by MCCOY, JUDI
“I don’t know about Fred, but Eugene isn’t smart enough.”
Ellie started at Rudy’s mental intrusion. “Are you reading my mind?”
“Duh, no. What do you think I am? Psychic?”
“Duh, yes,” Ellie argued, leading her pal onto Jett’s floor and marching to his unit. “What else would you call what I . . . what we can do?”
“I’d call it being in tune with each other.”
She rolled her eyes. “How about we stay in tune only when asked? I don’t poke around in your mind and you agree not to poke around in mine.”
“Sorta takes all the fun out of life, don’t it?”
Ignoring his questions, she opened Jett’s door and squatted. As the Scottie neared, she caught the scent of roses. “You smell great. Been to a new groomer?”
“Just Celia,” he intoned dourly. “If you ask me, I smell like a brothel at midnight.”
“Really? And you recognize the aroma because . . .”
Jett sneezed his displeasure. “The old girl used to work in one—talk about the big bang. Of course, that was a long time ago. I was a pup, but I remember.”
At the sound of the “big bang,” Ellie gave Rudy the evil eye. “Celia can’t be a day past forty. And she does not resemble a hooker. Where was this place, anyway?”
“Our last apartment. Three women lived there, and men were coming and going at all hours while us dogs had to sleep in kennels in the kitchen, listening to the intimate racket—not to mention the smells.” He twitched his tail. “It’s been a lot better since she quit the business.”
Celia Farnsworth—a prostitute? The woman had always appeared the height of elegance and social standing, rivaling Georgette in sophistication, expensive clothing, and perfect manners. Leading the dogs into the hall, Ellie locked the apartment door. “I thought Celia came from money, maybe through an inheritance or a divorce settlement.”
“Hah! That’s a good one,” quipped Jett.
Conceding that Celia’s past was none of her business, and if it were true, the other dogs didn’t need to hear it, Ellie warned him to keep his thoughts to himself and headed for the next apartment. Her canines were already as nosy and judgmental as humans. They didn’t need any encouragement.
After collecting Buckley, Sweetie Pie, and Stinker, she took the elevator to the main floor, waved at Randall, and made a beeline for the park. The brilliant blue sky and crisp spring breeze made the morning exceptionally pleasant, which helped to clear Ellie’s head. Sprawling Central Park, with its budding leaves and almost-open flowers, beckoned.
A short while later, everyone had taken care of business, gotten exercise, sniffed butt, and participated in all the usual doggie dynamics.
“Okay, last snurffle, then we start for home.” Ellie smiled at an elderly passerby, who shook his head when she spoke out loud. “Sorry. I can’t help talking to them.”
“I can see why. They’re a handful, but they seem very well-behaved.”
“They are.” She gave the man a couple of her cards. “If you know anyone looking for a dog walker in this area, tell them to give me a call, or they can find me here about this time every morning. Most of my clients come from the Davenport, but I’m willing to travel a few blocks north or south.”
He tipped his hat. “Will do.”
After delivering the last of her charges and writing their progress notes, she crossed her fingers. An hour had passed. The professor’s cousin and Ryder had to be through taking inventory by now. She rode to Buddy’s floor and skulked down the hall. Suddenly appalled by her criminal-like behavior, she squared her shoulders. If anyone saw her sneaking around, they’d think she was guilty of something, especially Ryder.
Standing in front of the professor’s apartment, she inspected the door, taped top and bottom with some kind of plastic coating. Then she put her ear to the panel.
“Exactly what are we listening for?”
Jumping back, she gasped. “I’m trying to find out if that detective is still inside, so be quiet.”
“Then step aside and allow me,” Rudy said, a smirk gracing his canine lips.
She opened and closed her mouth.
“Superior hearing, remember?” Cocking his head, he perked his ears. A full thirty seconds passed before he said, “The place is empty. Want me to scratch off the tape so we can go inside?”
