Nine Lives

by Wendy Corsi Staub

  Jiffy’s opinion might overrule Bella’s, but clearly Grant’s trumps all.

  She turns to him. “I doubt anything would be open around here at that hour.”

  “You’d be surprised.”

  She sighs inwardly. Lately, she’s been nothing but surprised at every turn.

  Leaving Max and Grant to their celestial search, she heads back inside to learn how to hand-rear a newborn kitten.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The wind is blowing again, and the wind chimes are chiming too loudly again, and . . .

  And the alarm clock is bleating. Again.

  Bella fumbles on the bedside table to silence it, wondering why it’s so dark.

  Slowly, it comes back to her: it isn’t morning.

  Well, technically, it is: four o’clock in the morning.

  The last time she got up, it was two o’clock, only she hadn’t slept more than ten or fifteen minutes before the alarm went off that time.

  That’s what happens when you go to bed at midnight with a troubled mind and a belly full of cheeseburger and most of Max’s leftover French fries.

  He had, indeed, managed to eat a burger without knocking out his loose tooth. And there is, indeed, an all-night diner around here. Grant had driven straight there—on back roads, of course—after they left Doctor Bailey’s office. He even managed to convince her that the crateful of felines would be fine in the car for half an hour while they went inside to get a bite to eat.

  How could she refuse? Max was beside himself with excitement at being out in a restaurant so late at night, especially when Grant told him to order anything he wanted.

  “You, too,” he said to Bella. “It’s on me.”

  He wouldn’t take no for an answer—about the money or the food. Anyway, she suddenly seemed to have a voracious appetite, as did Max. So she pushed aside her misgivings about her son eating burgers and fries with someone who wasn’t Sam. She ordered a meal for herself, too, and she let Grant pay. She felt guilty, but she had no choice.

  Lately, she doesn’t seem to have a choice about anything, does she?

  With a yawn, she gets out of bed quietly so as not to disturb Max and starts to feel her way across the room toward the crate.

  Her bare foot slams into the post at the foot of the bed.

  “Ouch!” She hops, rubbing her stubbed pinky toe.

  Max stirs. “Mommy?”

  “It’s okay, kiddo. I’m just being clumsy as usual,” she whispers. “Go back to sleep.”

  “What about the kitties?”

  “They’re fine. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of them.”

  And you. And everything.

  I’ve got this.

  Beyond the window, the sky has cleared, and the light of a fat full moon spills through the lace curtains, pooling on the floor where Chance lies nursing all but one of her kittens. Little Spidey, as she now affectionately calls him—“for short”—is nestled at his mother’s furry side, his faint mews only audible when Bella is standing right over him.

  She swiftly assembles the syringe, the tube, the formula, and a soft cloth on Leona’s dresser top and measures two milliliters of formula into the syringe the way Doctor Bailey showed her. Then she gingerly extracts the runt from the nest, swaddles him in the cloth, and gently inserts the tube into his mouth. The veterinarian was right. He’s learning to swallow it without as much of a struggle now, knowing that it will result in a comfortably full belly for a while.

  For the third time since they left the animal hospital, she settles wearily into a chair to feed him.

  Sitting there in the moonlight dutifully tending to a swaddled, famished newborn, she realizes that every part of her—save her throbbing toe—is numb with exhaustion. Tube and syringe aside, it all feels so familiar . . .

  Just like the wee-hour feedings when Max was a baby.

  Five years ago, he slept in a cradle on her side of the king-sized bed in a room very much like this one. She nursed him in a chair by the window.

  At first, in a valiant show of parental solidarity, Sam insisted on getting up with her for every feeding. He would hover, perched on the arm of the chair, watching Max eat, making conversation when she would have preferred the quiet.

  “I’m afraid that if I don’t talk to you, you’ll fall asleep,” he’d say.

  “Believe me, I won’t.”

  “But I might.” She can hear his laugh, hear him offering to burp the baby and singing silly songs to Max as he changed his diaper afterward.

