by Julie Chase
I had to find the killer before I wound up just like Viktor.
Chapter Six
Furry Godmother’s hard truth: Life isn’t perfect and neither is your outfit.
Penelope and I arrived at my parents’ house an hour early the next morning. Dad had promised me pancakes via text message before bed, but I suspected the invitation was a ploy to get me there and check me for signs of a nervous breakdown. Either way, I loved pancakes and my father, so I wouldn’t have missed it. Most people knew Dad as Dr. Crocker, the locally adored veterinarian. To me, he was infinitely more, but most specifically a confidant, hero, and friend.
I pulled my Volkswagen onto the driveway behind my family’s modest five-thousand-square-foot Victorian and pressed the shifter into park. Mom’s great-grandfather had commissioned the home, complete with scrolling gingerbread woodwork and muted mauve-and-olive color scheme, in the late nineteenth century. I’d grown up here, reared in the shadow of my mother and grandmother before me, but it was Dad who’d made my childhood fun.
He strode into view as I unbuckled and climbed out, crossing the lawn to my side from the renovated barn on their property, which had served as his veterinary practice all my life. “There’s my girl.” He kissed my cheek.
“Hi, Daddy.”
He rounded the hood of my car to retrieve Penelope’s carrier from the passenger seat. “I’m so glad you ladies made time for an old man and some pancakes.”
I followed him onto the porch with a smile. “You’re not old.” He was barely fifty-five. “You’re younger than George Clooney, and when have I ever turned down pancakes?”
A wild squawk turned me around on the porch. “What on earth was that?” The sound came again, this time louder and with a series of naughty words at the end.
“Parrot,” Dad said. “He’s got a broken wing and a potty mouth. I just hope none of my other patients bring anyone under eighteen with them today.”
“When did you get a parrot patient?” I asked.
“Yesterday. He’s from the NPP, actually.”
I took a moment to kick the notion around. “Chase thought Big Splash might’ve followed a parrot outside.”
Dad released Penelope in the rear hall, then locked the back door behind us. “I’m not sure what a Big Splash is, but the parrot definitely left the pageant unsupervised. He was collected from Armstrong Park with an injured wing.” Dad gave me a careful once-over, expression turning parental and sad. “How are you doing? Your mom said you were fine, but I know what you saw yesterday was awful, and sometimes things like that can take a little while to sink in and take hold.”
“I’m okay,” I promised. I wasn’t sure that was completely true, but it was true enough for the moment.
I still had to fess up about the threat I’d received last night by courier, and that was bound to change my emotional status. Dad would hate to hear it. Mom would wonder what I’d done to provoke it, and I didn’t particularly want to relive it.
He slid an arm across my shoulders and steered me into the dining room, where my mother sat with a cup of coffee and the morning paper. She took her glasses off to look at me. “What are you wearing?”
She was wearing a baby-blue blouse and pearls.
Dad kissed my cheek. “Good luck.” He ducked into the kitchen, presumably to avoid the line of fire, but there was no hiding necessary today. Today was a day of truce for me.
“I’m glad you asked,” I said, doing a slow twirl for her. I’d intentionally chosen something to wear that Mom would have to love. “This delightful number is a designer, butternut-yellow silk wrap dress that my mother saw in a shop window last month and suggested would look delightful on me.” Hopefully it would cushion her response to my bike-delivered threat.
“You went back and bought it?”
“Yes, ma’am.” And I’d kept it in my arsenal for the next time I needed to deliver bad news. Now I needed to go back for a few more because, in my experience, threats to my safety rarely ended after just one.
Her lips formed a small smile. “Your mother is clearly a genius. You look stunning.”
I performed a curtsy, then took a seat across from her at the elaborate, hand-carved antique table for twelve. Per the usual, only three seats had settings. Dad at the head and Mom and me on either side. “How’s it going with locating a new venue?” I asked.
