Claws of Action

by Linda Reilly

  Lara sat on one of the low cushions and watched him work. She admired how deftly he performed small tasks, the attention he paid to the tiniest details.

  “There you go,” he said, hoisting himself off the floor. He opened and closed the door a few times, then nodded with approval. “Nice and snug,” he pronounced. “You’re all set.”

  Lara smiled. “Thanks again. Do I owe you for the weather-stripping?”

  “Nah. You kidding? You’re one of my best customers. Besides, I get a contractor’s discount. I only paid about three bucks for it.”

  “I appreciate it, Charlie. Thanks for coming by.”

  “While I’m here, I’ll take that box to the recycling station for you. I didn’t see it outside. Did you move it?”

  Lara thought for a moment. “Oh, you mean the box the door came in. Someone stopped by yesterday and offered to take it for us. He had to go there anyway to get some packing boxes.”

  “Well, then, that saves me a trip,” Charlie said. He scooped the weather-stripping box off the floor, along with the lemonade glass. He drained the glass and handed it to Lara. “Thanks for the drink. It hit the spot. By the way, Nina and I are looking forward to Saturday. Is there anything we can bring?”

  Saturday. The open house.

  Inwardly, Lara groaned. What if the police haven’t arrested Evonda’s killer by then? Would she and Aunt Fran want to host the unveiling of the new reading room with an unsolved murder hanging over them?

  Lara wasn’t sure how to respond. “No, just yourselves, Charlie. But thanks for asking.”

  He nodded and opened the door, but then paused. “Okay, then, but if there’s anything we can do, just give us a call, okay? We both feel really bad about what happened.”

  “I will,” Lara promised, feeling her throat tighten.

  With a final wave, he trotted back to his truck.

  After putting away a few more books, Lara went into the meet-and-greet room. Something about this room gave her comfort. The reason, she suspected, was that so many cats and kittens had found their forever homes here.

  Resident-wise, the shelter was in a lull right now. Only three of the cats were available for adoption—Snowball, Orca, and Pearl.

  Lara meandered over to the bulletin board she’d set up on the wall when the shelter first opened. Photos of kitty moms and dads with their adopted furballs nearly covered the allotted space. Callie and Luna, two fearful kittens, were the first to be adopted. They were now enjoying happy lives with a local woman Lara had once fingered as a possible killer.

  So many others had followed. Lara herself had snapped the pic of the two sweet kittens, Bogie and Bacall, who’d been taken in by retired actress Deanna Daltry.

  One of Lara’s favorite matchups was the one between Butterscotch and a little boy named Oliver. From the day he arrived at the shelter, the marmalade male had shunned humans. But shortly before the holidays, Oliver had come in and read to the cat from his favorite alphabet book. The child’s voice was so soothing and loving that it melted Butterscotch’s heart. When Oliver returned after Christmas, the cat nearly had to be pried out of the boy’s lap to get him into the carrier for the ride to his new home.

  The reading program worked, Lara was convinced of it.

  “I can almost read your mind,” Aunt Fran said, popping into the room. “You’re thinking about all the cats we’ve placed in wonderful homes.”

  Lara smiled. She ran a finger over the photo of Valenteena, a petite, black-and-white girl with a vocal personality who’d been a favorite of Lara’s. Teena now lived with an active family in a rambling country home. With plenty of room to explore, and a food dish that was always full, she was leading a life of bliss with people who adored her.

  “I was thinking about what a little imp Valenteena was. Remember the day she opened my Christmas presents and added a few claw marks to the nightie my mom gave me?”

  Aunt Fran laughed. “Oh my, yes. She gave us a giggle that day, didn’t she?” Her face turned somber. “I know it’s hard, Lara, but try not to dwell on Evonda. We did nothing wrong, and we had nothing to do with her…demise. The police will sort it out. We just have to be patient.”

  The police will sort it out.

  Lara knew from experience that it wasn’t likely to be that easy. The path to a killer was narrow and winding, fraught with traps and deception.