  Eventually, the novelty wore off, and Bella told him not to bother getting up. He had an early commuter train to catch, and anyway, she didn’t mind when it was just her and Max. Just mother and son with the world all to themselves in those hushed hours.

  Yawning deeply, lost in drowsy twilight, she can hear Sam’s voice calling from the bed, “Are you two okay over there, Bella Blue?”

  “We’re okay,” she whispers, and for a moment, before reality dawns, she expects a reply.

  Why do memories of Sam seem to pop up more constantly here than they even did back home?

  Not at first, of course. The first few months after she lost him, there was a constant ache. But as time went on, before she left Bedford, there were occasions when she almost forgot. There would be moments when she’d be going about her daily business—at work, at the grocery store, even, sometimes, at home—and she would feel like her old self again.

  Here in Lily Dale, though . . .

  It’s like he’s everywhere.

  Maybe these people are rubbing off on her, with their philosophy that the dead are hanging around among, and interacting with, the living.

  All the more reason to get out of here as soon as she can.

  Chance’s eyes glitter in the dark, keeping a protective watch over her kitten on Bella’s lap.

  “It’s going to be okay,” she whispers—one mom to another. “I promise. I’ll figure it out.”

  It was too late when they returned to the Dale to talk to Odelia about taking on the cat and kittens, plus this special-needs one. And she didn’t want to bring it up to Grant in front of Max.

  The two of them seemed to have bonded over the binoculars while Bella was otherwise occupied in the hospital room. Over their late-night meal at the diner, Grant regaled her son with tales of his exotic travels. He’d dined with sultans, hunted big game, climbed the highest mountains, sailed the seven seas, and seen all seven wonders of the world—and then some.

  At least, that’s what he’d claimed. Maybe he was embellishing for Max’s sake, or maybe every word of his story is true. Maybe he really is a venture capitalist with a penchant for adventure and a soft spot for kids, kittens, and his foster mother.

  If not, well then at least she’s no longer convinced, or even speculating, that he’s a murderous pirate in a hoodie. She’s too rational—or maybe just too busy, not to mention crippled by mind-numbing fatigue—to entertain outlandish notions.

  She settles the sated Spidey back into the crook of his mother’s arm and sets aside the feeding equipment on the dresser beside the stack of papers she’d found scattered on the floor this afternoon—make that yesterday afternoon. She never did have a chance to ask Max about them. Too much has gone on.

  I’ll ask him tomorrow—I mean today, she thinks as she climbs back into bed and resets the alarm for six o’clock.

  Just as her eyes drift closed, she hears stealthy footsteps moving along the hall and then down the stairs.

  One of the guests, no doubt. Maybe Steve Pierson, the early riser. For a moment, she wonders if she should go brew the coffee. Or at least investigate.

  But she can’t seem to muster the energy to open her eyes, much less lift her head from the pillow and her body from the bed.

  It isn’t long before sleep overtakes her, again bringing the wind chimes’ foreboding knell and Leona’s haunted face staring back at her in the bathroom mirror.

  * * *

  Too soon, Bella is once again startled
awake. But this time, it isn’t the alarm that jars her from the familiar dream.

  It’s a shrill, distant little scream in the night.

  She sits up in bed, heart pounding.

  Beside her in the dark, Max is snoring softly.

  The cry must have come from the box of kittens. She must have slept through Spidey’s next feeding.

  No—according to the bedside clock, she’s only been asleep for ten or fifteen minutes.

  Straining her ears, she can hear muffled feline mews, but the sound that woke her was different.

  She must have been dreaming.

  Yes, that’s right. She was. As she settles back against the pillow, it comes back to her—the recurring dream about Leona in the bathroom on the windy night right before she drowned in the lake.

  She never gets to that point in the dream. It always cuts off right there in the bathroom, with the eerie wind chimes becoming louder and increasingly discordant. Somehow, she senses what’s coming.

  She—as in Leona.

  Why does Bella morph into Leona in her dream? Why does she see things through the eyes of a woman she never met and feel whatever Leona was feeling that night?

