by Elaine Viets
“Do I have to have that fur bag in my apartment?” Margery asked.
“He’ll be fine at Phil’s,” Helen said.
“Then the answer’s yes,” Margery said.
Helen, Daniel and Peggy helped clear the table while Margery served two desserts: champagne and strawberries, and warm brownies with whipped cream.
Elsie asked the one question the others didn’t dare: “How did you afford this awesome renovation, Margery, dear?”
“I cashed in a CD,” Margery said. “Then Zach left me his life insurance and his condo. He was behind on the mortgage, but Nancie helped me. I paid two months’ worth of missed payments, his condo fees, and some late penalties, so I’ll be able to sell it once his estate is probated.”
“The housing market is bouncing back in Florida,” Phil said. “Especially waterfront property.”
Whenever two or more property owners were gathered together, you heard that line, Helen thought. It’s the Florida mantra.
“Right now there are two interested parties and it isn’t even listed yet,” Margery said. “One wants to pay cash. While we’re on the subject of cash, I want to talk to you and Peggy about your rent at the Coronado.”
Helen looked at Phil. They’d expected a substantial increase. It was definitely due.
“I haven’t asked for a rent increase the whole time you’ve lived here,” Margery said. “Now I’ve had all this work done.”
Helen braced herself. She and Phil had three units—their two apartments and Coronado Investigations in 2C. Their business was thriving. They could afford more rent. They didn’t want to live—or work—anywhere else.
Peggy looked uneasy, and Daniel squeezed her hand.
“When I was in trouble, you all pitched in and helped,” Margery said. “I owe you my life and my freedom. So I’m making my promise now, in front of both legal eagles: I won’t raise the rent for at least two years.”
Everyone applauded. Peggy smiled with relief and Phil poured another round of champagne. They toasted Margery in style.
EPILOGUE
Helen talked Trish Barrymore into hiring Jan Kurtz for Justine’s first Gold Cup cat show in the Kitten Class. “She knows the ropes,” Helen said. “I’ll be there to help.”
They met at Trish’s home at seven o’clock the morning of the show. Justine’s short gray coat was in good condition, so she got a combing but not a bath. Helen thought the kitten looked so much like a stuffed toy she expected her to have a Made in the USA tag. Her coppery eyes sparkled with feline mischief, and her fur was luxurious with good health. Her ears were tiny tents on her round head.
“She’s perfect,” Trish said, and Helen agreed. This wasn’t maternal pride. Justine was a splendid Chartreux.
Trish, in a slim black dress, carried Justine like a stylish accessory in her bejeweled Baby Coach. At the cat show, Justine gave a surprisingly loud mew of displeasure at the noise and throngs of people. On the bench, Jan and Helen made sure she was comfortably settled into her show cage. The midnight blue curtains highlighted her hypnotic eyes.
“Justine has star quality,” Jan said. “Look at the spectators lining up to see her.”
Trish basked in the praise heaped on her cat: “Look at those eyes!” “Beautiful fur!” “Adorable!”
If the cat lovers’ awed stares and admiring comments were any indication, Helen thought, Justine was a shoo-in for Best Kitten.
The judge in Ring One called the numbers, including twenty-seven, Justine’s number. Trish bore her triumphantly through the crowd, confident Justine would come back with her first rosette.
But Justine didn’t like the plain wire cage. She hissed at the cats on either side of her.
The judge, a studious woman of forty, seemed to sense that Justine had beginner’s nerves. She praised and petted her, then carefully lifted her out of the cage. Justine bit the judge. Not a nip—a hearty chomp on the thumb.
“Ouch!” the wounded judge said.
Trish, Helen and Jan watched in horror from the back of the ring.
“Uh-oh!” Jan said. “Trouble.”
“It’s just a little bite,” Trish said.
“She drew blood,” Jan said. Helen saw three dark red drops splashed on the white stage. Justine was quickly returned to her cage and the judge retired to the first-aid area up front.
“I don’t know why they’re making such a big deal about a little blood,” Trish said.
“Cat bites need to be treated right away,” Jan said, “and the exhibitors of the next cats get offended if a judge bleeds on their cats. The wound has to be disinfected and covered. Let’s hope it’s not a deep puncture. Justine’s disqualified. Let’s get her out of there, Trish, before the judge returns.”
“But she’s only disqualified in this ring,” Trish said, desperate to save her cat’s career.
“The ring clerk is required to advise all the other rings of the incident,” Jan said. “Do the right thing for Justine. She’s clearly not happy about something.”
“But I can show her again, can’t I?” Trish said.
“She’s not barred from future competitions,” Jan said. “But if she bites and continues to be shown and is unhappy, Justine will quickly get a reputation as a bad actor. Do you want that for her? She’s hissed at the other cats and complained since we walked through the door. Justine is beautiful, but she’s telling you this is not the life she wants.”
“Please listen to her,” Helen said. “You’ve always done what’s right for Justine. Mort would want it, too.”
