by Nic Saint
“What about the ambulance parked out in front of the house?” Dooley asked.
“Oh, please,” said Rollo, rolling his eyes. “When you have a party, you have to have an ambulance. In case one of the guests suddenly gets sick.”
“Remember that party where all the guests got sick, Rollo?” asked Rex. “Remember that? That was some party.”
“We don’t mention that,” said Rollo sternly. “We never mention that party, Rex. That party never happened.”
“Oh. Right. Totally forgot about that.”
Rollo eyed us critically. “There was never any party where everybody got sick after eating the shrimp. And Donna never sued the caterer. Is that understood, cats?”
“My name is Max,” I reminded him.
“Whatever, cat,” said Rollo. “Now I think you better scram. I don’t remember seeing your name on the guest list. And if Donna finds out you’re trespassing and we’re allowing you, she’ll have something to say about it.”
“Oh, you think we should chase them off the premises, Rollo?” asked Rex.
Rollo thought about this for a moment. “Maybe we’ll just let them off with a warning this time.”
“Great,” said Rex with a smile. “I’m not in the mood for running around anyway.”
“Come on, you guys!” I said. “Your human is dead! You have to snap out of it and help us catch the killer!”
Rollo’s face clouded. “On second thought…”
“Uh-oh,” Dooley muttered.
Rollo turned to Rex. “Rex. You get the fat one. I’ll get the skinny one. Go!”
Good thing for us the dogs had more bark than bite. And more talk than dash. By the time Dooley and I had cleared the pool area, they were still nowhere near catching up with us.
“See?” asked Dooley, slightly out of breath as we hid under Odelia’s pickup. “That’s another advantage us cats have over dogs: we’re a lot faster!”
Or these two idiots were exceptionally slow, I thought as I saw Rex and Rollo appear around the corner and search around stupidly. Then, in perfect unison, they both plunked down on their haunches and started licking their private parts.
“Yuck,” Dooley muttered. “Imagine being the tongue of a dog. Just… yuck.”
“You lick your private parts,” I reminded him.
“Yeah, but I’m a cat. I’m naturally clean. Dogs are just filthy.”
He had a point, of course. Dogs are filthy, and cats are naturally clean.
“So now what?” I asked. “Our only potential witnesses are two dumb-ass dogs.”
“With the emphasis on ass,” said Dooley as he watched Rex and Rollo turn their attention from their private parts to a different, even filthier part of their canine anatomy.
“Let’s just hope Brutus and Harriet have better luck,” I said.
Just then, Brutus and Harriet emerged from inside the house. They were still gabbing away, probably discussing Bradley Cooper’s face and why it was off limits to cats. Rex and Rollo paused from their hygienic pursuit to gawk at the two newcomers.
“Uh-oh,” said Dooley. “Here we go.”
Within seconds, Brutus and Harriet had joined us underneath the car, scared off by those two idiot poodles, who were now sniffing around in the vicinity of the boxwood hedge.
“So? What did you find out?” I asked.
“That Bradley Cooper is the only human who looks good with a beard,” Brutus said morosely.
“Well, he does!” Harriet cried. “That man makes a beard look totally sexy.”
“Because it hides his big mouth!”
“It does not!”
Brutus, Dooley and I shared an agonized groan. “What about the murder?” I asked.
“What about it?” asked Harriet.
“Did you talk to anyone inside? Did Donna Bruce have other pets besides Beavis and Butt-head over there?”
Dooley snickered. “You said butt.”
“For your information, that place is filled with cops,” said Harriet. “So even if there were any pets around, the cops probably scared them off.”
Now it was my turn to place my chin on my front paws. This investigation was not exactly going the way I’d hoped. “So nothing?” I asked.
Harriet remained conspicuously silent.
“At least now we know that Bradley Cooper looks great with a beard,” Dooley offered. “That’s something, right? Right, Max?”
“Oh, Dooley,” I muttered.
