Beaglemania

by Linda O. Johnston

  When Nina and Bev returned inside, both looked tired. “Were any of them serious,” I asked, “or did they just want to visit some animals?”

  “Hard to tell,” Bev said.

  “If I were to place bets,” Nina said, “I’d say that only one of those families was really interested. The others just had time to kill today and wanted to show the kids some doggies and kitties.”

  “I’ll go keep an eye on them,” Bev said. “Whether or not any of them are really interested, I want to be sure they don’t tease the animals or hurt their feelings.”

  Nina and I smiled as Bev hurried out the door.

  “So,” Nina said, “how did your confrontation go?”

  “Confrontation? Moi?” I placed my hand to my chest in an affronted gesture, so my fingers touched the HotRescues logo on my shirt.

  She laughed, which caused me to drop my façade and join her. “Okay,” I said. “You got me. Those two . . . Well, I doubt they said anything accurate other than that they hated Efram.” I motioned for Nina to join me at the table. As we sat down, I gave her a blow-by-blow of all that had happened. I ended with, “I sure wish I knew if I’d ever seen either of them before, and if so, where.”

  “I’ll Google them for you,” Nina said. “And—hey, let me check one more thing, too.” She whisked herself behind the reception counter and onto the computer there. In only a minute, she said triumphantly, “Ha! Come look at this, Lauren.”

  I joined her—and saw she had opened a file with a list of people who had relinquished their pets here, at HotRescues.

  The name Shaheen wasn’t on it, but the names Bradley and Patsy Shane were! Over a year ago, people with that similar name had brought in a pair of bichons frises. They had claimed they were moving out of the country and needed to have their beloved dogs rehomed. They had left them that very day.

  Were they the Shaheens? Maybe. We had done our standard check to confirm what we could about these dog relinquishers. The address and phone number had checked out, so we’d been able to take in the relinquishments—although now, when Nina Googled the address, it appeared to be a private mailbox service, and the phone number was no longer working. Our standard veterinary exam at Carlie’s clinic had yielded that those two bichons were younger than their relinquishers had claimed. The female appeared to have given birth more than once and her reproductive equipment seemed worn out. Both needed some medical attention including a respective spay/neuter, but they’d come out of it fine.

  At the time, we’d suspected they had been puppy mill parents. If so, the Shaheens could have been dumping more adult dogs that could no longer be bred at other shelters, too. But by then we’d been unable to find the abandoners again to confirm it. Fortunately, we’d found the dogs a wonderful new home with a middle-aged couple—empty nesters who had recently lost their pet to cancer. Happy ending!

  But if they were the Shanes, the Shaheens were definitely liars. Murderers, too?

  Could be.

  Another thought struck me. “Nina, could you check to see if Efram happened to be here that day?” If so, it could have been how he’d met the Shaheens in the first place.

  We always kept records of when our volunteers were here—whether or not they were here voluntarily. Sure enough—

  “Yes, he was!” Nina exclaimed.

  Which made the scenario even more interesting.

  As I got ready to head home, I got a call on my BlackBerry from Esther Ickes. I had programmed her number in, not that I wanted the lawyer to become one of my best friends. But having it readily accessible was a lot more practical than looking it up all the time. This way her name showed up on the screen when she contacted me.

  Standing in the parking lot beside my car, I answered. My heart was revving up like a drag racer. Had she learned something awful? I was supposed to meet with her tomorrow before heading to the police station to be interrogated again.

  What if they planned to arrest me that night? The best I’d be able to do is tell the cops that the Shaheens admitted they hated Efram.

  “Hi, Esther.”

  “Hi, Lauren. I have some good news—at least for me.”

  What? That I was under arrest so she’d have an excuse to double her legal fees?

  “What?” I held my breath.

  “Detective Garciana has some business near my office tomorrow, so we’ve made arrangements for him to question you here this time. I hope that’s all right with you.”

