Fine-Feathered Death

by Linda O. Johnston

  She’d known Jeff for a lot longer than I had, so after I’d removed a stack of paper from her single extra chair, I regarded her earnestly over her desk and asked, “Do you think Jeff could have killed Ezra Cossner?”

  She snorted. She might be beautiful, but she obviously eschewed airs, unlike the snobs at the law firm I’d just left. “What do you think, Kendra? You’ve known him for a while.”

  “Ned Noralles has known him longer and considers him a suspect.”

  “Ned Noralles considered you a suspect a few months back, and we all know how that turned out.”

  I laughed. “Got it. So neither of us believes Jeff’s a killer.”

  “I didn’t say that,” Althea riposted.

  Which stopped me cold. “You do think he’s a killer?”

  “I didn’t say that either.” But she’d sounded serious. “I just don’t see him killing Ezra Cossner in cold blood. And as far as I know, he hasn’t killed anyone lately.”

  “He did as a cop?”

  “Could be. Now, I’ve got printouts of info on everyone you said could be a suspect in Ezra’s murder. Anyone else whose past you want me to pry into?”

  A quick change of subject. It made me curious, but she obviously wouldn’t fill me in further.

  Jeff had already shown me the fruits of Althea’s search on Ned Noralles. He’d had an interesting background that included minor transgressions as a teen, but nothing we could turn against him to twist him away from Jeff as a suspect.

  “Yes, there is,” I responded to Althea. I hadn’t previously inserted Bella Quevedo-Jetts onto the part of my suspect list I’d imparted to Althea. I explained the lady’s prior relationship to Ezra. “You know,” I finished, “it wouldn’t hurt to add the other attorneys at the Jambison firm to your search. It’s not large, maybe ten lawyers. Any one could have resented Ezra’s alleged client conversion.”

  “Okay. Oh, and I’ll add Borden Yurick, too, and not just Elaine Aames from your current firm. Jeff told me to hold off on him, but Borden obviously had a history with Ezra or he wouldn’t have hired him.”

  “Bordon couldn’t kill anyone,” I contradicted indignantly. “But it won’t hurt to rule him out.” My tone had deflated. “I can’t think why he might have had it in for Ezra, so motive would be a mystery to me, but Ezra obviously had a talent for rubbing everyone the wrong way.”

  “Okay.” Althea had been making notes, and now she looked up again. “What about anyone else Ezra might have known?”

  “I only met him last week. I’ve no way of knowing about other acquaintances who despised him, but I can’t help assuming there were many. He’d at least been greeted by others around our firm—attorneys, secretaries, our receptionist. And I’ve spoken with his parrot psychologist, though he was introduced to her only after he got Gigi, a few weeks ago. But the people I’m asking you to check are those I’m aware he was openly feuding with, and I’ll feed you more names as I find out about them.”

  “Fine. Anything else?”

  “Well … yes.” The main reason I’d come here hadn’t yet been broached, mostly because I’d obscured it from myself. “What can you tell me about Jeff’s ex, Amanda?”

  Althea’s brown eyes grew agog. “You think she’s a suspect?”

  “No, but …” I stopped. “I didn’t think so,” I said slowly, “but with Jeff in the hot seat, if she resented him and thought the murder would be pinned on him …”

  “Far-fetched, but worth exploring,” Althea agreed. “What you were asking, though, was more about what made their relationship go south—and then come north again?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Gossiping about one’s boss isn’t good form,” she replied primly.

  “Neither is researching the dirtiest little secrets of total strangers, and even resorting to hacking to do it,” I retorted.

  She grinned. “Who’s hacking?” she asked innocently.

  I laughed, and she responded by regaling me with the tale of how Jeff and Amanda met four years ago, when Jeff’s security and investigation business finally started to take off. Amanda, in commercial real estate, met Jeff when her employer hired him to add a security system to a moderate-sized office building. Something clicked between them, and they were married a few months later.

