Cat Got Your Cash

by Julie Chase

  “Please?”

  My front door creaked open. Chase stepped onto the porch in my apron. “Isn’t anyone eating breakfast? It’s getting cold.”

  I laughed.

  Jack muttered something about breakfast and headed back to my house.

  I retook my place at the island while Chase rinsed dishes and loaded my dishwasher. He whistled while he worked. I bobbed my head in time.

  Jack watched me eat. “What do you need to talk about?”

  I arranged the questions in my head by order of importance in case he tried to run off again. “How long have you known about Ryan Goodman?”

  “We’ve been looking for Ryan since Thursday.” Jack said, watching Chase as he answered.

  “You’ve known about him since the day we found her?” I said, incredulous. “Why didn’t you tell me? How did you know?”

  He dragged his heated gaze to me and pulled the badge he wore on a chain around his neck out from beneath his shirt. “You may recall I’m an actual detective.”

  “All right then, Actual Detective, where is he? Have you questioned him? What did he say?”

  Jack lifted his cup and blew over the steaming contents. “He’s in the wind.”

  “Guilty,” Chase announced, clicking my dishwasher shut. “Innocent people don’t evade the police or hide after their sister is murdered. I called it.”

  “I agree,” I said. “You know what else? That sneaky assistant, Josie, said she didn’t know him. I asked her about the guy in basketball shorts carrying boxes into Annie’s house, and she claimed to have no idea who he was. She’s Annie’s personal assistant. She was living there. She had to have met him. Why would she lie?”

  “Guilty,” Chase repeated. “Oh, or secret lovers.”

  I looked to Jack for an opinion, but his expression gave nothing away. “Maybe her lie had something to do with the boxes,” I suggested. “Ryan was the only one who carried the boxes with Xs, and Josie tried to take a box from Annie’s office that night. That box also had an X. They could have been in cahoots for another reason. Maybe they were selling Annie’s pieces on the underground.” I hopped down and went to find the little pillow I’d brought home with her kittens. “If Josie lied about knowing Annie’s brother, we need to talk to her again and see if she’ll admit to the reason.” I dropped to my knees and looked under my couch and coffee table.

  “What are you doing here?” Jack’s voice carried in from the next room.

  “Hanging,” Chase answered. “You?”

  Uh-oh. The testosterone tsunami brewing in my kitchen was strong enough to flutter the curtains.

  I jumped to my feet like a ninja, pillow in hand. “Found it!” I rushed the little satin treasure back to the kitchen and displayed it on the freshly cleaned chopping block Chase had left on my island. “It looks like a standard decorative number to me. These are really cute in gift baskets with chocolates or perfume.” The little rectangle was made of soft navy satin with plenty of stuffing, ruffled edges, and embroidery on top. White threads formed two letters: AL. The famous Annie Lane logo.

  Chase poked the pillow with his finger as if it were the Pillsbury Doughboy. “I suppose these will be worth money now that Annie’s dead. Do you know if her logo has been trademarked? If these are the last ones ever made, they could sell for a mint in the right circles.”

  I stabbed a knife through the pillow.

  Chase jumped back with a less-than-manly squeal.

  I rolled my eyes.

  Jack was on his feet, one hand extended toward me. “Lacy?”

  Chase moved to Jack’s side.

  “I’m just seeing what it’s made of.” I worked my knife through the stitches along one side. “I’m tired and frustrated, and nothing has been what it seemed all week. Why should this be any different?” Someone had hidden jewels in my store last summer, and it occurred to me that this could be another situation like that one. “What if Josie or Annie’s brother were stealing from her and walking her stuff right out the front door without her knowing?” I set the knife aside and looked at Jack. “Did Annie make any insurance claims recently before her death? Did she file any reports for missing or stolen items?” I worked my fingers into the stuffing and piled it on the island, then turned the satin inside out. “This is really ugly stitchwork. Obviously outsourced.” A pill of disappointment soured in my stomach. Was my hero a fraud? Had she sold the pillows as her own when they weren’t? Had she stolen her protégé’s designs? What other nuggets of dishonesty would I find if I kept looking?

  Jack separated the wad of fiberfill with his fingers. “Nice work, Lacy.” He raised a small baggie for inspection. He made a call with his free hand. “We need to pick up Josie Fresca again. Put out a BOLO on Ryan Goodman.” He hung up and stared at the little baggie caught between his fingertips. Several brightly colored pills lay inside. “I guess we know what Josie was hiding.”

  Chase locked his fingers behind his head. “Whoa. How many of those pillows were at her place?”

  I reached for the baggie, but Jack pulled it away. “There was a box of them in Annie’s office,” I told Chase. “And there were a bunch of pictures of her brother carrying similar boxes.”

  He tucked his shirt into his pants and buttoned it high. “All those boxes with Xs.”

  “Yeah.”

  Chase tied his tie and slid his jacket on. “Okay, so this is good news. If Annie’s death was about drug money, then her kittens are safe and so are you. Unless they know you took that.” He pointed to the shredded pillow. “In that case, you’re a loose end.”