  Calling the whole thing off would have been better, but being in my lawyer’s office, in territory that, if not neutral, at least favored me more than some stark room in a police station . . . “That’s fine,” I said. “Same time?”

  “Yes.”

  I was collecting a lot of hours of sleeplessness these days. I wondered if I’d be able to make any of them up when the truth about Efram’s death at HotRescues was known, whatever it was.

  But of course the answer was no. I’d still be busy with the job I loved—and all the animals I protected.

  At home, though, I felt nervous despite living in a gated community. The security at HotRescues hadn’t protected either Efram or me. Anyone could get inside my residential complex. Not that I considered my life in danger. But Efram’s death had made me a lot more aware not only of how fragile life was—and not just the lives of pets—but also of how any feeling of safety was as false as believing in immortality.

  For now, I lay down on the sofa I had chosen when the kids were still at home, a blue upholstered thing with lots of fluffy pillows. I’d bought it relatively cheaply at a chain store that mostly carried items from Nordic countries. I put my head down on a knit throw given to me by a friend and watched a talk show way into the night.

  My television was fairly new and state of the art, thanks to my son Kevin’s pushiness about it. When he came home, he watched it with me.

  That night, I hated being alone nearly as much as I usually cherished privacy. My mind kept turning to my first husband Kerry, whom I’d lost so many years ago. He’d scolded me lightly now and then for being so opinionated and having a temper. But if he were alive now, he wouldn’t believe I had harmed Efram. He’d stand by me and defend me just like he did during our marriage.

  The sorrow over my loss made my mind veer in another direction: again, to missing having a pet around. Someone to talk to and sympathize with, even if she didn’t completely understand.

  I’d mostly convinced myself that I had enough pets around every day, at HotRescues. But that still wasn’t the same as having my own, probably a dog, who’d never even think of accusing me of murder but would love me no matter what, as long as I was good to her.

  Heck. This was getting too maudlin. I turned down the TV’s volume and soon felt myself nodding off.

  Eleven o’clock in the morning. Back in Esther’s offices.

  This time, we were in a conference room big enough for half a dozen people. It reminded me of the room where I’d spoken with her the other day, mostly because it was lined with shelves containing a lot of law books.

  I’d mellowed about Esther as quickly as a Google search. So what if research material was available online these days like everything else? Senior-citizen Esther might just be more comfortable with a hands-on approach. If she used it to my benefit, all the better.

  She’d greeted me in her reception area on my arrival, and we’d chatted in her office for a short while about what to expect. She sounded so comforting and sure of herself that I felt certain I’d made the right decision by trusting in Kendra’s referral. Esther’s age—and, therefore, experience—now seemed a real plus. She wore a pretty, black suit with a white lacy blouse, dressy and lawyerlike.

  I’d worn a suit jacket, too, for the occasion, but I’d put on nice slacks, the easier to change when I returned to HotRescues. Since the meeting was here and not at the police station, I was hopeful it wouldn’t end in my being arrested.

  Esther preceded me into the conference room. I felt almost lofty behind
the rather stooped lawyer—especially when she appeared to slump even more as we entered the room. I caught the expression on Detective Stefan Garciana’s face, as smug as if this interview would be a piece of cake. He’d be able to run roughshod over the pathetic efforts of this frail old attorney.

  I knew better. He soon learned.

  “How are you today?” the detective said as we took our seats. He, too, wore a suit—funereal, as if designed to warn me to mourn my freedom. The concerned expression on his face pretended he gave a damn about making sure my attorney didn’t keel over because of her age.

  She wasn’t that old, anyway—especially these days. People often lived into their nineties and even beyond. I’d already guessed Esther to have achieved her seventies. I also figured she was shrewd enough to play the age card as long as it was to her advantage.

  Esther had asked her staff to bring coffee, so I sipped on a dark, bitter brew as I also contemplated dark, bitter answers to the detective’s questions. The most important thing was not to contradict what I’d said before—assuming I could remember everything.