“You’re right,” Trish said, and sadly carried her cat back to her cage. The other exhibitors averted their eyes. Helen and Jan helped Trish pack up and go home.
Justine ended her show cat career with that one chomp. Trish blamed the trauma from the catnapping. Jan thought the kitten had never been properly socialized. Helen believed clever Justine had figured out the one way to avoid a life she hated. Justine had the instincts of a true queen: People didn’t judge her—she judged them.
Trish decided not to breed Justine. She was spayed and lives happily as a house pet.
* * *
Trish Barrymore continued to date Arthur Goldich. The couple married a year after Mort’s death and now live in Trish’s Fort Lauderdale mansion. Trish has resumed her position as a social leader and gives fabulous parties. Arthur is devoted to Trish and to their cats.
* * *
Trish paid for the four red-light-camera traffic tickets Coronado Investigations racked up during the catnapping and gave Helen and Phil a fifty-thousand-dollar bonus, the ten-percent share of the ransom money. “I never expected to see any of it again,” she said.
* * *
Chatwood’s Cheshire Dream—Chessie for short—was the Gold Cup National Champion that year. Dee Chatwood commissioned an oil portrait of the blue-eyed beauty. Chessie retired, and Midnight fathered a coal black kitten, the spitting image of his father, who became a national winner.
Red did not win top honors in the Premiership Class, but she enjoys her retirement. Chocolate and Mystery each produced two stunning Persians. All the cats spend their days petted, loved and pampered.
* * *
Jan Kurtz inherited Mort’s mansion as well as half his estate. She could never enjoy living in the house where her fiancé died. She sold it to a South American shipping magnate.
As soon as she received her inheritance, Jan quit Chatwood’s Champions. Dee begged her to stay on. Jan refused, but promised she’d stay long enough to train her replacement—if she made twelve dollars an hour.
Dee screamed like every dollar was stripped off her skin, but gave in and started advertising for Jan’s replacement. But Dee’s reputation was known throughout the cat world: She went through six candidates in five days. No one lasted more than eight hours.
Jan, tiring of the drama, gave Dee an ultimatum: She was leaving next Friday, whether Dee had a replacement or not. But Jan loved the cats and wanted to see them properly cared for. S
he suggested Dee promote Gabby Garcia, the maid, to the head of the cattery. Gabby enjoyed the gentle Persians, but refused to work unless she made twelve dollars an hour, and she wanted an assistant.
Gabby hired her cousin, Graciela. Their other cousin, Rosita, took Gabby’s old job as a maid. The Garcia family has made a tidy sum tolerating Dee’s tantrums.
* * *
Jan began seeing Dr. Bob, the veterinarian she met at the Hasher School Pet Appreciation Day, six months after Mort’s death. They dated for a year, then married and moved to North Carolina. Jan breeds and shows prizewinning Persians, and Dr. Bob has a successful small-animal practice and an award-winning cable TV show.
* * *
Lexie Deener was convicted of the first-degree murder of Mortimer Barrymore and sentenced to twenty years in prison. The former cat show judge was forced to sell her beloved ’86 Jaguar, Black Beauty, to pay her attorney. Because of the classic car’s high mileage and the damage done when law enforcement searched it for evidence, Blackie brought less money than expected at auction.
* * *
Carol Berman, Mort’s executive assistant, received two offers to work at other financial firms, but decided she’d never have another employer as good as Mort. Instead, Carol manages the Tory Burch store on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach. Tory is her favorite designer. She knows the stock, the store and the kind of women who shop there.
* * *
Amber Waves, the catnapper, refused to take a plea offer. She’d had nothing to do with Mort’s murder and believed she was owed that five hundred thousand dollars in ransom money. She was sure her sizzling good looks would help convince the men on the jury and the judge to be lenient. Amber’s attorney was thrilled that she had a male judge and a majority of men on the jury. But the jury was appalled that Amber had stepped over Mort’s dead body to steal his cat, and moved by Trish’s dignified and heartrending testimony about her suffering when Justine was catnapped. Justine herself made an appearance and captivated the courtroom. Amber was sentenced to twelve years in prison for extortion, and they were hard years.
After her release, Amber couldn’t find work as a fitness trainer or a pole specialist. She dances in a bar as Miss Kitty, wearing cat’s ears and not much else.
* * *
BSO Deputy Webster Maddow was promoted to sergeant for his work on the Mortimer Barrymore murder case.
* * *
Nancie Hays wreaked havoc on the two detectives and the communities who had falsely arrested her clients. Lester V. Boland, the Peerless Point Crimes Against Persons detective who railroaded Trish into jail, was forced to resign. Trish settled out of court with the city for an undisclosed amount.
* * *
Millard Whelan, the bristly haired Snakehead Bay detective who conducted the careless investigation of Zachariah Flax’s murder, retired without a pension. He bags groceries at a local supermarket. Margery’s settlement with the city of Snakehead Bay was enough to replace the CD she cashed in to renovate the Coronado.
