by Molly Fitz
Once inside, I began to shout for my cat at the top of my lungs. But even after tearing through the entire house, I still couldn’t find him. “Octo-Cat! Octo-Cat! Are you here? Come out! It’s safe!”
When no answer came, I rounded on Breanne once more. “Where is he? Why did you take him? How could you?”
“I don’t have your stupid cat, and I don’t owe you anything,” she answered with a sniff and looked away, almost as if she might feel a little guilty. Yeah, right. I was most definitely not buying that.
“I think you owe me some answers, though,” Charles interjected. “Did you really steal Angie’s cat and send her threatening letters? Why would you do that?”
“You both need to calm down,” she muttered through clenched teeth. “I don’t have the cat. Okay?”
“Sorry. I’m not buying it. You delivered the letters. We caught you in the act,” I exploded.
Breanne narrowed her gaze, looking past Charles so she could focus all of her venom and hostility right on me. “Fine. I’ll admit it. That was me. But I’m not the one who wrote them.”
“Who did? Stop stalling, and tell me what you know,” I demanded. Why wouldn’t she just come out with it already? It’s not like either of us treasured spending time together, and this was serious.
Breanne shook her head. “I don’t know.” She took a step back when Charles stepped back so that we now stood side-by-side. Now we were united against her, and that seemed to break her. Apparently, she’d expected him to take her side in all this.
“How could you not know?” I couldn’t see Charles’s face as he spoke, but his disappointment came out loud and clear. “Why would you ever agree to be a part of this? And then to not get all the answers?” He cleared his throat before continuing. “I thought you were smarter than that, Bree. Kinder, too.”
“I didn’t,” I spat.
Breanne had never liked me, and I’d never liked her. I wasn’t surprised she’d want to hurt me, but it did startle me that she was involved in this terrible thing. Breanne had absolutely no link to Ethel Fulton’s estate, so why would she even get involved in the first place?
“It’s not a big deal,” Bree cried. “So, seriously, calm down. You know my income has been down ever since my brother was branded a murderer. So when an anonymous client turned up and promised me a big commission in my future plus a generous cash infusion now, how could I say no? It’s not like I’m hurting anyone. We were just trying to spook you out of that house of yours.”
“You threatened to kill my cat!” I shook with rage now that I had someone to blame but still had zero idea where my cat might be.
“No, I didn’t do that. I didn’t write the letters. And seriously, who would kill a cat? That’s taking things a little too far.” She seemed to be losing steam by the minute but still wouldn’t admit she’d done a single thing wrong.
“But extortion is just fine,” Charles grumbled as he narrowed his eyes at Breanne. “Really, Bree. I thought I knew you.”
“You do know me, which is why I thought you’d understand,” she pleaded. “You know how hard things have been lately.”
“But you’re working through that,” he argued. “Honest work. Not blackmail and threats.” Despite my anger, it struck me as a bit funny that Charles was berating his girlfriend for blackmailing me when he’d done the same thing to get my help on a difficult case. Granted, he never would have actually hurt me. Breanne, on the other hand…
“No,” she insisted. “I’m trying to, but not succeeding. And you know why? Everyone thinks my brother’s this monster, even after he was acquitted, and it’s all her fault.” She raised a shaky finger toward me. If looks could kill…
Charles tightened his grip on my shoulder. “She helped me get him acquitted. How have you conveniently forgotten that little part of the story?”
Breanne shrugged. “Her mother, though. That news anchor woman. She’s the one who convinced all of Blueberry Bay that Brock was guilty, and even after he was proven innocent, they’ve had a hard time changing their minds. Oh, and don’t think I’ve missed the fact that you’re trying to steal my boyfriend right out from under my nose.”
“Jeez, what is wrong with you?” Charles yelled. “Angie and I are just friends. And that doesn’t even really matter anyway, because you and I are officially through.”
“Charles, baby. Don’t be like that,” Bree begged, approaching him with hands raised in supplication.
He turned from her and strode toward the front door. “I’ll wait for you in the car,” he informed me before disappearing outside.
“Do you really not know who was sending the letters?” I asked gently. As much as I hated Breanne, she had just been dumped and seemed pretty upset by it. Besides, yelling at her wasn’t getting any of the answers I needed, but maybe a bit of kindness would.
“I really don’t know,” she said with a sniff. “Now please… Just… Just go away.”
I studied her for a moment before finally turning away and following Charles outside. I found him behind the wheel of his car with this head down and tears spilling down both cheeks. “Are you okay?”
He sat up straighter and cleared his throat. “I should have known better. I’ve been so stupid.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, because it seemed like the best response given the situation. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Honestly,” he said, pulling the car back out of the driveway. “I kind of want to forget it ever happened. I can’t believe I wasted so many months of my life on her.”
I found myself torn between wanting to be a good friend to Charles and wanting to scream I told you so from the top of my lungs. I’d always known Breanne was a bad egg, but I’d never known just how rotten she’d become, never would have suspected she’d go to such drastic lengths to make my life miserable.
