The Whole Cat and Caboodle: Second Chance Cat Mystery

by Ryan, Sofie

  Beside me Liz shifted in her seat, turning toward the backseat. “Thank you,” she said to Charlotte. “I know Maddie didn’t kill Arthur. I’ve already said that and I’m not saying it again. What I am saying is that the police have some reason they think she did. They must know he didn’t die of natural causes. We need to find out what makes them think Maddie killed him and find some way to show them they’re wrong.”

  “I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” I started to say, but they talked right over me.

  “You’re right.” Rose was nodding so vigorously she looked like a gray-haired bobble-headed doll. “I’m sure Josh must have some idea why the police arrested Maddie. They’d have to tell him, wouldn’t they? We should talk to him.”

  “And Maddie, as well,” Charlotte added.

  I glanced in the rearview mirror again. I knew that look in Charlotte’s eye. She was already making a mental list of things to do.

  “There’s no time like the present,” Liz said.

  “We could bring Maddie back with us,” Rose said. “I don’t think she should be all alone, anyway.”

  “I’m hoping she’ll stay with me,” Charlotte added.

  “Josh’s office probably has their own investigator, you know.” I didn’t like the direction the conversation was going in.

  “I’m sure they do, dear,” Liz said, sending me a look that seemed a little . . . condescending before she turned back to her friends.

  Thankfully we were almost at the courthouse. I found a parking spot in the nearby lot and we walked down the sidewalk to the building.

  “Is Christopher going to be here?” Liz asked Charlotte.

  Maddie’s son, Christopher, was a mining engineer who traveled all over the world.

  Charlotte shook her head. “He’s in northern Russia.”

  “Does he even know?” Liz asked, smoothing down the sleeve of her suit jacket.

  Charlotte slid the strap of her purse over her shoulder. She was wearing a navy suit with a bright print scarf at her neck. She looked like the school principal she used to be. “I don’t know. Maddie said she called him, but . . .” She shrugged and gave her head a little shake.

  Josh Evans was waiting for us inside the courthouse. He smiled and walked over when he caught sight of us. “Sarah, I would have known you anywhere,” he said, taking the hand I offered in both of his.

  “Is that good or bad?” I asked, smiling back at him.

  “All good,” he said.

  I would have recognized Josh, as well. His sandy hair was in the same short, spiked style he’d had when he was twelve, except now it was styled with a lot more expensive cut. He was tall and lanky but he’d lost his geeky awkwardness. He still wore black-framed glasses, except the frames were a designer name now and they weren’t held together with duct tape at one corner. His blue eyes were keen behind his glasses, taking everything in. Even as he smiled at me I felt myself relax, just a little.

  Josh said hello to Liz, Rose and Charlotte. Then he quickly explained what was going to happen. “After the charges are read the judge will ask Mrs. Hamilton how she pleads,” he said. “She’ll say not guilty. The prosecutor and I have already talked about bail. I’ll agree with her suggestion and I don’t see why the judge will have any problem with it.”

  He gave us an encouraging smile. “Things should go pretty quickly.”

  And they did.

  Maddie came into the courtroom looking a little tired and very serious but she smiled when she saw us all sitting in the front row. Josh was right about the bail and very quickly we were all in the hallway outside the courtroom.

  Charlotte took both of Maddie’s hands in hers. “Are you all right?” she asked, her eyes searching Maddie’s face.

  Maddie nodded. “I’m fine. I’m just . . . glad to be here with all of you.” She smiled at Charlotte, Rose and Liz in turn and then she turned to me. “Sarah, you sweet girl, I don’t know how to thank you,” she said. “Josh told me you sent him.”

  I reached out and touched her arm. “All I did was make a phone call. It was Rose’s suggestion.”

  Maddie looked at us all again. “I don’t know what I’d do without all of you,” she said.

  I could see the glint of unshed tears in her eyes. I remembered what Mac had said to me last night when I’d said pretty much the same thing to him. I smiled and patted Maddie’s arm. “It doesn’t matter,” I said, “because you’re not going to find out.”