  “I know,” she said, waving a hand at the air. “Don’t mind me. I’m feeling a little gloomy today.” She turned and stared out the window, into the yard. The leaves of the solitary maple were a lush green, and a slight breeze sifted through them. About ten feet above the ground, a birdhouse hung from a sturdy branch. A tiny chipmunk skittered around the trunk of the tree, then disappeared into a secret hole in the ground.

  Her aunt moved closer into the room. “Lara,” she said in a near whisper, “have you had any…sightings lately?”

  After Lara’s most recent brush with a killer, she’d revealed her secret about Blue to both Gideon and Aunt Fran. A cat no one else could see wasn’t the easiest thing to talk about. She was relieved that neither of them had told her she was insane or doubted her for a moment. At least she hoped they hadn’t.

  “This morning, only for a few moments when the chief was here. I think she was trying to comfort me with her presence.” Lara felt herself choking up.

  Aunt Fran squeezed her niece’s shoulder. “Come on in the kitchen. I just made a pitcher of iced tea. Let’s—”

  A knock at the door made them both turn. Brian Downing’s face peered through the glass.

  “Brian!” Lara said, unlocking the door. “Come on in. What’s going on?”

  Brian stepped inside and nodded to Aunt Fran. “Hey, I hope I’m not bugging you folks. I thought this might be a good time to check on Smuggles. Is it okay if I see him for a few minutes?”

  “You’re not picking him up?” Lara asked. “Not that we mind having him. He’s a sweetheart. But I thought…”

  He shook his head. “Unfortunately, I’m not out of the woods yet. The police grilled me today like I was the Boston Strangler.” His expression clouded. “It’s possible I’ll be arrested for Evonda’s murder.”

  “Are you kidding me?” Lara squawked.

  “Brian,” Aunt Fran said calmly, “why don’t you sit? I’ll bring out some iced tea and you can tell us what happened.”

  Lara gawked at her aunt. Did she realize she might be entertaining a killer?

  “Um, yes. Sure. Have a seat.”

  A few minutes later, the three of them sat at the table, glasses of chilled iced tea resting in front of them.

  Brian took a long gulp from his glass. “Man, that’s good. Thank you.” He swiped the back of his hand over his lips. “Listen, I want to be right up front with you. You guys have been good to me, and I won’t forget it.”

  Lara knotted her fingers together in her lap. Was he going to confess to murder?

  “I didn’t exactly tell you everything about what happened yesterday. After Evonda told me to get rid of Smuggles, I…I kind of chased her outside to her car. I couldn’t stop myself—I saw every shade of red in the spectrum when she said that.”

  “It was an awful thing to say,” Aunt Fran said.

  Brian huffed out a noisy breath. “When she got to her car, she jumped inside real fast, closed the door, and started the engine. I heard the locks click, so I figured I’d scared her. I started pounding on her window with my fist, screaming at her like a crazy person. At that point, I think I was crazy.” He took another sip from his glass. “Anyway, I’m afraid I used some pretty rough language. She started pulling out of the parking lot to get away from me, but the back window on the driver’s side was open a few inches. I grabbed it with both hands and pulled at it to stop her from driving off before I was finished yelling at her.”

  Lara squeezed her fingers over h
er brow. This was not good.

  “Do you think anyone saw you?”

  “Yeah, I know they did. When the police showed up this morning to question me, they also talked to my neighbors. Just my luck, the gal downstairs from me saw—and heard—the whole thing from her window. She related it pretty much as it happened. I don’t blame her for squealing on me—she had to report what she saw, right? I just—” He pounded the side of his fist on the table. “I just wish I hadn’t let my temper get out of control. It’s all coming back now to bite me in the butt.”

  Aunt Fran looked pensive. “Not to sound like someone out of a crime drama, but that all sounds like a lot of circumstantial evidence.”

  That made Brian smile, briefly, then his expression morphed into one of sheer misery. “Yeah, but the problem is, whoever killed her did it from the back seat, and my fingerprints are all over that back window on the driver’s side. Who’s to say I didn’t show up at her house early this morning, jump into her back seat, and strangle her from behind?”

  Aunt Fran tapped a finger to her lips. “But in a way, the fact that your neighbor told the police what she witnessed works in your favor.”

