Kitty Litter Killer

by Candice Speare Prentice

  I tapped my pen on the table and considered my tendency to jump into things without thinking about the consequences. I’d paid dearly for that impulsiveness repeatedly throughout my life. Until this year, the staff at the emergency room knew me by name because of all the times I had thoughtlessly participated in activities that led to some mishap. Like skateboarding with Tommy and his friends at the park, even though I hadn’t skateboarded since I was a kid.

  But this past year, since my last pregnancy, a sense of my own mortality had finally penetrated my dense brain.

  And even more important than that was the realization that I wasn’t an island. I needed to consider the consequences of my own actions in the lives of others, particularly those I loved most and who depended on me.

  Looking back at the last two mysteries I’d been involved in, I knew I had been impulsive. And I wondered if I’d really given my investigations to the Lord.

  However, that wasn’t relevant. What mattered was here and now. This time I would. I had to. I couldn’t do this on my own. And this time, the circumstances were even more pressing. At best, Abbie might have to postpone her wedding. At worst, she could be thrown in jail.

  I bowed my head and asked for guidance. Then I asked God to have mercy on my best friend.

  When I was done, I flipped open the steno pad. One key to finding a murderer is knowing the steps that the victim took minutes, hours, and weeks before his or her death. Philip was pretty much an unknown to me. I hadn’t seen him in years. And I’d had no idea he was back in town until Jaylene mentioned him.

  I’d have to begin with what Abbie told me and build on that.

  I titled the entry Philip’s Actions. Then I wrote what I knew about Philip.

  Philip showed up at Abbie’s book signing at the fall festival the weekend before. She refused to talk to him, and he left abruptly. Why?

  He caught up with her again at the Gas ’n’ Go on the day he was murdered. How did he know she was there? Was he following her? Or was it a coincidence?

  She refused to talk to him. They fought. He left. The he went to the church. How did he know she was at the church?

  She didn’t want to talk to him, so she left and went to McDonald’s.

  I needed to begin a list of questions I had to answer, so I wrote:

  Why was Philip’s car parked down the road? What did Philip want to talk to Abbie about? Where did Abbie’s novel come from, and why was it at the church?

  Why did he leave the fall festival so quickly? Because he was mad like he used to get at her?

  How did he know she was at the Gas ’n’ Go and the church the day he was killed? Was he following Abbie? Or coincidence?

  Why was he back in town?

  When I’d investigated the two other murders, the suspects had all been present and accounted for at the time. This time, I had no clear suspects. And no obvious reasons that I knew of why someone would kill a man who hadn’t been in town in years.

  The only people on the scene had been me, Ma, and Abbie. And none of us had done it. I tapped the pen on my chin. Linda had been out there, but did she even know Philip?

  To Detective Reid, it might appear that Abbie had good motivation. Philip suddenly returned after years, right before her marriage to Eric, who was an old friend and work buddy of Philip’s. But aside from his presence disrupting her life, what good reason would she have to shoot him now?

  Then there was Abbie herself. She sometimes holds bits of information back. And I often don’t know what she’s really thinking about a certain situation, incident, or person until long after the fact. She was trying to change, but a situation like this might make her retreat again. I couldn’t depend on the fact that she was telling me everything. I would have to question her again.

  The thing that scared me to death was that she had been in the right place at the right time to kill Philip. She had owned a rifle and was an experienced shot, thanks to my father. And then there was her recently published book. The one about a man who shoots his ex-wife and almost gets away with it.

  I tapped my pen against my teeth. How could I approach this? Trying to look for rifle owners wouldn’t get me anywhere. We lived in a rural area where most households had rifles because so many people hunted.

  I wondered about Max’s statement that maybe the murderer was someone Philip had dealt with as a cop. Someone who had followed him here from New York. That was a possibility.

  And what about Philip’s behavior? That was the most puzzling thing of all. He seemed to have been almost stalking Abbie. Why now? After all these years?

