Otter Under Fire

by Dakota Rose Royce

  “How did you like the fetish ball?”

  “I don’t understand it really,” Otter said looking up at the car roof. “I don’t understand people who so willingly give away their freedom like that.”

  “That’s an interesting way to put it.”

  “If something turns you on, that’s one thing, but to give your free will to someone who can do what they like with you is beyond my comprehension.”

  “Now that you mention it, it is a little strange.”

  “It’s like people that move into neighborhoods with a homeowner’s association.”

  “Wow, I sure didn’t see that comparison coming.”

  “It’s giving up personal choice, giving that privilege to someone else.”

  “OK.”

  “I’ll bet nobody in that ballroom tonight was less than second generation American. Nobody there had to flee a dictator or an oppressive situation.”

  “That would be an interesting study,” Joel said, flashing a grin at her.

  “It would make quite a paper. Some anthropologist should take that on. How many migrants who fled an oppressive government move willingly into an HOA neighborhood or become a sex slave.”

  “The next anthropological student I meet, I will suggest it.”

  “Yeah, me too,” She stretched her legs, “Another good study would be ‘The crazy things one does for friendship.’”

  “I’m sure Tempest appreciates what you do for her.”

  “Oh, she does. I give her grief about it once in a while, but it does get me away from always thinking about metals and engineering.”

  “Do you ever have her get in on the engineering?”

  “I run ideas by her once in a while. She’s a good sounding board.”

  They drove up in Otter’s driveway. On the front porch was a large cardboard box under the porch light.

  “Somebody left you a gift.”

  “It’s probably for Tempest. Her clients are always leaving things for her to test or try.”

  “So let’s go look,” Joel said putting the car in park.

  “Give me a minute; I’m steeling myself up to stand in these things again.”

  Joel strode around the car, across the front yard and up the sidewalk. He picked up the box.

  “It has your name on it.”

  “Just my name, no address or return label?”

  “Looks like it.” He brought it over to the car, where she was gingerly beginning to stand. “It has some heft to it. Looks like someone brought it themselves, it wasn’t sent by a delivery service.”

  He held out his left arm to help her walk to her garage. She hobbled to the door and flipped up the lid to the hand scanner and waited for it to read her finger and palm prints. Joel lifted an eyebrow in surprise as the garage door opened and the light came on inside. Otter smiled at him.

  “In case I forget my key.”

  “Impressive.”

  A similar scanner was at the door from the garage to the house. The lock clicked quietly and the door opened on its own.

  “It’s great for when you have arms full of groceries.” She said as she stepped inside and a light came on automatically.

  “I imagine it would be. What do you do if there is a power outage?”

  “Not likely to be a problem as these are on a solar circuit, but in case it goes haywire, I have a way to override it.”

  “I’m sure you do. What other gadgets do you have in this house?’

  “A few here and there, but I can’t give all my secrets away.”

  “Just knowing you have more secrets makes you more intriguing.”

  “Yeah, I’m a regular Mata Hari.” Otter said as she walked in pain into her house. Joel laughed.

  “Where would you like me to put this box?” Joel asked. The garage door led into a laundry room, which led into a small sitting room.

  “Just put it on this table,” Otter gestured to a tall display table against the back of the small couch. He sat it on the table and looked at her expectantly. She looked at the label, which only had “Mackenzie” written on it in block letters. She started working at the tape, but Joel brought out a pocket knife and slit the tape open.

  Spooky jumped on the table to see what they were doing. He pawed at the lid of the box in excitement, because he loved crawling in boxes. Joel scratched him under the chin which was Spooky’s second favorite thing in the world.

  “Hey buddy, nice to see you again,” he said.

  “He loves being in the action,” she said as she worked the box open.

  The first thing they saw when they opened the flaps was a large stuffed dragon. Under that on the bottom of the box was a laptop. Otter picked a protesting Spooky up and put him on the floor before he took a nose dive inside. She took out the dragon; it had a dog collar on it with the word “Jabberwocky” on it. It also had a charger draped across its back.

  “What in the world...”

  “What do you think it is,” Joel asked.

  “Other than it’s a stuffed dragon and a laptop, I can’t really say,” Otter said as she looked at the dog collar. “Jabberwocky is one of my favorite poems. Weirdly enough, I told Clark that once. This must have come from him somehow.”

  “And why would you think that?”

  “Because he and I had a running joke, years ago he was teasing me about how women liked romantic, flowery poetry and I told him my favorite poem was called Jabberwocky.”

  “OK, so what was the big deal about Jabber-whatever?”

  “Do you know the poem?”

  “Can’t say that I do,”

  “Look it up on the internet,” she said. “It was written by Lewis Carol—the same guy that wrote Alice in Wonderland.” She took the laptop out of the box and Joel put the empty box on the floor—much to Spooky’s delight. Otter put the computer on the table and tried to turn it on. It was dead; she couldn’t get it show even a glimmer of life.

  “Looks like we need to charge the battery,” She said looking the outside over like she expected a secret door.

  “Well conveniently there is one draped over the dragon.”