  Brian frowned. “How do you figure?”

  “Because it explains why your fingerprints were on that window,” Aunt Fran said. “Otherwise, they’d have only your word for it.”

  “I get what you’re saying.” Brian sighed. “I don’t know if it matters, though. The cops are still eyeing me a little too close for comfort.”

  “Brian,” Lara said, her stomach in a knot, “did you say Evonda was…strangled?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, but the cops aren’t revealing what the killer used to do it. They tried to make me tell them, but of course I couldn’t because I didn’t kill her.”

  Somehow, Lara believed him. Brian’s outburst of temper had been the result of a threat to his cat. If anyone could understand that, Lara could.

  “You know what’s weird, though?” Brian drummed his fingers on the table. “That thing about the sneaker. It’s downright bizarre, if you ask me.”

  “How did you hear about that?” Lara asked him.

  His laugh was mirthless. “You kidding? That nimrod Roy Tierney has been blabbing all over town about how he found Evonda dead in her car with her red sneaker stuffed in her mouth. The way he’s telling it, you’d think he discovered the Holy Grail, for cripes’ sake.”

  For another minute or so, they sipped their iced tea in silence. The sound of a new human voice had attracted the shelter’s official greeter—Munster.

  “Aw, I love this cat,” Brian said brightly, grinning at the orange-striped kitty strutting toward him.

  Munster didn’t stand on ceremony. He leaped onto Brian’s knee and rubbed his furry head against his chest. Brian scratched him under the chin, eliciting a monster-size purr.

  Not to be outdone, Snowball padded into the room. She looked up at Brian, who smiled and patted his knee. “Come on, there’s room for both of you. No one ever accused me of being skinny.”

  Snowball climbed onto his knee and leaned into him. Brian laughed. “This place is great. I knew bringing Smuggles here was the right thing to do.” His smile faded. “Is it—I mean, can I visit with Smuggles for a few minutes? I bet he’s fast asleep somewhere, right?”

  “Of course you can. He’s probably still in my bedroom. I’ll go get him.” Lara rose and collected the empty glasses, then paused. “Brian, I take it that you want him to stay with us for a while?”

  “Yeah, I do. If it’s okay, that is. At least until I know what’s going to happen to me. And will you promise me something?”

  Lara looked at her aunt. “I guess that depends on what it is,” she said cautiously.

  “If…I get sent to the pokey, will you keep him here and take care of him? You’re the only ones I’d trust with him.”

  Aunt Fran exchanged a look with Lara, then was first to speak. “You can rest easy, Brian. If it gives you any comfort, know that Smuggles will stay here with us until you’re ready to take him home. However long that takes.”

  “Thank you.” Brian’s eyes turned glassy.

  Lara delivered the glasses to the kitchen sink, then headed upstairs. Smuggles was curled up in the big corner bed. He opened one eye when Lara reached down to lift him. “Come on, baby, your dad wants to visit with you.”

  Lara carried the cat downstairs, and Brian spent about twenty minutes with him in the meet-and-greet room. The elderly cat was content to lounge in his owner’s lap and snooze. It was obvious that the two were close buds.

  With a promise to keep them updated, Brian left shortly thereafter. Lara followed Aunt Fran into the kitchen and immediately called Sherry. She’d received several texts from her bestie over the course of the day but hadn’t had a chance to respond.

  “Hey, you got time to join me for an ice cream cone?” Lara asked her.

  Sherry almost growled into the phone. “You bet I do, girl. We’ve both got lots to talk about. We might need three ice cream cones apiece by the time we’re done.”

  Lara laughed. Her friend’s no-nonsense tone had a magical quality. It lifted her spirits even on her worst days, regardless of the circumstances. She couldn’t imagine what she’d ever do without her.

  They agreed to meet at four thirty at Queen’s Dairy Bar, a popular ice cream spot on Main Street.

  Lara made a quick call to Gideon. They made tentative plans for later that evening and she promised to let him know when she got back from her date with Sherry.

  Aunt Fran chuckled. “I couldn’t help overhearing. You’re going to have ice cream with Sherry, and then dinner with Gideon?”

