She laughed. “My tooth is fine—it only hurt the day after. Besides, we haven’t seen each other in a while. This will give us a chance to catch up.”
Oh, dear. A chance for her to find out that Ayesha’s owner was probably murdered, that someone tried to burgle my store, that Sarah was knocked down by a potential mugger, and last but not least, that Mark’s receptionist was trying to steal him away from me. All things she was much better off not knowing.
“Tell you what,” Mom said. “Why don’t I pop up Thursday night, and you can show me what needs to be done? Then I can arrive on Saturday ready to go.”
She sounded so willing that I couldn’t refuse without hurting her feelings. “Okay, if you don’t mind. We’ll just . . . see how it goes.”
I hung up with mixed feelings. Having put in many years as a paralegal with a Morristown law firm, my mother was nothing if not responsible. If she was willing to hold down the store, at least I wouldn’t have to worry about her not taking the job seriously. More likely she would overachieve somehow, maybe rearranging all the boarder cats alphabetically by name.
I put the Siamese away and straightened the grooming studio. Saw an empty shampoo bottle in the recycling bin. We’d really been burning through that stuff by washing Ayesha every few days. I ought to run and get some, I thought, along with more of our regular food.
“Will you be okay here for another half hour or so?” I asked Sarah. “I should make a trip to the PetMart out on the highway.”
“Anyone scheduled to drop off or pick up a cat?”
“None ’til tomorrow,” I told her. “And I’ll make it quick.”
* * *
I could have picked a better time than four o’clock to head for a highway mall. Rush hour was already starting, to judge by the traffic. Well, maybe I could wrap up my errand and still get back to downtown Chadwick before it got too crazy.
Of course, this was wishful thinking, because it’s hard for me to get in and out of any pet supply store quickly. This one has a bank of cages right inside the front entrance with cats for adoption, and I could never pass by without visiting and commiserating. The kittens were always adorable, but my heart went out even more to the ones several years old, curled up tightly in the back corners as if they’d lost hope. Notes on their cages often explained that the cat had been surrendered after an elderly owner died or moved to a nursing home. I knew the playful, outgoing kittens would have no trouble finding new homes, but the mature cats might spend what was left of their lives in a noisy shelter, with minimal attention from overworked staffers. After being someone’s cherished pet, that had to be a tough comedown.
I always fought the urge to take an older cat home with me. My small apartment was pretty much maxed out with my three pets, all rescues of one kind or another themselves. Also, they had established a delicate balance of power among them that could easily be upset by the addition of a newcomer.
Trying to stay on mission, I grabbed a shopping cart and headed for the grooming supplies. Along the way, I passed other distractions, such as aisles of colorful toys, cat furniture, and feeding and training gadgets. I resolved to be strong, remembering I’d already left Sarah alone for a couple of hours today. I stocked up on shampoo, then swung over to the cat food section to pick up a couple of bags of dry kibble. I also searched for the special food Ayesha required, but didn’t see any in stock.
While standing in line to check out, I spied a cat magazine I didn’t subscribe to; it included classifieds in the back, so I stuck that in my cart, as well. Might be time to expand the search for Ayesha’s owner beyond just the Bengal breeders in our area.
I used my member’s card and a coupon to get a nice discount on my haul, paid up, and steered my cart toward glass front doors that parted automatically. Pausing on the sidewalk to remember where in the huge lot I’d left my car, I noticed a matte black commercial-sized van in the loading area, a few yards away. Actually, the chief thing that caught my eye was the tattooed man who stood by the van’s open rear doors.
The same one I’d seen arguing with Todd at the garage and talking in an agitated tone on his cell phone in the diner. I’d built him up as such a threatening figure in my mind that it stopped my heart for a second to see him unexpectedly again.
This afternoon he was doing something else intriguing. He had filled several shopping carts with empty pet carriers that he was loading into the back of the van. I counted maybe two dozen carriers, a few large, most medium to small. All were the store’s cheapest model—hard-sided, in light gray plastic with a wire grill door.
