by Nic Saint
He seemed taken aback. “What for?”
“For letting me be a part of the investigation. And for your confidence.”
He made a throwaway gesture. “Oh, nonsense. Anyone with a brain can see you’re a natural at this stuff, honey.”
“Chase Kingsley can’t see it.”
“Well,” he said with a grin, “Chase is new. He’s got a lot to learn about Hampton Cove and the way we do things around here. I’m sure that over time he’ll start to see what a great addition you make to the team, in a non-official capacity. Now what are your plans? Where do we go from here?”
She chewed her lip for a moment, then suddenly remembered something. “You know, when I talked to Gabby, she mentioned something about there probably being other people out there that Frey must have slandered. How about I try to find those other victims? Maybe one of them finally snapped?”
“Great idea,” he grunted. “Chase said something similar.”
“Oh, Chase is looking into that angle too, huh?”
Uncle Alec scratched his scalp. “He’s a great detective, actually.” He eyed her wearily for a moment. “You may not see eye to eye with the guy, but he’s a first-rate sleuth, and, just like you, a great addition to the team.”
She nodded. “I know. It’s just that he rubs me the wrong way, especially when he insists I’m just a nosy reporter and should mind my own business.”
“Yeah, well, like I said, he’ll get over that. I’m sure that’s just a big-city kind of thing. Now that he’s here in the sticks, he’ll see we do things differently.”
And with these wise words, he waved her off.
Chapter 17
Walking out of the police station, she wondered what her next course of action should be. How could she figure out who Frey’s other victims were? And then she got it. All manner of vile abuse these days was done on social media sites. So where better to start her search than by going through Frey’s feeds? If he’d targeted people, she was bound to find the evidence right there.
She headed back to the office and for the next couple of hours meticulously went through Frey’s Facebook page, his Twitter feed and his Instagram. She even read his blog, and when she finally had enough, her view of Paulo Frey had taken a nosedive, if that was even possible.
The man was simply a troll, and not one of the nice cuddly ones with the brightly colored hair either, but a vicious, nasty one who stalked anyone he disagreed with. He’d engaged in online warfare with so many people it was a miracle he hadn’t been killed sooner. Gabby Cleret was only the tip of the iceberg. Over the course of the last couple of years, he’d fought with so many people she wondered why people still bothered to read his books. Surely readers must have discovered what a dreadful person he was by now?
But instead of abandoning him in droves, he’d actually garnered support for his trollish behavior. A group of rabid followers, calling themselves the UnaFreyds, admired his boldness and the way he dared say what others didn’t, and had enthusiastically endorsed his attacks on reporters, actors, politicians and anyone else he didn’t agree with. When he’d disagreed with a reporter for the New York Times, they’d actually gone after the man IRL, which was short for In Real Life, by picketing his house. The man had finally been forced to move to an undisclosed location with his wife and kid.
Holy crap, she thought as she sat back. This guy was the worst of the worst. No wonder someone had taken a poker to the back of his head. The only question was who? Who of the dozens of people he’d harassed had finally taken matters into their own hands and ended the guy’s reign of terror? It appeared there were a great number of candidates. All they needed to do was check them one by one, to see if they’d been in town that day.
She quickly compiled a list of the most egregious displays of online abuse, and emailed it to Uncle Alec. Then she rubbed her eyes and closed her laptop. Tonight she had that dinner with Chase Kingsley to look forward to, and if Max was right—and she had no doubt in her mind that he was—she owed the guy an apology. She wasn’t going to offer him one, though, for his behavior against her didn’t warrant one. She wasn’t the commissioner and she hadn’t gotten him fired from his job, so why he had to be so angry with her she didn’t know. Sure, he had a bone to pick with the Post, but she wasn’t the Post. She was just a small-town reporter who had a newspaper to fill.
