. Other opportunities await. So it’s all good.”

Odelia shifted in her chair.“Rumor has it that Mike’s death wasn’t accidental.”

He stared at her, visibly startled.“Not accidental? What do you mean?”

“There’s a possibility that he didn’t jump, but was pushed.”

His eyes had gone wide.“Pushed? You mean… murder?”

Odelia nodded.“This is not official, mind you.”

“Oh, my God,” said the former editor.

She eyed him closely.“Can you tell me where you were last night, Gary?”

He blinked a couple of times.“You’re not seriously accusing me of murder, are you?”

“No, of course not. Just doing my job. Asking questions and trying to find some answers.”

“But…” He glanced around. “You’re not here on police business, are you? I mean, I’ve heard that you work with your husband as a police consultant.”

“No, this isn’t one of those occasions,” Odelia assured him. “I’m strictly here as a reporter for theGazette. In fact as far as I know, the police are working on the assumption that this was suicide. At least that’s what my sources are telling me.”

“Your sources are impeccable,” said Rapp, searching Odelia’s face. “Your husband is a detective and your uncle is the chief of police.”

“True,” she admitted. “But like I said, I don’t represent the police right now.”

The guy seemed to relax a little.“Okay, so I want it on the record that I vehemently deny any involvement in any murder business. I liked Mike. We were friends for a long time. And I didn’t hold any grudge against him. He did what he had to do as the company’s CEO, and I understood and respected his decision.”

“That said, can you tell me where you were last night?” Odelia insisted.

“Of course. I was at the Pussy Wagon, for the birthday party of one of the hostesses. I stayed late, until maybe, oh, three o’clock? Ask anyone. They’ll confirm my alibi.” He produced a wry smile. “Am I glad that I accepted that invitation last night. I didn’t want to go—not in the mood—but good thing I did.”

“Can you think of anyone who would want to harm Mike Madison?”

Rapp furrowed his brow and rubbed his temple.“Um… I know there was some trouble with Howard White.”

“The designer?”

Rapp nodded.“Glimmer published a pretty scathing article on his latest collection, and Howard wasn’t happy about it. Accused us of writing a hit piece.”

“Who wrote the article?”

“Well, that’s the interesting part. Mike wrote it himself. Before he became CEO he was a pretty accomplished editor himself, and he liked to keep his hand in, so to speak. At first Howard thought I’d written the piece, so he came after me. But Mike was decent enough to own up and admit he wasthe actual culprit.”

“And Howard wasn’t happy with Mike.”

“You can say that again. They had a flaming row in Mike’s office.”

“When was this?”

“Couple of days ago. I wasn’t there, of course, but a friend texted me. Said it was epic.” He flashed a quick grin. “Howard really threw his weight around.”

Odelia nodded and wrote down the name.“Anyone else?”

Rapp shook his head slowly.“Not that I can think of. I mean, how sure are you that it was murder? Who is your source?”

She smiled.“You know I can’t tell you, Gary. Let’s just say I’m pretty sure.”

“God. Who would do such a thing? It’s just so…” He lapsed into silence, then dumped the remainder of his drink down the hatch in one go. “Sobarbaric.”

CHAPTER 24

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

It wasn’t easy for Odelia to arrange an interview with Ona Konpacka. The former model wasn’t giving interviews—no exceptions. In fact according to her former publicist she wasn’t seeing anyone, a big change from before, when she had enjoyed a dozenGlimmer covers—the most for any model ever—and her face had featured on anything from billboards to commercials to cameos in blockbuster movies. But no more.

If Miss Konpacka thought Odelia would give up so easily, she was mistaken, though. She can be quite tenacious, our human. And so instead of going in herself, she dispatched Dooley and me to do the honors. Yikes!

“I’ve never done an interview for theGazette before, Max,” said Dooley nervously. “I’m not sure I can do it. We haven’t had the training!”

“We’re not actually going to interview Miss Konpacka,” I told him. “We’re just going to talk to her miniature Brussels Griffon Joey.”

“What’s a Brussels Griffon, Max? Is that like a Brussels sprout?”

“I doubt it, Dooley” I said. “I think it’s hard to interview a Brussels sprout.”