  Josh touched my elbow and we moved a few steps away from the women. “You and Mrs. Elliot found Arthur Fenety’s body,” he said.

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  “I’ll need to talk to you at some point.”

  “Just let me know when.”

  “So, you’ve talked to Michelle.” A hint of a smile played across his face.

  “I have.” I glanced over at Maddie again. Surrounded by her friends she didn’t look quite as tired as she had in the courtroom.

  “Michelle’s fair, Sarah,” Josh said. “And she’s a good cop. If we come up with anything, she’ll investigate. She wants the truth.”

  “That’s good,” I said.

  He pushed back the sleeve of his suit jacket and checked his watch. It had a wide black leather strap with a silver dial, and on the black face I saw something familiar.

  “Wait a minute. Is that Darkwing Duck?” I asked, leaning in for a closer look.

  Josh grinned and held up his arm so I could get a better look. It was the purple-suited cartoon superhero on the face of his watch. Josh had been obsessed with Darkwing Duck when he was a kid. The summer he was nine he’d worn a purple cape everywhere. I guess it said something good about the majority of kids in North Harbor that he didn’t get beaten up once.

  “It’s good to see you haven’t changed too much,” I said, grinning back at him.

  He tugged his sleeve back down. “Sarah, most people in town remember the dorky little kid I used to be. It would be pretty difficult to get too full of myself.”

  “You weren’t a dork,” I said. “You were quirky.”

  “Quirky,” he said, nodding slowly. “Okay. I like that.” He glanced over at Maddie and the other women. I hoped they weren’t pumping her for information for their “investigation.”

  “If you saw Michelle, then I’m guessing you saw Nick, as well,” Josh said.

  I nodded. “I did.” I slid the strap of my purse back up onto my shoulder again.

  “Heck of a first week.” Josh shook his head. “A murder investigation for his first case, and then he spent most of last night talking a suicidal teenager off the Memorial Bridge.”

  “What?” I said. It didn’t sound like the kind of thing an investigator for the medical examiner’s office would be doing.

  “He was going somewhere and he saw this kid who had climbed up on one of the girders of the bridge. He pulled over. She started talking to him and she wouldn’t talk to anyone else.”

  That sounded like Nick: always the hero. And it explained why he hadn’t called me back. I wondered if Charlotte knew. I glanced down at my own watch. I really needed to get to the shop. I knew Mac could more than handle things, but I didn’t want to dump everything on him for too long.

  Josh needed to spend some time going over the case with Maddie. He offered to drop her off at the shop later.

  “Are you sure?” I said.

  He nodded, setting his briefcase down to pull on his navy trench coat. “I’d love to see the place. I’m assuming I’ve earned enough brownie points to get a tour.”

  “Absolutely,” I said with a smile.

  We said good-bye to Maddie and Josh and walked back to the parking lot.

  Neither Charlotte nor Rose said much on the way across town. There was a tour bus full of leaf peepers at the shop when we got there, but Mac seemed to have everything pretty much u
nder control, although there was a line at the cash register.

  Rose peeled off her coat and handed it and her purse to Liz, bustling over to help out. We’d stopped to pick up Elvis on the way. I set him down and he swiped a paw over his face before making his way over to a group of three women looking at the quilts.

  Over by the window a woman had a teacup garden in each hand and was looking around for another set of hands. Charlotte piled her purse on top of Rose’s bag in Liz’s arms and headed across the floor to help.

  “You might as well pile your things on, too,” Liz said to me.

  “Thank you,” I said, hooking the strap of my purse over her shoulder.

  “I suppose you’re going to want tea and coffee,” she said.

  “You don’t have to do that.” I brushed a clump of cat hair off my red jacket. “Why don’t you go wait in my office?”

  She smiled. “This is a onetime offer, kiddo. Who knows when it will come again?” She started for the stairs, looking a little like a Nepalese packman.