“I’m so sorry she did this to you,” he said, keeping his eyes glued firmly to the road ahead. “I wanted to find Octo-Cat before, but now it feels like it’s my duty, like somehow this is partially my fault. I know I’m a big part of the reason she hates you, and it’s up to me to make things right.”
“Charles, none of this is your fault.”
“It feels that way, though.”
I put a conciliatory hand on his forearm. “I accept your help, but not because you owe me anything. Thank you for being such a good friend.”
We drove back to my house in utter silence. Had Charles meant it when he told Breanne we were only friends? Or had he also been harboring a secret crush on me all these months?
I pushed these questions from my already overcluttered brain. Only one question mattered now, and it needed all our focus…
Where was Octo-Cat?
Chapter Sixteen
Back at my house, Nan and Cal were waiting for Charles’s and my return with every light on the main floor at full blast.
Cal popped to his feet when we entered. “Did you find him?”
“No,” I said, accepting a fresh mug of cocoa from Nan, who was clearly enjoying her role as stakeout hostess.
“Did you find who was leaving the notes?” she asked with large eyes.
“Yeah, we did.” I bit my lip, not wanting to be the one to break this news to Breanne’s twin brother, especially since she’d used his unfairly earned bad reputation as an excuse for getting involved in her shady dealings.
“It was Breanne,” Charles answered for me. His voice brooked no arguments. I’d never seen him so livid about anything in all the months I’d known him.
“You mean, your girlfriend?” Nan looked from one man to the other and frowned. “And your sister?”
“She’s my ex now,” Charles said with a sigh.
Nan didn’t even try to hide her happiness at this news. She even wrapped an arm around me and squeezed me to her side. “Good. She wasn’t right for you anyway.”
I about died when she shot me what she must have assumed was a surreptitious wink.
Charles saw it plain
as day, but at least it made him smile.
Cal, however, seemed to be the most upset of everyone. “Why would she do something like that?” He sank down onto the couch and dragged both hands through his hair. “Oh, wait. It’s because of me. Isn’t it?”
“It’s not your fault you got framed for murder,” I pointed out gently.
“It sure feels like it, though.”
“Charles is blaming himself, too,” I said. “But, believe me, this is nobody’s fault except Breanne’s.”
“Okay,” Nan shouted, drawing everyone’s attention to her. “Enough with the pity party. We have work to do.”
“What work? We reached a dead end with Breanne. She says she doesn’t know who was paying her to drop off the letters.” Charles paced around the living room like a caged lion ready to pounce.
“I’m going to go talk to her.” Cal rose to his feet and marched toward the front door. “Call me if you need me.”
The door slammed shut, and we all took a collective breath in.
“Charles, look at me.” Nan walked right up to him and stood on her tiptoes in an effort to bring her face closer to his.
He stopped pacing, the pent-up energy visible in the bulging veins that had risen to the surface of his neck and forearms. This was killing him.
“I know you’re feeling down in the dumps right about now, but you and that woman were never right for each other anyway,” Nan said firmly. “So, stop mulligrubbing, and fire up that big, beautiful brain of yours again. We’re going to need it to bring our kitty boy home safely.”
“Maybe we didn’t get anywhere with Bree,” I told Charles much gentler than Nan had just spoken to him. “But that doesn’t mean we’re at a dead end, either. We still have the list of beneficiaries from Ethel’s will, and you only checked out the local ones, right?”
He nodded but said nothing. I briefly wondered whether he was holding back tears or shouts. Maybe both.
After grabbing his hand in mine, I gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Then I say it’s time we take a little road trip. If someone needed to pay Breanne to drop off those letters, chances are they don’t live close enough to do it themselves.”
“I’ll stay here with the animals in case anything else goes down at mission central,” Nan volunteered.
“Charles?” I asked. “I know you’re having a really hard time with all of this right now, but I could really use a friend by my side. Are you in?”
He dropped his gaze toward the floor and nodded as if a hundred-pound weight was pushing down on his neck. “I’m in,” he groaned.
I wrapped my arms around Charles and gave him a tight hug. “Thank you,” I murmured. “But first before we go, we need to make a quick stop off at the twenty-four-hour market and swing back by Bree’s real quick, too.”
He studied me in horror. It seemed our opinions about Breanne finally matched, although I hated the circumstances. Unfortunately, we didn’t have much of a choice as to whether or not to return to her house that night.
“I’m pretty sure we forgot Maple there,” I admitted with a flippant shrug, even though I was beating myself up about having left a man—er, a squirrel—behind on our mission. “I figure we should come prepared with an apology and peanut butter, thus our other stop. C’mon, let’s go.”
Given that our stakeout party had started at ten that night, neither Charles nor I had slept recently. Still, I doubted either of us could have grabbed even a few winks if we’d tried—not with all that was weighing on our minds. Instead, we grabbed a case of the cold espresso drinks—the ones Nan always said tasted like chalk—from my fridge and set off on our next great fact-finding adventure.
“Who should we pay a visit to first?” Charles asked once we’d made it to the main road that ran through our tiny town of Glendale.
“Ethel’s niece, Anne,” I said definitively, pointing to her name on the printout Charles had given me. “She gave off definite creepy vibes when last we met.”