Sometimes I do shoot off my mouth without thinking, but in this case, I actually considered my strategy. My instincts told me I shouldn’t let the opportunity pass without trying to find out what this guy was up to. Yeah, he looked a little rough, but it was daylight, with people all around. Besides, I didn’t intend to accuse him of anything.
I steered my cart close to his van, as if headed for a car in that direction. In a naïve, cheery tone, I called out, “Wow, you must have a lot of animals!”
The stranger’s head whipped around, as if he’d been hoping no one would notice what he was doing. Today he wore his hair tied back in a bushy tail that hung between his shoulder blades, and his weathered face showed heavy stubble. As the muscles in his arms worked, the ink designs moved with a life of their own—assorted skulls, flames, snakes, and sexy women flexed in a twining, sinister dance.
Interrupted by my question, he shot me a warning glare. “Not me,” he snapped. “Just relocating ’em. For . . . a friend.” Then he emphatically turned back toward the shopping carts and grabbed two more carriers by the handles. He tossed them easily onto the pile, which almost reached the top of the van’s cargo space.
Guess he’s not one for casual conversation. So it shouldn’t be a total loss, I glanced at his license plate. It was so dirty, I could only read a few letters—"N, O, and a Y or V, plus the last number, 2.
As I continued toward my car, I wondered if I was being overly suspicious. But really, who buys two dozen pet carriers, except someone breeding and/or selling animals? I stashed my own supplies in the hatch of my CR-V, slid in behind the wheel, and pondered some more. Then I pulled out my cell and dialed Bonelli.
Luckily, I caught her at her desk. I told her what I’d seen and gave her the partial plate information for the van.
“I realize this isn’t exactly criminal behavior,” I added. “I’m sure he must have paid for all those carriers, or they’d never have let him out of the store. But I thought you’d want to know, just in case he’s tied in somehow with that mysterious breeding operation. He said he was ‘relocating’ animals for ‘a friend.’ That could mean the breeders have gotten spooked and are pulling up stakes.”
“Mm. It’s possible, from what Naughton said, that they figured out the SPCA is investigating them,” Bonelli agreed.
“Plus, this was the same tattooed guy I saw last week at Gillis’s Garage, arguing with Todd. Considering Todd is still missing—”
“Another good reason to check the guy out,” she agreed. “Speaking of vehicles, Cassie, I have news for you, too. We got a call about a car that was abandoned at a roadhouse not too far from where that hit-and-run took place. It might—or might not—have been be used to run down the guy who gave you that Bengal.”
Chapter 11
That sounded like a lucky break, but . . . “ ‘Might or might not’?” I asked Bonelli. “What do you mean?”
“According to the VIN number, it’s registered to a Peter Reardon of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.”
That deflated me a bit. “Then there could be no connection.”
“There still could be. Sounds enough like ‘Rudy Pierson’ to have been an alias. The fingerprints on the steering wheel are a match with the dead man’s. Our forensics guys found a tuft of brown cat hair in the backseat and an unopened bag of litter in the trunk. But most interestingly, they found traces of blood on the tires, the same type as the
dead guy’s.”
My breath caught. “Oh, my God. He was run over with his own car?”
“We still don’t know for sure if it was the vic’s car, but put it together with the medical examiner’s report, and we’ve got a clearer picture of what happened. It looks like the dead man was beaten up before he was run over. I wouldn’t call it a fight, because they found no evidence that he did any punching. But one of those blows might have killed him or at least knocked him out. Then his assailant might have run over the body to make it look like a road accident.”
“Crazy!” I remembered Rudy’s nervous state when he’d come to my shop. Maybe he’d had plenty to be nervous about. But did all of this even relate to Ayesha?