Odelia had dropped us off in front of the apartment building where Ona Konpacka lived. According to her information—gleaned from Gran and Scarlett—the prematurely retired supermodel adored her Brussels Griffon Joey, and allowed no one else close to her accept the tiny doggie, who had been her constant companion when she was still traveling the world to the most exotic locations on the planet for her photoshoots, and who was her only friend now.

“Toi toi toi!” Odelia said as she watched us mount the fire escape that snaked up the tall brown brick building.

“Why does Odelia call us Toi?” asked Dooley.

“It’s an expression people use to wish someone luck,” I explained. “Like break a leg?”

Dooley started violently.“But I don’t want to break a leg!”

“If you tell someone to break a leg, they’re not going to break a leg,” I said. “It’s a kind of superstition.”

“I see,” he said, but I could see that he didn’t.

We climbed that fire escape to the top floor, where the model lived, and I sincerely hoped that Odelia had done her homework, and Ona hadn’t traded in her miniature Brussels Griffon with a Doberman. Or a pit bull terrier! Cats may be brave creatures, always ready to dive into a badger’s burrow, but we’re not suicidal!

“I wonder what Harriet and Brutus are up to,” said Dooley. “And why they’re not here with us right now. I mean, I don’t mind being Odelia’s eyes and ears, but it’s always the same cats having to do her dirty work, isn’t it, Max?”

“It’s because she trusts us, Dooley,” I said.

“You mean she doesn’t trust Harriet and Brutus?”

I hesitated.“I wouldn’t go as far as that,” I said, prevaricating. “But maybe she trusts us just that little bit more than she does our friends. And anyway, Harriet is too busy preserving her beauty and worrying about her shoot right now, and Brutus has to make sure she looks her absolute best all the time, so there’s that.”

“I wouldn’t mind being on the cover ofCat Life. I may not be the prettiest cat around, but I’m not that ugly either, right?”

“No, you’re not ugly at all,” I said with a smile.

“Or maybe you could be on the cover, Max. I’m sure in this day and age of diversity, a plus-sized model like you would look good on the cover ofCat Life.”

My smile vanished.“Let’s just focus on the task at hand, shall we?” I suggested. All this talk about cover models was starting to annoy me. We had a murder to solve, after all, not contemplate ways and means of makingCat Life more diverse.

We finally arrived on the balcony that wrapped around Ona Konpacka’s apartment, and took a moment to catch our breath. When I looked down, I could see Odelia leaning against her pickup, patiently awaiting our return, hopefully with some exciting news about this potential suspect.

We didn’t have long to search for the model’s constant companion: on the other side of the glass window a little doggie was staring back at us. It looked like one of the Ewoks in those Star Wars movies: very tiny and very hairy.

“It looks like a rat,” said Dooley when he caught sight of the creature.

“I’m sure it’s not a rat,” I assured him.

“Or a badger.”

The doggie, recovering from the shock of this sudden and unexpected intrusion, started barking furiously, jerking back and forth as it did in a sort of full-body spasm. For a moment I thought it was going to have a heart attack, but it seemed to be the way it responded to unwanted intruders.

After what felt like an eternity, a human person appeared, and when I looked up, I found myself gazing into the face that had once been described by an astute observer as the most beautiful face in the world.

Now I’m not a human myself, of course, so I’m not exactly the best judge of what constitutes or doesn’t constitute beauty in humans, but this particular face didn’t exactly strike me as particularly beautiful. Then again, tastes differ.

Ona Konpacka, if this was her, had a sort of square face, with plenty of lumps where no lumps were supposed to be, and lips that were entirely too plump for comfort. In fact her face looked like a landscape, but with the dales and peaks in all the wrong places. Possibly a consequence of that botched cosmetic procedure.

She frowned at us a good deal, picking up Joey in the process, then finally opened the sliding glass door to take a closer look at this oddly mismatched duo.

“Did you guys get lost?” she asked. “You climbed and climbed and now you don’t know how to get down?”

As agreed, both Dooley and I started meowing piteously, clawing the air with one paw, and making the kind of pleading faces humans think only dogs can make. It prompted the kind of response we were hoping for: Ona Konpacka’s cat eyes—perhaps the result of one too many facelifts—turned moist with pity.