  Whatever it was had unclicked soon thereafter, though Jeff tried to keep things together for a year before giving up. But like the proverbial cobbler whose own kids go unshod, it was only at the end that Jeff considered checking Amanda’s credit rating and love life. There was no credit rating—not any longer. She was way overextended, which definitely cast a pall on Jeff’s finances.

  And there was a love life that was unrestricted to Jeff.

  He divorced her. End of story.

  Only it wasn’t. She was back.

  I had to ask. “I know she’s got him convinced she’s being stalked.”

  “She is being stalked. I’ve checked. After Jeff and she broke up, she went wild on the dating scene. Hooked up with some real losers—and that one, Leon, has a record of abuse, stalking, you name it, short of murder. I can understand why the bitch sought out the best source to help her—her beloved ex, Jeff.”

  “Oh,” I sad softly. “Then maybe I’ve read things wrong.”

  “No, you haven’t. Amanda is genuinely and justifiably afraid for her life. But she’s also using Leon to weasel her way back into Jeff’s good graces. She probably realized she blew the best part of her life and wants it back.”

  “And him?” I had to ask. “What does he want?”

  “He’s a man, honey.” Althea’s beautiful full lips sucked in sympathetically. “He thinks with body parts beyond his brain. I love the guy like a brother more than a boss, but there are times I’d like to kick those brains right out his butt.”

  “Then—”

  “Then if you want him, Kendra, you’ll have to work at it. Good luck. Oh, and I’ll have the skinny on these additional murder suspects for you tomorrow.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  THOUGH—OR BECAUSE—Althea assured me that Jeff was expected back any minute, I said my farewells to Buzz and her, then buzzed back to my office.

  A mistake, maybe. Gigi was at her loudest all over again. “Did something upset her?” I asked Mignon the moment I walked in.

  “Sure,” Mignon replied with a pained expression beneath the sharp crimson nails on the hands she’d slapped over her ears. “But no one knows what it is.”

  I resisted the urge to place my own, less dangerously tipped hands atop my own rebelling noise receptacles, and strode straight for the kitchen.

  Elaine stood there looking frustrated and forlorn. “I don’t know what to do with her,” she shouted. “I’ve tried all the techniques Polly Bright suggested.”

  I knew the parrot professional had proposed that we distract Gigi often—as I’d inadvertently but instinctively assayed before. “I’ve got an idea,” I called back. “Wait here.”

  I headed out to make sure the path was clear and the prospective perch prepared. I also enlisted Borden, who’d secluded himself behind his shut office door.

  Together, the three of us awkwardly propelled Gigi’s cage down the hall and into Ezra’s office. Maybe one person could have accomplished it less clumsily. But the kitchen clearly failed to provide a suitably soothing environment now. Hopefully, someplace slightly more familiar would do the trick. Of course, this particular place also held miserable memories for the confused macaw. But perhaps drastic measures trumped none.

  To my amazement, my ploy succeeded—after, of course, an initial five minutes of screeches and flaps. Or maybe it was simply the act of accomplishing the unforeseen—relocating her. But suddenly Gigi grew so quiet that my ears started ringing.

  “Great idea!” Borden told me. I hardly heard his soft words for the imaginary sounds in my head.

  “Good thinking,” echoed Elaine, her grin huge. It faded fast, though. “I don’t know if I’ll be able to adopt her,” she said
with a sigh. “I may not be creative enough to come up with things to surprise her, and so far I’m still in my condo. No more house hunting, at least for now.”

  “Aren’t macaws supposed to be tame enough to perch on their owners’ shoulders?” I asked.

  Elaine shrugged her own. “You’re the pet expert. But I’ll ask Polly one of these days.”

  I watched while Elaine and Borden exited the office, leaving me standing there with the alert bird.

  “What are we going to do with you?” I remarked rhetorically. I really liked this gorgeous girl, despite the quantity of personality quirks she exhibited. I wished I could come up with a way to keep her content.

  Gigi’s response to my query was to make a sound I hadn’t heard from her before. It was songlike. Oh, yeah. I’d been informed that birds of the parrot class knew how to croon. Though this sound seemed vaguely familiar, I couldn’t put my finger on what it was.