  “I love you, Liz,” I called after her.

  She waggled her elbow at me as she went up the steps. “Everybody does.”

  It was just a bit more than half an hour before the tour bus pulled out of our parking lot. Liz handed me a steaming cup of coffee and gave one to Mac, as well. He came to stand beside me by the front window. I was counting how many of the teacup gardens we’d sold.

  “How was court?” he asked.

  “Maddie’s out on bail,” I said, folding my fingers around the coffee mug.

  “What happens next?”

  I shrugged. “I’m not sure. Maddie’s with her lawyer right now.” I glanced over to where Charlotte, Rose and Liz were sitting around a small round table with a mosaic glass top. Rose was talking, gesturing with her hands, while the other two listened.

  Mac followed my gaze. “Problem?” he asked.

  I crossed my arms over my midsection, still holding on to my cup. “Umm, maybe,” I said.

  He raised an eyebrow and I could see genuine interest in his warm brown eyes.

  I sighed. “On the way over to the courthouse they were talking about looking for evidence to prove Maddie is innocent.”

  “They’re not serious?”

  I nodded. “Oh, I think they’re very serious. That’s what worries me.”

  Mac looked over at the three women sitting around the small round table with their teacups. “Realistically, Sarah, how much trouble could the three of them get into?”

  “You have no idea,” I said, rolling my eyes. Before I could say anything else the door opened and Nick Elliot stepped into the store.

  Charlotte immediately pushed back her chair and stood up. I handed my cup to Mac and walked over to Nick.

  “I got your message,” he said. “I thought it would be faster to just stop in. I hope that’s okay.”

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  Nick was dressed casually in khakis, a blue-striped dress shirt and his navy Windbreaker. The ends of his sandy hair were damp and I wondered if he’d had any sleep.

  “You know about Maddie.” It wasn’t a question.

  “We do,” I said. “She’s out on bail.”

  He nodded. “Good.”

  Charlotte stood in front of Nick and put her hands on his shoulders. She was only a few inches shorter than he was. I should have told her what Josh had told me about how Nick had spent his night. I wondered what she was going to say. I had a couple of ideas.

  “I’m so proud of you,” she said, beaming at him.

  Okay, not that.

  “You are?” Nick said. His eyes darted to me and then back to his mother. I didn’t have any answers for him.

  I looked over at Liz and Rose. There was a little self-satisfied smile on Liz’s face. I knew who had told Charlotte.

  “I heard what you did last night,” Charlotte said. “You saved that girl’s life.”

  Nick had that when did I fall down the rabbit hole? look on his face. “How did you know?” he asked. He looked at me again and I gave an almost imperceptible headshake.

  She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. And I’m sorry. I haven’t been supportive about this new job and I should have been.”

  Nick put a hand over his mother’s. “It’s okay.” They smiled at each other. I looked over at Liz again. She caught my eye and smiled, too.

  Charlotte dropped her hands and Nick cleared his throat. “So, Maddie’s out on bail and she has a lawyer?”

  His mother nodded. “And we’re already working on a plan to figure out who really killed Arthur Fenety.” She made a gesture with one hand that seemed to include me.

  Nick’s brown eyes narrowed. “Hang on a minute, Mom,” he said. “What do you mean, you’re working on a plan?”

  “She means we’re going to investigate and find the real killer,” Rose said. Liz sent her a daggers look and for a moment I thought she was going to swat Rose with her napkin.

  “No, you’re not,” Nick said, emphatically. “This is a police investigation. He made a circular motion with one finger that, like his mother’s gesture, seemed to include me. “You all need to stay out of it.”

  “Excuse me?” Charlotte said.

  She wasn’t my mother or even my grandmother; still, I knew what her tone meant. So would hundreds of her former students. Somehow Nick didn’t.

  “Let the police do their job,” he said. He spoke slowly, enunciating each word.

  “They don’t seem to be very good at it.” Charlotte crossed her arms defiantly over her chest. “Or they wouldn’t have arrested an innocent woman.”