Bonelli added, “Our officers checked at the roadhouse where the car was found for any reports of bar fights, even arguments that might have gone outside, and they showed the sketch of the dead man around. No one admitted to seeing him there or to hearing or seeing anything relevant. The owner couldn’t even remember when he’d first noticed the old green sedan sitting abandoned in a corner of the lot.” The detective sighed. “So now we’re trying to find out whatever we can about this Peter Reardon from Harrisburg. You may want to concentrate your search, too, on breeders in that part of Pennsylvania.”
“I sure will,” I promised her. “Thanks so much for the update!”
Powering down the phone, I realized I’d let time get away from me, sitting in my car in the mall parking lot, and it was almost five o’clock. Bad enough that I’d left Sarah at the helm for most of the day, but now she’d be stuck there after quitting time! I took another minute to call her and briefly explain what had happened; as always, she was a good sport about it. Then I made my way as quickly as possible through the highway’s rush-hour crawl, back to downtown Chadwick.
* * *
“Don’t know if it was such a good idea for you to approach that guy with the van,” Sarah said, as she rose from her stool and tucked the crutch under one arm. “If he really is up to something illegal, you don’t want him to think you suspect him.”
I dismissed this. “I’m sure he thinks I’m just some ditzy animal lover. He turned his back on me so fast, he probably wouldn’t even remember what I looked like. And even if he watched me go to my car, which I doubt, a silver-blue CR-V does not exactly set me apart from all the others on the road.”
“Maybe that’s a good thing.” Hooking her big purse over her shoulder, Sarah limped toward the front door. “I remember when poor Rudy came in here, how upset he acted. You and I both thought it was because his house had just burned down.”
“It was a convincing story,” I admitted.
“To think somebody beat him senseless and then ran him over. That person either really hated him, or is a nasty piece of work who’d be capable of anything.”
As she said this, Sarah pinned me with a meaningful look, and I took it seriously. I knew she’d taught for many years in inner-city high schools and still lived in a marginal neighborhood. She didn’t scare easily, but she probably also knew a badass character when she saw one.
Did the tattooed man qualify? Could I imagine him beating up Rudy, then running him down with the old green car? So that none of his blood would be found on the tires of the black van?
Remembering the stranger’s dark, angry glare, I couldn’t rule him out.
“I hear you,” I told Sarah as I held the door open for her. “That’s one reason I don’t want to leave you here alone on Chadwick Day. Anyhow, you go home now and rest that ankle!”
* * *
I fed the boarders and took note that Ayesha would need more food soon. Too bad I wasn’t able to find her brand at the big-box store, but it would give me an excuse to pop over and see Dawn tomorrow.
Upstairs, I took care of my own cats and threw together a quick dinner. I phoned Nick Janos and left him a request to stop by soon and fix the door of the quarantine condo. Ayesha had been so hard on it that I worried one day soon she might actually break out. I figured that right now, while she was a little mellowed, would be a good time to reinforce it. After all, it looked as if she might be in residence for a while longer.
Then I checked e-mails, but no more breeders had replied to my original query. I already had reached out to the northeastern Bengal rescue group, which requested more details about the missing cat. Since they had a good reputation, I dared to tell them more about Ayesha, including the information that someone had dyed her coat.
I spent the rest of the evening going through the classifieds in various pet magazines for breeders in Pennsylvania who offered any type of exotics. I also searched on a couple of lost pet databases, as well as on Facebook, for anyone claiming to have lost a Bengal. Surprisingly, there were quite a few postings, though not so many in Pennsylvania or New Jersey. Several included photos, and none of those animals looked quite like Ayesha. One owner stressed in her post that although her pet had leopard spots, he was “not a wildcat.” She sounded worried that someone might chase the animal off, or even shoot him, because of his unusual coat pattern.
Great Britain had a whole registry just for lost Bengal cats, but I doubted that “Rudy”—or Peter—had traveled that far with Ayesha!
How far afield, though, might he have gone? New England, or the Southeast? Did I need to answer ads for those regions, too?
I decided for the time being to concentrate on those close to home. I answered the ones I could by e-mail, to avoid long-distance charges. For a couple of lost cat postings in New Jersey, I phoned and left messages.