  I knew of only two people besides Abbie who were angry with Philip. The Adlers. I’d start at the Pet Emporium. I’d buy another Kitty Koller. Then I’d stop by Ma’s shop. I never knew what kinds of clues I’d pick up there.

  I also wanted to talk to Eric. In person, preferably. I glanced at my watch. He would be at work now. I grabbed my cell and dialed, thinking of all my arguments to get him to agree to see me. Eric answered on the second ring.

  “Trish, I was going to call you. Can you come to my office? I want to talk.”

  Well, that was easy. “I was just going to ask you if I could do that.”

  “Good,” he said.

  We agreed on a time and hung up. I took a deep breath. There was one other thing I had to do even though it made me feel sick. I needed to go back to the murder scene. I probably wouldn’t find anything, but it might help jog something in my head. That meant I had to get a key to the church hall from my mother. And I had to find out when the police would be finished with the scene. Maybe Eric would be able to tell me.

  I put the pen down, slapped my notebook shut, tucked it into my purse, and stood. The first thing was to find a babysitter for Chris.

  I was counting down to Abbie’s wedding. I intended to see that everything went as planned.

  After a quick call to Ma for babysitter advice, which she gave me only if I promised to stop by the shop, I decided on Gladys, who went to church with my mother and had lived in a house across the street from my folks’ farm since I was a kid. She watched her great-grandchildren on a regular basis, so I wasn’t putting her out. She was perfect.

  Gladys’s house smelled like laundry detergent and cinnamon. A strange but very appealing combination. She had a round face that matched her round waist. When I was little, I visited her often, and she’d ply me with chocolate chip cookies by the dozen and homemade root beer by the gallon.

  “Well now, Trish, you just come right on in here. And here’s that adorable little boy your mama’s brought by.” She reached out and took Chris right from my arms. He beamed at her.

  “Can I get you somethin’ to drink?”

  “No, thank you.” I was eager to begin my clue collecting.

  “Your mama told me you’re going to solve this dreadful crime. Someone like Philip Grenville wasn’t the kind of person you’d want your daughter to marry, but nobody deserves to die that young and in such a tragic way.”

  I agreed wholeheartedly. “I don’t know where to start.”

  “Well, your mama says you’re the best sleuth around, so I’m sure you can do it.”

  “I’m not sure I agree with that.” I wished my mother would keep her mouth shut about my investigating. “I don’t even know how to start this time.”

  “Well, you just need to clear your head.” I followed her into the family room, where she put Chris on the carpeted floor next to a baby very near his age. Then she turned to me. “You know what I think?”

  I shook my head, knowing she would tell me what she thought no matter what. “You need to look at people without moral values. Or people who are strangers in town.”

  I wanted to ask her how I could determine whether people had moral values, given that some of the worst killers in history had seemed like the salt of the earth. However, her idea about strangers in town was one that I needed to examine. “Do you have any suggestions? Do you know of anyone who has been in town recently wh
o doesn’t live here?”

  Gladys pursed her lips and tsked. Then she planted herself on a brown, suede-like sofa. “Why, yes, I do. The good-looking boy. The one everyone fawns over, including two of my granddaughters.” She tsk-tsked again. “Why, even your mother goes googly-eyed. I’ve never seen Doris have no sense like that before.”

  There was only one man who fit that bill. “Do you mean Clark? The WWPS delivery guy?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Well, why? He’s just a delivery guy. What in the world would he have in common with Philip?”

  She snorted. “He’s just too good looking for his own good. He was a model, you know. In New York. Still goes up there a couple times a month.”

  That confirmed my suspicion that he knew he looked good. “I’ve never seen his picture anywhere,” I said.

  “Well, of course you haven’t. My lands, Trish. You wouldn’t read those kinds of magazines.”

  “What. . .”

  Gladys raised an eyebrow.

  “Oh,” I said. I didn’t bother to ask how she knew. “Does my mother know?”