“Are you crazy?” She dragged trembling fingers through her hair. “If anyone caught us, I’d be arrested for sure. Then where would we be?”
“Don’t know about you, but I’d be home sitting on a nice cozy sofa, sound asleep.”
“That’s what you think. They’d probably put you back in the big house. Want to do time there again?”
Rudy shuddered. “Okay, okay. But if we’re not going inside, why are we here?”
She raised a shoulder in an “I don’t know” gesture. “I just thought that maybe the police had overlooked something in their investigation.” Or maybe someone with a key, say Eugene, had found Buddy, and brought him back.
“Not in this lifetime,” Rudy said. “The jerk doesn’t have enough heart.”
Leaning a shoulder against the wall, she gave the matter serious consideration. Then she decided to check the tape more thoroughly. Maybe a corner had come loose and needed to be smoothed back in place. Getting an adhesive coating to stick could be tricky, especially if someone scraped it with a foot. She ran the tip of her sneaker across the tape. Or there was an inordinate amount of humidity in the air. She took a bottle of water from her bag and drizzled a little on the bottom of the door. Who knew what might cause the tape to come off?
Rudy growled low in his throat, and she ignored him. After a third rub with the tip of her shoe, she poured more water on the tape.
A deeper growl made her tsk. “For God’s sake be quiet. Can’t you see I’m busy here.”
“Um, Ellie—”
“Hush up and keep your comments to yourself.” She bent at the waist and ran her fingers across the covering, noting it hadn’t budged. Maybe a penknife would be sharp enough to break the seal. Before she came to a conclusion, the hairs on her nape stood on end. Peering between her ankles, she spied a pair of men’s dress shoes, large but not overly so, and worn but nicely shined.
The man cleared his throat and visions of her sitting in a dank, musty cell somewhere in the Big Apple danced in her brain. Swallowing, she rose slowly and rested her forehead on the door.
Chapter 8
Just when Sam thought his day couldn’t get any more interesting, he stepped off the elevator and spotted Ellie Engleman, bent at the waist in front of Albright’s apartment, her curvy butt reeling him in like the lure on a fishing line.
At first, he told himself he had it wrong. No way was the woman trying to break into the professor’s home. When she started fiddling with the crime tape, rubbing it with her toe, dousing it with bottled water, he about shit a brick. She was a nut job. An idiot. She was insane.
She was out to get herself arrested.
Counting to ten, he made his way down the hall. Her pooch saw him coming, got an evil glint in its eyes, and glared as if to say, “Take one step closer, and I’ll rip your face off.” And even though the mutt’s growl deepened the closer Sam got, the fool woman kept muttering as she concentrated on the door.
He stopped a yard away, angled himself directly behind her, and gave her shapely butt another once-over. “Disturbing a crime scene is a felony, Ms. Engleman. If you continue tampering with that tape, I’ll be forced to arrest you for breaking and entering.”
He smirked when she froze, straightened slowly, and rested her head on the door. Then she smacked her forehead against the panel a couple of times in a deliberate, measured, and totally certifiable manner.
“Hurt yourself if it makes you feel better. Just don’t blame me when I haul you in.”
She spun around and gave him a smile as phony as a knockoff Rolex. “Detective Ryder, fancy meeting you here.”
Fancy
my ass. His fingers itched to grab her and shake some sense into her. Instead, he rested a palm on the doorframe, caged her in on one side, and caught the flicker of worry in her eyes. “What are you doing here?”
The picture of innocence, she blew a stray curl from her forehead. “I was hoping to meet the professor’s niece and talk to her about Buddy.”
“Did you knock?”
“I did, but no one answered.”
“That should have been your first clue. Ms. Pernell has already been and gone.”
“Oh . . . uh . . . well, thanks for telling me.” She licked her full lower lip. “Did she ask about Buddy? Tell you how to proceed in his search, or give you instructions on what to do if . . . when you find him?”