* * *
Margery Flax held a small, simple service for her ex-husband Zach. Before his body was cremated, she slipped their silver-framed wedding photo into his casket. “That will either make him happy or torment the heck out of him,” she told Helen as the casket rolled toward the fiery furnace.
Helen, Phil, Peggy, Elsie and XD Duncan, Zach’s barfly friend, attended. Mike, the dealer he’d cheated out of his share of the drug money, did not, though he did call Margery and tell her that Zach owed him twenty thousand dollars “for a business deal.”
“You’re welcome to sue me for your money,” Margery said sweetly. She has not heard from Mike since.
* * *
Later, Zach’s ashes were packed in a pink scallop-shell urn. Helen accompanied Margery and the biodegradable urn to the beach at sunset. The urn floated on the pink-tinged water under a flamingo sky shot with molten gold.
“I thought our love would last forever,” Margery said, as the ocean carried away the urn. “But our love didn’t last. His lies did.”
Helen patted Margery’s hand. “Lies destroyed my first marriage,” she said.
“Dust,” Margery said. “That’s all that’s left—dust and ashes.”
“Like the African dust that creates these incredible sunsets,” Helen said. “It’s beautiful.”
“Yes,” Margery said. “Yes, it was.”
A pink wave swept over the urn, and Zach was gone.
* * *
Helen and Phil drove down to Key Largo in the Igloo and spent the week swimming, sipping cocktails on the beach, making love in the lazy afternoons and listening to the local bands at night. They often ate at the Fish House, a restaurant that served locally caught fish. Helen loved the grilled yellowtail snapper. The Fish House’s ceiling was strung with colorful lights shaped like flip-flops, pineapples, martini glasses, palm trees and parrots. After lunch on their last full day, Phil said, “Let’s take a drive. I want to show you something special.”
They drove for more than an hour on the Overseas Highway, the romantic name for US 1 in the Keys, passing restaurants, dive shops and tourist haunts. Helen enjoyed the inventive Keys mailboxes along the roadside: manatees, flamingos, fish and buoys.
Finally, they reached Big Pine Key, some thirty miles north of Key West. “Good,” Phil said. “It’s close to sunset. That’s the best time to see them.”
“See who?” Helen asked. But when he turned in to the National Key Deer Refuge, Helen knew the answer.
“Key deer live on Big Pine Key and a few nearby islands,” Phil said. “They’re the smallest of the white-tailed deer, and they’re not found anywhere else in the world. Back in the fifties, there were fewer than thirty Key deer left. Now there are about eight hundred.”
They quickly slathered on bug repellant, then softly slipped down a nature trail toward the water. Fat whipped-cream clouds sailed overhead. Helen heard a tiny snap! and Phil put his hand on her shoulder. In a mangrove thicket near the water, they saw a doe and her fawn.
Helen was bewitched. The doe was barely bigger than a dog, and the fawn was smaller than Thumbs. The pair delicately stepped toward Helen and Phil. They put out their fists, and the doe and the spotted fawn sniffed them and took a step forward, watching Helen and Phil with big, melting brown eyes.
There was a loud guffaw from the trail, and the deer disappeared.
“They’re beautiful!” Helen said.
“They’re tough,” Phil said. “Survivors. Like you.”
“Like us,” Helen said, and she kissed him by the fading glow of the setting sun.
ALSO BY ELAINE VIETS
ANGELA RICHMAN, DEATH INVESTIGATOR
Brain Storm
Fire and Ashes
A Star is Dead
Ice Blonde (Novella)*
DEAD-END JOB MYSTERIES
Shop Till You Drop*
Murder Between the Covers*
Dying to Call You*
Just Murdered*
Murder Unleashed*
Murder with Reservations*
Clubbed to Death*
Killer Cuts*
Half Price Homicide*
Pumped for Murder*
Final Sail*
Board Stiff*
Catnapped!*
Checked Out
The Art of Murder
Killer Blonde (Novella)
JOSIE MARCUS, MYSTERY SHOPPER
Dying in Style*
High Heels Are Murder*
Accessory to Murder*
Murder with All the Trimmings*
The Fashion Hound Murders*
An Uplifting Murder*
Death on a Platter*
Murder Is a Piece of Cake*
Fixing to Die*
A Dog Gone Murder*
FRANCESCA VIERLING MYSTERIES
Backstab*
Rubout*
The Pink Flamingo Murders*
Doc in the Box*
SHORT FICTION
Deal with the Devil
and 13 Short Stories
*Available in JABberwocky eBook editions
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elaine Viets has written 34 mysteries in four series: the bestselling Dead-End Job series with South Florida PI Helen Hawthorne, the cozy Josie Marcus Mystery Shopper mysteries, and the dark Francesca Vierling mysteries. With the Angela Richman Death Investigator series, Elaine returns to her hardboiled roots and uses her experience as a stroke survivor and her studies at the Medicolegal Death Investigators Training Course. Elaine was a director at large for the Mystery Writers of America. She's a frequent contributor to Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine and anthologies edited by Charlaine Harris and Lawrence Block. Elaine won the Anthony, Agatha and Lefty Awards.
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