  “Fantastic.”

  He smiled. “At least we know why the boxes were all marked with an X.”

  I raised my brows. “We do?”

  “That’s Molly. X. Ecstasy. It’s really popular on the club scene.”

  “Molly?” I asked. I’d heard about it on the news but had no real firsthand information.

  “MDMA,” Jack said.

  I pursed my lips and made a mental note to research the drug later. “If Josie and Ryan had a Molly business going under Annie’s nose, they probably weren’t the ones to kill her. They needed her to move their merchandise.” I lifted my phone and took a picture of the pills. “Unless she found out and confronted them.”

  “What are you doing?” Jack asked.

  “Keeping a photo log.” My cell phone rang, and I froze. “Unknown caller.”

  Chase extended his hand. “Do you want me to answer it?”

  Jack narrowed his eyes. “You think that’s the guy with the song?”

  I lifted my shoulders to my ears. “It can go to voice mail.”

  Chase took the phone and hit the speaker button. “Answer,” he whispered. “You’ve got a cop here.”

  Jack nodded stiffly.

  Right. Besides, it was only a call. No matter how many times I heard the music, it couldn’t hurt me. I exhaled slowly and answered as normally as possible. “Hello?”

  The dreary, ominous music began.

  I covered my mouth with one hand and pointed frantically at the phone with my other.

  “You follow me. I follow you. You follow me. I follow you.” The creepy voice promised all my worst nightmares.

  I considered covering my ears, but it was too late. I knew the words. They echoed in my head most of the day. I was never alone, not at work and not at home. I rubbed the chill from my arms.

  Jack took the phone from Chase. “This is Detective Jack Oliver.”

  The line went dead.

  Jack made another call on his cell phone. “Yeah. I need a trace on the last number to call five-oh-four, five-two-two . . .” He repeated my phone number to whomever he’d called.

  Chase stepped around Jack and into my personal space. “Why don’t you stay with me until Jack figures that out?” Worry tugged the corners of his eyes and mouth. “I have plenty of room. I’ll be a perfect gentleman.”

  “No. It’s okay,” I said at the same time Jack said, “No.”

 
Something that looked a lot like hurt flashed in Chase’s eyes. He turned his back to Jack. “Then stay with your folks. Please.”

  “You know I can’t.” I hated the grim expression on his normally jovial face. “Maybe I’ll buy a whistle.”

  He laughed. “Don’t you have a license to carry a concealed weapon?”

  Memories of my mugging rushed back, yanking my already wild heartbeat to a sprinter’s pace. “Yes, but I don’t want to shoot anyone!”

  Chase pulled me into a hug and chuckled as he stroked my back. “I don’t think a whistle is the answer. Why’d you bother getting the permit if you won’t carry?”

  It wasn’t the first time I’d been asked. “I like having rights and knowing the laws, and I happen to believe strongly in education and options.” My chin jutted forward. “And also in whistles.”

  He released me and pulled keys from his pocket. “Fine. I’ll stay here again tonight.” He planted a kiss on my cheek and let himself out.

  Jack stared at the closed door until Chase’s car revved to life out front. “He’s not staying here again, and for the record, I don’t approve of whatever you two were up to last night.”

  My head spun. “What are you talking about?”

  “Chase Hawthorne should not know so much about this investigation. Neither should you, for that matter.”

  I crossed my arms. “Now that I know Ryan’s in town, and he had a possible reason to attack his sister, I want to go back to the French Market and see the artist making those big animal heads.” He didn’t keep records or pay taxes, but maybe he’d remember Ryan’s face if he’d bought a mask from him.

  “Which artist?”

  “Come on. You drive.” I snapped the lid back onto my coffee. “Where do you do the most Molly busts in the Quarter? I’ll show Ryan’s and Josie’s pictures around. See if anyone knows them.”

  Jack swung a thickly muscled forearm in front of me like a guard gate. “Slow down. First of all, I’m homicide, not narcotics. I don’t handle drug busts. Neither do you. I need to make some calls before I’ll know where Molly’s most popular in the Quarter. Second, once I have that information, I’ll let the narcotics division handle the investigation from there.” He pointed to himself. “Homicide.” He pointed to me. “Shop owner.” He wagged the finger between us. “Not narcotics.”

  I loaded Penelope into her carrier. “Can we drop Penelope off at Furry Godmother? She likes to play with Spot, and Imogene’s opening for me today. She’ll be glad for the company since I’m going to be late.”

  Jack took Penelope’s carrier from me and motioned me into the day.

  I set my alarm and locked up. “Chase can stay with me if he wants to, by the way. Don’t think you’re the boss of me because I’m letting you drive me to work.”

  He wrenched the passenger door of his truck open and waited for me to climb inside, then passed Penelope to me in her carrier. “You let me drive you? The way I recall, you demanded I drive you. Big difference. Huge.” He shut the door and rounded the hood to the driver’s side.