Chapter 5
Inside the house, Odelia and Chase sat down with Hillary Davies, who was the CEO of donna.vip. Hillary, a fortysomething woman with short blond hair streaked with gray and a square face, knitted her brows. “I still can’t believe Donna’s dead. That’s just not like her.”
Odelia would have said it wasn’t like anyone to be dead, but she thought she understood. Donna Bruce had apparently been one of those extremely dynamic women, possessing a very strong personality and an iron will to succeed. People like that often seemed indestructible.
She handed the CEO a cup of chamomile tea. Hillary took it gratefully, the cup shaking between her fingers as she put it to her lips.
“How long have you known Donna Bruce?” Odelia asked.
“I started to work for her five years ago, so that’s when our relationship began, though I was a customer way before that. Donna.vip was already an established brand by that time, and Donna felt that in order to expand, she needed to professionalize and hire a CEO. And that’s where I came in.”
“Was she tough to work for?” asked Odelia.
Hillary smiled. “She wasn’t easy to work for, that’s for sure. She was demanding and outspoken. And she definitely didn’t keep her opinions to herself. But she was also generous and eager to give credit where credit was due. She lived for the brand, so if you improved the brand, she considered you a friend.”
“And did you? Improve the brand?” asked Chase.
“Yes, I think I did,” said the woman, tilting her chin. “I took it from twenty million annual gross to two hundred, and I like to believe I played a big part in that expansion. And judging from the bonus Donna paid me last Christmas, I think she knew it too.”
“Did she have any enemies?” Odelia asked.
“Oh, more than I can count on the fingers of my two hands,” said Hillary. “A strong and visible woman like Donna Bruce will always rub a lot of people the wrong way and she was no exception.”
“Can you think of anyone who could have killed her?” asked Chase.
Hillary thought for a moment, touching her lips with her fingers. “Well, there was her ex-husband, of course.”
“Tad Rip,” Chase read from his notes.
“That’s right. He didn’t like it when Donna got sole custody of Sweetums and Honeychild. And he certainly didn’t like it when she called him a drug addict, a drunk and a serial philanderer. Claimed it ruined his reputation.”
“What does he do, this ex-husband?” asked Odelia.
“He’s one of those Silicon Valley tycoons,” said Hillary. “You know the type. Multi-millionaire before the age of twelve and an ego bigger than the state of Alaska. The man was a buffoon, plain and simple, and spent more time bedding his secretaries than trying to make his marriage work.” She leaned forward. “In my opinion the only reason he married Donna was so he could leverage her success to his advantage. A trophy wife on steroids. But Donna wasn’t having it and he paid the price.”
“So you think he might have murdered the mother of his own children?” asked Odelia, surprised.
Hillary pressed her lips together. “You didn’t hear it from me, but the man is a sociopath. Which I guess is a quality that comes in handy when you’re trying to make it to the top of the heap in Silicon Valley.”
Chase smiled. “Sounds to me like you’re not a big fan of Mr. Rip.”
“No, I’m not. The man tried to damage our business, claiming donna.vip was just a silly little whim. Around the time of the divorce there was a hostile takeove
r attempt I’m sure was instigated by Mr. Rip. Luckily with the help of a few private backers we managed to get it overturned. It’s clear to me Donna’s ex tried to destroy her company out of sheer spite.”
“And now he’s destroyed its owner and founder,” Odelia said softly.
“As I said, you didn’t hear it from me. I’m still the CEO, and it’s a tough world out there. I don’t need this to come back to me.”
“What do you think will happen to the company now that Donna is gone?” Chase asked.
“I have no idea. I just hope she made the necessary arrangements. Many of these business tycoons don’t, thinking they’re immortal. And then when they die the whole thing is taken over by a bunch of bumbling relatives and run into the ground within a year. I hope she didn’t make that mistake.”
They left Hillary to take an urgent business call, and ambled into the kitchen, where the housekeeper, Jackie Laboeuf, was busy preparing breakfast. The sturdily-built woman with the raven-black hair looked up when they entered.
