Meow Matrimony

by Lickel, Lisa;

  Ripple nodded at Dow and both drew weapons.

  He frowned. “Who’s in there? Who were you talking to? Stay here.”

  Dow eyed me and took up a position at the side of the entry to the living room while he bent low and duck-waddled in.

  I followed, despite the warning, and Dow pulled me back.

  “It’s her computer,” I whispered. “Somebody calling Ivanna.”

  Dow scrunched her brows.

  “Phone app on her computer,” I said, trying not to get too technical about my area of expertise, electronic communications.

  “Oh,” she whispered, cocking her head to listen to Ripple who was attempting to get information from the man on the computer without giving anything else away.

  I would have to do a lot of explaining to a lot of people about a great many things. I shivered at another waft of cool air and turned back to stare absently at Ivanna’s body, keeping a healthy distance.

  Dow sent me a sympathetic glance and stood down from her ready position.

  Jason Clark, the man on the computer, as he finally admitted to Ripple, was poor Ivanna’s fiancé. Former fiancé. Ripple asked Jason questions. What did he know about Ivanna’s schedule today? Where had Jason been all day?

  Even after Ripple convinced him to cooperate, I wondered about the legality of investigation by computer call. Short of the video court appearances from prisoners, such things weren’t always admissible evidence in court. I loved those procedural dramas.

  “Sir, please come to the police station. Officer Dow will meet you there in thirty minutes to take a statement,” Ripple said.

  “Statement about what? That sounds official. What’s going on? Why can’t you tell me now?” Jason asked, agitated all over again.

  I felt sorry for him.

  “Don’t you need to notify next of kin first?” I whispered and received a shush from Dow.

  “It’s bad, isn’t it? I’m calling my attorney,” Jason’s voice said. The rest of his statement faded and squawked, then was gone. Ivanna’s computer probably needed to recharge.

  Ripple reappeared as the front door swung wide to admit emergency medical techs with a stretcher.

  Dow took more photos, then Detective Reyes showed up with a toolbox. He spent a few minutes collecting samples around Ivanna’s body and the doors.

  Eventually Ripple allowed the EMTs to remove Ivanna’s body.

  I glanced at the time on my phone and sighed.

  “In a hurry?” Ripple asked, amusement dripping.

  I drew myself up and acted like the drama queen he assumed I was after I’d previously called to report my friend Donald, the former mayor, had been kidnapped a few months back. Ripple hadn’t believed me at first.

  We had since developed a friendly but professional relationship laced with mutual respect, especially since I’d been correct. Though I sincerely hoped meeting over dead bodies would not become normal routine for us.

  “I planned to meet Adam for supper,” I told him. “The mayor,” I added, mostly for my self-esteem.

  Ripple gestured for me to precede him from the premises. “I’m sorry you found Miss Pressman like this.”

  “Me, too. You think it might be some kind of accident, or natural—”

  “Let’s not speculate. Do you want to give me your statement now? While Officer Dow meets Mr. Clark?”

  Dow brushed past me out of the house. “That might be better. While your memory is fresh.”

  “You’re right.” I twisted my lips and patted at the embarrassing gurgles from my stomach, hunger resurfacing after the fright and sadness of the last hour.

  “Come to my office,” Ripple said. “I’ll order sandwiches.”

  How could I resist?

  2

  I followed Dow’s squad car and Ripple’s personal compact downtown to Apple Grove’s antiquated city hall. Three stories of cheerless concrete block and narrow windows, the building had served the good people for the past five generations. I might catch Adam after his meeting. I texted him while we walked to Ripple’s office.

  “You’re not telling anyone specifics about the case, are you?” Ripple asked, flipping on the lights and settling behind his desk.

  I didn’t bother to answer but waved at his desk phone. “Corned beef and swiss on rye,” I said instead. “With a large side of thousand island dressing.” The extra calories would help me get over the shock. It was a scientific fact.

  Ripple only raised a brow as he arranged for delivery. While we ate, I explained about the wedding invitation mix-up. I said I’d send over a copy of my order form for comparison to those I’d left at Ivanna’s. I dabbed at a dribble of dressing on my slacks, so I didn’t have to meet his eyes while I admitted to checking out Ivanna’s wedding dress. “Took you long enough to get there,” I said in my weak defense.