“Fine.” Mom stirred her caramel-colored coffee with calm confidence. “I’m looking at the Audubon Tea Room today. The committee and I have been invited for lunch and a proper tour. You’re more than welcome to join us, though I suppose you’re busy.”
“I have to open Furry Godmother,” I said. “It’s just Imogene and me until I get time to hire some help.” I bit down on the insides of my cheeks. I hadn’t meant to bring up needing help. I’d crossed into dangerous territory. I’d once babysat for the girl who’d helped me last summer while she was home from college. She was unavailable this year because she was getting married.
“I spoke with Paige’s mother,” Mom said. “She’s home again right now, but she doesn’t have any free time.”
I let my eyelids fall shut. “I know.”
“She’s planning a wedding,” Mom said. “Isn’t that nice?”
I forced my eyes open and tipped my head with a bright smile. “Yep.”
I poured a cup of coffee from the carafe on the table and sucked in a mouthful. I’d need a little caffeine in my system for the direction this train had taken. “Some man is very lucky,” I said. “Paige is a doll.”
“Indeed.” Mom stared.
I avoided eye contact.
“I noticed you talking with Chase Hawthorne yesterday,” she said, uncrossing then recrossing her legs. “You two are thick as thieves this year.”
I nodded. “We are.” I’d always thought Chase was handsome, but we’d lost touch until last summer. Then I’d broken my leg escaping a lunatic in the fall, and Chase had stuck by my side while I’d healed. We’d bonded over weeks of bad television and a lifetime of shared memories. I loved Chase deeply, and I had no doubt he knew that. I was sure he felt the same way. I just wasn’t sure the love we had was the kind either of us wanted.
“Well?” she asked. “What are you going to do about that?”
“About what?”
“You and Chase,” she said. “I’ve never seen a pair of adults so close who refuse to so much as go out on a proper date. I can’t understand it. Your children would be beautiful.”
Dad arrived wearing a ruffled apron, oven mitts, and a semi-panicked expression. These days, the only discussions more heated than the ones centering on my wardrobe were those involving my love life. “Pancakes!” He set the tray between Mom and me, then made a second trip for toppings.
The disruption didn’t faze Mom. “I saw him on his veranda last night when I got home. He said he went by to check on you, but Jack Oliver’s truck was there. What was that about?”
I let my head fall forward. It was nearly impossible to buy a home in the Garden District, but Chase had somehow managed to buy the one right next door to my parents’ five months ago. I hadn’t even known the home was for sale.
Now I had to segue from my tragic love life to the other topic I didn’t want to discuss. “I had to call Jack because a bike messenger delivered a threat to my doorstep. I even had to sign for it.”
Dad nearly collapsed onto his chair. “What?”
I passed my phone to him. A picture of the stuffed cat and note was centered on the screen. “Jack is looking into it.”
Mom gaped. “Is this about Viktor Petrov?” She craned her neck for a better look at the image in Dad’s hands. “He’s barely cold.”
Dad grimaced, his pale face whiter than his dress shirt. “You aren’t looking into that man’s fall.”
It wasn’t a question.
“I didn’t do anything,” I said. “All I did was go to Viktor’s dressing room to get his playbook.” And find thirty-eight thousand dollars. And see a pet owne
r arguing with a PA. And vow publicly to get to the bottom of things and save Eva.
“Jack was at your house on official business?” Mom asked. “Nothing more?”
Dad dropped my phone onto the table and stabbed a pancake with unnecessary aggression. “That’s hardly the most important part of this conversation.”
“Jack was off duty when I called,” I said, helping myself to a stack of warm buttery pancakes, “but he came anyway when I sent him the photos.”
“I know you like him,” Mom said, “and he likes you. That’s painfully evident to everyone in this district. More painful to some than others,” she added under her breath, “but you should think long and hard before you jump into anything with a cop.”
“Why?” I clamped my mouth shut the moment the word was out, hoping uselessly that my mother would show enough grace not to answer.
“Is that really what you want for your life?” she asked. “A significant other who may or may not come home from work every night? Someone who could leave you a widow at any moment?”