“Oh, will you look at these two sweeties!” she cried, as she bent down. In the process the Ewok poured from her arms and took up its barking frenzy once more. “No, Joey,” said Ona sternly. “Can’t you see you’re scaring the poor kitties?”

“Yeah, you’re scaring the poor kitties, Joey,” said Dooley.

The doggie abruptly stopped barking.“Who are you?” it demanded.

“My name is Max,” I said. “And this is my friend Dooley.”

“I’ll go and get you something to eat,” Ona announced, and wagged a warning finger at Joey. “There will be no more barking, you hear? Be nice to the kitties.”

“Yes, be nice to the kitties,” Dooley echoed.

Ona returned indoors, and then it was just us and Joey.

“So are you a girl or a boy?” asked Dooley, curious. “Or neither?”

“How can I be neither?” said Joey, plunking down on its tush.

“We met a person in Paris who was neither a boy or a girl,” Dooley explained.

“Well, if you must know, I’m a girl,” said Joey. “Though I’m not sure if it’s any of your business.” She was still eyeing us with distinct hostility, so I felt we needed to address the situation if we were to make any progress here today.

“Look, we’re not here to stay,” I told her. “Or to invade your space. We’re here because a man died last night, and we think he was murdered. And now we’re trying to figure out who could have murdered him. And since your human knew this man, we wanted to have a chat and see what she knows.”

Joey gave me a look of surprise.“Someone was murdered? Who?”

“Michael Madison,” I said. “The publisher ofGlimmer magazine?”

“I knowGlimmer,” said Joey. “Ona used to work for them a lot.”

“She was on the cover twelve times!” said Dooley, who’d listened carefully when Odelia had given us our brief for this interview. “The most times any model was featured onGlimmer—ever.”

“And Ona kept every single cover, framed on the wall of her study.” Then Joey’s furry little face sagged. “Or at least she used to. Now they’re all packed up in a crate somewhere, locked up in storage—probably forever. She removed every single photograph of herself and every single mirror from the apartment after…”

“After the incident,” I said, nodding.

Joey glanced over her shoulder.“It was a sad day when it happened, and Ona still hasn’t recovered. We used to travel the globe, you know, she and I. One week we were in Thailand for a shoot on the beach, the next in Paris for a shoot with the Eiffel Tower as backdrop, or Bermuda or Senegal or Switzerland. It was a jet-setting life and all great fun… As long as it lasted.”

“She doesn’t leave the apartment anymore?”

“Hasn’t set foot outside since… the incident.”

“Doesn’t eat out? Doesn’t receive visitors?”

“Nothing. No one is allowed, not even her siblings or her mom and dad. She doesn’t want to see anyone—or anyone seeing her. Even the kid who delivers her meals isn’t allowed to see her. He leaves the box in the hall, and she won’t come out until he’s gone. It’s a sad, sad life, Max and Dooley. And very, very lonely.” She gave us a weak smile, and for the first time I sensed the little doggie’s loneliness.

“So maybe she should get you a companion?” Dooley suggested. “A Brussels sprout, maybe?”

“A Brussels sprout is a vegetable, Dooley,” I explained.

“Oh, so maybe a Paris Griffon? Or a London Griffon?”

“Forgive my friend,” I told Joey. “He’s just trying to be helpful.”

“I know,” said Joey. “And I appreciate it. I’ve told Ona a million times to find me a friend, but unfortunately she doesn’t speak our language.”

“Maybe we could tell Odelia,” Dooley suggested. “And she could tell Ona.”

“Who’s Odelia?”

“Our human,” I explained. “And she does speak our language.”

“Oh, if you could do that for me?” said Joey, her eyes lighting up. “I’ve been dreaming about having some company for so long. It would be like a dream come true. I mean, don’t get me wrong—I adore Ona. But having a friend to talk to would be so nice.”

“We’ll make it happen,” I promised the little fluffball. “So one important question, Joey: where was Ona last night?”

“Right here, of course. I told you, she never leaves the apartment.”

“Just like Greta Garbo,” said Dooley.

