Let Sleeping Cats Lie: The 9 Lives Cozy Mystery Series, Book Four

by Louise Clark

  “I know,” Christy said. She sat down on one of the stairs going up to the next level. Stormy hopped up onto her lap and she patted him absently. “The woman’s a fruitcake. She knew her husband had an affair that resulted in a child, but it didn’t seem bother her. She even thinks that his own daughter killed him. And that seems perfectly reasonable to her.”

  “Fred Jarvis always presented himself as a very ordinary man,” Ellen said. Her expression was dubious. The individual being revealed since his death was far from ordinary.

  “Fred Jarvis was a two-faced liar,” Roy said with some heat. “If he couldn’t charm you into agreeing with him, he’d lie about his intentions to achieve his goal. He’d do whatever was needed to get what he wanted.”

  “Is that why you protested at his funeral?” Christy wrinkled her forehead. “Seems a bit harsh. After all, the guy’s dead. He can’t do any more harm.”

  Roy hesitated, then he said, rather defiantly, “Yes.”

  Trevor said heavily, “He wanted the cops to notice him so they’d focus on him and not on Quinn.”

  Ellen turned wide eyes on him. “Is that true, Roy?”

  Roy’s expression was fierce. “That idiot inspector says he can hold Quinn indefinitely because he’s a security risk. He needs to know that the only thing my Quinn is guilty of is caring for a vulnerable woman.”

  Trevor said briskly, “You holding a megaphone at the man’s funeral and shouting demands that the barricades be lowered, isn’t going to help Quinn.”

  “I was merely pointing out that funerals are private events and there was no reason to make such a spectacle of this one. Fred Jarvis was a politician. He wasn’t the damned Prime Minister. He didn’t deserve a state funeral.”

  “It wasn’t a state funeral,” Trevor said.

  “Close enough,” Roy retorted, thrusting out his chin. “Every major street in downtown Vancouver was shut down. On a weekday afternoon! Traffic was a nightmare. It wasn’t right.” His tone was ridiculously virtuous for a man whose goal was to disrupt a major event and cause as many problems as possible for the authorities.

  “The only way we can help Quinn is to prove who killed Fred Jarvis,” Christy said, breaking into what promised to become an epic argument between Trevor and Roy. “Which is another reason I’m here. Aunt Ellen, can you pick up Noelle from school this afternoon?” When Ellen nodded, Christy said, “Thanks. I’ve got an appointment to see Olivia Waters at three. I tried to arrange an earlier time, but she was having none of it.” Christy’s lips twitched. “I think she might be a bit hungover.”

  “She was certainly putting it away at the reception yesterday,” Ellen said.

  Christy nodded. “She was undoubtedly distraught by Jarvis’ death. Which makes me wonder, what are her real feelings for her daughter? Tamara is her blood and the main suspect. Doesn’t she care?”

  “She’s an irritating woman,” Roy said. “Full of herself and too smart for her own good.”

  She’s got your number, old man.

  “Which is why I want you to come with me, Roy,” Christy said, ignoring Frank.

  “Not a good idea,” Trevor said.

  “Why?” Ellen asked.

  “Olivia’s daughter and Roy’s son are prime suspects. If Fortier found out, he’d probably figure the three of you were brewing a conspiracy.”

  Trevor sounded impatient, although Christy couldn’t tell if it was with laws that gave the Canadian government sweeping powers of arrest in terror motivated crimes, or with the actual individuals involved. She lifted Stormy from her lap and put him on the stair beside her. “I’m taking Roy with me because he and Olivia strike sparks off each other. If Inspector Fortier has an issue with our visit he can talk to Detective Patterson. After all, I’m working for her.” She stood up. “Olivia lives in an apartment in Dundarave on the North Shore. If we’re going to make it for three, we should get going.”

  “Lead the way,” Roy said, rising to his feet.

  I’ll come too! Stormy leapt down to the floor, then darted down the stairs to the open front door.

  Christy stared after him. Roy shot her an amused look, eyebrows raised. “Well?”

