Cat's Claw

by Susan Wittig Albert

  “I never thought they’d actually pull it off,” McQuaid remarked, after the bride and groom had driven away for a short honeymoon at an undisclosed location, and the rest of the hundred-plus guests had wolfed down the last chipotle meatball, nibbled the last piece of wedding cake, and drunk the last champagne toast. The cleanup crew would be working for several more hours, but McQuaid and I were getting ready to call it a day.

  “Sheila looked absolutely stunning, didn’t she?” Ruby said, tossing a dustpan full of birdseed (a good substitute for rice) onto the grass.

  She did. Sheila Dawson is beautiful at any time, any place, no matter what she is wearing: jeans and sandals, a chic suit with pearls and heels, or her trim blue cop uniform with a duty belt loaded with guns and gadgets. (I’ve always said that you have to wonder at somebody who looks like a homecoming queen and thinks like the regional director of the FBI.) Since she and Blackie had decided on “ranch attire” for their wedding, the bride was dressed in a sheer, off-shoulder, ivory blouse, western denim skirt, and cowgirl boots, with a wreath of rosemary and white rosebuds on her shining blond hair and a bouquet of lavender and white roses in her hand. She might have put Blackie off while they got their respective careers sorted out, but anybody with eyes could tell that she believed that “yes” was the right thing to say at last, after several long years of “yes,” then “no,” then “maybe.” She was radiant.

  “You gotta admit that Blackie looked pretty good, too,” McQuaid said with a grin. “Especially for a guy who lost his job in a coin toss.” McQuaid had been the groom’s best man. He and Blackie had worn open-collared white shirts, dark jackets, jeans, and cowboy boots. They looked like ranch hands who were cleaned up for Sunday church.

  “Well, yes,” I said. “But you have to remember that he lost a job and won a wife.”

  McQuaid is right, though. Throughout the ceremony, Blackie wore the stunned, disbelieving expression of a man who’d just learned that he’d won a ten-million-dollar Super Jackpot in the Texas lottery, instead of the regretful look of a man who had given up a job he enjoyed. He and Sheila had long agreed that two law enforcement careers in one family were a train wreck, so marriage hadn’t seemed in the cards. But when they decided (after several false starts) that they really wanted to get married, they couldn’t decide which one of them should quit.

  If I’d been guessing, I would have said that Sheila (known to her friends as Smart Cookie) would be the one to hand in her badge. She has worked like the devil to break the brass ceiling, but while she doesn’t talk much about what goes down in her cop shop, it’s an open secret around town that PSPD is not a congenial place for women. If she weren’t as stubborn and tough as she is—we sometimes call her Tough Cookie—she probably would have called it quits already. What’s more, the Blackwells count three generations of Adams County sheriffs in the family, and Blackie loved his job. He was good at it, too. The best sheriff that Adams County ever had, according to some.

  Either way, each of them had a lot to give up. They had reached a serious impasse: a Mexican standoff, as it were. They wanted to get married, but neither Blackie nor Sheila was ready to quit. So a few months ago, after another frustrating evening of weighing pros and cons, they gave up trying to make a logical choice and decided to toss for it. Heads he’d keep his job as sheriff and she’d give up hers as Pecan Springs’ police chief. Tails she’d keep her job and he wouldn’t run for a third term.

  The coin came up tails, and Blackie bowed out of the next election. But the toss is a close-held secret, known only to a few friends. As far as the rest of the world is concerned, Blackie had simply decided that he’d been in the sheriff’s office long enough. He was leaving to join McQuaid at McQuaid and Blackwell. Now, a couple of months after the fact, he is a licensed private investigator. He seems to like the job.

  McQuaid cocked his head, regarding me, his lips pursed. “You look pretty great, too, China.” There was an admiring glint in his eyes.