“Creepy as in catnapper creepy?” Charles asked with a lopsided grin. He adjusted his hands on the wheel and settled back in his seat. Now that we’d rescued Maple from Breanne’s house and moved past that portion of our night, he seemed to be returning to his normal relaxed self.
“Creepy as in she was on my short list of murder suspects creepy.” I then filled him in on my various run-ins with the eerie older woman.
“Definitely creepy,” Charles agreed. “So she really broke into Ethel’s house?”
“Yup, but seeing as I’d also broken in, I decided to let that one pass.” I began to fiddle with a hangnail absentmindedly. Even though Charles and I were back to our usual easy banter, something important had changed. Now I was wondering what every glance, touch, and word meant, whether it might imply that he felt how I did.
I pinched the skin on my wrist to force myself to focus on finding Octo-Cat rather than finding out what Charles may or may not feel for me.
Luckily, he had to keep his focus on driving, which meant he missed all the weirdness I was serving up in the passenger seat beside him. “But you said she was there to scout out antiques and other valuables she wanted to keep for herself, right?”
“Yeah, and if Octo-Cat and I hadn’t showed up to stop her, I’m pretty sure she would have taken it all.”
“That’s what she said.” Charles suppressed a boyish chuckle, and I gave him a playful slap over the center console.
“C’mon. We’re both grown-ups here.”
Charles broke out laughing again.
“I’m going to let that go, since it’s already been a long night and we’re just getting started,” I said graciously. “Anyway, yeah, my gut says it’s Anne. Nobody else really left much of an impression, to be honest.”
“Well, then I guess we’re headed into Boston. At least we’ll beat the morning rush.”
We both surveyed the darkness ahead as I plugged Anne’s address into the GPS on my phone. “It’s almost a four-hour drive,” I whined.
“It could have been worse,” Charles said with a shrug. “Ethel had family as far away as Oregon. Now there’s a drive.”
“What do we do if it’s not Anne?” I wondered aloud. “Where do we go next?”
He reached for my hand and held it in his. “We’re not going to think like that. Just focus on finding Octo-Cat and bringing him home. The in-between details aren’t important. And if your gut is saying Anne did it, then that’s what I believe, too.” He raised my hand to his lips and gave my knuckles a quick kiss before letting go.
Despite the fact that this small gesture of kindness sent my heart cartwheeling and my stomach loop-de-looping, the feel of his lips on my skin did more than any anti-anxiety pill ever could. Charles believed in this, believed we could do it.
And now so did I.
Chapter Seventeen
I couldn’t have slept even if I’d wanted to. Anticipation at finding my long-lost feline friend gripped one side of me, and excitement for this private time with Charles grabbed hold of the other.
For so long I’d wished that he would just break up with Breanne already, and now he had. Might he also see that it had always been the two of us who were meant for each other? I’d tried to put my feelings for Charles aside for months now, but nothing ever worked.
He’d defended Cal against that double murder charge with everything he had. He accepted my ability to speak with animals and never made me feel weird because of it. He’d taken in two homeless, traumatized cats after they’d accidentally killed their owner. He’d just always been there, always been good and kind.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked me now.
I yawned to buy myself some time. “Just sleepy.”
“You better not fall asleep on me,” he teased. “Your shift is coming up soon.”
“Pull over. I’ll take it now.” Driving would be a nice distraction from all the thoughts fighting to take center stage in my mind.
Charles glanced toward me, then back to the roa
d. “You sure about that?”
“I’m awake, I promise. But if it makes you feel better, I’ll shotgun another one of these coffee things.” I picked up one of the small blue and brown cans and gave it a good shake.
“Okay, but after that you’re cut off.” He turned up the music and shuffled through a few songs before landing on one of my favorite ’80s hair metal jams.
“It’s a myth, you know,” I said while bobbing my head along to the heavy, soul-filling beat.
Charles stopped singing along with the track and risked a quick glance my way. “What is?”
I shrugged. “That too much caffeine will either stop your heart or make it explode.” As it was, my heart was still beating wildly like a caged animal rattling against its bars. No amount of coffee would change that, either.
It was all Charles, my dream guy. Heaven help me.
When the song ended, Charles put away his air keytar and pulled onto the side of the road so we could switch seats.
“Are you sad?” I asked him when a slow jam took over the speakers and he had to put away his air keytar for a second time. “About Breanne?”
“Angry, more like.” He flipped through his playlist again, and this time chose something hard, angsty, and most definitely not from my favorite musical era.
“Do you think you’ll forgive her? That the two of you will get back together?” I yelled over the shouty, migraine-inducing music.
He took the hint and lowered the volume. His eyes stayed firmly fixed to my profile as he asked, “Do you think we should?”
I felt a flush rise to my cheeks and hoped he didn’t notice. “No,” I answered honestly.
“Yeah. Neither do I,” he said, crossing his arms and leaning his face against the cold glass of the window with a sigh. “We were never really right for each other anyway.”
“Then why’d you stay together so long?”
Yeah, I was most definitely being nosy, but I also needed to know where things stood, and Charles seemed more than willing to share. Plus we had a lot of time left to kill before we reached Anne’s Boston-based bungalow.