Tired out, I had finally settled down to watch a movie on cable when my phone rang. The unfamiliar number had a central Jersey area code, so I answered the call with my guard up. “Hello?”
“Hi, you called earlier? You said you found a Bengal cat? I think it’s mine!” The woman sounded breathless with excitement.
“That would be great, if it is,” I told her, and meant it. “Can you tell me your name and where you live?”
“Doris Meacham, and I’m in East Brunswick, New Jersey. Where are you?” When I told her, she said, “Oh, my. I can’t imagine how my Xena got all the way up there!”
“As I said in my message, someone dropped her off at my shop, so it’s possible he found her and took her out of your area.” I grabbed a notepad from my end table to write down the name and location. “So the cat you lost is a female? How old?”
“Hmm. She’s been missing a couple of months, so she’d be around three now.”
My hopes rose—that was the age Mark had guessed for Ayesha, too. “I should explain, there are a lot of people out there looking for lost cats, even for Bengals, so I have to be sure I’m returning her to the right owner. Can you describe her coat? Y’know, its color and pattern?”
“It’s totally gorgeous!” Doris gushed. “Honey-gold, and she has those leopard spots all over.”
“Spots or rosettes?”
The woman paused. “I dunno. What are rosettes?”
“More like open circles.”
“Gee, I don’t remember.... Yes, I think she did have some of those.”
I wasn’t sure whether to hold this mistake against Doris—she just might not be very observant. “Are you a breeder?”
“No, no, we just got her as a pet, when she was a kitten.”
“And I guess you had her spayed.” Trick question.
Another beat of silence. “Not so far. We thought she should have at least one litter first, and experience being a mother. It’s only natural, right?”
Bad answer, but correct in the sense that it fit Ayesha. Maybe before giving her back, I’d try to persuade Doris to have her fixed. “Has she got any special habits that would identify her? Things she likes to play with or things you’ve taught her to do?”
“Let’s see . . . We have a screened porch, and she liked to sit out there for hours and watch the birds. And my husband and I would throw those catnip mice for her to chase.”
Too normal, I thought. I’d
try lobbing her an easy one. “Ever try to walk her on a leash?”
Doris laughed out loud. “Oh, my, no. I can’t imagine she’d put up with that!”
“Or give her a bath?”
The laugh took on a panicky edge. “Are you kidding? She absolutely hates water! If I want to stop her from doing something, I just have to point the plant mister at her and she runs. Anyhow, I didn’t even think you were supposed to wash cats—are you?”
I thought of how patiently Ayesha had tolerated the four baths we’d given her since she came to my shop. “Mrs. Meacham, how exactly did you lose Xena?”
“We don’t usually let her out, because we did pay a lot for her. But one day the delivery man was bringing in a package, and she just darted past my legs. Probably chasing a bird. I couldn’t catch her. My husband and I searched for her, asked the neighbors, and even posted signs. That’s why I think somebody picked her up, maybe because she was so pretty.”
I asked Mrs. Meacham if her cat ever had a microchip, and needed to explain to her what that was. She said she’d never had it done, and the breeder hadn’t mentioned anything like that, either.
“We got a regular license for Xena, from the town, but even that was just to be extra safe. Like I said, we never let her outside.”
Mark had seemed pretty sure that Ayesha’s wound came from someone removing an implant, and if the breeders had put a chip in the kitten, wouldn’t they have mentioned that to the buyer? It was just one more wrong answer that tipped the scales for me.
I told Mrs. Meacham, “You seem like a nice person who really loved her cat, and I hope you do find her. But I don’t think the one in my shop is your Xena.”
“Oh, but she has to be!”
“I understand you’re disappointed, but—”
“This is some kind of a scam, isn’t it? You’re preying on people who are heartbroken, who just want their animals back—”
“Not at all, Mrs. Meacham. I just need to be sure I’m returning this cat to the right person. As you said yourself, she’s probably worth a lot of money—”
The Bengal Identity Page 11