“Not quite. Garbo was often out and about, walking all across New York. She liked peace and quiet, but she wasn’t a recluse, like Ona has turned into.”

We were silent for a moment, as we looked at the still statuesque figure of Ona gracefully gliding up to us, as if she was on the catwalk. She knelt down, and placed a bowl filled with what looked like balls of meat in front of us.

“That’s my favorite food!” Joey cried. “Straight from the best caterer in town!”

“Well, dig in,” I said. I know I was going to. All this talk, and especially climbing that fire escape, had given me a serious appetite.

And so the three of us shared this delicious meal.

“What’s in this?” asked Dooley when the last meatball had been eaten. “Cause Max and I are vegetarians, you see, so we don’t eat meat.”

Joey frowned at my friend.“These are meatballs, Dooley.”

“Uh-huh. So what’s in these meatballs?”

“Why, meat, of course.”

Dooley laughed.“Meat doesn’t look like that. No, seriously. What’s in it?”

I interrupted,“So you’re one hundred percent sure Ona didn’t leave the apartment last night?”

“One thousand percent. Unfortunately.”

“Not even to go for a midnight stroll around the block?”

“Not even for a midnight stroll.”

“So who takes you out for a walk?”

“She’s hired a dog walker. A very nice lady who loves dogs.” She smiled. “In fact it’s the only time I get to socialize. Apart from now with you guys, of course.”

I had one more obligatory question to ask.“Can you think of anyone who would hurt Michael Madison, Joey?”

“Apart from Ona, you mean?” She thought for a moment. “Not really. He was well-liked, as far as I know. In fact Ona liked him a lot, too. Until he told her to have this operation.”

“But why? Wasn’t she beautiful enough?”

“I thought she was. But what do I know? I’m just a dog.”

“Sometimes beautiful people want to look even more beautiful,” said Dooley. “And then they have cosmetic procedures they don’t really need. It’s sad, really.”

“It is sad,” said Joey.

We studied Ona, as she sat on a lounge chair on her balcony, reading a book and sporting oversized sunglasses that obscured the upper portion of her famous face.“Maybe a new medical procedure can undo the damage that was done?” I suggested.

“Ona has consulted with the best doctors on the planet. They all agree that there’s considerable risk involved if she gets more work done on her face. The important thing right now is to give the skin tissue time to heal. Then maybe after a while she can go in and they can try and fix some of the things that went wrong.”

“So there’s hope, at least,” I said.

“Oh, absolutely,” said Joey. “I mean, Ona is the most positive person I know. She doesn’t feel she’ll look like this forever, or be locked up inside here forever. At some point she hopes she can put this whole ordeal behind her.”

“And in the meantime we’ll make sure she adopts a friend for you,” I said.

The little furry doggie actually teared up at this.“So kind,” she murmured. “You guys are so, so kind.”

And so we found ourselves in the unlikely position of having to comfort a dog. Then again, I guess it’s all par for the course when you’re a feline sleuth!

CHAPTER 25

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

Our quest for the truth continued, and this time our subject was Doris Booth. We met up with the former editor in a cozy tea room, where she had agreed to meet Odelia for a tell-all interview about the lawsuit she had filed against Michael Madison. Though now that the CEO was dead, I wondered if the lawsuit would still go ahead. Hard to sue a dead person, I would have imagined.

Underneath the table, a teacup doggie sat eyeing us with misty eyes. It looked like a tiny ball of fluff, but unlike Joey didn’t respond to our presence with hostility but unveiled curiosity.

“Hey, there,” I said as we settled in for the duration of the interview.

“Hi,” said the doggie, who was of uncertain breed.

Introductions were made, and the dog turned out to answer to the unlikely name Froufrou. She was nice enough, and soon we enjoyed a cozy little chat.

“So Madison is dead, huh?” said Froufrou. “Well, as much as I hate to say it, good riddance, Max.”

“But why?” asked Dooley. “I know we only met him briefly, but he seemed like a good person.”

“Good person! He gave Doris a copy ofElements of Style! Basically telling her she can’t write. That’s not the kind of thing you do to a person. Totally out of line.”

“Can Doris write?” I asked.