  I had been the bride’s attendant. Sheila and I picked out a blouse exactly like hers, except it was a steel blue color that went with my denim skirt. I wore my red cowgirl boots and carried a bouquet of red roses, with lavender, mint, and rosemary. Justice of the Peace Maude Porterfield conducted the ceremony, and in the spirit of the occasion, wore a white cowboy hat, white pants and cowboy boots, and her best Dale Evans shirt. Judge Porterfield has been a JP in Pecan Springs for nearly fifty years and still leads a busy and colorful life, holding traffic court, issuing warrants, signing death certificates, and marrying people. She says she much prefers to marry people. It doesn’t leave a bad taste in her mouth, like death certificates.

  As long as they stay together, that is. Maude regards the ones who don’t make it as her own personal failures. “I guess I didn’t put enough emphasis on ‘until death do you part,’” she says sourly, whenever she hears about the latest divorce. “Sad to say, but some are in it just for the good times. Married folks, they gotta be like that cat’s claw acacia I’ve got growin’ in my yard. Gotta grab hard and hold on tight when the going gets rough. Only way to get through the bad times. Grab hard, hold on, and ride. No matter what.”

  But even though Maude gave “until death do you part” her very best shot, it may not be enough. Sheila’s and Blackie’s careers in law enforcement have created a great many conflicts between them over the past few years, and after a couple of broken engagements, I’m afraid to be too optimistic. Or maybe I’m just realistic. I’m married to an ex-cop, and I understand why McQuaid’s first marriage ended in divorce. So did Blackie’s, and while I don’t know all the details, I’m guessing that it happened for pretty much the same reasons. I’m sure that he and Sheila will give it all they can, and I hope it works. Their friends and well-wishers gave them a great sendoff, and we all wish them the best. The rest is up to them.

  I picked up my shoulder bag and paused for a moment before I switched off the lights, liking what I saw. Thyme and Seasons, the Crystal Cave, and the tearoom are housed in an old two-story building that is constructed of blocks of Texas limestone. The shops and the tearoom have stone walls, deep-set casement windows, and the original wooden floors. My shop is small and very full, but I like it that way—there’s an intimacy about it that’s lacking in larger, more open shops, seems to me, and the rustic space suits the down-to-earthiness of my wares. The ceiling-high shelves along the back wall display dozens of jars and bottles of dried herbs, salves, and tinctures. A corner rack holds herb, gardening, and cookery books, as well as copies of my own China Bayles’ Book of Days. There’s a display of essential oils, diffusers, and other aromatherapy supplies on an old wooden table—everything you need to create and enjoy herbal fragrances. Along another wall are herbal items from local crafters: jellies, vinegars, seasoning blends, and soaps. There are baskets of dried herbs in the corners, bundles of dried plants hang from overhead beams, and raffia-tied braids of red peppers and garlic are displayed on the stone walls. The air is rich with the sweet-spicy scents of patchouli, nutmeg, cinnamon, and sandalwood—fragrances that remind me of a lingering autumn. I won’t start putting up the holiday items for another week or two. I absolutely hate going to malls and seeing the Christmas stuff up before Halloween. This is my shop, and I don’t rush the season.

  People sometimes ask if I miss my former profession—I was a practicing criminal attorney—or long for the excitements and entertainments of Houston, where I used to live. But I don’t have to hem and haw and fumble for an answer. I love it here. I’m doing something that feels right and healthy for me, for my customers, and for the planet. I don’t know what the future holds—nobody does. But I intend to do this for as long as I can.

  I reached for the switch to turn off the lights. But before I could flick it, the door to the Crystal Cave popped open and Ruby stood there, her cell phone in her hand, her eyes round, her face white.

  “It’s Ramona!” she gasped. “She’s just— She—”

  “Uh-oh,” I said, u
nder my breath. Ramona is a little ditzy. She collects weird accidents, like the time the car ahead of her on the freeway threw a hubcap through her windshield, or the afternoon she was sailing with a friend on a lake near Dallas and a big fish jumped into the boat and bit her toe. Aloud, I said, “What’s happened to Ramona now?”

  Ruby gulped. “She … she’s found a body.”

  “A dead one?” I was startled. Even for Ramona, finding a body is not something that happens every day. “Where?”