Victoria Pernell was a thin woman with a nose that could double as a letter opener and a figure like a ruler. Her beady brown eyes had worked over the apartment at warp speed as she tallied the contents while jotting notes and snapping pictures. The disagreeable woman even warned him that she’d know if a single thing was disturbed or stolen, so the NYPD had better beware. And she didn’t care jack about her uncle’s prized possession.
“Not exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means she doesn’t expect us to go out of our way to find the dog.”
“Was she going to the ASPCA? The one on Ninety-second is the closest, but there are other places—”
“I doubt it.”
“But what about Buddy? What if I find him and he’s injured or—or—”
“She’s not interested in the dog, Ms. Engleman. Seems she hated that her uncle wasted money on its upkeep and show costs. She also thinks he’s dead or lost, but if he were here, she’d sell him to the highest bidder. Since he isn’t . . .”
Ellie’s face crumpled and tears glistened in her eyes. “That’s . . . that’s unconscionable. Did you check her pulse, because my guess is she doesn’t have a heart.”
“Just because you think dogs are four-legged humans doesn’t mean everybody feels the same.”
“That’s the problem with this world. No one gives a damn anymore. Did you read about the thousands of dogs exterminated in China a few years ago, just because the fools didn’t have sense enough to stock the right amount of rabies vaccine?” Her mouth turned prim as a grade-school principal’s. “If that’s how the Chinese treat their innocent animals, imagine how they treat their people.”
He held up a hand, hoping to stop her before she took the rant further. “I’m not here to debate the evils taking place in a foreign country on another continent. My job is to find out how Professor Albright met his Maker.”
“Quite the humanitarian, aren’t you?”
When he didn’t answer, she inched sideways. “Have you given any more thought to my theory—find Buddy and you’ll find the killer?”
He pushed away from the door. “I’m still waiting on toxicology and the other test results before I know for certain he was murdered,” he said, giving her as much info as he could. “I tie up all the loose ends before I jump to conclusions.”
“Might I remind you that if the killer knows the professor is dead, he’ll also realize he has no hope of a reward. That will be Buddy’s death knell.”
“We’ve checked the phone line and his mail. There hasn’t been a single ransom note or phone call, so my guess is the dog’s already outlived his usefulness.”
“I refuse to accept that he’s dead. I think someone stole him, and that someone could only have been the person who killed Professor Albright.”
Sam ran a hand through his hair. Ellie Engleman might have a point, except for one thing: Why would someone commit a dognapping if there was no chance for a ransom? “Let’s say I buy your theory. If they killed Albright, what could they possibly hope to gain by keeping the dog?”
“Maybe they didn’t start out to steal him, but when they didn’t find anything else of value in the apartment, they just grabbed Buddy and ran.”
“Doesn’t make sense. The professor had artwork the niece says is worth a lot of money, ditto some antique vases and a small sculpture. They would have been way easier to haul out than a squirming mutt.”
“Then we have to think of a sensible reason why—”
“There is no ‘we.’ You have nothing to do with this case.”
She rested her hands on her hips. “Can I continue to look for Buddy?”
“Be my guest.” Anything to keep her out of his hair, not to mention appeasing his captain. “Just let me know if you find him, and I’ll take it from there.”
She jutted her chin, as if to say, “Yeah, right.” “What’s his niece planning to do with the apartment?”
“After we’re through with the investigation, she’ll hold a tag sale. She has a friend in the antiques business who’ll come in and give an appraisal. Then she’ll set up a date and put out the word.”
“How soon will that be?”
“In a month or so. Why? Are you interested in anything special?”
She gazed at her sneakers, then looked him in the eye. “I might want to buy a few pieces.”
The woman couldn’t lie her way out of a paper bag. “Your apartment appeared pretty well-stocked to me.”
“You didn’t see the den or my bed—the rest of the rooms.” Her cheeks turned pink. “And you won’t, unless you think I stole Buddy.”