Which reminded her that the Paulo Frey case wasn’t the only article that needed writing. So for the next couple of hours, she diligently typed up an article on the upcoming opening of a new flower shop on Bleecker Street, an article on the new Children’s Room in the library—courtesy of her mother—and a small article on the mermaid festival that was taking place down at the marina. Anyone who wanted to compete had to show up in their best mermaid’s costume and prove they could swim. The jury awarded a prize to the best one, and a picture would be featured on the front page of the paper.
Thinking of pictures… She quickly transferred the pictures she’d taken at the crime scene to her laptop, and leafed through them. She’d taken a couple of the pit, and suddenly got an idea. Uncle Alec said they’d gotten Frey’s laptop to work but hadn’t found any evidence on it so far. What if she could take a closer look at it? Now that she knew what kind of man Frey was, it stood to reason he’d been threatened over the years. What if he kept some of that stuff on his computer? Maybe it could provide a clue to the murderer?
She fired off another email to her uncle, asking him if she could take a look at the laptop, and he immediately wrote back to tell her she was more than welcome to have a peek, along with the other stuff they found in the pit.
Most of her work for the day done, she breezed into Dan’s office.
“All done?” he asked, looking up from his own computer.
“Yeah, pretty much,” she said, leaning against the doorjamb. “I haven’t solved the Frey murder. Yet. But the rest is all done.”
He laughed. “You’re incredible, Odelia. You know,” he said, removing his glasses and starting to polish them with the hem of his shirt, “I think you’re going to solve this murder. I really do.”
“Of course I’m going to solve this murder,” she said with humorous bluster. “Who do you think I am? Some talentless hack?”
“No, you’re definitely not a talentless hack,” he agreed. “In fact I think hiring you was probably the best decision I ever made in a long career. Now shoo. I’ll finish up here.”
She grinned at the aged editor. “See you, Dan.”
“See you, honey. Say hi to your folks for me.”
“Will do.”
As she climbed into her pickup, she took in the empty passenger seat, and wondered if Max and Dooley would have remembered the other story she’d been working on today: the secret affair of the NYPD commissioner and the mayor’s wife. And as she started up the car, she hoped they’d find proof of Chase’s innocence. But even if they didn’t, she knew they’d called it: the guy was innocent. She now realized she’d known all along, but had allowed her instincts to be clouded by her annoyance with the guy.
Chase might be a pain in the behind, but he was not a molester of women.
She now wondered if maybe deep down she already knew who Frey’s killer was. She thought for a moment. Somewhere at the back of her mind, the kernel of an idea was tugging, but she couldn’t quite catch it. Something she’d missed. But what? And where? And, more importantly, who?
Chapter 18
I think I’d been a little too optimistic when I told Odelia I’d solve this mystery in a heartbeat. Dooley and I had been traipsing all over town, talking to any cat we could find, and so far had nothing to show for our efforts. None of them had an inkling of who Chase Kingsley was, or the commissioner of the NYPD, or even the mayor’s wife for that matter, nor did they care.
Instead, they all shook their heads, convinced we’d both gone off our rockers. I should have known, of course. Cats, as you may or may not know, like to stick close to home. They like to wander around, p
referably at night, when the world is asleep, in search of mice or other little snacks, but never stray far, for they like to be home before dawn, curl up at the foot of a warm, soft bed, and wait until their human wakes up to fill up their bowl of kibble.
We used to be proud hunters once upon a time, but centuries of being fed and nurtured by humans have made us lazy and complacent. New York is another continent, as far as we are concerned, and rarely do we even venture outside of Hampton Cove these days. Why should we, when all we need is right here at home?
Even my theory that we might run into a cat who’d met a cat who’d talked to a cat who’d witnessed the commissioner and the mayor’s wife in the act was pretty far-fetched, I now saw. Cats rarely travel. Dogs love to ride in cars, their heads stuck out the window, tongues lolling in the breeze, but then we all know dogs are a bunch of dummies. Cats are dignified creatures. We wouldn’t be seen dead with our tongues hanging out and our faces flapping.