  Gladys shrugged. “Your mother is too smitten by him. She refuses to believe it.”

  That was odd, but then, Ma was unpredictable. This was an interesting fact. Philip was from New York. Clark was from New York.

  “Why is Clark here? Do you know?”

  She shook her head. “Something about his mama, I think. Philip moved her to a nice trailer on the other side of Brownsville, next county over.”

  I remembered Clark had said something about his mother being sick. This was more and more interesting. I needed to get that autographed bookplate for her and deliver it personally.

  “Models do drugs and. . .do other things for money,” Gladys said. “I see it enough on the news. Like all those actors and actresses.”

  I nodded as if in agreement, but I didn’t like to make blanket assumptions like that.

  “Mark it down,” she said. “There’s something funny with him. It’s not right for a man to do that kind of thing. Modeling, indeed.”

  I left “do that kind of thing” alone and said my good-byes. Chris didn’t even look up when I walked out the door. I may have found the person I could leave Chris with when I started working with Max. And I’d made up my mind about that. Once I solved this mystery and got Abbie married off, I was determined to work at Cunningham and Son.

  I walked into Adler’s Pet Emporium. No one was behind the counter, and I yelled hello while I picked out another Kitty Koller.

  Jaylene walked out of the back room and frowned at me. “Did you forget something last time you were here?”

  She might as well have tossed a bucket of ice water over me.

  I pointed to the Kitty Koller rack. “No, I just wanted another one of these.”

  Her attitude didn’t change. “That’s not the only reason you’re here, is it?”

  I shrugged. “Well, I did want to ask you some questions.”

  “I knew it. I knew that’s what you were doing. Your mother says you’re trying to solve Philip Grenville’s murder. To save Abbie from going to jail.” She glared at me. “Well, you won’t find any suspects here. I told your mother that this morning when she walked in here and started demanding answers to her questions. I’ve never been so offended in my life.”

  I wondered what my mother had asked Jaylene. I’d never known her to act so hostile, especially to an old family friend.

  “I don’t want my friend to go to jail,” I said. “So I’m asking questions of everyone I know. I’m not accusing anyone of anything.”

  “Well, you’d better not. That’s all I have to say.” Jaylene crossed her arms and stared hard at me.

  After my little chat with Gladys, maybe I’d do well to begin with questions about Clark. Not that I could imagine how he would fit into Philip’s murder. Still, it would serve to distract Jaylene. “Do you remember those holes in the cat litter bags?”

  Her eyes widened. “Yes. What about it?”

  “Well, I wondered if you knew anything about that delivery guy. Clark? One of my, um, friends is interested in him. But if he’s irresponsible, I want to discourage her.” April May was a friend. And she was interested.

  Jaylene relaxed a fraction. “I don’t know anything about him except that he’s too cocky for someone who works at WWPS. I called them and complained.”

  “How long has he been coming in here?”

  “Only a few weeks. The WWPS company said he was new. Sloppy is what I said.”

  I pulled some cash from my wallet to pay for the Kitty Koller. “Well, maybe he’s not the kind of person she needs to hang out with if you think he hasn’t got good character.”

  She snatched the money from my hand. “Good character is in short supply around here.”

  That reminded me of Philip. “Listen, you said Henry had seen Philip in town. I wondered if you knew why he was here.”

  “Why would we know that?” She eyed me with a narrowed glance then slapped some change into my hand. “I’m sure I don’t know, and Henry wouldn’t know, would he? It’s not like Philip’s a relative of mine or Henry’s, is it?”

  “Why do you say that?” I asked as I put the money back into my wallet.

  She huffed. “He was scum. Just plain scum. But you would know that, wouldn’t you? Because of Abbie?”

  I couldn’t help the look of surprise that I know crossed my face. “Scum?”

  She put her hands on her hips. “If I don’t hear Philip Grenville’s name ever again, I’ll be happy. And don’t think you can pin this on Henry.” Her vehemence was like a physical blow.