“Of course she can! She’s the best writer I know.”

Which wasn’t saying much, of course, since Doris was probably the only writer Froufrou knew. Still, it was admirable to see such loyalty in man’s best friend.

“Did Doris kill Michael Madison, you think?” asked Dooley.

Froufrou gave him a look of amusement.“You don’t beat around the bush, do you, Dooley?”

“I believe in the direct approach,” my friend said. “Humans circle round and round and sniff each other’s butts for hours before they get down to brass tacks but not me.”

“I think you’ll find that’s actually dogs,” said Froufrou. “Especially the butts part. But to answer your question: no, Doris did not murder Michael Madison. She was getting even with the man, but she wasn’t going to stoop as low as that. And besides, now that he’s dead, her wrongful dismissal suit is probably going out the window.”

“She can still sue Advantage,” I suggested.

“And she will. But with Michael gone, they’ll claim it was his decision and his decision alone, and they had nothing to do with it.”

“So she was home last night—all night?” I asked.

“She was home last night,” Froufrou confirmed. “We Netflixed and chilled.”

I stared at the doggie“You mean…”

“We watched a Netflix movie and relaxed on the couch.”

“Oh, right,” I said, much relieved. I didn’t think Doris was into any funny business, but one can never be sure, of course. “Netflix and chill. Gotcha.”

“We Netflix and chill all the time,” said Dooley.

I grimaced. This conversation was getting off track.

“Or at least Odelia and Chase do, and we stick around.”

Our humans seemed to have concluded their conversation, and so it was time to leave. But Froufrou had one parting shot to deliver.“Doris is much better off since she left Advantage. Did you know that the day after she quit she was hired by Advantage’s big competitor? She writes forGlam now, and no one has accused her of not being able to spell yet. So it’s all to the good.”

All to the good, except for Michael Madison, who was dead.

Then again, one person’s misfortune is often another person’s fortune.

CHAPTER 26

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

We caught Wayne Piscina on his break. The former assistant photographer was working for a local catering company now, delivering meals at home. He might even be the one delivering meals to Ona Konpacka. He was dressed in a snazzy orange outfit, hoisting a bulky orange backpack.

Odelia seated herself on the park bench next to the disgraced assistant, and launched into her spiel.

“Look, I don’t know what you heard,” said Mr. Piscina, “but there was no scandal, and I wasn’t fired, okay? I quit. Creative differences. Mike Madison was a tough man to please, and I just couldn’t function in the kind of toxic environment he created around himself.”

“So you quit and now you’re working as a delivery guy?”

“Hey, it’s a great job. You’re out and about, on your bike, plenty of exercise and fresh air. If there’s one thing you should know about me, it’s that I’m a people pleaser, and there’s nothing more gratifying than delivering a great meal and watching those happy faces when you arrive on their doorstep with their meal.”

“So that story about the tweets?”

“Lies—all lies. Never happened.”

“I’ve got some of those tweets here,” said Odelia, taking out her phone. “Looks like someone took a bunch of screenshots before you removed your account.”

Wayne eyed her nervously, his back stiffly pressed against the bench. Finally he relented.“Okay, so maybe those tweets exist. But like I explained already to anyone who’ll listen, I was young and stupid when I fired off those tweets. Young,drunk and stupid, I might add. And I apologize unreservedly. Absolutely. But to fire me over some old tweets? Come on. That’s just ridiculous. You might as well come after me for stealing Nickie Marshall’s Barbie doll in second grade.”

“So you admit that you were fired now?”

“Yeah, okay. So I was fired. There. Happy now? You got your quote?”

“It’s not about quotes, Wayne. Mike Madison died last night, and rumor has it he didn’t jump but was pushed. So at some point the police will be looking at you.”

“I know, I know,” said Wayne, dragging a hand through a shaggy mane of dark hair. He sat forward. “Look, I didn’t kill him, if that’s what you’re implying. Okay, so he fired me over some stupid old tweets, and I was unhappy with the guy, hoping he’d have more backbone than that. But I’m not going around murdering people, okay? Like I said, I’m a peoplepleaser, not a people killer.”

“One doesn’t exclude the other,” she pointed out.