I stuffed my mouth full of pancake so I couldn’t respond. Anything said in my mother’s presence could and would be held against me until I died.
“A life like that is bound to give you premature grays, wrinkles, and stress weight,” she continued.
I shoved another hunk of carbs into my mouth. The conversation was irrelevant. Jack had never given voice to any feelings he had about me beyond frustration and, occasionally, entertainment. So, as much as I liked Jack, and as much as I thought he liked me too, until he told me how he felt, what I thought I knew didn’t matter. People didn’t start relationships on hopeful speculation.
“Chase would make a lovely husband,” Mom said. “He’s handsome, charming, witty, and he puts up with your tomfoolery. Even starts some of it, I imagine. You’re perfect together, and he believes in you, Lacy.”
Chase also believed the French Quarter was haunted, but I doubted Mom wanted to hear that right now.
I waved my white linen napkin in surrender.
“Fine,” Mom conceded. “Did Jack stay long after he took the stuffed cat and note?”
“A little while,” I said. “Scarlet was there, and the three of us talked until after midnight before they both headed home.”
“Scarlet,” Mom said. “There’s a girl who has her head on her shoulders.”
I concentrated on my breakfast while Dad fumed silently over my recent threat and Mom sang Scarlet’s praises.
I’d been up until nearly dawn researching the National Pet Pageant by skimming pet owner blogs and newspaper articles from around the country. Most of the material I’d found was overblown and grossly sensationalized, but I was shocked at the number of scandals involving Viktor Petrov. More peculiar still was the fact that the online pet community seemed to have accepted his misogynistic tyrannical ways. Instead of him being kicked off the pageant for his horrible behavior, ticket sales had increased every year. The public loved it. It was just as Mrs. Smart had said. Fans couldn’t get enough of his spectacle.
I couldn’t help wondering what the people on the receiving end of his wrath thought of him. Even Eva had slapped him, and she was the most mild-mannered human on earth.
“Well, are you ready?” Mom asked, standing over me and clearing my empty plate.
“What?” When did I finish all four pancakes?
Mom huffed. “You need to adjust the hem on the gown you made me. I’ve chosen my shoes, and the dress needs to be taken up or it won’t fall along my ankles properly.” She hiked one perfectly sculptured brow. “We talked about this last week. Or have you forgotten already?”
I followed Mom to the master bedroom. The world beyond her spotless glass doorknobs was exquisitely decorated with plush wall-to-wall carpeting and soaked in the powdery scents of makeup and Chanel No. 5. A stretch of sensored lights flashed on as we entered her personal closet, illuminating rows of dresses, blouses, and jackets alongside shelves of sweaters, jeans, and shoes. I smiled at the jeans. She hadn’t owned a single pair a year ago, but she’d admitted in the spring that I was having an impact on her fashion choices.
“I’ll just be a minute,” Mom said, slipping behind her screen to change. She emerged in the pastel replica of a gown I’d made in college. I’d recently worn the original to a fancy dinner party, and Mom had fallen in love. She’d requested one of her own, in lilac, and I’d agreed.
“Beautiful,” I said, lending her my hand as she stepped onto the small pedestal set before her mirrors.
“Thank you. You do marvelous work,” she said. “Which reminds me, your store has been open a year now, and it’s time we marked that milestone with a party.”
“Oh, no thank you,” I said, lining her hem with pins. I had enough going on without worrying about the details of a party.
Mom, on the other hand, never tired of details. Mom was a party-throwing machine. Her events were lavish and frequent. Invitations were coveted, and despite the significant amount of time she’d devoted to the NPP, she’d still managed to host three luncheons and two dinner parties this month.
“I don’t need a party,” I repeated, in case she’d missed my previous response. The faraway look in her eyes suggested she had.
“You have to do something to commemorate the milestone,” she scoffed. “It’s a big deal.”
“I know. I was thinking of offering a discount on merchandise or BOGO pupcakes and tuna tarts.”