  She was so uneasy. Frightened, even.

  Something must have lured her out into the storm to the water—or someone dragged her or carried her. She never would have ventured out on her own.

  You don’t know that, though. It was just a dream. You can’t really think—

  The thought is curtailed by a dull thud from somewhere below.

  This time, it wasn’t a dream.

  For a long time, Bella listens for something more.

  She hears nothing at all.

  Logic tells her that it was just one of the guests moving around downstairs. A deep yawn overtakes her. And then another.

  She rolls over, deciding she’d better get some sleep while she still can.

  * * *

  Beyond the lace curtains, the sun is coming up at last. Bella can hear birds chirping beyond the screen as she pulls a T-shirt over her head.

  After forcing herself out of bed for baby Spidey’s six o’clock feeding, she’d taken a quick, bracingly cold shower in an effort to revive herself and perhaps appear somewhat presentable.

  It hasn’t quite done the trick on either count.

  Maybe some coffee will help.

  Coffee and a hairbrush.

  Looking into the bureau mirror, brushing the tangles out of her damp hair, she again remembers her dream.

  But just like yesterday, the morning light brings reassurance. It seems silly to have lost even a moment’s sleep fretting about something so insubstantial.

  A dream is just a dream. It isn’t evidence of foul play—regardless of what the medium next door might have to say about that.

  Not even if the medium next door had precisely the same dream?

  Choosing to ignore that, she reminds herself that there’s no legitimate reason to conclude that Leona’s demise was anything more than an accident.

  You have more than enough real problems to waste any more time worrying about imaginary ones.

  She sets aside the brush and finds the sheaf of papers she’d picked up from the floor. It’s yet another violation of Leona’s privacy, but curiosity gets the best of her. Especially when she comprehends that she’s looking at a real estate contract.

  Shuffling the pages into order, she sees that Leona sold a Wyoming dude ranch—also called Valley View Manor—to an upscale hotel chain. The contract is dated several years ago, and it lists an astronomical sum of money.

  Which means that if Leona Gatto hung onto that money, she may have been worth far more than either Luther and Odelia seemed to realize—at least, according to yesterday’s conversation. Either Leona chose not to tell them, or they chose not to mention it to each other—or to Bella.

  Again, paranoia mingles with suspicion, and her mind flies through the possibilities.

  Another if—big if, huge if: if Leona was murdered, could money have been the motive?

  That would make Grant one of the most logical suspects. As Leona’s trusted confidante and only heir, surely he had some inkling that her financial situation was hardly in keeping with her humble lifestyle.

  But Pandora and her ex-husband Orville may also have been aware. According to another real estate contract in the stacked papers, Leona had purchased this place from Orville Holmes a few years after she’d sold her Wyoming property. Of course, Valley View Manor Guesthouse had cost her a mere fraction of what she’d made on Valley View Manor Ranch. But she’d paid in cash. That very well might have sent the message There’s more where that came from.

  What about Odelia, Leona’s trusted friend? Had she really hurt her leg because she was clumsy? Or could she have hurt it in some kind of struggle . . . perhaps with Leona?

  Is that any more implausible than anything else that’s happened here?

  Quickly looking through the rest of the documents she’d gathered from the floor, Bella sees that they mainly consist of financial paperwork: bank statements, investment accounts, legal contracts—that sort of thing. She can’t go over it now—and maybe she should leave that to Luther. But it’s too early to call him, and anyway, it’s time to get moving.

  She takes one last look in the mirror. With straggly hair and an outfit more suited to housework than playing hostess, she’s not likely to set any hearts afire this morning. Not even Karl Adabner’s.

  Oh, well. At least I’m on my feet, she thinks, and shoves them into her sandals.

  Oops—not hers at all. She takes one step in them, trips, and nearly falls.

  Why do I keep trying to walk around in your shoes? she asks Leona silently. She could have sworn she’d put them away yesterday after this happened. She swaps out the sandals for her own pair. But the strap rubs so painfully against her pinky that she takes them right off again, remembering that she stubbed her toe on the bedpost in the middle of the night.