“Hi, Mrs. Laboeuf,” said Chase, producing his badge. “My name is Chase Kingsley and I’m the detective in charge of this case. This is Odelia Poole, civilian consultant to the Hampton Cove Police Department. Can we ask you a few questions?”
The woman sniffed, dabbing a handkerchief the size of a dish towel to her eyes. “Ask away, Detective. The sooner you catch the monster that did this the better. How anyone could hurt Mrs. B is beyond me. The woman was a saint.”
“You were the one who found her?”
“Yes, I’m sorry to say that I was. I come in every morning around eight, to take care of breakfast and organize the household, and usually when I arrive Mrs. B is waiting for me and we sit down to discuss any ongoing things and plan out the rest of the day. But this morning as I let myself in with my key there was no one here. And when I went looking for her, I…” Her voice faltered and she brought the dish towel to her eyes again, then proceeded to loudly blow her nose in it. “I’m sorry. This has all come as a big shock to me.”
“Wasn’t there any security?” asked Odelia.
Jackie shook her head. “Mrs. B fired See-Cure last week. They weren’t up to her usual standards. There had been reporters that had managed to get close to the house, with one even snapping a picture of Mrs. B while she was taking a bath. You may have seen the picture. It was all over the Internet.”
“So she fired the security company but didn’t replace them?”
“She was in talks with one other company operating out of Amagansett, but the contracts hadn’t been signed yet, so the cameras were all switched off and the fence wasn’t hooked up to anything. But we did have the dogs, so Mrs. B wasn’t worried.”
“Right,” said Chase dubiously. “Rex and Rollo. Not exactly guard dogs, are they?”
“They’re pretty good barkers. And they’ll bite anyone they don’t like, especially reporters.”
It was obvious the housekeeper wasn’t fond of reporters, which wasn’t surprising as they hadn’t been kind to Donna Bruce and her website, heaping more scorn on her and her project than praise over the years.
“Do you have any idea who might have done this to her?” asked Odelia.
Jackie Laboeuf shook her head, tears springing to her eyes again. “It might be those reporters,” she said, harping on the same theme.
“But why would a reporter murder Donna Bruce?” asked Chase.
“They hated her,” the housekeeper burst out. “For some reason they just hated her. And is it so hard to believe that one of them just went nuts and killed her? That lot is obviously capable of anything.”
“What about Mrs. Bruce’s ex-husband?” asked Odelia. “Tad Rip?”
Jackie shrugged. “It might have been him. Though why he would kill the mother of his children is beyond me. He might be a douche but he’s not a murdering douche.”
“So you knew Mr. Rip?”
“Of course I knew Mr. Rip. I’ve been working for Mrs. B for coming up on fifteen years now,” she said proudly. “I was here when they brought Sweetums and Honeychild home. Such a happy couple they were back then. You should have seen how proud Mr. Rip was. But that was before he and Mrs. B had a falling-out, of course.”
“Why did they divorce?” asked Odelia.
“Couldn’t keep his hands off his secretaries,” said Jackie with a snort. “She forgave him more than once, but after the fifth or the sixth—I lost count—she kicked him out. Even made sure he never got to see his kids again.” She shook her head. “That was one mean divorce. All fought out in the press, of course.”
“Of course,” said Odelia softly. “What’s going to happen to the kids now?”
“They’ll go and live with their father I suppose,” said Jackie. Then, as the uncertainty of her own fate came home to her, she dissolved into tears again.
When they left the unfortunate housekeeper, she’d just taken out a clean dish towel and was burying her face in it.
“So sad,” Odelia murmured as they stepped into the foyer.
“Yeah, the poor woman was obviously very attached to her employer,” Chase agreed. “Which doesn’t mean we should rule her out as a suspect, of course.”
“A suspect? But why? Why would she kill Donna? She’s not only losing her position but obviously one she was extremely fond of.”
“I don’t know,” said Chase, fiddling with his notebook. “That’s what we’re here to find out.”
There was a commotion outside, and Odelia looked up. The ruckus seemed to come from the front gate, and when they stepped outside, she saw that a group of protesters were marching down the drive in the direction of the house. A few of the police officers tried to head them off, and the end result was a very voluble confrontation.