He barked a humorless laugh.“Nice. Very nice. Anyway, I can prove it wasn’t me. When was he killed?”

“Around three o’clock last night.”

“Bingo.” He had taken out his phone. “At three o’clock I was delivering a meal to…” He tapped his phone. “Ian McCluster. Three-course meal from Delmonica’s.”

“At three o’clock at night?”

“Sure. You’d be surprised how many people order meals in the middle of the night. Those are the best shifts, by the way. Extra pay and extra tips for the tip jar.”

“So if I contact Ian McCluster he’ll confirm that you were on his doorstep at three o’clock last night?” When Wayne nodded, she added, “What’s the address?”

After he’d given her the address, she closed her notebook, and shook the guy’s hand. And then he was off, to deliver another meal to another happy customer.

“What do you think?” I asked after Wayne had mounted his bike and left.

“Ian McCluster lives awfully close to Advantage Publishing headquarters,” said Odelia. “In fact according to Google Maps Wayne could have reached there in less than twenty minutes, after delivering that three-course meal from Delmonica’s.”

“So he’s a prime suspect?”

Odelia shrugged.“Too soon to tell, but he’s definitely on the list.”

Our next port of call was the Mitchell home. Scarlett had told Odelia to go easy on Tom, since he was probably suffering an acute attack of lovesickness. But still, he was a potential suspect, and so he needed to be interviewed by our relentless reporter!

We found the whole family home, all living under the same roof in a modest row house in one of the less agreeable neighborhoods in Hampton Cove. The streets were clean, though, and the house was nice enough once you stepped inside.

Tom’s mom Melanie was a voluminous woman with a ready smile and a homey demeanor. She clearly loved her son Tom and his little brother Harry, and also Danny, the cousin, Advantage’s mailroom maven.

“So I just wanted to ask you a couple of questions,” said Odelia once we were all seated in the living room, which centered around a very large flat-screen television where some football game was silently playing. “You know that Michael Madison died last night?”

Melanie Mitchell nodded fervently.“Danny told us the news. Bad business. Really bad. Do you have any idea when the boys will be able to go back to work?”

“Mrs. Kingsley doesn’t work for Advantage, Mom,” said Tom.

“I know, but maybe she heard something.”

“I have no idea,” Odelia confessed.

“They have to find a new boss first,” said Danny. “And knowing Advantage that won’t take long. Big conglomerates like that have contingency plans for these types of situations.”

“Suicide situations, you mean?” asked Melanie.

“Death of a CEO type of situations. CEOs get killed all the time. They break their necks skiing in Vail, or burn to death when their private jet falls from the sky, or they choke to death on a caviar sandwich. Very risky being a CEO.”

“I didn’t know people ate caviar on a sandwich,” said Harry, who was Tom’s little brother, and looked about twelve, though in actual fact he was fifteen. He was chewing his nails, and clearly wanted to be elsewhere right now.

“You can eat caviar on anything,” said Danny. “Toast, a sandwich, fries….”

This had Harry burst out laughing.“Caviar and fries! No way!”

“Okay, so rumor has it,” said Odelia, trying to get the conversation back on track, “that Madison didn’t jump, but was actually pushed out of his window.”

Silence greeted these words, then Melanie said,“What do you mean?”

“She means he was pushed, Mom,” said Tom.

“But what does that mean?”

“It means he was killed,” said Danny. “Isn’t that what you mean, Mrs. Kingsley?”

Odelia confirmed that this was what she meant, and Melanie gasped, clutching a hand to her throat.“But that means… he was murdered!”

“Yes, Auntie Mel,” said Danny. “That’s usually what happens when you’re pushed out of a window and end up dead.”

“But why? And who? And… oh, God, what does this mean!”

“That’s what I’m trying to find out,” said Odelia, glad to get that part of the conversation out of the way.

“I thought you said he jumped?” said Harry, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

“That’s what I was told,” said Danny. “But clearly Mrs. Kingsley heard different.”

“Was there a witness?” asked Tom. “Someone who saw what happened?”

Dooley and I shared a look, but Odelia answered smoothly,“I don’t know. I’m just telling you what I heard. So can you think of anyone who’d hurt Mr. Madison? You, Tom?”