  She’s definitely overtired. Maybe deliriously so.

  But it’s worthwhile.

  She looks down at the crate on the floor. Ever noble, Queen Chance reclines regally on the nest of towels. Most of her furry subjects are nursing, a couple of others are squirming around making pipsqueak sounds, and Spidey is snoozing contentedly beneath his mama’s arm. Chance bestows a dignified stare upon Bella.

  “That was a long night for both of us, wasn’t it?” Bella whispers, reaching down to pet the M on her head. “But we made it through. Everything’s going to be all right. I promise. I won’t let you down. Any of you. I’ll figure this out.”

  The promise is rewarded with a slow blink from those green eyes, leaving Bella feeling vaguely like Doctor Doolittle.

  She turns toward the closet. Her suitcase sits within its shadows atop the tapestry straps of a folding wooden rack. Unwilling to wake Max by turning on the overhead light, she fumbles inside, feeling around for sneakers and a pair of socks.

  She finds one sneaker, finds the socks, drops one as she looks for the other sneaker, and manages to drop the other as she crawls on the floor to feel around for the first one. As she blindly manages to retrieve both socks and shoves them into the back pocket of her shorts, she decides that unlike Grant, she doesn’t enjoy living out of a suitcase.

  Yet the thought of unpacking doesn’t sit well, either. Is it because she doesn’t want to bother, since she’s only going to be here for a few days? Or because she wants to be able to make a quick getaway when it’s time? Or because she’s afraid she might be tempted to stay?

  Where the heck is her other sneaker?

  As frustrated with the search as with the flurry of questions in her mind, she gives up and puts on the sandals again—this time, the right ones. She’ll have to suffer with the sore toe for now.

  Just as she did yesterday morning, she leaves the key in the inside lock for Max, using the one on her key ring to lock the outside. The hallway is deserted, every door still closed.

  Morning
sunlight falls through the stairway’s circular stained-glass windowpane, casting a fluid prism across the hardwood landing. The kitchen, too, is flooded with light, with a view of the sparkling, brilliant blue lake.

  Yes, everything seems brighter today. Somehow, it’s all going to be okay.

  She hears the front door open and then close. Footsteps head into the breakfast room.

  “Coffee’s coming,” she calls to whoever it is as she hastily scoops coffee grounds into a paper filter.

  “It’s okay.” Grant appears in the doorway, fully dressed in jeans and a polo shirt, holding a newspaper and a paper hot cup. “Already got my caffeine fix, though this is gas station coffee, so I’ll swap it for yours if it’s on the way.”

  “It is. Sorry you had to go out for it.”

  “I was going out for the paper anyway. Do you know how far you have to drive around here to get a copy of the Wall Street Journal?”

  “Can’t you just access it online?”

  “I like paper,” he says with a shrug as she presses the button to start the brew cycle. “I’m an old-fashioned guy. And Internet access isn’t always reliable around here. I learned that the hard way the first time I visited Leona here, when I couldn’t check in for my flight and lost my seat. I was stuck here an extra day.”

  “Stuck, and out of luck, huh?”

  “I thought so at the time. Now I’m grateful for every day I got to spend with Leona.”

  Seeing the genuine sorrow in his eyes, she wonders how she could have thought he was an imposter. Thank goodness she hadn’t confronted him last night—or worse yet, tried to escape his clutches on the way to the animal hospital. Imagine if she had grabbed Max and the box of kitties and jumped out of the car at high speed?

  Come on, you wouldn’t have actually done it. You just wished you could, in a moment of panic.

  What a difference a day—or rather, just daylight—makes.

  She turns on the flame beneath the teakettle and wonders how to segue into asking him to take over with the kittens.

  “So,” she says casually, pouring half-and-half into a pitcher, “how long are you planning to stay here?”

  “Only through the weekend. I have an important meeting next week in New York.”