by Dale Mayer
She made a bed on the couch. It seemed odd to be sleeping on something worth so much money. But she figured that more than one person had slept on it over the years. She laid a sheet down to preserve it, which also felt stupid. But it didn’t matter. She would do what she had to do.
She stretched out, shutting off the light, leaving her upstairs light on. She pulled the comforter over her and felt measurably better. Nobody would sneak in here now without her knowing it.
But they might try.
She frowned and thought about that. Then she left her warm covers and grabbed the poker from the fireplace. With that at her side, she curled up in a ball, Goliath laying on her hip, Mugs at her feet, and Thaddeus resting on the back of the couch. And she snoozed away.
A low warning growl from Mugs at her side woke her up. As she shifted, Goliath dug his claws into her hip, and it was all she could do to hold back her yelp. She looked up to see Thaddeus’s eyes gleaming in the darkness as he stared toward the kitchen. The kitchen was out of sight, but the doorway that led to it was where something had grabbed all their attention. She listened, hearing the doorknob rattle. If it was the same person who had come last night, she figured he should know a chair was there. So it wouldn’t work to get back in again. She carefully moved Goliath and snuck out of the covers with Mugs at her side, placed a hand on the back of his neck, and whispered, “Shh.”
Goliath rose and stretched, arching his back high into this weird witch’s cat look. And Thaddeus, not to be left out, jumped onto her shoulder, digging in his claws in his panic to not be left alone.
She crept forward, and, with the lights out, she could see a shadow outside at her kitchen door. The poker was firmly in her hand as she got closer to find out who the hell was here. She should have checked out the front to see if a vehicle was parked anywhere. Not that an intruder would be stupid enough to pull up into her driveway. But, if he had, then Mugs would have definitely heard that.
But the intruder had full access to her backyard now. Something she hadn’t considered when she had pulled down the dilapidated rear fence. Not that she’d been considering assholes breaking and entering her property either. She’d been all about cleaning up the rat’s nest of three different mixed fencings and opening up her view to the creek. But it also meant it was easier for people to creep into her yard.
She frowned, seeing the same shadow, wondering how she could open the door suddenly and smack him one.
The doorknob turned again. This time somebody had a tool scraping on the other side. He’s trying to pick the lock. She frowned deeper and crept along the kitchen to see if she could see from the kitchen window by the table, but he was behind the framework of the door, so she couldn’t see him. She knew he couldn’t come in this door because of the chair propped underneath.
She crept back to the front door, taking a quick look for any suspicious or unknown vehicles. At the bottom of the cul-de-sac was an old flatbed pickup. She stared, wanting to go outside to take a picture of the license plate but was afraid to.
She pulled out her phone and sent a text to Mack. Intruder at back door. Trying to pick lock. Then she turned off the volume on her phone, leaving it in her hand so she could feel the vibrating buzz instead. She crept back into the kitchen to see who wanted in.
He appeared to have given up on the lock and stomped his feet on the veranda. She was surprised he let his frustration get the better of him because, if she’d been upstairs, she would have heard that.
Then she heard him swear. With an ear cocked against the door, she still didn’t recognize the voice.
A buzz in her hand alerted her. She backed out of the kitchen, hoping the intruder hadn’t heard her. What she wanted to do, if he disappeared to the front door, was to go and see who it was.
There was one simple line from Mack. On my way.
But she knew he’d be at least ten minutes. Could the animals attack the intruder enough to detain him? And, if so, should it be at the front door or at the back door? If she unlocked the front door, and he came in … That was the last thing she wanted, having her intruder inside to see those antiques. Nan had had her door open for anyone and everyone all those years she had lived in this house, and these antique pieces were still sitting here. But the minute word got out that the pieces were worth big money, Doreen knew everybody would view things differently.
And they had, as witnessed by her two intruders to date. Or one guy coming back a second time.
She vacillated between her choices, when her intruder gave the doorknob one last hard shake, then he stomped down the veranda steps. He was a large man, wearing a black hoodie, with a baseball cap under the hoodie. She watched as he disappeared, at a run toward the front yard.
She raced to the front door, not worried about being quiet. He tried the front door. She watched as the knob turned in his hand. The simple little closure defeating him. He brought out his tools again.
She held up her phone in Camera mode, ready to take a picture, but the curtains on the big front windows were closed. It was too dark for a flash because it would bounce back, reflecting off the window. That wouldn’t work for her either. No way in heck would Mack get here fast enough. As soon as he did arrive, this guy would run. The best thing she could do was sneak out the back and come around to the front and see if she could trip up her intruder.
With that thought in mind, she went to remove the chair at the kitchen door, propped it open for the animals, and then slipped around to the side of the house. She could see headlights turning down toward the cul-de-sac as she came around to the front. But her intruder still worked on entering the front door.
He saw the lights coming and crouched below the railing. The light came up, going over his head and coming down and around the corner. Sure enough it was Mack. She wanted to cheer.
When her intruder realized the vehicle was coming toward him, the guy bolted down the front porch steps and tried to run away. But he came first into contact with Goliath, who snuck between his legs, tripping him. As he fell flat to the ground, Mugs barked in his ear.