  “Seven minutes,” Ripple replied.

  “Seemed like forever.” I leaned back in the chair and closed my eyes. “Her wedding was the week before ours.” I shook my head. “She had the same dreams and hopes. And now…”

  “Don’t think about it.”

  I opened my eyes when I heard commotion in Ripple’s open door. Ah, my hero. I rose and lunged two paces into Adam’s embrace.

  “Ivy! What’s going on?” Belatedly he mumbled, “Tim,” at Officer Ripple.

  “Mayor. You’ll hear soon enough,” Ripple said. He came around to shake Adam’s hand. “Ivy stumbled across a deceased person.”

  Adam’s hold tightened. “You OK?” he whispered in my ear.

  “Mmhmm. Just shaken. She—”

  “It will be in my report,” Ripple cut in.

  Hmpf. As if he thought I would spill any crucial beans. If I knew any. I was nothing if not trustworthy. Adam’s chuckle reverberated under my cheek and I reached to pat the unscarred side of his chin, reveling in the glitter of his gray eyes.

  We all turned at the sound of Dow escorting a man who strongly resembled Ivanna’s dreamboat fiancé, arguing and arm-waving, along the hall. “Did you call her mother?” he asked. “I’m not about to do your job. When Doralynn finds out, I hope you have a SWAT team ready...”

  They were followed by another gentleman, stout, silent, and lugging a briefcase. I had the impression of a large, sinister-appearing person as his shadow crossed Ripple’s door.

  “Mr. Clark, I assure you we can handle this,” Dow was saying, heat in her voice. “I have alerted Chief Hackman, who is on his way. You are not authorized to request an autopsy…”

  Ripple went on alert even as their voices faded toward the conference room.

  “Autopsy?” Adam asked.

  Ripple grimaced. “The deceased’s fiancé.” He slumped. “I was not supposed to be on duty…I guess you’ll want to be prepared, Mr. Mayor. The deceased is…was Ivanna Pressman. From the radio station. If you’ll excuse me, I have work to do before the chief arrives.”

  “Of course.”

  I followed Adam outside to the parking lot where a couple of bats wheeled in and out of the pools of light from the tall posts. “Why don’t you let me take you home,” he said. “I’ll pick you up in the morning.”

  The thought of five more minutes close to him tonight in his truck overrode my independence. My practical side said he shouldn’t have to leave his apartment over the shop to come and get me at 7:00 AM when all he had to do was walk downstairs to get to work. He had other important things to do. Unless he had a morning meeting, he usually opened for the early rush and checked in on the other shops by phone until Martha arrived mid-morning to help me.

  “OK,” I agreed, giving in to my weak side again. Soon enough I’d share the stairway commute. Unless we decided to live in my house. Hiking the several blocks between my house and the store wouldn’t exactly kill me. Us. But it really was more practical to live at the apartment. Adam owned it…and I owned my little house. More decisions we should address directly instead of dancing around before the wedding.

  At home, the things I co
uld talk about, like shop business and finding the wrong invitations, came easy while I fixed us cups of hot chocolate.

  Isis wrapped herself around Adam’s legs. Her warble and chirping sounds didn’t seem to affect the kittens, asleep in their basket against the wall behind the door. Adam picked her up. “Have you been behaving, Madame Isis?”

  She blinked green eyes at him and went limp, offering her throaty, sporadic purr as an answer.

  “Isis is the perfect mommy,” I said, reaching over to scratch her ears and grabbing a kiss from her owner.

  “You don’t need any more food or litter?” Adam asked.

  “We’re good.” I sat next to them and played footsie, gradually coming down from the adrenalin high of the evening’s events, while Adam grinned at me, most unlike a mature widower of forty-two. We’d gone through the “you must have been so frightened, are you all right, and no it didn’t seem like a violent crime” routine on the way home. It didn’t look as though Apple Grove was about to become the scene of a murder spree, so the mayor could relax.