Tom shrugged.“I can think of a lot of people who didn’t like Madison. I didn’t like him, for instance.”

“But Tommy, you didn’t kill him!” said his mother.

“Of course I didn’t kill him, Mom,” said Tom. “But that’s not the question. The question is if we can think of anyone who’d harm Madison. And to be honest, I could. Though I wouldn’t, of course,” he hastened to add.

“You didn’t like how he treated Natalie Ferrara, did you?” asked Odelia softly.

Tom nodded and looked away.“I hated him for what he did to her. First getting her pregnant, then breaking up with her and telling her to get an abortion? Who does that?”

“He wasn’t a kind man,” Danny confirmed.

“Can I go now?” asked Harry, who clearly wasn’t interested in this part of the conversation.

“No, you’re going to stay put,” said Melanie, “and listen.” She gave Odelia a look of apology. “Don’t mind him. Harry can’t wait to get back to his computer.” She ruffled her youngest son’s hair, who made a face and pulled away. “He’s the hacker in the family, aren’t you?”

“How many times, Mom? I’m not a hacker,” said Harry. “I’m an online investor.”

“Of course you are,” said Melanie. “Harry wants to become a millionaire,” she announced, regarding her son affectionately. “Isn’t that right, sweetie?”

“Yeah, whatever,” said her son with an eyeroll.

“Okay, so how about you, Danny?” asked Odelia. “Can you think of anyone who’d wanna hurt Madison?”

“Do you want a list?” said Danny. “The guy wasn’t exactly Mr. Popular.” He gave us a few of the names on his list, but it turned out Odelia already had them on hers, so there wasn’t a lot of news to be extracted from this scion of the Mitchell family. “Though personally I’d put my money on Deith,” Tom’s cousin concluded.

“Madison’s wife?”

“Absolutely. You should have seen them yesterday, fighting like cats and dogs in his office, and she didn’t care if his entire staff heard them.”

“It’s always so sad when husband and wife fight,” said Melanie. “Sad for the kids, I mean.”

“Do you have anything concrete to support these suspicions?” asked Odelia.

“No, just my general knowledge of human nature,” said Danny. “The woman is evil, Mrs. Kingsley. And if she found out about her husband’s affair with Natalie, there’s no telling what she would do to get even.” He straightened and held up a finger. “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. That’s Shakespeare for you.”

“Congreve,” said his cousin quietly.

“Who?”

“William Congreve,” Tom said. “Not William Shakespeare.”

“Huh. How about that?”

“Okay, so now for one final question,” said Odelia, “but an important one. Where were you guys last night, when all this happened?”

Danny grinned widely.“Seriously? You’re asking about our alibis?”

“You’re not accusing us of murder, are you?” asked Melanie.

“I’m not accusing you of anything,” said Odelia. “It’s just a routine question. Just a matter of excluding you from my inquiries.”

“You sound like a cop,” Harry muttered darkly.

“Well, if you have to know, we were right here,” said Melanie. “Sound asleep in our beds, just like we always are at that time of night. Isn’t that right, boys?”

Three heads obediently bobbed up and down.

“So no one left the house last night?” asked Odelia.

“Absolutely not,” said Melanie. “And I would know if they did. I’m a light sleeper, you see. If one of the boys goes to the bathroom I wake up. My husband Jim always told me to use earplugs. He didn’t understand I don’t mind waking up. I like to know that if anything happens my boys cancount on me. Jim, rest his soul—he died ten years ago next week and I still miss him every day—he fell off a roof, you know—we sued the construction company, of course, but nothing doing.”

“Mom!” said Tom. “Get to the point already!”

“Right. What was I saying?”

“Something about earplugs?” Harry suggested with a wicked grin.

“Earplugs? Now why would I talk about earplugs?”

“You said you’d know if one of your boys left the house last night,” Odelia said helpfully.