  Oh, well. I had a few loose legal ends to work on before this day ended, so I couldn’t stay here playing “Name That Tune.”

  “Glad you’re feeling better, Gigi,” I said. “I’ll let Elaine know it’s okay to feed you dinner whenever she’s ready.”

  As if she understood what I’d said, Gigi stopped singing and started swaying on her perch, squawking quietly but rhythmically.

  “I know she’s fed you regularly,” I told the macaw. “So don’t try to convince me you’re about to keel over from hunger.”

  She stopped swaying and squawking, and I used that opportunity to make my exit.

  AFTER REVIEWING FILES and planning follow-up legal efforts, I headed off for my delightful pet-sitting duties of the evening.

  I fortunately found Abra and Cadabra without any effort. Apparently their practical joke the other day had been enough. Both cats condescended to turn up in Harold Reddingam’s kitchen, the tips of their tails curved in regal question marks—like, why hadn’t I arrived earlier to feed them faster, as was their due?

  “My apologies, your majesties,” I said in pseudoabjection as I poured kitty kibble into their dishes.

  I expected Harold home in another few days. I’d miss visiting his personable pussycats.

  Same went for Alexander the pit bull. His owner would be back in town at the nether end of this week. I hadn’t many other pet-sitting clients lined up after lessening my availability.

  Should I give up pet-sitting in favor of spending all my time as an attorney again? The thought made me sigh as I sat in my car after tending Alexander. I liked the soothing routine of tending to generally grateful nonhumans.

  I aimed my Beamer for my own home—ostensibly to check on Beggar, since Russ Preesinger had called to say he was back on the road scouting locations. He’d left Rachel in charge, but wasn’t convinced he could count on her to care for his setter the way she should.

  If Lexie had been parked at our apartment, I wouldn’t have had to go anywhere else that evening. But she’d been left at Jeff’s to keep Odin company. Kind of.

  In some ways, it had been a conscious decision to convey to the private investigator of my dreams—who often kept me from sleeping at all—to assure him of my belief in his innocence.

  It meant I’d have to go there tonight to at least retrieve Lexie … and after this weekend I figured it would be hard to head home. A good thing? Was I really putting the whole scenario about his ex-wife at the back of my mind?

  If so, then why did it keep coming to the forefront to torment me?

  I reached my home in the hills and pressed the button to open the gate. I drove inside and parked the Beamer in its regular spot, then headed for the house.

  The door opened before I even got there. I anticipated I’d see Rachel.

  Instead, I saw Russ. His sheepish grin seemed sweet and boyish, and I’d an impulse to ruffle his red hair.

  Now, where had that come from?

  “I thought you were out of town,” I said somewhat snappishly.

  His grin was replaced by a sigh and an embarrassed shrug. “Running late,” he explained.

  “Dad, I’ve given Beggar his dinner, but what does he get for dessert?” Rachel had slipped up behind Russ, and so had Beggar, who pushed his long red muzzle out the door and into my hand.

  “Doggy dessert?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Rachel replied, her brown eyes landing incredulously on me. “All good dogs should get special treats. You’re a pet-sitter. You should know that.”

  “Dessert’s a people term,” I pointed out.

  “For dogs, it means extra treats like biscuits or stuff like rawhide that they can eat, or anything that’s special but good for them.” Her superior air would have irritated me under other circumstances, but I kind of liked her comment.

  “I do give my charges treats,” I told her, “but I’ve never called it dessert. Till now.”

  That earned me a smile from my house’s subtenant and his pet-loving offspring. Enjoying their presence and attitude, I smiled back.

  “Time for me to join Lexie,” I told them. “I left her at a pet-sitting assignment where I usually spend the night.” I didn’t explain that the pet owner was sometimes home on those same nights. I wasn’t sure I wanted Russ and Rachel Preesinger to know I had a kind-of relationship with Jeff.

  And that made me extremely uneasy as I retrieved my Beamer and drove it toward Jeff’s Sherman Oaks abode.