  After a minute, she shrugged. “Why not? Frank and Stormy will either charm her into giving up her secrets or she’ll be so annoyed I brought my cat she’ll tell me what I want to know just to get rid of me. Either way I win.”

  Dundarave was an enclave in the larger district of West Vancouver. Olivia Waters lived in an unassuming low-rise apartment building in the quirky little village. The area was popular, but expensive. A few blocks in one direction was a sandy beach where families swam in the icy north Pacific during the summer, while in the other was Marine Drive with its collection of shops and galleries. Parking was at a premium, so it took Christy a few tries, but eventually she found a spot a couple of blocks away from Olivia’s building.

  Christy and Roy planned their strategy while they walked to their destination. Stormy poked his head out of Christy’s tote and took in the smells of the ocean wafting up from the nearby seaside. Frank was silent.

  The building proved to be a charming six-story heritage site, built not long after the Lion’s Gate Bridge connected the holiday resorts on the North Shore to Vancouver proper and opened the area to development. Its Art Deco style featured rounded corners and lots of windows to take in the view. Inside the spacious lobby was a concierge, who looked disapprovingly at Stormy, but passed them through to the elevator without comment, since they were on his visitor’s list.

  “I wonder if there are any units for sale?” Christy said as the ultra-modern elevator doors slid closed. “This building looks like it’s been updated fairly recently, but they’ve kept the ambience of the original. It might fit all of Aunt Ellen’s exacting standards.”

  It’s in West Van. She wants to live downtown.

  “I know, but … ” The elevator doors slide open into a foyer of the single penthouse apartment. “I suppose she wouldn’t want a unit on one of the lower floors anyway.”

  Roy rang the doorbell. Stormy squirmed in the tote and Christy lowered the bag and widened the opening so he could jump out. She was straightening when the door opened.

  “Right on time,” Olivia said. Her features were drawn and she looked tired, but she had dressed with some care in an expensive pair of slacks and a silk top. Though she raised her brows at Roy, she stepped to one side and waved her hand. “Come in.”

  “Thanks,” Christy said. She and Roy stepped into the apartment. Stormy pranced behind, tail up and ears pricked.

  Olivia’s brows rose higher. “Not only do you bring my daughter’s co-conspirator’s father, but you bring your cat too?”

  “He wanted to come,” Roy said. His words were clipped, his tone hostile. He walked deeper into the apartment, heading for the plate glass windows and their exquisite view.

  “I’m out on the terrace,” Olivia said. She sounded annoyed. “It’s a lovely day and my head aches. I want the sun and the sea air.”

  Hungover. You were right, babe.

  The terrace was spacious, the size of a large room, and designed for three seasons, if not year-round use. On this warm, clear, June day the afternoon sun competed with a breeze off the water, resulting in a soothing warmth that Christy admitted would be a very pleasant atmosphere to ride out a hangover. Olivia waved them over to a padded sofa and offered them drinks. “Rye and water?” she said to Roy. He nodded and settled at one end of the sofa. Olivia turned to Christy. “Wine? A cocktail?”

  “I’m the driver, so I’ll have water.” She headed over to the waist high balustrade that enclosed the terrace. Stormy was strutting along its narrow top. She lifted him off and placed him on the floor. “Stormy stays off the railing and on the ground.”

  “An odd way of talking to your cat,” Olivia said. She was watching Christy with a marked curiosity.

  “He’s an exceptional cat,” Roy said. He still sounded grouchy.

  Olivia cocked her h
ead, shrugged, then went over to a sideboard on which were decanters, a tray holding a crystal jug filled with water, and a cocktail shaker. She poured a hefty slug of Rye from one of the decanters into a cut-glass tumbler and topped it up with water. She handed it to Roy, then poured Christy’s water from the jug into a tall glass. After Christy accepted it, she poured herself a Martini from a cocktail shaker.

  Stormy hopped up onto the sofa and settled in beside Roy. Not nursing a hangover then, still working on one.

  “Hair of the dog?” Roy said, indicating her Martini.

  “I’m grieving,” Olivia said shortly. “I’m allowed.”