  The reason for this latest interrogation? “We’ve come across new evidence,” the detective claimed. Something else that could point to my guilt? Or something manufactured in the hopes that I would get nervous enough to disgorge something against my own interests?

  “Suppose you tell us what it is, Detective,” Esther said calmly, sitting beside me with a yellow legal pad in front of her.

  “We got an anonymous tip. The caller said you had threatened Mr. Kiley in front of an entire group of people, Ms. Vancouver. Is that true?”

  “Hmmm,” I responded. “Could that be when I yelled at him for participating in that horror at the puppy mill, like I told you about before, Detective? Or maybe when we went outside then, and I accused him of throwing those poor puppies down the storm drain—as I also mentioned to you.” I put my finger to my chin in mock pensiveness. “Or—I know. My reaction when he came to HotRescues and threatened not only me, but my employees and the animals there . . . as, oh yes, I’ve described to you.”

  “She’s got you there, Detective.” Esther’s smile ironed even more creases onto her face. “Unless you could be more specific—one of these, or did someone manufacture something else?”

  The detective consulted a notebook he’d brought along. “Then these were the only times you threatened Mr. Kiley, Ms. Vancouver?” He looked at me as if his gaze were a drill that could extract different answers.

  “I wish I’d brought a pack of playing cards,” Esther said. I aimed a sideways glance toward her, wondering about the non sequitur. But then she added, “The kind my grandson has. He just loves a game of Go Fish. And I enjoy playing with him. But he’s only six years old. I think we’re all too old to be playing Fish here, Detective.”

  I didn’t even attempt to hide my grin.

  “So are we done?” she continued. “I need to prepare for a late-day court appearance.” Her tone had changed from light and frothy to hard and lawyerlike. I loved it.

  The detective, scowling, attempted to save face by asking a couple more questions, none of which particularly bothered me. He soon left.

  When he was gone, I asked Esther, “Fishing or not, he’s not going to quit till he makes an arrest, is he?”

  “Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure that’s his game. I’ve seen it before.”

  “And he’s hoping I’ll be the one he arrests. In fact, he’s planning on it.”

  Esther put an arm around me and gave me a hug I’m sure she thought was comforting but only made me realize even more the tenuous situation I was in. “Could be. But we’ll thwart him, dear. Don’t worry.”

  Right. As if I wouldn’t worry that my relatively happy life, as I knew it, might be about to change into a disaster.

  As I drove back toward HotRescues, I thought even more about how I couldn’t rely on the official legal system to find the truth. I hadn’t learned enough from the Shaheens to pin Efram’s murder on them.

  I always like to feel in control of circumstances, but right now circumstances seemed in control of me.

  Chapter 13

  “Everything okay, Lauren?”

  As I hung up the phone, Nina peeked in through my office door. She’d been upstairs in her own small office when I’d gotten back from Esther’s. At least that was what Bev, who was staffing the welcoming area, had told me.

  Nina’s face looked drawn, as if she was the one who’d just been raked over the coals by a detective itching to make an arrest. I wondered if I appeared as frazzled. I hoped not.

  “Everything’s fine.” The fib rolled over my tongue as if it were a smooth latte. “Come in and sit down for a minute.” When she’d settled into one of the chairs facing my desk, I asked, “Are you doing okay?”

  “Sure.” The word was belied by the droopiness of her smile. “Well . . . not exactly. I don’t know how you stand it, Lauren.”

  “Stand what?”

  “The taint around here. Efram’s death. The cops asking questions. Do you know . . . Well, they seem to want me to tell them you lured Efram here that night so you could stab him.”

  My blood must have stopped pumping through my veins, since I immediately felt full of icy shards that formed a blockage. “I see. So . . . what have you said to them?”

  “That you couldn’t have. They’re barking up the wrong tree if they suspect you.” This time her smile was a little less ghastly, and I joined her.