  “I’ll plug it in tonight and see what happens in the morning.”

  “This Clark sure liked his riddles.”

  “This is kind of in character for him. He liked the dramatic and he was always making obstacles that prevented people from getting something accomplished. This is exactly like what he would do.”

  “Hopefully we figure out what he was trying to say before we die of old age.”

  “Little prick,” Otter muttered “Why didn’t he just tell me what he had? Something like: ‘Hey Otter, if something happens to me, I have a list with a code and it means that John Smith is a cold blooded killer.’”

  “His killer might be looking for all of his evidence if he has any,” Joel pointed out reasonably. “If you are having a difficult time, you know that whoever Clark was worried about is having more trouble than you. You keep getting stuff dumped on you; I doubt the other person has the same advantage.”

  “There is that,” Otter agreed looking at the tag on the dragon. “This is just a gold engraved tag you can get anywhere. The pet stores even have kiosks where you can pick your tag, type in the animal’s name and put your money in. It spits out a tag in a couple of minutes.”

  “There’s nothing else on it, no codes or anything?”

  “Nope,”

  “It sounds like a lot of people didn’t like him and out of that number we can figure out how many actually want him dead.”

  “Right now, I’m one of them,” Otter said, “He’s getting on my nerves more now than when he was alive. I need to do something and I need to figure out what to do next.”

  Joel’s phone signaled and he looked at the readout. “I have to go, they need me at work.”

  “Wow and I thought I had crazy hours.”

  “Get some sleep,” he said and kissed her on the forehead. “We can talk more about this later. I will call you as
soon as I can.”

  “OK,” she walked him to the door to the garage, “It’s Saturday night and the crazies are on the road, be safe.”

  “I will.” Then he was gone.

  Otter sat in one of her easy chairs and began the thirty minute process of unlacing and taking off her boots. Fortunately she was helped by Mouse, the clothing expert, who assisted by playing with the boot laces. They were some hot looking boots she had to admit as she picked them up and carried them into the bedroom. The bustier took another 20 minutes; she took off the makeup and the leather pants and got into the shower. Once she was in her night shirt, she double checked to make sure the house was secure, fed the cats and went to bed.

  She thought about Joel. He was pretty nice so far. He liked cats and seemed genuinely interested in her, but what was with the kiss on the forehead? She sighed to herself. It looked like Joel was going to be another guy that was going to be a buddy not a potential boyfriend. How did that keep happening?

  Of course the stupid murder didn’t help. She was turning into The Woman with a Fascinating Problem. She was just going to have to soldier up and get the thing solved. Otherwise it will keep hanging around until someone else got killed or it swallowed up her life.

  She would call Susan in the morning and see if she would come and see the dragon and lap top. That someone would leave them on her front porch was a little unsettling. Maybe it would be of interest to somebody who can do some official investigating. She could poke some places and see what she could find in the meantime and maybe give the police even more.

  Otter woke to Spooky sitting on her chest, demanding breakfast. It was six in the morning. Darned cats, she thought, they never got the concept of late nights, holidays or weekends. She usually fed them at four in the morning before she went to work, but on weekends she wanted to sleep in, particularly when she was up half the night. Cats didn’t give a rip about her sleeping in; they could sleep whenever they wanted. They were after kitty crunchies and lots of them.

  She put on a robe and staggered out to the kitchen to the chorus of starving furry beings. That was going to be her next gadget; she decided sleepily, a cat feeder she could program to drop food into a dish at a prescribed time. It couldn’t be that difficult and it would make her life a lot more pleasant. She headed back to bed, but remembered to text Susan and asked her if she wanted to come by for brunch. Since Susan’s husband was typically working on Sundays, she was normally free to visit.

  Her phone rang at eight. It was the weekend supervisor at AzTech about a problem with a special run. They talked about it for a bit, figured out a solution and after apologizing for bothering her, he went back to fix the problem and get the job finished.

  May as well get up, she thought and got dressed in black jeans and a purple, short sleeved sweater. Her feet still twanging, she put on black imitation snakeskin sandals with a low heel. She checked her phone and there was a text from Susan saying she would be there at ten and another text from Joel with the information on the Chinese restaurant for dinner later that week.

  After a quick peek in Tempest’s wing to see if her purse and keys were on her chair where she usually left them, Otter went into the kitchen and began assembling the brunch she promised Susan. She made a pitcher of orange pineapple juice from concentrate and made enough crusts for three quiches. She decided to make three because the leftovers would be great for lunches during the week or dinner in a pinch. She mixed up the filling for the crusts. One was going to be spinach, roast beef and cheddar. One would be ham, mushroom and Swiss and the last one would be green pepper, pepperoni and 3 cheeses. She cut up fruit and made a fruit salad and put it in the coldest part of the refrigerator. She made a small carafe of coffee and a larger one of spiced tea to be iced.

  The quiches were in the oven for only a few minutes when Tempest came in.

  “You know I can’t sleep if I can smell food,” she grumbled. She was perfectly made up and wearing a red V-neck, blue jeans and black boots. “Who is the breakfast for, Joel?”