“Who are those people?” she asked as she watched the scene.
“Let’s find out, shall we?” Chase suggested, and set foot for the altercation.
She followed him reluctantly. She hadn’t come here to get into a brawl with a bunch of protestors. When they came closer, she saw that they were brandishing placards that read, ‘Down With The Wall!’ ‘No To The Wall!’ ‘Don’t Take Away Our Sun!’
“What’s all this?” asked Chase as he addressed what appeared to be the most vocal protestor of the bunch. He was a red-haired red-faced man shouting, ‘Down With The Wall!’ at the top of his lungs, while engaged in a shoving match with two officers.
“They want to have a word with Donna Bruce, sir,” said one of the officers.
“You damn right we want to have a word with Donna Bruce!” the protestor yelled. “She will build her wall over our dead bodies! Do you hear me, cop! Over my dead body!”
He’d gotten right in Chase’s face. Spittle was flying and testosterone was pumping.
“I need you to back off, sir,” said Chase. “This is private property.”
“I don’t care!” yelled the guy. “I want to see Donna and I’m not leaving until I do!”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” said Chase, his face reddening.
“And who’s going to stop me, huh? You? You’re all protecting her, aren’t you? The whole lot of you! Well, I’m not taking any more of this crap!”
And with these words, he charged forward, embarking on a mad dash toward the house. But he hadn’t counted on Chase, who uttered a few choice curse words and then chased after the man, tackling him before he’d gone twenty yards.
The protestor, obviously not too well pleased, screamed, “Get off me, you Nazi pig!” and proceeded to hit Chase over the head with his placard. At this, Chase hauled off and hit the man in the eye. “Hey! What did you have to go and do that for?!” said the protestor dumbly, and then promptly collapsed on the ground, out for the count.
Chapter 6
The reenactment of Fight Club had taken us by surprise. Hidden beneath Odelia’s pickup, we’d had a first-row seat to the entire show, from the arrival of the dozen or so protestors to the takedown of the most fiery one of the lot by
Chase. The man soon came to, and was tucked into a squad car and shipped off to the police station.
“Wow, did you see that?” asked Brutus. “That was one great punch!”
“Such a violent man,” tsk-tsked Harriet.
“Yeah, good thing Chase was here to take him out,” I said.
“I mean Chase. Who goes and punches an innocent man like that?”
We all stared at the Persian. “Wait, what?” I cried. “Chase is the hero here. Who knows what that dude was up to.”
“All he was doing was exercising his right to protest as stated in the Constitution.”
“Right to protest? He was charging the house!”
“With a placard as a weapon,” said Harriet. “Big threat.”
“Well, he still had no right to be here. This is private property and he was trespassing.”
“We are trespassing on private property,” Harriet argued. “Nobody ever gave us permission to be here, so technically we’re in violation too. But you don’t see Chase punching our lights out, do you?”
“That’s because we’re here with Odelia,” I pointed out. “So we’re not trespassing at all. We’re part of the police effort to find the killer of the owner of this private property.”
Harriet studied her nails. “You can argue all you want, Max, but the fact remains that Chase just punched a man and now I’m seeing him in an entirely different light.”
“In a great, wonderful light,” I said. “In the light of heroism! He saved us from crazy protestor guy.”
“The man has a violent streak and I for one think Odelia should be warned.”
“He does not have a violent streak! He was protecting us!”
“From a placard,” said Harriet skeptically.
“I think Harriet is right,” said Dooley.
I wheeled around. “What?!”
“Chase had no reason to punch that man. He could have simply pointed out to him in a firm voice that he was trespassing and kindly have requested him to leave.”
“He did! And the guy called him a Nazi pig!”
“Well, I’m sure it’s all one big misunderstanding,” said Dooley vaguely, directing a keen look at Harriet. Then it dawned on me. He was simply trying to get in good with the feisty white cat. Nice! My best friend was openly disagreeing with me so he could score points with Harriet. Great going, Dooley.