With the fireplace poker in hand, she stomped her foot on his back and held the poker tip against the center of his neck. “Don’t move,” she said in a deep, dark voice.
He squawked and lay still. As he squawked, so did Thaddeus, crying out, “Body in the garden. Body in the garden. Body in the garden. Body in the garden.” He wouldn’t shut up.
Mack ran over. “Thaddeus, are you okay?”
The bird stopped speaking and preened. “Thaddeus is fine. Thaddeus is fine.”
Mack had a flashlight and shone it at the man underneath her foot but caught sight of the poker and followed her arm up to Doreen’s face. “Are you really out here confronting your intruder?” he asked.
She glared at him. “You know how I feel about the contents of that house.”
He raised both hands in utter frustration. “This guy could have killed you.”
“And I could have killed him.” She poked the point of the poker into the guy’s neck for emphasis.
“Yeah,” the guy called out. “What the hell is going on?”
“You were trying to break into this person’s house.” Mack squatted in front of him.
“Get that dog off me.”
Mugs was on the guy’s back, his mouth full of the guy’s shirt.
“Nah. I’m not doing that. I’m not exactly sure what technique he’s using, but he’s usually a pretty good watchdog.”
“It’s my house,” the guy blustered. “I forgot my key.”
At that, Doreen poked him harder in the neck. “That’s my house,” she snapped. “How dare you?”
“Oh, no you don’t. That was Nan’s house, and she lost it to me in a poker game.”
“Oh, yeah? And when was that?” Mack asked in a drawn voice.
“Two nights ago,” he snapped.
“Well, that’s nice,” Doreen said. “It wasn’t her house to bet in a poker game. It’s in my name. Legally. L
ike, two weeks ago. And I don’t believe you. She would never have put up the house in a poker game.”
“She said I could have anything I wanted.”
“That’s nice, but it’s not hers to give away,” Mack said.
The man glared at him. “She said it was hers.”
“Well, it’s not,” Doreen said. “It’s mine.”
The guy tried to roll over and look up at her.
“I’m Doreen, Nan’s granddaughter,” Doreen said, “and you’re nothing but a dirty rotten liar.”
“Dirty rotten liar. Dirty rotten liar,” Thaddeus squawked, his wings wide as he flashed his brand-new words at everyone loud and clear.
Mack leaned back on his haunches and chuckled. “I thought you were teaching that bird to say nice things.”
“I forgot,” she said. “Who knew he’d pick up that phrase?”
“Dirty little liar. Dirty little liar.”
The man groaned. “I’m not lying.”
“Yes, you are,” Doreen said. “Because you were trying to pick the locks to get in.”
“Of course I was,” he said. “How else am I supposed to get into my new home?”
“In the middle of the night?” Mack asked. “I don’t think so.”
He reached around Doreen, grabbed the guy’s arms, and hooked him up with handcuffs. He turned to Mugs, who didn’t appear to want to let go of his quarry. “Sorry, big guy, but I have to take this perp down to the station and arrest him for breaking and entering. And attempted assault and attempted theft.”
“I didn’t steal anything,” he roared. “And you’re the ones who assaulted me.”
“You’re trying to break into my house,” Doreen said. “I’m allowed to defend my home.”
“I didn’t steal anything,” he snapped.
“How do I know that?” she asked. “You were in my house last night. Weren’t you? I’m still trying to figure out just what you might have stolen. And then you came back this time, so you were obviously back for more.”
“You don’t know anything,” he spat out. “I was just looking around the place. I wasn’t hurting anything.”
“No, you were casing my place.” She glared at him. “Looking for what you could steal. Admit it …”
“Hey, I wasn’t hurting anything,” he blustered, but Mack had heard enough.
He hauled him to his feet, dumping Mugs unceremoniously to the ground.
But Mugs wasn’t to be deterred. He grabbed a hold of the guy’s pant leg and tugged it. With Mack pulling in one direction and Mugs in the other direction, the guy was being torn in two. Doreen figured it was better to walk Mugs toward Mack’s car so at least the basset hound was going the right way and was a help, not a hindrance.
At his car, Mack put the guy in the back seat and turned to look at Doreen. “Are you all right?”
She sighed, staring at her intruder. “I am. But, I’m not real fond of him.”
The intruder glared at her from the back of the vehicle.
She looked over at Mack. “Do you know who he is?”
“Not yet,” Mack said, “but I will find out. Go on. Get some sleep. The excitement is over for tonight.” He hopped in the vehicle and drove away.
Chapter 17
Sunday morning…
The next morning she woke up, still sleeping on the couch but feeling a whole lot better. She stretched, groaned slightly at the way her back didn’t appreciate the new sleeping position, and realized it could have something to do with the weight of Goliath, lying on the small of her back.
She moaned. “Goliath, you need to go on a diet.”
A huge furry arm stretched over her shoulder, the paw coming to rest on the inside of her forearm with the claws out to squeeze ever-so-gently.
“Okay,” she said, “maybe not a diet. Still, you are one heavy cat.”