  Christy took her water and went back to stand by the balustrade. She leaned against it, her back to the glorious view of English Bay and the city of Vancouver beyond. “When we first met I got the impression you no longer had romantic feelings for Frederick Jarvis.”

  “I don’t.” She sat on the sofa, on the other side of the cat. “I’m grieving for opportunities lost and mistakes made.”

  “You’re talking about Tamara.” Christy said.

  Olivia ran her finger around the rim of her glass. “Fred and I made Tamara together. She’s as much his daughter as she is mine. And she killed him. Would she have done that if she’d grown up knowing him? Was I wrong to give her away all those years ago?” She lifted the glass and downed a hefty slug. “I was so pleased she came to Vancouver. I thought this would be my chance to build a relationship with her. Instead, I provided her with the perfect opportunity to murder a man who was my friend.”

  “You believe Tamara killed him?”

  “Who else?”

  “You,” Roy said.

  Olivia stared at him. She looked bewildered by his bluntness. “Me? Why would I kill Fred?”

  “Because he wanted to use your daughter as a tool to get himself elected to the leadership of his party,” Roy said. “Because he didn’t want Tamara all those years ago and he didn’t care about her now.”

  Olivia downed the last of her Martini, then stood up to get herself a refill. She tipped the cocktail shaker, but only a dribble came out. She set about making herself another batch. “I will admit that Fredrick Jarvis could be a manipulative bastard, but he had a charm that was hard to resist.” Her hands shook as she measured vermouth and followed it with vodka. “Ask any of his mistresses. They will all tell you the same thing. When Fred wanted you, there was no resisting him.” Her eyes were dreamy. Then she shook her head and put the top on the shaker.

  Christy stared at her as she shook the beaker, mixing the drink. “How many mistresses did he have?”

  “I’m not sure,” Olivia said, pouring the mix into her glass and adding an olive. “I know about Marian Fleming, of course. She was one of his more important relationships. I think they were together for years. He moved on eventually, after Marian got pregnant. Fred was never very good with the complication of pregnancy.” She paused, contemplated her cocktail. “That may have been Letitia. She was fine with Fred having a string of mistresses, but she didn’t want any competition for her own brood.”

  “Was Marian’s child Fred’s or her husband, Archie’s?” Christy wondered if Archie knew about his wife’s liaison with a man he’d worked closely with for years.

  “Archie’s.” Olivia laughed a little. “No denying that. The kid has Archie’s beak of a nose and his icy blue eyes.”

  “So Fred didn’t have to worry about an unwanted child,” Christy said, watching Olivia as she took another deep swallow of her drink. “Yet he still broke up with Marian?”

  Olivia shrugged. “It was his way. You accepted it and moved on to a new place in his life.”

  There was a decided clunk as Roy put his glass on the Plexiglas top of the coffee table. “Ever thought that Letitia might have killed her husband, then made it look like his bastard did it?”

  Christy thought Roy was being deliberately harsh in his choice of words, but Olivia simply opened her eyes and shook her head. “She doesn’t have it in her.”

  Frank made a derisive sound in Christy’s mind and Roy said, “Everyone has violence in them if they’re pushed too far.”

  “You don’t understand!” Olivia said. “If you were with Fred you knew you were the most important woman in his life. He made you feel—” She shook her head as she searched for the right words. “Sexy. Sensual. Beautiful. Needed. Desired. Perfect. Yes, you knew that he had a wife, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was how vital he made you feel.”

  “And then he dumped you.” Roy’s eyes were hard. His expression said he didn’t approve of Frederick Jarvis.

  Olivia shook her head again. “No. Well, yes, at first it felt like being dumped. At least for me it did. And then, when I came back to Vancouver after Tamara was born, he … ” She hesitated, then she said deliberately, “He courted me. He drew me back into his life. Not as his lover, but as his friend. And that’s what we’ve been ever since.”

  “Is that what he did with Marian Fleming?” Christy asked before Roy could say something caustic.

  Olivia turned to her eagerly. “Yes. That was his pattern. He did that with all of his mistresses. Once the initial hurt was gone, he brought them into his extended family, as friends and allies. He was an extraordinarily complex man.”