  ON THE WAY, I recalled I’d scheduled a meeting first thing in the morning with Michael Kleer, the VORPO attorney. But I’d neglected to tote a necessary part of the file along to review when I’d departed my office.

  An excellent excuse not to go to Jeff’s till I’d cleared my mind a little more. If I couldn’t understand what was going on in my addled brain, I didn’t want to subject anyone else to my misguided mood.

  I called Jeff. “I’ll be there a little late,” I said. “Have you taken care of the dogs?”

  “They’ve been fed and walked, but they’ve been edgy. Guess they’re missing you.” A pause. “Me, too.”

  “I’ll get there as soon as I can,” I said in a surly tone, then, much nicer, I finished, “They deserve dessert, you know. So do we.” I hung up before he could extract an explanation.

  This time, when I saw lights on in the Yurick firm office, I was surprised. I soon discovered that the person present was Corrie Montez. “Surely Borden didn’t exclude the support staff from his promise that we’d have fun practicing law,” I told her when I found her inundated with work at her cubicle, files mounded all around her.

  She smiled. Her big brown eyes drooped drowsily, and even her inevitable bright red lipstick looked as if it could stand refreshing. At least she was dressed down enough for late-night work, in faded jeans and a violet T-shirt. “I ought to get a life,” she acknowledged. “But I wanted to finish indexing this file so I can get to that research I promised you—on how animals can inherit from their deceased owner.”

  “I appreciate it.” I perched my butt on the border of her desk. “But don’t kill yourself to do my work. I’ve assumed Borden’s attitude about practicing law.” Sort of. Old litigation habits lingered despite all excellent intentions. “We take cases we find interesting,” I continued, as if convincing myself, “and enjoy working on them without billing humongous numbers of hours like our big-firm counterparts.”

  “I get it. Just a few more minutes, and I’ll log off.”

  “Since it’s my stuff you’re working on, log on as long as you’d like.” I laughed.

  She laughed, too. “I don’t need much sleep, but I promise to stop when I get too tired to take in what I’m reading. I can always come back early in the morning.”

  “Bet your former firm loved that attitude,” I said. I had a sudden thought. Well, maybe not so sudden, considering where I’d been before, that day. “Speaking of megafirms and slave drivers, I visited your old employer earlier today.”

  “Jambison & Jetts?” At my nod, she inquired, “Why?”

  How disclosing sh
ould I decide to be with her? After all, she’d known Ezra Cossner well, which landed her on my suspect list—even though I couldn’t see Corrie offing her boss.

  But to extract her reaction, I said, “Ostensibly, I was there to obtain whatever information I could on clients Ezra brought here, assuming they’d hang out with us. I didn’t succeed in getting a lot of low-down from the lawyers there.”

  “But you had another reason to visit them?” She looked a little livelier now, and a lot more interested.

  I nodded. “After learning that the feud between Jonathon Jetts and Ezra was somewhat fueled by a fight over a female, I wanted to meet that apparent vamp and assess Jonathon and her as possible murder suspects.”

  Corrie blinked, then brought the edges of her mouth up into a sad-seeming grin. “Poor Ezra. I heard of your reputation of solving murders, but … Well, a lot of people didn’t like him. I don’t suppose you’ve figured out yet which of them killed him?”

  “No, but I’m working on it,” I said. “What about you, Corrie?”

  Her fingers rose defensively. “I honestly liked the guy. I wouldn’t have killed him.”

  I’d purposely made my question ambiguous to see what her reaction would be—and I found it indubitably interesting. I hastened to act as if I’d erred in my phraseology. “I meant, do you know who killed him? I certainly don’t think you did it.” I punctuated my partly false statement with a laugh.

  Her slim shoulders relaxed back into her desk chair. “That’s a relief,” she said. “And no, I don’t know who killed Ezra. I wish I did.”

  So why did I have the sense that she was lying?

  Chapter Fifteen

  MY MIND WAS spinning around my conversation with Corrie when I edged into Ezra’s office to see how Gigi was getting along.

  The moment the macaw saw me, she started squawking, but at least it wasn’t the worst of her shrieks with which she bombarded my eardrums this time.