“I highly doubt you have the dog.” But you do have a few screws loose. “Why were you trying to get into the apartment? And bear in mind telling the truth right about now might keep you out of jail.”
Straightening her shoulders, she gave her shoes another inspection. “The professor had an original of the photo I printed off the other night, and I was hoping to borrow it and make a copy as a keepsake. Now that I know his niece is holding a tag sale, I’ll buy it there.”
“Maybe I can arrange for you to get the picture for free.”
“That’s very kind of you.”
“I try.” He rocked back on his heels. “I have a question. Which officer did you give your copy of the professor’s key to the other morning?”
“Um, I’m not sure. I’m certain Officer Martin would remember, or maybe the other patrolman. Why do you ask?”
“It’s my job.” He raised a brow. “How about pulling out your key ring and letting me take a look . . . just to be sure?”
Her cordial expression closed like a slammed door. She huffed a breath.
He held out his hand.
She dug in her pocket, found the ring, and passed it over.
After plugging a few keys in the lock, he grinned when one worked. “Well, what do you know? Good thing I checked, or Martin might be in trouble for not following procedure.” Slipping the key off the holder, he dropped it into his pocket. “Thanks.”
Her jaw clenched. “You’re welcome.”
“Since we’re done here, can I escort you to the lobby?”
She gave a curt nod, and they walked to the elevator, where he pressed the CALL button. Glancing down, he frowned at her dog, who was still eyeing him as if he were a serial rapist. “Does he always look like that?”
She followed his gaze and quirked her lips. “Rudy’s an excellent judge of character.”
The thought made Sam cringe inside. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Let’s just say I use him as a guide.”
“I smell the big bang, Triple E. And it’s enough to power a nuclear explosion.”
Ignoring Rudy, she wrinkled her nose. “Though he can sometimes be wrong.”
“Not that I care, but I don’t think he likes me.”
“Whatever gave you that idea?”
The elevator arrived, and they stepped inside. “For one thing, he keeps staring at me as if I’m some kind of threat.”
“You are a threat,” she said, pressing the button.
“To who?”
“Me. He’s very protective.”
“Just so long as he doesn’t decide to use his teeth.”<
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“Unless you make a hostile move, he’ll never bite, but he would show disapproval. Growling is the canine way.”
“Well, he’s done the canine thing the last couple of times we met. You think he’d be over it by now.”
They reached the lobby level, and he let her out first. The jacket hung over her ass, but he’d already committed the curves to memory, so he followed her to the doorman’s desk. “Mr. Graves, have you done as I suggested and kept a list of the people who’ve asked about the professor?”
Randall nodded and handed him a sheet of paper. “As you can see, I’ve already amassed quite a log. Do you want me to continue?”
Sam folded the pages and stuffed them in his pocket. “Sure, why not?” Turning to leave, he remembered an important point. “We collected your key to Albright’s apartment, right?”
“I gave a key to Officer Martin the morning of the incident.”
“Okay, fine.” He directed his gaze at Ellie, who was staring at her dog in a totally nutso manner. “Remember what I said, Ms. Engleman, and let me know if you find Buddy. That’s all you’re allowed to do. Just look for the dog.”
She bit her lower lip and nodded, and he headed out the door, fairly satisfied with the way the morning had gone. Things would be damn near perfect if only Ellie Engleman would get off this case and stick to walking her charges.
“At least he got Buddy’s name right,” Ellie commented after Ryder strode from the building. “That’s one plus.”
Randall expelled a breath. “Are all officers of the law so—so—anal?”
“I think it’s a requirement of the job,” she answered, propping an elbow on the counter. “If it makes you feel any better, Rudy doesn’t care much for him, either.”
“Most dogs are excellent judges of character.”
She shrugged. “Too bad about your key. I was kind of hoping I could use it to go inside the apartment and take a look around. You know, just to see if anything was out of place.”