Nothing to Fear But Ferrets

by Linda O. Johnston

  Yul could have, of course. What if he had been in cahoots with Chad, behind Charlotte’s back? What if he had shared his ladylove’s latest reality show ideas with the guy she’d rejected—instead of getting that same reject to cough up his ideas for Yul to relay to Charlotte? Chad could have threatened to blackmail him, and—

  I laughed a little at myself as I stealthily returned to my car. All this speculation, a shifting of my suspicions back onto Yul, just because this guy I’d concluded was innocent was speaking on a cell phone?

  I was probably way off base. And yet, this latest oddity niggled nastily at the most suspicious synapses in my brain.

  I’d already planned to spend more time on Borden Yurick’s computers doing research. Googling I could do at home. But now, I intended, on the more sophisticated databases, to look up every iota of dope on everyone I thought could have killed Chad, to root out anything unusual in their backgrounds. The cops had probably already undertaken such a search. My turn, now.

  And the first person I’d dig into would be Yul.

  BUT NOT TODAY. After the memorial, I had to get busy seeing to my many pet charges. Since it was Sunday, I didn’t have to worry about Widget. Though romping with the rambunctious terrier wasn’t on my agenda, more than half a dozen dogs and cats, including Harold Reddingam’s friendly felines Abra and Cadabra, awaited my attention. So did Pansy, the adorable pig, though Avvie would be home later that night. At least Milt Abadim had gotten home, so I no longer had to check on my pal Py the python.

  Eventually, I was ready to head home. Or at least my temporary home-away-from-home. The place I’d been invited romantically to move into permanently.

  Until I’d learned of Jeff Hubbard’s perfidy.

  I sighed as I headed the Beamer back through the Valley. Maybe I really had overreacted. Ex meant ex, as far as I knew. And if the experience had been unmemorable, maybe Jeff wouldn’t have thought to mention it. Or maybe it had been too horribly memorable for him to talk of.

  But either way, why was he helping dear Amanda to deal with her stalker?

  Too much cogitation made my mind spin. I’d shelve the subject for now. After all, with Jeff out of town, I didn’t have to consider his offer, or him, except to take good care of Odin and his house.

  I’d nearly gotten to Jeff’s when I recalled I had forgotten some files at home, stuff on my Chad Chatsworth investigation. I could get them tomorrow, but I had a feeling I wouldn’t sleep well tonight. Not after my discussion with Philipe, my spying on Yul, my fretting about Jeff, and mostly, my consideration of Chad’s memorial, and the many potential murder suspects there. Maybe sifting through notes that so far led nowhere would be soporific enough to let me doze.

  Mentally sending a message to Lexie and Odin that I’d be there soon, I had the Beamer bear right, toward the hills.

  At my place, I used the electronic eye to open the gate. There was no sign of any other car—neither Charlotte’s nor Yul’s. Evidently they’d driven separately to Chad’s service. Where were they now? Not my business. But at least this day of mourning Chad hadn’t been Charlotte’s cue to toss another shindig.

  I parked in my usual spot beside the garage, then headed for the wooden stairway to my upstairs apartment.

  Since I was in a hurry, I started quickly up the stairs. But as I stepped on the third step—or was it the fourth?—my feet slithered out from under me.

  I grabbed frantically for the handrail. Got it!

  Only as I tautened my hold, the railing was slick and slimy beneath my hand. In no way did my action steady me.

  Instead, I tumbled headlong back down the stairs.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  PITCHING BACKWARD, I shoved out my hands, snatching at whatever, wildly attempting to break my fall.

  Except there was nothing to grasp but humid and useless November air.

  I smashed hard onto the pavement and felt as if I broke something, all right. Not the fall, but a bone. Or two. In my butt. Maybe my arm.

  Pain slammed through me. I may have screamed. I wasn’t sure, though I heard something shrill.

  I sat there, stunned. Waiting for the agony to ebb enough for me to stand and assess the damage. Only I couldn’t stand just then. Nor did the pain abate, not for a long while.

  I half lay, half sat, immobile in the shadows of the late fall evening. The light at the top of the stairs came on as dusk grew to dark.

