Killer Content

by Olivia Blacke

  I pulled a mixing bowl out of the cabinet and filled it with cool water from the sink faucet. I didn’t have any dog food in the house—obviously—but I found a few slices of chicken cold cuts in the crisper that were about to go bad. I retrieved those, along with a handful of baby carrots, and made my way to the bathroom.

  Huckleberry was a good-natured dog. I had no idea what his life was like before he wandered into the bookstore, hungry and alone, but ever since he’d made Untapped his home, he tolerated a constant flow of strangers, delicious smells wafting from the kitchen that he wasn’t allowed to eat, and more importantly, he put up with Todd. He was a good dog with a big heart, and when I opened the door to the bathroom, he thumped his tail on the floor and gave me an enormous doggy grin as if I was his favorite person on the entire planet.

  I liked to think that meant he forgave me, but in my heart of hearts, I knew he could smell the chicken in my hand.

  I put the chicken and carrots on the sink, as far back as I could, then set the bowl of water on the floor. When I straightened, the chicken had disappeared, and Huckleberry was still grinning at me with an expression of complete innocence, which would have been easier to believe if he didn’t have a baby carrot stuck in the gap between his only remaining canine and the next tooth back. “You’ve got to be kidding me. That chicken was meant as a bribe, you know.”

  Huckleberry might not be the oldest dog on the planet, but there was dirt younger than he was. I hadn’t expected him to be able to jump up and reach all the way to the back of the counter to gulp down all that chicken in apparently one bite. I wouldn’t underestimate him again.

  Then again, I was pretty sure I was forgiven now, which was a good thing considering what came next. But before I could give him a bath, I needed to take care of a few things myself. My swimsuit was still hanging up on the towel rack from yesterday, and I stepped into it. Yes, it’s silly, but I felt a lot more comfortable wearing a swimsuit than nothing at all, even when I was home alone.

  Next, I washed the cat scratches and bite off with soap and hot water. The cuts were shallower than I thought, and the bite hadn’t broken the skin. After patting my arm dry, I considered putting some antibacterial cream on the scratches, but it would just wash off in a minute anyway, so I left them to breathe for now.

  Blissfully unaware of what was in store for him, I pulled the last two clean towels out from under the sink. I really needed to do laundry soon. I started the shower and got it to a comfortable temperature. Then I started to worry that this wouldn’t work. The shower had a fixed head, not one of those retractable wands. Would that be enough water pressure to clean a dog as big and furry as Huckleberry?

  Or maybe I could draw a bath and convince him to jump in and splash around. But then how would I get the soap on him? For that matter, what would be better, bar soap or shampoo?

  If he didn’t stink so infernally bad—and me right along with him—I would have considered giving up on the whole idea and dragging him to the groomer. But I was broke, and besides, my wallet was still at the café. I could figure this out. How hard could it be?

  Convincing Huckleberry to jump into the bathtub was easy.

  The first time.

  As soon as the water hit him, he yelped like I’d poked him in the eyeball with a sharp stick, and knocked me over in his ungraceful attempt to escape. He huddled in the corner of the bathroom, shivering and giving me pitiful “Why?” eyes while whining incessantly.

  “Oh, come on, don’t be such a big baby. It’s just water,” I told him. I tried pulling on his leash, but he didn’t budge. I had to push him from behind to get him to go anywhere near the tub, but I couldn’t for the life of me convince him to get inside, and I couldn’t lift him up over the lip.

  Frustrated and running out of ideas, I turned the shower off. No use wasting water, right?

  As soon as the water stopped flowing, Huckleberry jumped into the bathtub and started licking the drain. “You’re kidding. It’s that easy?” I grinned and reached for the knob. As soon as I twisted it into the on position, Huckleberry yipped and leapt out of the tub. This time I avoided getting bowled over, barely.

  “This is gonna take all day, isn’t it?” I turned off the water. Huckleberry sprang into the tub. I kept one hand on his collar, and with the other, I grabbed the mixing bowl I’d put down on the floor for drinking water and dumped it over his big, stinky head. Huckleberry grinned at me. Feeling encouraged, I left him in the tub as I filled up the mixing bowl in the sink with lukewarm water.