“Oh, right! Well, I would, wouldn’t I? The least little noise and I’m wide awake. But I don’t mind. Jim always told me to use earplugs—ah, now I see where I was going with this—well, anyway, he fell off that roof through no fault of his own and I still miss him every day.” Her eyes had grown moist, and she now pulled a Kleenex from a box on the coffee table and pressed it to her nose. “And then when my sister and her husband died… Car crash.” She nodded emphatically. “They were both dead on impact. We sued the other driver but nothing doing. Anyway…”

“So nobody left the house, because you would have heard if they did, and you don’t know who killed Michael Madison,” Odelia summed up the state of affairs.

“It’s not easy raising three boys on your own,” Melanie posited. “But I like to think I did a good job.”

“You did a great job, Mom,” said Tom, who seemed the most sensible of the trio. He patted his mom on the back, and more tears formed in the woman’s eyes. Soon she was sniffling and snuffling, much to the embarrassment of the three young men gathered around her.

“That’s what you get from watching those soaps all the time,” Danny declared earnestly. “They turn your mind to mush.”

“Hey, watch your tongue, young man!” said Melanie, then seemed to collect herself. “You’ll stay for dinner, of course, Mrs. Kingsley,” she said.

“Oh, no,” said Odelia. “I couldn’t.”

“Nonsense. Skinny little thing like you? It’s obvious you haven’t had a decent meal in ages. If you were living under my roof I’d fatten you right up. Put some meat on those bones.”

Odelia didn’t seem to want fattening up, and after some wrangling, managed to escape the woman’s hospitality unscathed and so did we.

We had one more person to talk to, you see, and I had a feeling Deith Madison wasn’t the kind of woman who liked to be kept waiting!

CHAPTER 27

[Êàðòèíêà: img_2]

We met Madison’s wife in the driveway in front of her majestic villa. She was on her way out, and when we arrived, gave Odelia a supercilious look, before declaring, “I’m not a difficult person, Mrs. Kingsley, but I do appreciate punctuality. So I’m afraid we’ll have to do this some other time.”

“I just need five minutes of your time,” Odelia hastened to say.

Deith Madison ostensively checked her watch, then said,“Make it three.”

“Witnesses told us that you and your husband had a row yesterday in his office. Would you care to elaborate what that row was about?”

“No, I would not. What happens between husband and wife is nobody’s business except theirs. Next.”

“Could it have something to do with the fact that your husband’s girlfriend Natalie Ferrara is expecting his baby?”

The woman’s mask didn’t crack, indicating an extreme level of self-control. “I don’t know where you get your information, but I can assure you it’s all filth and lies. And if you dare to print any of this, I’ll sue you and your paper into oblivion. Last question!”

“Where were you last night, Mrs. Madison?”

For the first time emotion flashed across the woman’s face. I interpreted it as surprise. She quickly regained her poise. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I was home last night.”

“Alone?”

“Since my husband was in the habit of working late at the office, it wasn’t unusual for me to spend my nights alone. So yes, I was home alone last night. Now if there’s nothing further,” she said, walking to a waiting yellow Mercedes.

“Rumor has it that your husband didn’t kill himself, Mrs. Madison, but that he was pushed. Care to comment?”

This seemed to spark her interest.“Who told you this?”

Odelia shrugged.“A reliable source.”

Deith studied Odelia carefully before responding.“Please share your suspicions with the police. I find it hard to believe Michael would have killed himself. He wasn’t the type.” She got into the Mercedes, and before long we were being sprayed with gravel as she drove off at a respectable rate of speed.

“What do you think?” asked Odelia, as we stared after the disappearing car.

“She seemed truthful enough,” I said. “Except for the part about the pregnancy. I’m pretty sure she knew all about that, and that’s what that fight was about.”

“I agree,” said Odelia. “But until we get her into the police station, she’ll never admit to that.”

“So why don’t you make a citizen’s arrest?” Dooley suggested as we got back into our own car.

Odelia laughed.“You need to have probable cause to make an arrest, Dooley. A suspicion that someone is lying isn’t enough.”

“I think she did it,” my friend insisted. “She found out about that pregnancy, and got so upset she shoved him out of that window.”

“It’s possible,” Odelia agreed as she started up the car. “But we need more than a hunch to make an arrest. We need evidence, and a solid case against Deith.”

“You’ll get there,” Dooley assured her. “I have every confidence in you, Odelia.”