  Ruby gave me a look that said, Yes, dead, you dummy. Into the phone, she asked, “Where?” After a moment’s listening, she said to me, “Three doors down from my house. In the kitchen. There’s a… a gun.”

  I could’ve asked why Ramona was wandering through the neighborhood kitchens, but I didn’t. Urgently, I said, “Tell her not to touch a thing. Tell her to call nine-one-one, then go around front and stand on the curb until the cops get there.”

  Ruby repeated my message. Ramona must not have processed it, so Ruby repeated it again before she closed the phone, biting her lip.

  “She says she’s already done all that, and there are cops on the scene. I’ve got to go over there, China. Will you go with me?”

  “No,” I said automatically. “I’m sorry. I’ve got to go home and cook supper for—”

  And then I remembered. Brian’s school baseball team was playing at Seguin this afternoon, and McQuaid had picked Caitlin up after school to go and watch the game. Afterward, they planned to have supper with Mom and Dad McQuaid, who live in Seguin. I would have joined them after I closed the shop, but McQuaid hadn’t had a chance to spend an evening with the kids lately.

  Ruby was looking at me plaintively. “Please?” she whispered tremulously. “I don’t want to do this by myself. Ramona is— Well, you know.”

  I knew. But hubcaps and toe-biting fish are one thing. Dead bodies are something else altogether.

  “Okay,” I said, deciding. “Let’s go.”

  Chapter Two

  “That about does it for now, I guess,” Deputy Chief Clint Hardin said in his slow drawl, getting out of the chair on the opposite side of the chief’s desk. Hardin was six-two with burly shoulders, craggy face, unflinching dark eyes. Impressive in his dark blue uniform. A cop’s cop. Looking up at him, Sheila thought with a tug of irritation that he never missed a chance to use his height and size to make a point with the women on the force, including (or maybe especially) his boss.

  He picked up the file from the desk. “If we get anything actionable on the blackmail, I’ll let you know, Chief. But you can look for an arrest on the trespass and burglary charges in another—” He looked down at his watch. “Fifteen, twenty minutes. You’ll get the word when it happens.”

  “Good job, Captain,” Sheila said, although she knew that the arrest was more Bartlett’s work than Hardin’s. The deputy chief had a reputation for taking credit for his subordinates’ work when it was good and giving them hell when it wasn’t. Not a positive character trait, in her opinion. But Clint Hardin had spent the better part of his nearly twenty-year career developing and perfecting it and wasn’t likely to change.

  She rolled back the black leather desk chair and stood up. The massive chair had belonged to the former chief, Bubba Harris, and was much too large for her—another of the things about the Pecan Springs Police Department that didn’t fit but were hard to change. It was the chief’s chair. She was stuck with it.

  “Pass that word along to Bartlett,” she added, “and put a note in his file. This one is dicey, considering who’s involved. Bartlett handled it well—this part of it, anyway.”

  The commendation would go through channels, of course, but Sheila would take a minute to speak to Jack Bartlett herself. He was in charge of PSPD’s four-person detective unit. Young, newly promoted, and ambitious, he’d go by his gut when Hardin would’ve gone by the book. On the surface, the case had seemed minor, a random break-in at a local computer firm, Kirk’s Computer Sales and Service—one of a string of several break-ins at other small businesses. But as things turned out, it wasn’t the size of the crime that was important; it was the status of the criminal whose shadowy image had been caught on video. A prominent citizen who was going to be mightily embarrassed when his arrest became public later today.

  But desperate people did desperate things, and George Timms—who was about to find himself printed, mugged, and booked for criminal trespass and destruction of property—must have been very desperate. According to his attorney, Charlie Lipman, Timms was being blackmailed. He had broken into the business in an attempt to retrieve the incriminating evidence, then removed some of the shop’s items to cover up his purpose and make it look like a burglary. Lipman hadn’t yet said what the evidence was or who the blackmailer was, and that part of the investigation was still pending. The attorney was no doubt holding the information back as leverage for the plea deal he was expecting to work with the DA, who just happened to be a friend of Timms, and he wouldn’t want the police to have it until he was good and ready. Sheila knew and respected Lipman, who was the best—and the busiest—lawyer in Pecan Springs. But he could also be damned frustrating. They’d get the information when he was done dealing with the district attorney and not a minute before.