  The hardness of the driveway spread unyielding beneath me. No one came to see what was wrong. Charlotte and Yul apparently were absent. Only a minimal number of lights were on in the house, probably those set on a timer to suggest to the stupidest thieves that someone was home. No neighbor was close enough to mark anything amiss over here, except maybe Phil Ashler. But no windows in his house across the street spied directly at my garage, even had he been home staring out.

  My teeth started to chatter, though the throbbing mess that was my body began to stop hurting so badly. A sign of shock? I breathed deeply and forced myself to cease shivering.

  I glanced around to see if my purse was within reach, considering whether to call 911. What, and let the world know that klutzy Kendra Ballantyne couldn’t even climb her own stairs without falling flat on her fanny?

  Shame suddenly outshone the pain. Instead, I assessed the damage. My butt ached and would doubtless be bruised, but where I’d landed had been padding, not bone. It would be okay.

  And the hand that had hit nearly simultaneously, and the arm to which it was attached? I was a little less sure whether they’d suffered damage. When I tried to bend both, they hurt, but not enough to make me scream.

  Still, I remained there for a few moments longer before carefully turning to rise to my hands and knees.

  Which was when I realized the driveway was dry beneath me.

  It had been raining earlier, when I’d been at Chad’s service. The sky had wept in a dreary drizzle later, too. But not for a few hours—I hadn’t had to dry doggy paws when I walked my canine clients.

  So how, then, had my steps stayed so wet? My hands, too, now, as well as my dressy dark slacks that I hadn’t bothered to change all day?

  The dampness I felt from fingers to feet was slick, even oily.

  Oily?

  Carefully, I stood and stumbled toward my stairway. Its wood shone, reflecting the sheen of the dim outside lights. I touched it.

  No way had this slippery sliminess fallen from the heavens. No, someone had slathered it onto the steps and handrail, to ensure that anyone climbing up would lose traction and tumble down. Just as I’d done. And who else besides me would be expected to scale this stairway this night? Lexie? Maybe, but the texture of doggie paws would cope with the oil without causing a canine catastrophe.

  No, this skullduggery was deliberate and not intended to injure a dog.

  It had been planned particularly for me.

  “NO HOMICIDES HERE tonight, Detective Ned,” I said to the most familiar of the cops who’d shown up after my 911 call. “So why are you here?” I sat in the driver’s seat of the Beamer, the door open. The first cops to arrive had set up floodlights and had begun to conduct a crime scene investigation.

  Did greased wood collect fingerprints?

  “I recognized the address.” Noralles stared down at me with what looked like sympathy in his dark, usually expressionless eyes. I wondered fleetingly if this African-American flatfoot ever went off duty. Or whether he slept in his inevitable dark suits. He’d probably been wearing the same one earlier, at Chad’s service. “And I gathered this could be an attempted homicide.” He nodded toward where guys from the L.A.P.D.’s Scientific Investigation Division were taking samples of the slime I’d slid on.

  Considering that his supposition was most likely true, I shuddered but tried not to let him see it. “Maybe,” I said as carelessly as I could. “Or a nasty practical joke gone bad.”

  “Any idea who might have done it? And don’t tell me it’s more ferrets. I might bite, though, if you s
ay it’s some former ferret owners.”

  I shook my head. “Not Charlotte or Yul,” I said vehemently, though more convinced about the former than the latter.

  Why had Yul acted so different from his typical taciturn character earlier?

  “Maybe, but they still could have set up Mr. Chatsworth and let someone else stop their nosy landlady from solving the murder.” He stroked his smooth-shaven chin. “Now if my department made a habit of disposing of meddling citizens, I might be a suspect in that myself.” He lifted a dark brow as he smiled speculatively.

  I couldn’t help it. I laughed.

  “Not funny, Kendra,” he said, though his voice stayed lighter than the usual grouchy growl. “Even if I didn’t like it, I could understand your butting into our investigation of murders when you were a suspect. But right now, you’re off my radar and I figure you want to stay that way. You’re not a suspect in Chad Chatsworth’s murder, but I can’t say the same for Ms. LaVerne or Mr. Silva. My investigation indicates your relationship with them is as landlord and tenants, but you’re interfering as much as if you were related.” He gazed at me quizzically. “You’re not, are you?”

