Purrfect Secret

Chapter 20

Tex Poole was generally a happy man. He’d married the woman of his dreams, had the most amazing daughter any doting father could ever have wished for, who’d recently become involved with a great guy and a fine cop, and he worked in a noble profession that fulfilled his every expectation and more. He even still had all of his hair and his own teeth.

The only thing that occasionally marred this blessed life he led was a little old lady who was a far cry from the sweet and loving mother-in-law he’d envisioned when he first met Marge Lip. He’d known from the moment Marge introduced him to her mother that this might not be the kind of easygoing relationship one often sees in Hallmark movies. Vesta Muffin adhered more to the cliché of the monster-in-law than the loving mom-in-law.

The first time he saw Vesta—when picking up Marge to go to the prom—she’d hit him over the head with a broomstick. Asked to explain herself by a horrified Marge, she said Tex had a face like a serial killer and she thought he was there to slaughter her daughter.

Things had gone downhill from that point. And Marge’s dad, who at that point had already left his family to fend for itself, hadn’t helped. He had an aversion to doctors that stemmed from a badly digested experience in the armed forces, when the barracks physician had given him a pill that had given him an itchy rash that had lasted weeks.

He’d never forgiven the medical profession—or any of its practitioners, whom he steadfastly referred to as voodoo priests.

Daddy Poole had died soon after Tex had started dating his daughter, though, which only left Marge’s testy mother. And since Tex had taken an oath to save lives, he couldn’t very well act on the impulse he sometimes felt to simply smother the woman in her sleep.

And it was with great reluctance that he had accepted his wife’s suggestion to allow Vesta to move in with them—seeing as how she was increasingly having trouble taking care of herself. Forgetting to turn off the stove. Putting fresh laundry into the oven. Stuff like that.

So now, as a token of her gratitude, Vesta had set out to turn her son-in-law’s life into a living hell every chance she had. Or at least that’s the way it sometimes felt to Tex.

He’d just seen his last patient of the day when he walked out of his office and into the waiting room and was surprised to find it chock-full of people, all expectantly looking up at him.

He blinked and turned to Scarlett. “Scarlett?” he asked.

She smiled sweetly, then jiggled her boobage, as was her habit. “Dr. Tex?”

He approached the desk. “What are these people doing here?” he whispered.

Scarlet leaned in, in the process offering Tex a scintillating view of her cleavage. He fought against the sudden spell of vertigo. “I don’t know what happened, Dr. Tex,” she whispered back. “They started coming in twenty minutes ago. When I asked if they had an appointment they said yes. But I can’t find them in your appointment book.”

“So why didn’t you tell them to make an appointment and come back? Are these even my patients? I’ve never seen any of them before.”

“They said they arranged things with you, Dr. Tex,” said Scarlett. “What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t just kick them out. Some of them look really sick.”

He glanced over his shoulder at the dozen or so patients. They did look sick. All of them. And unwashed. And when he looked closer, he saw they’d brought their raggedy bags with them. Almost as if they were…” He frowned, then turned back to Scarlett. “Did you get their names and addresses?”

“No, Dr. Tex,” said Scarlett sheepishly.

“Insurance information?”

“I don’t think they have any, Dr. Tex.”

“Oh, for crying out loud,” he muttered.

The door swung open and five more ‘patients’ stumbled in from the street. They all looked as grimy as their dozen colleagues. As soon as the door had closed, it opened again and five more walked in. This place was starting to look like Grand Central Terminal.

“Are you Dr. Tex?” asked one of the newcomers, a toothless older man.

“I am.”

“Oh, great. I have a pain in my nose, doctor.”

Tex studied the man’s nose. It was one of those narrow, veiny noses. It also had a safety pin stuck through the fleshy part. “Maybe you should take out that pin,” he suggested.

“What pin?” said the old-timer, feeling for his nose. “Oh, there’s a pin in my nose!”

“Oh, for Pete’s sakes.” He addressed the small crowd. “How did you all get here? Who told you to come and see me?”

“Scarlett O’Hara,” said the man with the pin in his nose.

“No, Scarlett Cannon,” said an old lady with a glass eye. “She said you would treat us for free. Day or night. Any time.”

Tex locked eyes with Scarlett, who was shaking her head. “I didn’t say nothing, Dr. Tex! I swear! I don’t even know these people!”

He had a sneaking suspicion he knew exactly who this ‘Scarlett Cannon’ was.

“What did the person who invited you look like?” he asked.

“A nice old lady,” said one man. “Little white curls. Looks like Estelle Getty. I met her at the bus station. I like to hang out at the bus station. It’s always nice and warm out there.”

“I met her at the train station,” said another man. “She even gave me your card.”

“Lemme see that,” grumbled Tex, and took the card from the man. It read, ‘Scarlett Canyon, Unlicensed Receptionist, Dr. Tex Poole,’ and even mentioned Tex’s home address and phone number. “Vesta,” he muttered under his breath, crumpling up the card.

“Hey, that’s my card!” said the guy.

“You’re going to treat us, aren’t you, Doc?” asked a cross-eyed woman.

“Yeah, a promise is a promise,” said another woman, who looked like a hobo.

In truth, they all looked like hobos. Probably because they were all hobos.

Scarlett was eyeing Tex with a knowing look. ‘I told you,’ that look said. And she had. And even if she hadn’t, he should have known Vesta wouldn’t leave well enough alone.

“All right,” he said resignedly. “The first one come with me.”

And he returned to his office, determined to murder Vesta the moment he saw her.