Mom grabbed handfuls of her skirt and whipped the material out of my hands. She glared down at me. “Be serious.”
“I am,” I said. “I don’t need a party for staying in business. The fact I’m still in business is reward enough.” I tugged her skirt back over her ankles and slipped the final few pins in before she had another outburst.
Thankfully, her ringing cell phone diverted her attention while I double-checked my work. “What do you think?” I asked when she hung up.
Mom twisted at the waist before her mirror. “Very nice. Thank you.” She grabbed her original outfit and headed for the screen to change again. “Aren’t you going to ask who I was talking with?”
“No. That would be rude.”
She frowned. Probably because she always asked who I was talking to. “It was Mary Jean. She said Jack released Eva last night. Did you know that? Are you the reason he let her go?”
“No,” I answered honestly. “We barely talked about Eva last night, and when I tried to discuss her with him earlier in the day, he blew me off.”
Mom made a sour face, then stepped behind the screen.
I left the closet.
Voodoo was on her four-poster cat bed near the window in my parents’ master suite, tail flipping lazily as she sunned herself.
Penelope had a pink cushion in my bedroom in Uptown but preferred to sleep on my head.
A few minutes later, Mom led the way back to the dining room, listing things that needed to be taken care of for a smooth transition of NPP venues. “Don’t be late tonight,” she warned. “We’ll need all hands on deck if we’re going to pull off a relocation of this magnitude. And be sure to wear what you have on. It’s perfect. Also, try not to act surprised when I call you forward. We’re down by a judge now that Mackey has stepped into the role of MC, so you’re up.”
I stopped moving, and Mom went on several steps without me. “Up where?”
She turned back, looking exasperated. “It’s an expression. It means you’re the replacement judge.”
“I can’t judge,” I said.
Mom turned forward once more and marched on.
“I’m serious. I’m not qualified,” I said, hurrying after her. “This is a national pageant. There’s a lot at stake, and I don’t know anything about pets except how cute they are.”
“You know as much about pets as anyone. You grew up watching your father care for every pet in the district. You own a shop where you bake for and dress them. There are always five judges. We’re down one, so you’re up.”
Mom stopped in the dining room and hiked her bossy eyebrow.
I pressed a fingertip to the twitching skin beneath mine. “Great.”
“Good.”
“Fine.”
Dad stood to greet us with Penelope purring happily in his arms. “I was going to crate her for you when I heard you coming.”
“It’s no problem,” I said. “You’ve already caught her, and that’s sometimes half the battle.”
He smiled. “I didn’t crate her because I know you’ve got a full schedule, and I thought I could keep her with me at the office instead. There’s no need to tote her to work, then over to the theater, then off to the Tea Room when she can spend the day with Voodoo and me.”
I gave Penelope a long look. He was right. All that running around amounted to a lot of time in her crate, and she couldn’t run loose at the theater or the Tea Room, not to mention the commutes. “You don’t mind?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t have volunteered if I did.”
* * *
I parked at the end of the block farthest from Furry Godmother and hurried along the sidewalk toward my shop. The searing summer sun and suffocating humidity baked my skin and aggressively accosted my wrap dress. The most I could hope for was to reach the cool air-conditioning of my shop before there were permanent sweat stains on the silk.
Meanwhile, the Garden District was hard at work earning its name. Bees buzzed around bountiful baskets of seasonal flowers hanging from streetlamps overhead. Every corner, every windowsill, every grassy knoll was alive with an eruption of color, and the air was scented with its bouquet. I jumped a little river of water leaking from a gardener’s hose as he watered the city’s landscaping and hustled toward the crowd outside my still closed shop door.
A woman in a flowy skirt and a peasant top smiled up at me from the bench outside my window as I passed. Big gold-framed sunglasses covered her eyes and mounds of wild blonde hair hid parts of her face as the wind blew. I ushered the customers inside, flipped the lights on, then poked my head back through the open door to admire the sleek black cat on her lap. He was a dead ringer for Voodoo. The woman, however, looked a little lost.