  “No.”

  “And you’re still not practicing law, so they’re not your clients, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  His formerly friendly stare segued into something malevolent. “If you’re doing this because you think you’re smarter than the L.A.P.D. in general, and me in particular, I’d suggest you concentrate on your pet-sitting, Ms. Ballantyne.”

  I blinked under Noralles’s sudden switch of mood. “All I want is justice, Ned,” I said, not liking at all how my statement slipped out as a shaky whisper.

  “You’ll like it better if you stay alive to see it. Finding out who killed Chad Chatsworth is an official investigation, and we’re still gathering evidence. Someone besides me apparently doesn’t like your nosing around—someone with an interest in shutting you up.” I opened my mouth to offer my opinion, but he waved it shut with his officious hand. “Butt out, Kendra,” he finished, “before things really get too slippery for you.”

  NORALLES HAD MORE to say to me before we parted company.

  By then, I’d waited for the SID team to let me climb my stairs again, more carefully this time. They’d gathered what evidence they could, then kindly helped me scatter sand along the wooden stairs from a bag some landscapers had left long ago.

  A few neighbors filtered through my open gate. Phil Ashler, for one, hadn’t seen anyone do the nasty deed on my property.

  Lyle Urquard left his bicycle on the edge of the street to check on me, but he hadn’t been around to view who’d committed the vandalism, either. “Was Charlotte here?” he asked anxiously. “She wasn’t hurt, was she?” He didn’t seem overly concerned about me, but maybe that was because he could see I’d survived.

  No sign of the usually nosy Thomasons, but Ike Janus parked his Hummer and checked what was happening, too.

  A while later, after gaining access to my apartment, I used some strong household cleaner to take an initial swipe at eliminating the oil, aching with every snail-like motion I made. To my surprise, Noralles hung around and even helped a little.

  As I finished all I had intended to do that night, he eyed me up and down. “You don’t look so hot, Kendra.”

  “Thanks. I’d like to say the same, but I can’t.” I eyed him similarly up and down and waggled my brows à la Groucho. Was I flirting? Heck, I didn’t know. Maybe the fall had knocked all common sense out of my noggin. Of course it had been my nether end I’d landed on.

  Noralles laughed, then grew sober within the same thirty seconds. “I’ll add a patrol along this street tonight.”

  “No need, unless you think the mad oiler intends to come back. I’m staying at Jeff Hubbard’s.” As his gaze intensified, I felt my face flush. “He’s out of town,” I clarified quickly. “Lexie and I are staying with his dog, Odin.”

  “Well, give me his address and I’ll make sure there’s an extra patrol there, too. This wasn’t a random act of vandalism. Whoever did it knows you. And wherever you go, nasty surprises may follow.”

  I felt my knees weaken and grabbed on to the partially scrubbed stair rail.

  “You need to be checked over,” Noralles said. “I’ll drop you at the St. Joe’s emergency room.”

  Providence St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank was the nearest major medical facility. But I no longer had medical insurance. Plus, what ailed me now besides ugly bumps and bruises couldn’t be cured by emergency medicine specialists.

  “Thanks,” I said, “but I’m okay.” I watched him watch me while I poured myself into the Beamer. He sat in his unmarked car while I backed out the driveway and used the automatic control to close the gate behind me.

  And I repeated to myself as a mantra, “I’m okay,” during my whole ride to Jeff ’s.

  LEXIE AND ODIN seemed happy to see me. Or maybe their pleased wriggles and wags in Jeff’s kitchen simply signified eager anticipation of dinner and their last walk of the evening. I didn’t want to disappoint them but, after feeding them, led them only a short way on their leashes—making sure to stay on the sidewalk beneath the streetlights before turning back. Fortunately, Jeff’s residential road was flat and straight. The idea of navigating a curving, climbing street like mine didn’t sound inviting to my sore carcass.

  And here, I could see anyone approaching for several blocks.