And then there was the fact that both Dooley and I were bone-tired. Daytime is sleeping time, and we’d skipped nap time to go out hiking in the woods, and to play detective across town. It also explained why there weren’t all that many cats around, and those that were, didn’t want to be disturbed. The best time to do this was at night, Dooley reminded me as we dragged our weary bodies along the strip mall, on the edge of town.
“You’re right,” I admitted. “Let’s call it quits and do this again tonight, when there are more cats around. Maybe we’ll have better luck then.”
“I kinda doubt it, Max,” said Dooley. “Considering all the cats we talked to laughed in our faces, I think our chances of finding the one cat that saw the mayor of New York having relations with the commissioner are slim.”
“Mayor’s wife,” I corrected him tiredly. “The mayor’s wife is having relations with the commissioner, not the mayor.”
“Who cares?” Dooley cried. It was obvious he was getting cranky.
And we were just about to call it a day and return to our cozy home, when I happened to glance at a set of dumpsters located behind the mall and recognized a familiar figure snooping around in there.
“Don’t look now, but I think I just saw Clarice,” I whispered, even though she probably couldn’t hear me from this distance.
“Clarice? Where?” Dooley asked, immediately starting to look around like a tourist on a tour bus.
“I said, don’t look now,” I hissed. “She’s over there by those dumpsters.”
I watched as the scrawny feline dove into one of the dumpsters, obviously fishing around for something edible.
“Poor creature,” Dooley said ruefully. “No home, no hearth, and no food.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe she’s luckier than us. At least she gets to choose her food. I’ll bet there’s some choice stuff in those dumpsters.”
“I see what you mean,” he said. “Do you think there’s raw meat in there?”
“Raw meat, pizza, lasagna, a nice beef burger. You name it, they got it.”
“Maybe we’ll have a peek?” he suggested. “I need me some raw meat.”
“What’s with this sudden raw meat obsession?”
He shrugged. “I can’t help it that Brutus gets fed raw meat and I don’t, can I? And that because of that he’s better looking and more attractive.”
“Well, I’m not so sure about that,” I intimated.
“What do you mean?”
“What if he’s lying? He wouldn’t be the first cat to turn out a liar.”
“You mean he’s lying about the meat?”
“Why not? There’s no way for us to check.”
“He’s just messing with us!” cried Dooley. “And deceiving poor Harriet.”
“Don’t feel sorry for Harriet. If she chooses that brute it’s her funeral.”
“Funeral!” he cried, his voice skipping an octave. “Do you really believe that horrible creep would hurt her?”
“It’s just an expression, Dooley,” I said irritably. The longer I was up, the more cranky I was becoming as well. I needed a nap and some food and I needed it an hour ago. First things first, though. “Let’s have a chat, shall we?” I suggested, and started tripping over to the dumpsters.
“A chat?” he asked, falling into step beside me. “With who?”
“With whom,” I corrected him. We might be cats, but that was no excuse for a lapse in grammar. “Who do you think?”
“Is this a trick question?” he whined. “Don’t do this to me, Max. Not when I’m tired. Just tell me already. Whommmm are we going to chat with?”
“Clarice, of course.”
He gulped. “Clarice? Are you nuts? She’ll just tell us she saw nuthin.”
“Well, maybe she will, or maybe she won’t. But it’s definitely worth a try.”
Of all the cats I knew in Hampton Cove, Clarice was the one who’d traveled the most and traveled the farthest. She had to, to find food and shelter, as she didn’t have a human to take care of her. Once upon a time, the rumor went, she’d had a human, but he’d abandoned her. Some tourist who came to Hampton Cove for the holidays, and then tied her to a tree out in the woods and took off. The same rumor held that she’d gnawed off her own paw to escape, like James Franco, though from what I’d seen her limbs were still present and accounted for, so that story might just have been a fabrication.