  “I hope they figure out right away how she died,” I said, “and that it was an accident. Ivanna’s mother will be crushed.”

  “Doralynn has certainly been louder than ever since she figured her daughter became a public figure,” Adam mused.

  “I guess Ivanna was about as much a celebrity for Apple Grove as Barry the afternoon call-in swap shop guy on WWAG, and you, Mr. Mayor.”

  “Every town needs a diva. One wronged used car salesman’s wife sure knew how to milk her situation and push her daughter into the public.”

  “Mmhmm. Oh, is that Doralynn’s past? I thought she, like, owned the Country Club since she’s always there, winning some tennis trophy.”

  Adam smiled. “Trophies and a new car lease every year can’t make up for public humiliation. I understood it was quite a scandal when Peter Pressman sold the business without telling her, then filed for divorce. Their daughter, Ivanna, was a young girl at the time.”

  I wondered if Peter had stayed in his daughter’s life. I had been a young girl too when my father died. What I understood about Doralynn was that she had a reputation for letting everyone in range know if her drink wasn’t carbonated enough or if a page was bent on the magazine she was purchasing, or if a dandelion dared showed its sunny face between cracks in the sidewalk.

  “This wedding was a really big deal. How sad,” I said.

  Doralynn had also been good friends with our former mayor’s wife who was currently in prison.

  “Doralynn just keeps getting knocked down, first by her husband, then her friends, now the loss of her daughter. She’ll probably make a public complaint somehow. Once she gets over the shock.”

  “I should probably get some kind of statement ready for Yolanda at the newspaper.”

  I yawned. “I’m surprised she hasn’t called. I wish you didn’t have to go.”

  “Me, too,” Adam said. “The wedding will come soon enough. I’m glad you’re not the bridezilla type.”

  When Adam started to rise, Isis plopped to the floor and strolled to the nest of kittens.

  I accompanied Adam to the door.

  “They seem fine after their eight-week shots at the vet,” he said.

  “Yep. Addy’s a genius. That’s why we’re such good friends. We’re supposed to name them,” I reminded him.

  “I guess.” He watched Isis curl up protectively around her brood. “I hoped the new owners would name them.” He set his chin on top of my head when he hugged me.

  I relished his solid heartbeat beneath my cheek and breathed in the comforting aroma of books and coffee.

  “They’re cute, but we can’t keep all of them.” My house was cozy—I believe I mentioned that—but the apartment was just as small.

  Our friend Donald had owned the third type of Mau, a bronze named Tut who’d lived with Adam and Mem for a time. Tut had been at the crux of Donald’s murder investigation and been missing for many weeks. Although he came out of hiding eventually, sadly, he hadn’t been able to overcome the rough conditions he’d suffered, partly due to his advanced age. He’d passed away quietly one sunny day a few weeks ago. We’d mourned him and buried him in Addy’s pet cemetery.

  “Agreed,” Adam said softly.

  “So, they’re still One, Two, Three, and Four on their veterinarian records.”

  He laughed, and I playfully smacked his shoulder. “I can tell them apart. One has that white spot near her eye, and Two’s black stripe goes all the way to his nose. Three’s bib is really white, and Four has a wispy stripe under his chin, like a bowtie.”

  “I’m glad you have that all figured out.”

  “Sure. It’ll be a few weeks yet, Addy said, before we should let them go. She’ll give them boosters and take care of the…you know…procedures.”

  “I guess there are enough kittens in the world.” Adam kept his arms around me where we stood. “We don’t want the neighbors talking. I should head home.”

  “Mmhmm,” I mumbled against his lips. I was stalling big-time because I had one more thing I should tell Adam—about the candy I found near Ivanna—but surely such gossipy tidbits weren’t that important. Were they?

  My phone chimed with an incoming text. The sound was enough to distract Adam, who touched the tip of my ear and mouthed goodnight. I listened to his engine fade before I checked the phone.

  Stanley.

  A rude buzz reminded me I hadn’t responded yet, and it had already been a whole minute. “OK, already.”

  Mite b trouble. I dint do it, swear.