  “Sounds decadent, doesn’t it?”

  “Not really. Sometimes food really is the best medicine.”

  “Actually,” Lara explained, “Gideon and I are planning a light supper. Salad with a loaf of rosemary bread and a glass of wine at The Irish Stew.”

  “Mmm. Now you’re making me hungry.”

  “Why don’t you come with us? Gideon would be thrilled to have you!”

  Aunt Fran shook her head. “Thanks, but not tonight. My brain is worn out from everything that’s happened today. I think I’ll stretch out on the sofa with a bowl of Cheerios and my book and read to my heart’s content.”

  Lara shoved her hands into the pockets of her pink capris. She leaned against the counter. “Aunt Fran, is it awful, my thinking about stuffing my face when a woman we knew was horribly murdered?”

  “No,” Aunt Fran said gently. “It’s not horrible. The one meeting you and I had with Evonda was an unpleasant one, but that was all on her, not on us. She didn’t deserve to die, but neither of us had anything to do with what happened to her. I feel sad for her family, and of course I’ll attend the memorial service, if they have one. Aside from that, all I really want is for her killer to be brought to justice.”

  Lara was shocked. “You’d go to her memorial service?”

  “Certainly. Wouldn’t you?” Aunt Fran carried the newspaper from the counter to the table and sat down.

  “Honestly, I don’t know,” Lara said, trailing after her. “I guess I hadn’t thought that far ahead. Wouldn’t it seem, you know, hypocritical if we attended?”

  “Not at all. It’s simply a sign of respect to the family. That’s the least they deserve, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” Lara smiled. “Why are you so smart?”

  Aunt Fran gave a dramatic shrug. “It’s a trait I inherited from my favorite niece.”

  Chapter Eight

  “I was tweezing my eyebrows this morning when I heard about the murder,” Sherry told Lara. “I almost plucked out an eyeball!”

  They sat at one of the wooden picnic tables behind Queen’s Dairy Bar. All around them kids squealed while moms and dads and older siblings scolded and fussed. Tiny sparrows
picked at the ground for stray crumbs. A young woman shared a vanilla cone with her eager black Lab.

  Lara licked the edge of her soft-serve chocolate cone. She normally attacked ice cream cones with the zeal of a polar bear, but her attempt at finishing this one had been half-hearted at best. Most of it had already dripped onto the grass, and that was right before a sprinkle-coated blob had plopped onto her knee.

  She took one last bite, wrapped a napkin around it, and tossed the whole thing into a nearby waste can.

  “Good shot,” Sherry said, studying her friend. “Although I never thought I’d see the day you’d throw one of those things away.”

  “I was starving before I got here,” Lara said, “but once I started to eat, I lost my appetite.” She wiped her mouth with a fistful of flimsy napkins. “Aunt Fran and I didn’t find out about…the murder until the chief came over this morning to give us the bad news.”

  Sherry examined the remains of her dwindling cone. “Word got around fast. That ditzy Roy Tierney came into the coffee shop this morning right after the police let him go. Oh my gosh, you should’ve heard him. He was blathering to everyone about the red snea—”

  The anguish registered on Lara’s face stopped her midsentence.

  “Hey, I’m sorry,” Sherry said. “I didn’t mean to get graphic. What’s that saying? Mea culpa?”

  “You don’t have to apologize.” Lara turned over what she knew in her mind. “In fact, the more I learn, the more I—” Averting her gaze from Sherry’s, she rubbed her thumb over an old stain on the picnic table.

  “The more you what? The more you can go snooping around?”

  Lara lifted her chin. “No. I didn’t mean that. Not exactly. I only meant that the more we know, the sooner Evonda’s killer can be caught.”

  “I love the way you slipped the royal ‘we’ in there. Like you’re part of the investigative team.” Sherry bit off another chunk of her cone.

  “Don’t worry. I know I’m not part of the team, as you put it.” She shot her friend what she hoped was a disarming smile. “No more about Evonda, okay? New subject. What’s happening with you and David? Any definite plans yet? Should we be shopping for frilly gowns?”