  “No, Susan is coming over for brunch.”

  “You mean he didn’t stay over?”

  “No, he carried something in for me, kissed me on the forehead and left. His job called him.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Well we have a date for dinner later this week.”

  “And he just kissed you on the forehead?”

  “Yes,”

  Tempest’s eyes narrowed. “The bastard, he has no right to treat you like that.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “He’s going to brush you off, give you the ‘let’s be friends’ speech.”

  “Probably not right away. I didn’t tell you what we found on the porch when we got here.”

  “Oh, what was that, another dead body?’

  “Not quite,” Otter went into her sitting room and brought out the freshly charged computer and the Jabberwocky. “This was waiting for me, with my name on it.”

  Tempest just stared for a minute. “This is crazy. Who left this for you? Do you think it was the widow?”

  “They didn’t leave a name, so I don’t know.” Otter said drily.

  “So this is why you asked Susan over for brunch.”

  “Well I often ask Susan over for brunch on a Sunday morning, but yeah, this was the motivation today.”

  “Does she know?”

  “I didn’t tell her. I figured she needed to see it.”

  “And this is why you think Joel will hang around for a while.”

  “Unfortunately,”

  “Well there are more where he came from.”

  “The morgue? I don’t think I want anyone else from there.”

  “That’s not what I meant, silly. I meant we can find you lots of other men.”

  “You know, I’m thinking it would be nice to have a steady guy for a change,” Otter said as she opened the oven to check on her pies. “I’m tired of the serial dating.”

  “You had an awfully late night last night,” Tempest said, “You’re just tired.”

  “No, I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I believe I’m ready to stick with one guy. I know it will take a while to find one who wants to be serious with me, but I think I’m ready to start looking. Johnny was a long time ago.”

  “Wow, ok. If that’s what you want, then that’s what you want.”

  Otter started taking the quiches out of the oven and putting them on hot pads on the butcher block island. Tempest set the table and folded the napkins into fancy shapes just as Susan knocked on the front door.

  She brought Duke, much to Stella’s delight. The trim little kitty came running out of Otter’s room, trotted right up to him and smacked him on the face. She turned and ran back in the direction of Otter’s room, with Duke hot on her tail.

  “It’s amazing how much they like playing together,” Susan said taking off her jacket. “When Duke realizes we are coming here, he gets all excited.”

  “Well he likes the pool too,” Otter said, hanging Susan’s coat in the closet.

  “Of course, but I think he likes coming for his little buddy the most.”

  “Could be,”

  “I have some good news for you Otter. A detective said he would look at Clark’s case.”

  “Really? Just like that?”

  “Well I had to vouch for you to a couple of them before Addison said he’d take a look. Once he said he would, I gave him the appointment book and told him about Marvin Jones. He said he’d reach out to Michigan and see what they say.”

  “I have more,” Otter said gesturing to the counter. “Someone left this on my doorstep.”

  “Someone sure wants you to be involved in this.” She looked at the box that Otter brought out. “Interesting they just put your formal name of Mackenzie on the label. They didn’t use your nickname of Otter nor your last name and there is no address written on it either.”

  “Yeah, we noticed that,” Otter said.

  “We?”<
br />
  “Joel and I,” Otter said. “I ran into him while I was at an event for Tempest’s client and he offered to drive me home.”

  “I thought you were going to some kind of sex toy expo or something, you ran into Joel there?”

  “Of course, she didn’t,” Tempest chimed in, “When the police showed up in response to a prank call, he came out of the restaurant next door.”

  “Oh my God, I heard about this. It’s been going around all the departments. There was something about a dominatrix party 911 call and a drop house that turned out to be a hoax and there were lots of women in black leather and high heeled boots and there were slaves and all sorts of crazy talk. You mean it was real?”

  “Well, yeah,” Tempest said. “And this guy drives Otter home and leaves after giving her a kiss on the forehead. Can you believe it?”

  “He’s probably just being a gentleman,” Susan said. “They haven’t actually been out on a date yet.”

  “Nobody acts like a gentleman to my best friend,” Tempest muttered.

  “It’s not an insult Tempest,” Otter said. She turned to Susan, “He and I are having dinner later this week.”

  “He just wants to talk about the murder,” Tempest said. “I don’t trust him one bit.”

  “Then there’s this box,” Otter said, trying to change the subject. “I have no idea who it’s from. I’m thinking it may be related to Clark because of the running joke we had about that poem.”

  “Jabberwocky,” Susan said opening up the lap top. “A very weird poem if I remember correctly.” She touched some keys on the keyboard. “Password protected. Of course. Did he leave you any numbers?”

  “No, he didn’t, try Jabberwocky for the heck of it.”

  “Not working. Too easy is my guess.” Susan stopped messing with the computer and picked up the dragon. “Do you know if Clark was getting any money from the people he blackmailed?”

  “According to his wife, he thought of himself as some kind of sword of Jesus Christ and he didn’t ask for money. Apparently at first he tried to force them to reform their evil ways. When that didn’t work he forced them to do little things for him. The IT guy says he asked for passwords and information.”