  “Thanks,” I said. But I doubted whether her support would make even a tiny change to Detective Garciana’s opinion. “I didn’t do it. Period. And now all I have to do is prove it.”

  “But you’re supposed to be—”

  “Innocent until proven guilty. I know that. But that’s only in court, or so I gather from some of the crime shows I watch. It doesn’t deal with popular opinion. And it certainly doesn’t mean a cop won’t keep accusing you till you get a jury to acquit you. Rather, me. So—well, you’ve known me long enough to realize I’m not the kind of person who’ll just sit here, wringing my hands and petting the dogs till I’m arrested, tried, and convicted.” When she didn’t say anything, I stared pointedly into her face. “Right?”

  “Yes, but what—”

  Before she could finish her sentence—which I assumed would be something like, “What the hell can you do to stop them?”—I turned the computer monitor on my desk so she could see it.

  I’d been Googling Efram. Maybe knowing more about him would help me learn how to get the cops searching elsewhere for his killer.

  “I haven’t found much on Efram,” I told her. “He had a Facebook page, and he’d posted some pictures that were taken here, ones with him playing with dogs. Guess he was trying to build a good, if false, image for some reason. In real life, when he wasn’t pretending to take good care of our animals, he was an air-conditioning repairman, so he also has pictures up of wielding tools near an air compressor.”

  “So maybe someone whose air-conditioning he ruined followed him here and killed him,” Nina surmised. “I suspect he was as good a repairman as he was an animal caretaker.”

  I smiled grimly. “You’re probably right. About his skills, I mean. But who’d have followed him here to kill him, for something like that, at least? Although . . .”

  Her mind must have gone in the same direction as mine did. “Hey, I haven’t checked out the application and other forms he filled out to become a volunteer here,” she said. “Have you?” At my headshake, she continued. “That should at least tell us where he lived, give a person to notify in case of emergency. That kind of thing.”

  I’d looked over his form when he’d started helping but hadn’t paid a lot of attention to it since his presence was a result of our legal settlement. We hadn’t even required that he take a class for volunteers—a must for everyone else. But his application should have been one of the first things I thought of to learn more about the guy, even before Googling him. At least I now had anothe
r way to research him besides going to the meeting I’d scheduled via a phone call I’d made a little while ago.

  “Has the information been put on the computer?” That was our standard procedure. I turned my monitor back to face me and began to open our online personnel files.

  “Probably.” Nina edged her way behind me.

  Efram’s background had been added to our database. I found it right away. I quickly printed the page, which contained his former address, his employer’s information, and the person to notify in an emergency: a woman named Mandy Ledinger. His girlfriend? But who’d have chosen to be that friendly with Efram?

  I would find out soon who Mandy was—and why Efram had included her.

  “If you’d like,” Nina said, “I could continue the search you started and give you anything else I find on Efram, both through the Internet and our records.”

  “I’d love it. But first why don’t we cheer ourselves up by visiting our residents?”

  A big smile smoothed out Nina’s pinched face. “Lead the way.”

  We were outside in the shelter area less than five minutes later. I started down the row of barking dogs, taking pleasure in my usual greeting of each one after encouraging them to quiet down. Their placement had been reorganized a little, at my direction. We’d gotten a couple more adoptions started, and having all our enclosures filled near the entrance usually made a bigger impact on potential adopters. It emphasized how many animals needed a new home. Besides, changing vistas now and then enriched the dogs’ lives.

  “Lauren, hi!” Si Rogan had just turned the corner at the far end of the row and motioned toward us with one hand. The other was occupied with a leash attached to a Great Dane mix—Hannibal. “Come here. I want to show you how well Hannibal is doing.”

  Hannibal was a large and rambunctious one-year-old whose owner had dropped him off a couple of weeks ago in a relinquishment. Another victim of the economy, the twenty-something owner had lost his job and house and was moving in with his parents—into an already small apartment, in a building where pets weren’t allowed.