  We soon went inside, and I fixed myself a short glass of wine, strictly medicinal. Then I settled down on one of the white sectional sofa pieces atop the bright, Southwestern-style area rug in Jeff’s sunken living room. I turned on his wide-screen TV to watch a mindless sitcom to get my mind off my aches.

  My cell phone rang, and I looked at its digital display. Avvie Milton’s number. The last time I’d visited Pansy, her potbellied pig, had been earlier that evening, but by then it felt like a lifetime ago.

  “Hi, Avvie,” I said. “Are you home?”

  “Yes, and Pansy’s great. Thanks so much for taking care of her for me.”

  “You’re welcome.” I relaxed a little in relief. The way things had gone that evening, I’d half expected to be scolded for mistreating her pet in some unanticipated way.

  “You sound funny. Are you okay?”

  I didn’t feel at all funny. And though Avvie and I hadn’t been in touch much recently, we’d been good friends up until a few months ago.

  A little to my surprise, and a lot to my chagrin, I found myself pouring out the night’s misadventures to her.

  “Oh, Kendra, are you okay? Do you want to come here and spend the night? What are you going to do?” And then, before I could spew out any answers, she said something that clinched my reply to her invitation, even had I been inclined to accept it. “You’re not sticking your nose in the investigation of the Chad Chatsworth murder, are you? I mean, Kendra, you nearly got yourself killed the last time you interfered in a murder case, but at least you had a stake in that one.”

  She’d been bent out of shape then because of some fingers I’d pointed toward her, but at that point I’d been flinging out accusations against everyone to see where they stuck. But that didn’t excuse her interfering with my interference in this case.

  “Thanks for asking,” I said coolly and noncommittally. “I’m glad Pansy enjoyed my pet-sitting. I’ll get your keys back to you soon.” After a hurried goodbye, I hung up.

  I hadn’t much time to simmer over Avvie’s intrusion before my cell phone rang again. The caller this time was the man of this very house, Jeff.

  After my last conversation, I had every intention of remaining unruffled and talking only of how much fun Odin, Lexie, and I were having. Since Jeff and I were hardly speaking to each other anyway, that shouldn’t have been hard.

  Only it proved to be impossible. Jeff’s voice sounded calm and caring. His flight to Phoenix had been fine, and so far his business meetings about the security system at a major corpo
ration’s headquarters had gone magnificently.

  “And Kendra,” he added. “I miss you.”

  That did it. Whether he was a hypocrite or not about his prior married state, I missed him, too. Damn it. And I missed being able to share my problems with him.

  So, once again, I found myself blurting out all that had happened.

  “Damn it, Kendra, listen to Noralles this time. He—”

  That was enough to break the spell his voice had cast about my poor bruised body. “He has his own agenda, Jeff,” I interjected irritably. “And I’m fine. Maybe even getting closer to whoever really killed Chad Chatsworth, and I’m making someone nervous.”

  “That’s the point. Stay out of it. Look, I’ll be home in a couple of days. We can talk about it then, and I’ll help you—”

  “Fine, Jeff. Thanks. Odin says good night. Lexie, too.” And then I hung up without saying good night.

  I didn’t need a macho security guy P.I. telling me how to run whatever investigation I intended to make.

  I didn’t want Jeff Hubbard, the secret ex-husband, interfering in my life.

  I didn’t want …

  And then I realized what I did want that I could get right here, in Jeff’s house, while he was gone. He’d never know about it, so that would make it okay.

  Well, ethically it wouldn’t, but who would ever know but Odin and Lexie? And they’d never tell.

  They did follow me into the guest bedroom, though—the one I’d slept in when I’d first started pet-sitting for Jeff, before I started sleeping with him. The one I should have moved into now, but hadn’t. The room that doubled as a storeroom for boxes of some of his security company files.

  The one that contained a carton labeled PHILIPE PELLERA.

  That box was at the bottom of a stack of four. I made certain to put the others in order as I lifted them down, so when I returned them, they’d stay the same way. That job wasn’t easy, the way my body ached at every move, but at least with all the walking and lifting I’d done that evening, I was even more sure I hadn’t broken any bones in my fall.