  “He was a self-absorbed narcissist,” Roy said with considerable hostility. “I can’t believe you’d choose him over your own flesh and blood.”

  Olivia sipped her martini. Her eyes glistened with tears. “I don’t know who Tamara is. Is she the dedicated doctor who went out into the world to help the most desperate? Or is she a woman who has been turned into a terrorist by her years in captivity?” She sipped again, then said in a low voice, “I don’t know Tamara, but I do know her father. He’s been part of my life for thirty years. How can I not choose him?”

  Chapter 18

  Ellen was standing by the planter at the end of the walk watching Noelle and Mary Petrofsky when Christy, Roy, and the cat returned. She was wearing a chic and expensive designer dress, handmade leather heels, and the diamond necklace she’d worn the day the taskforce arrested Quinn and Tamara. The outfit was a little odd for minding two kids at play, Christy thought, but quickly dismissed it. With Ellen, she could never be sure when that starchy Jamieson propriety would re-emerge. This was probably one of those moments. She guided the van into her carport, careful not to disturb the two girls, who were racing scooters along the street that intersected with Christy’s. As she cut the engine, she could hear their competitive squeals of delight. She had to grin, her mood lightening.

  The children’s obvious joy in their game couldn’t lift the gloom that enveloped Roy, however. Olivia’s willingness to abandon the daughter she’d borne, but not raised, had shaken some basic part of him. At one point during the drive back from West Van, he had confided to Christy that he feared Quinn might be caught in a net from which he wouldn’t be able to break free.

  Christy had reached over and taken Roy’s hand. “It looks bleak now, but we’ll sort this out.”

  “Yeah. Sure,” he’d said, polite but disbelieving.

  “We’ve done it before,” she said. She gave his hand a comforting squeeze. “We’ll do it again.”

  That had cheered Roy to the point that he began to talk about his pride in Quinn’s successful career, and how much it had meant to him when his son had decided to stay in Canada after Vivian Armstrong, Quinn’s mom and Roy’s beloved wife, died.

  Christy let him talk. The visit to Olivia had depressed her, as well, and she didn’t have a lot of positivity to pass along to Roy at this moment. She had to push down a panicked thought that Roy was right—they would never get to the bottom of who killed Frederick Jarvis, leaving Quinn and Tamara as the only suspects. Long, contentious trials, and the possibility that both Quinn and Tamara would be held without bail, loomed in this dark potential future. Christy had to resist the urge to shiver as she visualized it. She couldn’t let Roy see her distress. He was upset enough on
his own.

  With her daughter’s joyous cries ringing in her ears as she exited the van, she felt a renewed determination to continue her investigation and was hopeful that she’d find something to exonerate Quinn and Tamara.

  Ellen pricked that optimistic bubble almost immediately. “Fortier and his gang of thugs came to visit while you were out.”

  “Fortier?” Roy’s voice rose sharply as he climbed out of the van.

  Fortier’s appearance explained Ellen’s dress-to-impress clothes. “What did he want?” she asked.

  Ellen’s eyes were worried. “Roy. And he had a search warrant.”

  “Did they break the door down?” Roy sounded almost hopeful as he stepped out of Christy’s driveway and headed for his home. Ellen and Christy followed.

  “No,” Ellen said to his back. “I called Trevor and asked him what I should do. He said to stall them as long as I could, but ultimately to let them in. So I did.”

  “Pity,” Roy said as he stopped at the end of his front walk. “I would have enjoyed suing them.”

  Ellen came up beside him. Christy stood to one side. The cat perched on the flower box. They all surveyed his front façade.

  “Looks undamaged,” he said. “I suppose they left a mess inside.”

  “Some,” Ellen said. “Less than they might have.”

  “What does that mean?” Roy was still staring at the closed front door.

  “Inspector Fortier seemed to think that it was permissible to dump the contents of drawers for no purpose other than to annoy you. I pointed out to him that vandalism had little to recommend it, certainly not for a civilized person. We had quite an interesting conversation about that. I fear he wasn’t paying much heed to what I was saying until I began shadowing his men, cleaning up after they’d dumped. They became quite agitated. So did the inspector.”