  Nick took a deep breath and let it out slowly. The set of his jaw showed that he was grinding his teeth together.

  Suddenly Mac was at Nick’s elbow, holding out a mug. “Have a cup of coffee,” he said.

  Nick turned to look at him. “What?” he said.

  “Have a cup of coffee,” Mac repeated. “There isn’t anything stronger.” One eyebrow went up.

  A little of the tension in the air seemed to dissipate. Nick took the cup and I mouthed a thank-you at Mac.

  I touched Nick’s elbow. “Let’s go for a walk.” I smiled at him. It was a little fake but a smile nonetheless.

  “I know what you’re doing, Sarah,” he said, shaking off my hand.

  “Good,” I said. “I need to stretch my legs. Get the blood circulating.” I looked at him, thinking, Don’t be a dipwad. And hoped somehow he would get the message.

  “We’re fine, Sarah,” Charlotte said without looking at me.

  “I know you are,” I said, keeping my voice light. “I just want to take a little walk and I don’t want to go by myself.”

  Nick pressed his lips together for a moment. “I’ll be right back,” he said. “Sarah wants to take me outside because she wants to give me a little lecture.”

  “Yes, everyone knows that,” Liz said dryly. “So, why don’t you just get on with it?”

  I looked at Nick. “So could we get on with it?” I asked.

  He looked at Charlotte. “We’re not done, Mom.” It was a good thing he’d decided to move at that point, because I was ready to give him a nudge with the perfectly pointed toe of my black boot.

  Nick didn’t say a word until we were outside, standing in the small side lot. He took a sip of his coffee, nodded his approval and then held out his free hand. “Okay, start lecturing me.” His sense of humor seemed to have returned.

  “I’m not going to lecture you,” I said, keeping my voice and face as neutral as possible and holding up my hands like I was about to surrender. “I just want to ask you a question without everybody listening.”

  “What’s the question?”

  I took a step closer to him. “What the heck are you thinking?” I said. “Do you really think telling your mother
, Rose and Liz to stay out of Maddie’s case is going to work?”

  He made a face. “You think they should just start poking around in a murder investigation?”

  I fought my first impulse, which was to roll my eyes at him. I took a deep breath and then a second one when the first one didn’t get rid of much of my aggravation. “Of course I don’t. But they aren’t going to sit around and do nothing. They’re three of the most loyal people I know. You’re lucky my grandmother isn’t here. There’d be four of them to deal with.”

  He had the same stubborn look I’d seen dozens of times on his mother’s face.

  “Nick, let me see what I can do.”

  He took another sip from his coffee. “You think you can talk them out of this ridiculous idea?” He sounded skeptical.

  “Maybe. Or at least convince them there’s really nothing they can do.”

  He looked past me for a moment and I stayed silent while he weighed my words. “Okay,” he said, finally. “But they’re your responsibility, Sarah. My mother, Liz, and Rose.”

  I nodded. “That’s fine.” Surely I could find a way to talk them out of the idea of playing detective.

  “So, was this a long enough walk for you?” Nick asked teasingly.

  We started back toward the building across the bit of lawn in the front. “You should come running with me sometime,” I said.

  “Running? You mean like jogging around the block?”

  I laughed. “No. I mean putting in some miles and getting sweaty and stronger.”

  “I don’t know,” Nick said, grinning and shaking his head. “I think I’m busy.”

  “I haven’t named a time,” I said.

  “I know,” he said. “I’m still busy.”

  I mock frowned at him. “I have a feeling that if I were suggesting lunch, suddenly you wouldn’t be so busy.”

  Still smiling, he held up a hand. “I’m not going to answer that, on the grounds that it will probably get me in trouble.”

  There were two customers in the store. Mac and Liz had both disappeared. I was guessing they were in the storage room and upstairs, respectively. Rose was at the cash register and Charlotte was arranging a set of wineglasses and an ice bucket on the table that she and Rose and Liz had been sitting at earlier.