  I ran back and forth between the tub and the sink several times until he was sopping wet. Then I dumped half a bottle of my favorite shampoo on him and rubbed it into his matted fur. Maybe I should have sprung for a professional groomer. He needed a haircut and I was certainly not prepared for that.

  “Odessa, I’m home!” Izzy called out, and I leapt to my feet. I had my hand on the doorknob, about to warn her to not open the bedroom door, but I was too late. She let out a shriek. Eager to investigate, Huckleberry—still lathered up with shampoo—climbed out of the tub, skittered across the floor, and squeezed past me into the living room.

  “What on earth?” Izzy exclaimed, as the big dog ran full tilt to greet her, hit the tile, and slid into the kitchen. Rufus, who had been hiding on top of the fridge, thought that Huckleberry was aiming for him. He yowled and leapt to the kitchen counter, knocking a bag of nacho cheese chips to the floor. Ignoring the cat, Huckleberry rushed toward the chips and began vacuuming them up in giant noisy mouthfuls.

  “I’d ask how your day was, but I’m not sure I want to know,” Izzy said. She bent down and grabbed Huckleberry’s leash in one hand while trying to pry the nearly empty bag of chips out of his mouth with the other.

  “Pretty much like this,” I confirmed.

  She handed me the leash, then her eyes started watering and she pinched her nose. “For the love of Pete, what is that smell?”

  I gave her a lopsided grin. “That would be me. Come on, Huckleberry. Let’s finish up your bath so I can take a shower.”

  “Anything I can do to help?” Izzy asked. I was impressed that she hadn’t run out of the apartment yet.

  “I’ve been showering myself for a couple of years now. I think I can handle it,” I quipped. To be honest, I wouldn’t have minded a hand in the bathroom. It sure would speed up the process. I’d tried getting water from the bathtub tap, but Huckleberry had bolted again, so I went back to shuttling water from the sink. However, I wasn’t about to lock Izzy up in a tiny room with me with the way I was smelling right now. I didn’t even want to be in the same room as me. “Unless you have an idea of how to get all this matted fur off him?”

  “I’ll see what I can come up with,” she replied, still pinching her nose.

  It took twice as long to get all the shampoo off Huckleberry as it had to get him wet and lathered up in the first place, but when the job was finally done, I felt an enormous sense of accomplishment. I dried him off as good as I could, then poked my head out of the bathroom. “Where’s Rufus?”

  “Hiding under the bed,” Izzy replied.

  “Good. Can you close the bedroom door? I’m gonna let Huckleberry out.”

  “No problem.”

  “Thanks. Oh, and don’t feed him anything. He’s already had half a pound of chicken and all those nacho chips.” Secure in the knowledge that the dog was in good hands and the cat was locked up in another room, I took a long, hot shower. I washed my hair three times, and used both soap and body wash on a loofah sponge, which was still tinted green from the shirt-staining debacle. When I was convinced that I was as clean as I was ever going to be without going through one of those decontamination showers at the CDC, I dried off with a stack of hand towels.

  I seriously needed to do laundry.

  I came out of the bathroom wearing my aunt’s robe to find Izzy sitting in the middle of the kitchen
floor surrounded by piles of orangey fluff, holding the leash of an overweight poodle. “What in heavens happened here?” I asked.

  Izzy held up a pair of electric clippers, then went back to finish buzzing Huckleberry’s flank. “A little help? He doesn’t like it when I mess with his toes.”

  “Sure thing.” I grabbed a jar of almond butter from the cabinet and a big spoon out of the drawer. I wasn’t sure if dogs liked almond butter as well as they liked peanut butter, but it was all we had. I sat down on the floor in front of him. “Oh, who’s a pretty boy?” I crooned. I fed him small bites of almond butter as Izzy finished up shaving his paws.

  While she worked, Izzy told me, “I can’t believe you cut out while Geoffrey Tate was still reading. He’s so funny and smart and handsome, not that I need to tell you that. He asked about you, you know?”