“Clarice,” I called out as we approached the dumpster she was currently holed up in. “Clarice, we’d like to talk to you.” The small collection of dumpsters was where the stores the mall was comprised of dumped their garbage, and was always a place where all manner of critters gathered.
When Clarice’s head popped up out of the dumpster, looking shifty-eyed and ready to flee, Dooley chimed in, “Hey, Clarice. So we meet again, huh? What are the odds?” He looked a little afraid, and with good reason. Clarice had been known to lash out when she was approached without invitation.
“We were just wondering—” I began.
“I know nuthin,” she muttered, repeating her usual mantra.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I said, a little gruffly. I wasn’t in the mood for games. I was tired and hungry and my paws hurt. “Look, all we need to know is whether you know a cat who knows a cat who might have seen a cat who…”
“I know nuthin,” Clarice repeated.
“See? I told you this was a waste of time,” said Dooley. He’d planted himself on his rear end and was sniffing the air, probably looking for meat.
“Look, we just want to know—”
“I know nuthin!” she repeated, and jumped out of the dumpster, giving us both the dirtiest of looks and starting to walk away.
“Now hold it right there!” I cried. “All we want is information. Is that too much to ask? If you tell us what we need to know we’ll even share our kibble with you next time you’re in the neighborhood. Isn’t that right, Dooley?”
Dooley stared at me. He obviously didn’t agree. If anyone was going to share his kibble, it was going to be me. Well, that was fine by me. From experience I knew that fresh kibble was only a trip to the store away.
I panted a little, because Clarice was giving me her best stare. Locked in a stare-down with the most feral cat in Hampton Cove. If she lashed out now and scratched my nose, that would set the seal on this day. To my surprise, she didn’t. Instead, she said, “Oh, all right, Max, you annoying little weasel. What do you wanna know?”
Relieved, I told her about the murder of Paulo Frey. It turned out that the Writer’s Lodge was like a second home to her. Which, now that I thought about it, wasn’t surprising. Writers are an easy mark for a cat’s affections, as a lot of them genuinely like us. Most of them got cats at home, and when they come out to the woods to write they miss their little furballs. So when they see Clarice lurking in the woods, they try to lure her by offering her the best treats. I now saw what her MO was, and with it came a newfound respect.
“Well, I don’t know anything about that Chase Kingsley affair,” sh
e finally said, “and I don’t care one hoot either. What humans do is none of my business. What I can tell you is I saw someone drag the body of that writer out of the lodge a year ago, so I’m guessing that might have been your killer.”
Dooley and I exchanged excited glances. “You saw the killer?” I asked.
“Sure, sure,” she said, studying her nails, which were razor-sharp. “They dragged the body of that Frey guy out of the lodge and dumped it where they like to do their business. Made a nice big splash, too. Then they came out again and dumped a bunch of other stuff in there.”
“A laptop and a couple of suitcases,” I said.
“Sure, sure,” she said, rolling her eyes, already bored with the conversation.
“So?” I asked when she was silent for a beat. “Who was it?!”
“Yeah, Clarice,” Dooley huffed out. “Who’s the killer?”
“What’s it worth to you?” she asked, removing a fishbone from between her teeth and giving it a tentative nibble.
“Whatever you want,” I said excitedly.
“I’ll take a twenty-pound bag of fish kibble. The expensive stuff. And a couple bags of that party mix you guys seem to like so much. Mixed grill.”
“Deal!” I cried.
Clarice gave a chuckle, spit out the fishbone and suddenly, fast as lightning, flicked a paw beneath the dumpster and came away with a mouse, dragging it out by its tail. And then, before our horrified gaze, she gobbled down the mouse, hair and hide!
I gulped and so did Dooley. We weren’t necessarily mouse hunters, what with having such a cushy life and all, and watching this… massacre taking place in front of our noses reminded us we were as far removed from our feral ancestors as felinely possible.
“So, those are my terms,” Clarice said, spitting out the mouse tail and using it to pick her teeth. “I want the best stuff. Take it or leave it.”