He stood and shoved his face into hers. Very gently, and hanging on to his body, she twisted underneath him so the cat was now stretched out on her belly. She looked around to see Thaddeus perched on top of the couch, sleeping. Mugs, aware that she was awake, now shoved his jowls into her face, probably out of jealousy of Goliath.
She chuckled. “Good morning, guys. We had an eventful night again, didn’t we?”
She checked the clock and saw it was already eight. Good thing she didn’t really have anything to do today. She would go to Mack’s mom’s garden, but now Doreen hated to leave her house. She also had more research she wanted to do. And that would take a bit of time.
Since it was eight, maybe she had some email responses. As she stood, she groaned. “Coffee. We’ll put it on first. Then we’ll have a shower.”
And that was what she did.
When she came back downstairs forty minutes later, dressed and her hair no longer dripping, she felt marginally better. When she checked her emails and saw a response, she felt a hell of a lot better.
Instead of jumping into the message from Oceanic, she grabbed a cup of coffee first, then sat down at the table with a piece of toast. She slowly read through the email and crowed in delight. They had completed a project in the lake. They had been looking for the large mammal that everybody had spoken about but hadn’t found anything. And was she looking for something in particular?
She wrote back and gave them the location she had been worried about, thanking them for any information they had.
With that sent off, she finished her toast and coffee, considered contacting Mack to see if he’d gotten any more information out of her intruder. But maybe Mack had gone to bed really late after questioning her intruder. She didn’t know how that worked with him. She sent him a quick text. It’s morning! Did you get any information out of my intruder last night?
Instead of texting her back, he phoned. “He’s still saying it’s his house, and he wasn’t trying to break in.”
“Well, it’s not his house,” she said heatedly.
“No,” he said, “but he’s figuring, by saying that, he’ll get off without having any charges pressed.”
“What does he do for a living?” she asked suspiciously. “And what’s his name?”
“What are you gonna do with that information?”
“See if he has any connection to Nan. I’m afraid somebody overheard a conversation about the antiques here.”
“That could be possible,” he said. “His name is Brandon Byers. I believe he’s a janitor at the elementary school.”
“Huh,” she said. “I wonder if he does part-time work over at Nan’s retirement home too.”
“I can find out,” he said. “Anyway, relax, have a good morning, and, if you get a chance to go to Mom’s garden, go for it.”
“I’m just really hesitant to leave this place alone,” she said.
“With good reason,” he said cheerfully. “But you can’t be a prisoner. You need to do other things.”
“I know that,” she said. “Even when I am at home, apparently things get me into trouble.”
“Exactly,” he said. “So don’t worry about it.” And he hung up.
She thought about it and knew he was right. She had a key, so she could lock the doors. She could leave the chair propped up against the front door. The garage was full of junk, and its doors were inoperable. If she could get that garage cleaned out, she could park her Honda inside and lock that door too. It was just such a mess in there.
Nan hadn’t gotten rid of anything in this house for the last forty or so years. At least from the looks of it. Because Doreen would reap the reward for that, she could hardly complain. She would look up who this asshole was who thought he could walk into her place first.
She called Nan, her source of all information. “Do you know a Brandon Byers?”
“Oh, the new janitor,” Nan said. “Yes, I absolutely do. He works here part-time. Why?”
“He tried to break into my house last night. I think your retirement home needs to hire somebody different. I suspect he overheard our conversation about the antiques and de
cided to come look for himself.”
Nan was horrified. “Oh, my dear, that’s terrible. Do you think he’s the same one who was there the previous night?”
“Yes, it was him both times,” Doreen said, not wanting to think about the alternative. “If two different men were involved, that would be awful. I don’t want to think about two intruders.”
“That would be too much of a coincidence,” Nan said comfortingly. “I will be sure to tell the management here.”
“Yes, because, if he’s overhearing those kinds of conversations, he could be going into apartments and stealing things at Rosemoor Manor,” Doreen said. “You can’t trust him.”
“Now that you mention it, there have been some complaints about a few pieces going missing. Vernon said somebody took twenty dollars off his dresser. I wonder if Brandon was around then.”
“Somebody needs to investigate that,” Doreen said heatedly, “because Brandon was certainly here last night. Mack took him down to the police station for questioning. I don’t know if they’ll charge him or what, but I sure as heck don’t want him left on the streets.”
“That was really foolish of Brandon,” Nan said. “He’ll lose both jobs because of this.”
“It sounds like he should be losing both jobs,” Doreen said. “Think about it. The guy is a thief. Oh, by the way, he also said he won the house in a poker game with you.”
At that, Nan’s outrage turned into sheer anger. “I would never bet the house on a game. Not even in any of our betting pools. Not when it was mine. And certainly not when it was yours.”
“I knew that,” Doreen said. “I told him that too.”
“I’m glad you did,” she said. “How dare he spread such horrible rumors about me. And why?” she cried out. “What could he possibly expect to get out of that?”
“Access to the antiques,” Doreen said.
“Wow,” she said. “So did you ever figure out who was your caller?”
“Interesting,” Doreen said. “I wonder if that was him too. I’ll mention it to Mack. I’d love to have that locked down too.”