  “He did?” That surprised me.

  “You made quite an impression on him,” she told me. “I’ve got a personalized, autographed copy of his latest book for you in my bag. Here, help me turn Huckleberry around so I can get that last paw.”

  Once Izzy was finished, Huckleberry looked like a completely different dog. Instead of matted and dusty, his fur was soft and smelled like my favorite lilac shampoo. Without all of the hair obscuring his face, I could see his eyes clearly and I realized he wasn’t half-blind after all. He’d just had a hard time seeing out of all of that matted fur. His tail looked a little weird shaved, but it would grow back. And best of all, he had to be a thousand degrees cooler now.

  “He looks amazing. Where’d you get the clippers?”

  Izzy ran her fingers through her own short hair, flipping it over to show the hair above her right ear was buzzed almost down to the skin. “You think I can afford to go to the barber every couple of weeks?” she asked with a grin. “By the way, your phone has been ringing off the hook ever since I got home.”

  “Thanks.” I got up and checked it. Fifteen missed calls, all from my aunt. No voicemails. “Uh-oh. Busted.”

  I’m a pull-the-Band-Aid-off-quick kind of woman. I never understood people who avoided bad news when they could get it over with and get on with their day. So instead of hesitating or making up some kind of excuse to talk to her later, I called my aunt back.

  “Odessa, sweetheart. So good to hear from you,” she said by way of a greeting. I knew from the excess molasses in her voice that I was in trouble, big time.

  “I can explain,” I replied. Maybe not the best way to open the conversation, but it was the truth. “By the way, Rufus is doing great. He misses his mommy, but he’s eating and playing and behaving himself.” I left out the part where he had bit and scratched me because, really, that wasn’t his fault.

  “Uh-huh. Good to hear.” She fell silent.

  “About the roommate, it’s just for a couple of days. Two, three at the most. She’s a friend. I trust her. And the dog isn’t staying, I swear. I needed to give him a bath and I’m taking him back home right now, as soon as we get off the phone. Yes, the cops stopped by, but that was a totally unrelated matter.”

  There was a long pause, and I wondered if we’d gotten disconnected. Thanks to the miracle of cell phones, talking to someone in Nice—or was she in Paris this week?—was as easy as talking to someone in the same room, except without the benefit of their facial expressions.

  “Aunt Melanie, are you still there?”

  “A roommate, Odessa? The cops? And a dog? I’m so disappointed in you.” I could almost hear her shaking her head on the other end of the connection. “I thought I was very clear about not having friends over. Some of my collection is irreplaceable, and if it got knocked over or broken . . .”

  “I understand, and we’re being careful. Izzy’s building is being fumigated and she needs a place to stay. You don’t want her living on the street, do you?”

  “Well of course not, dear, but don’t you think . . .”

  “What, that any of her other friends are staying in a huge apartment all to themselves? I met someone the other day that has three roommates living in a space about the size of your bathroom. One of my friends lives in an abandoned school and has to shower in the gym locker room. Or maybe I should have turned her away and found out later she’s sleeping in the park? Sure, it’s not like she’s gonna freeze to death this time of year, but what park benches remain in Williamsburg are specifically designed to be too uncomfortable for anyone to sleep on.”

  “Odessa,” Aunt Melanie cut me off, “you’ve always had such a big heart. It’s just for a few days, right?”

  “Right,” I told her.

  She sighed. Aunt Melanie couldn’t have turned Izzy away any more than I could. “I only wish you would have asked first.”

  “I know. I should have.”

  “Why were the police there?”

  “Detective Castillo was just following up on something that had happened at work.” All right, that wasn’t exactly the full truth, but if I told my aunt that one of my coworkers had been murdered, she’d tell my mom, and I’d be yanked back to Louisiana before I could count to five.

  “Now about the dog . . .”

  “It’s the shop dog at Untapped Books & Café. We just finished his bath and I’m taking him back the minute we hang up.”

  “Rufus doesn’t like dogs.” Now she tells me. “He had a bad experience when he was a kitten.”