  Do what? I pursed my lips, debating whether to answer. I checked my text to him from Ivanna’s house. Nope—no mention of accident or death. Stanley was not given to dramatics. “Staid” was his best descriptor, and one of the reasons, well, the main one, that kept us apart, even though we’d dated five years before attempting a jaunt down the aisle. Which he bailed on. Not that I’m still bitter. I twirled Adam’s engagement ring and took three cleansing breaths.

  Nope—no worries here. Adam was nothing like Stanley. He’d be the perfect husband, having had some practice already before his poor wife and daughter were killed in a terrible accident, leaving him scarred from burns. And he’d be the best father. Period. If we had children.

  If? Well, of course we would.

  I decided to ignore Stanley for now. I set my phone down by my keys and purse and bent to stroke the kittens.

  Adam and I loved kids. We babysat for Jenny, Yolanda’s preschool granddaughter, when she needed extra time getting the twice weekly little Apple Grove Gazette ready, or when her husband Jim needed medical treatments for his heart and she had to care for him.

  Sure, Adam would be a great father…again. He’d already had a chance to prove it. But what did I know of motherhood? I might like kids now, but I was afraid of them when I was growing up. I was always the different one in school after my father died the Christmas I was six. Mother had been great, but I wanted to be normal, and have a normal family. How did moms share parenting duties? I would never know if I was doing it right.

  Two nibbled on my fingertip, and I stroked his tall ears.

  Isis purred and closed her eyes.

  I sighed, creaked as I stood, and went to check my calendar for the rest of the week. Not much going on besides the usual. I’d made a big circle around “dress shopping” next Thursday with Addy. Yep. I walked back to my room, happy wedding thoughts jarring with dead Ivanna’s outstretched hand and the image of her wedding dress hanging like a phantom in her trendy living room. I wondered what had happened to her.

  As I drifted off to sleep, I tried to recall the layout of her house, the position of her body—no worries there. I’d probably never forget—and something about the candy. Had she opened it? Taken a bite? The wrapper was different from the usual Featherlight cubes. It was sealed on the ends, so it didn’t have to be peeled.

  Stanley and Ivanna…relevant or not?

  “I didn’t do it” ec
hoed in my dreams.

  ~*~

  The next morning at the shop, I admitted being more easily distracted than usual after we’d served thirty-two customers who picked up forty-one coffees and sixteen teas, mostly take-outs for office workers, though three had also bought different newspaper editions and magazines we had delivered from Chicago and St. Louis and New York City.

  Adam rang up a coffee and gossip magazine for one last customer before he needed to leave for his other job. I could tell he was itching to head to City Hall.

  “All set?” I asked as he untied the strings of the Mea Cuppa aprons employees wore. His was brown today, and mine blue. Both uniforms had plaid coffee cups tipping along the front with Mea Cuppa lettered in a fancy script.

  He set his hands on my shoulders and seemed as though he wanted to say something, but two ladies at the magazine rack were smirking at us. He winked at me. “We’ll talk later.”

  Martha came in at ten. Since it was a Friday, we tended to be busier in the afternoon. She voiced her favorite topic for the day. She wanted Adam to offer food, like rolls and muffins, maybe even a sandwich special. I reminded her about the fight Tiny, the owner of the cross-street diner, had put up when Adam applied for a food vendor license to establish a coffee shop. Tiny was sure Adam was out to ruin him, until Adam had assured everyone he only had non-alcoholic drinks and candies on his menu.

  Martha checked the stock of takeout cups and lids while I inventoried the tea stash and refilled the sugar and spice shakers—cinnamon, nutmeg, and cocoa. “I don’t see how some nice muffins or scones to go with coffee would hurt Tiny,” she said. “It’s not as if he offers those things. Just full, greasy breakfasts. And equally fried lunches.”

  “Hmm.”

  She turned on the radio for background noise. Later we’d switch to some gentle instrumental CD from the sales racks. Something with pipes and drums, Irish, for March and St. Patrick’s Day.

  “Good Friday morning to all you Grovers, this is Robert the ramblin’ man in for Ivanna In The Morning. We have another hour before Barry “woof-woof” Goodyear comes in for the Neighborhood Swap Shop…”