  But from Sheila’s point of view, getting this far with this particular case was not an insignificant victory. City council member Ben Graves had been making a crusade out of the unsolved minor burglaries. He had made up a three-by-four-foot chart and posted it prominently at every council meeting. It wasn’t that Graves cared for seeing justice done—if he did, he would stop opposing nearly every budget request she made for upgrades to police personnel and equipment. All he cared about was making himself look like a guardian of community safety and making her look as incompetent as possible, in the hope that Pecan Springs’ first female police chief would give up and turn in her resignation. She would be more than happy to rub his nose in the outcome of Bartlett’s investigation, especially since George Timms was a former business associate of Graves and a golfing buddy of the mayor’s. Timms owned the Chevy dealership, as well as several rental properties around town and some prime Hill Country real estate—which made him a very odd burglar, indeed.

  And while Clint Hardin had been a thorn in her side ever since she’d been appointed chief, Sheila had to admit—grudgingly—that he had done a good job on this particular investigation. He’d given the detective unit the backup it needed and kept a tight lid on possible leaks after it became apparent that this wasn’t your ordinary, everyday break-in. That was crucial, considering who their suspect was and who his friends were. Hark Hibler had a nose for police news, especially when he thought there might be scandal in high places. The Enterprise would break this story big, once Hibler got his hands on it.

  But Bartlett had done his job, Hardin had played the investigation close, Hibler hadn’t gotten even a whiff of anything rotten in Denmark, and the arrest would come as a shocking surprise. Not to Timms, of course. Bartlett had negotiated the man’s surrender with Charlie Lipman last night. And as soon as the arrest and booking were complete, Sheila would give Ben Graves a call.

  “I thought you might appreciate a heads-up on this one, Mr. Graves,” she would say smoothly, sweetly, and maliciously. Then she would add, “Although I’m not sure it’s what you want to hear.”

  Hardin cleared his throat assertively. “Don’t know if you saw the duty roster, Chief. I’m due to take the next ten days for vacation. Brother-in-law and I have rented a boat at Rockport. We’re supposed to leave this afternoon. Of course, when I put in for the time off, I didn’t know we’d be so shorthanded. If you want me to hang around—” He eyed her.

  “Negative,” Sheila said firmly. Yes, she had seen the duty roster, and yes, they were even more short-staffed than usual, between court appearances, vacations, and a couple of guys out sick. But Hardin had the time coming. They’d manage.

  “The Timms case is in the bucket,” she added. “So go
, Clint. Get yourself some trophy redfish.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Hardin said it with a slight touch of insubordination, as he always did. Not heavy enough to call for anything like a reprimand or even an informal reproof, but noticeable. And definitely irritating. He headed for the door, adding over his shoulder, “I’ll remind Bartlett that he’s reporting directly to you while I’m gone.”

  The door clicked shut behind Hardin, and Sheila sank back into the oversize chair, pushing out a long, weary breath. He had been one of the candidates for the chief’s job when she was appointed, and he never let her forget it. She ought to be glad that he was out of her hair for a few days. It was one less conflict to manage, although their relationship was such a perpetual source of conflict that it more or less faded into the background and only came up when one of them felt like butting heads. She ought to be looking forward to the gotcha conversation with Graves, too. Opportunities like that were few and far between.

  But right now, Sheila couldn’t whip up a lot of enthusiasm about anything. She had been up since before five for her morning run with Rambo, her drug-sniffing Rottweiler who worked the day shift in the K-9 Unit—nights, too, when he was called out. She was at the desk at six thirty, uniform sharply creased, tie neatly tied, duty belt fastened around her waist. She always came in before seven to get an early start on the stack of paperwork. Didn’t count for much, though, because there’d be an even bigger stack the next day.