  “Don’t worry, Aunt Melanie. He’s in your bedroom with the door shut. When I get home tonight I’ll give him lots of treats and extra playtime.”

  “No harm, no foul, I guess.”

  I glanced down at the red marks on my arm. Huckleberry had escaped unscathed. He might have been terrified, but Rufus’s claws couldn’t gain any traction though his thick, matted coat. “Exactly. I’m sorry if I worried you . . .” I paused and thought. “Wait a minute. If you didn’t know about Izzy, and you didn’t know about the cops or the dog, why did you call me more than a dozen times and not leave a single message?”

  “Earl the concierge called, told me I needed to talk to my dear, sweet niece. Refused to tell me why, but said it was a matter of some urgency.”

  I narrowed my eyes. Rat Fink Earl. I knew it. “So nice of him,” I said between clenched teeth.

  “He’s just doing his job. I’ve got to get back to my friends, but please do at least try to stay out of trouble.”

  “I will. Love you, Aunt Melanie.”

  “Love you, too. Oh, and, Odessa? There’s a spare set of keys in the junk drawer. Make sure you get them back when your friend moves out. They’re very expensive to replace.” She hung up before I could thank her.

  15

  Dizzy Izzy @IsabelleWilliamsburg ∙ June 26

  busted! #sorrynotsorry

  THAT WENT WELL,” Izzy said hesitantly.

  “Better than can be expected,” I agreed.

  “Do you want me to leave? I know I kinda pushed my way in here and didn’t give you much of a choice. I’m sure I can find someone to crash with until it’s safe to go back home.”

  I shook my head. “No way. Like I told my aunt, there’s more than enough space here, and she gave us her blessing, so you might as well stay.” I rummaged through the junk drawer in the kitchen. I think there’s a law somewhere that everyone needed a miscellaneous drawer somewhere in their house to store everything from matches to string to box cutters to spare keys that didn’t fit anything anymore. Aunt Melanie was no exception. I found the keys. They were on a keyring along with a big fuzzy piece of fur.

  I tossed it to her.

  Izzy caught it in one hand, and then almost dropped it again. “Eww, what’s this supposed to be?”

  “I think maybe it’s supposed to be a kitten? Anyway, it’s your key for the duration so we don’t have to keep playing do-si-do with the door.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Melanie,” Izzy said.

  “I better g
et Huckleberry back to the shop before Rufus has a heart attack.” The dog in question was stretched out on the cool kitchen tile, snoring softly. With his new haircut, he was probably comfortable for the first time all summer, and I had no idea how I was going to convince him to walk all the way back to Untapped in the heat, especially after forcing a senior dog into more exercise in one day than he’d had in months. I’d call an Uber but most of them didn’t allow dogs. “Do we know anyone with a car?”

  “I don’t even know anyone with a driver’s license,” Izzy said. I think of all of the culture shocks I’d had in Brooklyn, that was the biggest. Less than a quarter of eight and half million plus New Yorkers had a driver’s license, and most of them were over forty and living outside of Manhattan. Why bother learning to drive when they can take a bus, train, or Uber anyplace they couldn’t bike or walk? “Oh wait. I think Parker has a van.”

  “Perfect. Do you have his number?”

  She gave it to me and I texted him. It’s Odessa. Got a sec?

  A few seconds later, my phone beeped. Sup?

  Big favor. Need car 2 drag Huckleberry 2 UB&C.

  Addy? I typed in my address. Meet U 5 min.

  Thx.

  I slipped my phone into my pocket. “Parker’s on his way. Thanks for the suggestion.” I changed out of the robe into real clothes and pulled my wet hair back into a ponytail. With my only pair of shoes out on the balcony, I borrowed a pair of flip-flops from Aunt Melanie’s closet. I hoped she wouldn’t mind.

  Huckleberry’s leash was still damp—I’d tried to wash the stench of garbage off it—but I clipped it to his collar and cajoled him to his feet. As stubborn as Huckleberry could be, it could easily take a lot longer than five minutes to get to the lobby, but luck was on my side and he ambled slowly behind me without much resistance.