  “What?”

  “Philip’s murder. You can’t pin that on Henry.”

  “Why would I pin it on Henry? What does Henry have to do with Philip?”

  She glared at me. “Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Isn’t that what I just said? Now I have things to do, unless you need to buy something else.”

  My lie-meter alarm, honed from being the mother of five, was clanging like Ma’s old dinner bell. Jaylene was covering up something that had to do with Henry and Philip.

  I heard some rustling in the back room, then Henry came charging into the store. “Jaylene, I—”

  “Trish is just leaving,” she said.

  Henry finally noticed me. “Trish.”

  “Henry,” I said.

  “She’s trying to prove that we murdered Philip.”

  “That’s not what I said at all.” I couldn’t believe how people jumped to conclusions.

  Henry’s lip curled. “Well, I wouldn’t be so ready to defend Abbie. You know she can handle a rifle as easy as a guy can.”

  The door to the shop opened, and Jaylene glanced over my shoulder. Her eyes narrowed.

  I turned and saw Clark walking determinedly down the aisle.

  “Abbie coulda done it,” Henry said, undeterred by the intrusion. “Your daddy taught her, you know.”

  Clark reached the counter, and Jaylene stood there with her arms crossed, glaring at him.

  “I ain’t takin’ it back. I called your company and complained. Because you busted open those bags of cat litter.”

  Clark smiled at her. White teeth. Full wattage. Lit up the room. The guy was good looking, no doubt about it. “I just came by to apologize,” he said. “I’ll pay for them.”

  I watched Jaylene’s frown diminish. He was a charmer, all right, if he could accomplish that with her.

  “I’ll try not to let it happen again.” He looked at Henry. “Sir. . .”

  Henry nodded.

  Then Clark turned to me. His fingertips danced a rhythm against his thighs. His smile faded, and a tiny frown creased the skin between his brows.

  “I met you. . . .”

  I didn’t like the fact that I wasn’t memorable. If I were tall and striking like Abbie, he wouldn’t have forgotten. “I’m Doris’s daughter. Doris’s Doughnuts? I met you the other day.”

  “That’s right.” He
grinned. “I’m headed down there in a minute. Say, you’re the one who’s gonna take the bookplate to my mother.”

  “Yes, I’m the one.” I’d be doing that as soon as possible. I wanted to know more about the handsome Clark Matthews.

  “Good. I told her about it and she’s excited.” He looked me up and down. Then he frowned again. “Abbie. Isn’t she the one whose husband just—”

  “Ex-husband,” I corrected. “Yes. He was killed.”

  “Ah. I’m sorry. Bad thing. You wouldn’t think it would happen around here in Four Oaks.” He turned back to Jaylene. “I promise I’ll do better in the future. I can’t afford to lose my job.”

  He continued to talk. I edged toward the door. I had a few other things to find out, but I knew one thing for sure. I wasn’t going to get any more answers from Jaylene. At least not today.

  At Doris’s Doughnuts, things were hectic. Linda was cleaning a table and chatting with some customers. April May was making sandwiches, and Ma was stomping around the coffee machines, wiping them down hard with a white rag. The scowl on her face was an indication she was in a bad mood. I hoped it wasn’t something I’d done.

  “Hi, Ma.”

  She glanced at me. “Well, you came. At least some people do what they say.” She slapped the rag on the counter.

  I breathed a sigh of relief. That sounded promising. Someone else was the object of her wrath, not me.

  “So what’s wrong?” I asked. “Oh, and can I have a Mountain Dew, please?”

  “What’s wrong?” She jammed her fists into her hips. “You ask me what’s wrong?”

  “Yes,” I said. “That’s what I asked.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what. You think people are friends. And then this.” She yanked a glass from the stack on the counter and filled it with ice and soda for me.

  “Uh-huh.” I waited.

  When she was done, she slid the glass toward me. “I don’t know why I bother.”