  I scrolled the Internet on my phone. “I’m going to show that artist making papier-mâché animal heads at the Market a picture of Dylan Latherope, too. I don’t know why I didn’t think of showing pictures before. Maybe he’ll recognize one of my suspects. I’ve been thinking it was Dylan in the cat costume, but maybe it’s Ryan. I’m going to ask about Josie, too. She could’ve bought the mask and given it to Ryan. She’s definitely not the one wearing it. Whoever’s in those black coveralls is broad. Josie’s a bean pole.” I held up my pinky finger for visual reference. “I haven’t heard from Dylan Latherope since you threatened him with your personal restraining order, but he wasn’t in the footage I found online of Annie’s Manhattan memorial. I bet he’s up to something. I should call my dad and tell him to batten down the hatches. It doesn’t take a genius to connect me to the local veterinarian. Once Latherope realizes that, he’s sure to go badger Dad.”

  Jack listened as I talked through the gobs of information flooding my head. We made it to Furry Godmother in record time. Imogene was just turning the sign from Closed to Open when Jack pulled half onto the curb out front.

  I hauled Penelope’s carrier out with me. “Good morning, Imogene. Would you mind keeping Penelope here for a while? I’ve got a new lead on the guy who’s stalking me, and Jack said he’ll take me to check it out.”

  She looked at the open truck door behind me. “Good morning, Detective Oliver,” she drawled. “How are you doing this fine morning?”

  “Very well, Miss Imogene. You look pretty as ever. How’re the grandkids?”

  I let my head fall forward. I was in too big of a hurry to wait while they exchanged southern niceties. I rolled my head up and made big puppy dog eyes at her. “I won’t be long, and I really appreciate it.”

  She took Penelope and waved me off. “Go on. You two kids have fun. Hope you put that dime in your shoe. Don’t try to hold me responsible if you didn’t.”

  I climbed back inside Jack’s truck and shut the door. I couldn’t remember where her weird dime was.

  Jack powered my window down. “What was that?” he asked Imogene, who was saying something.

  I curled my fingers on my lap, itching to run to the market if we didn’t start driving soon.

  Imogene stepped closer to the truck. “I just wondered if you two were getting breakfast somewhere nice. There won’t be many folks to talk to in the Quarter just yet.”

  I looked at the clock on Jack’s dashboard. Eight fifty.

  Jack leaned across me and spoke through the open window at my side. “I’m sure she’ll find something for me to get into.”

  Imogene laughed and headed into Furry Godmother with my cat.

  The weight of defeat pressed my shoulders forward. “I guess I can go in and work for a while. The market won’t be busy for a few hours.” Why was it so early? It felt as if I’d been up for hours.

  Jack gave me a side glance. “Can I trust you to stay here if I let you out of my truck?”

  “Let me out?” I twisted on the seat to gape at him. “I’m not a prisoner.” Am I? I gave him my business face. “I’m a grown woman. I can go anywhere I want.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean, no? Yes.”

  “No. You can’t do anything you want because you want to come up with cockamamie ways to twist yourself into my homicide investigation. That’s called obstruction.” He broke the final word into syllables.

  “That’s ridiculous. My ideas are fantastic.”

  He stared.

  I tapped my foot against the floorboard, begging my brain for another fantastic idea. It was a little too early to look for artists at the market and way too early to question night clubbers about drugs. “How about we visit Shannon Martin until the market opens? Chase and I never found him last night, so I’d planned to go see him this morning anyway. Wherever he is now, he’s probably hungover and willing to answer my questions if I promise to go away. Take me there. Let’s talk to him.”

  Jack eased his truck into traffic. “This is why I can’t leave you alone.”

  “You’re having fun,” I teased. “Admit it.”

  He didn’t admit it, but something new blinked through his blank cop stare. “Am not.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Furry Godmother’s words of warning: Be prepared. Life can change on a dime.

  I scrolled through Shannon’s Instagram feed as we drove toward his apartment. Two new pictures emerged. “He’s at Café Du Monde.”

  Jack changed direction quickly. “Which one?”

  “At the market.” Yes, Café Du Monde had more than one location, but the one that counted was at the French Market, steps from Jackson Square, nestled in the heart of the French Quarter. I’d grown up eating beignets there, and so had my mother. In fact, so had my grandparents. Any other location was subpar at best, though I was admittedly biased.

  “I thought this guy was supposed to be hungover and
ready to answer all your questions?”

  “Me, too.” I unfastened my seat belt. “I’ll be right back.”

  I hurried across the street toward the oldest café in the city. The beloved green-and-white-striped awning ruffled gently in the wind. A line of customers wrapped the perimeter of tables and stretched onto the sidewalk. Scents of chicory and powdered sugar floated to my nose.

  I scanned the scene, praying I hadn’t missed him again.

  A dramatic-looking man with gel-spiked hair and a dancer’s figure leaned against the counter near a napkin dispenser, chatting up a café worker who was busy filling orders. I gave his latest selfie one more look. “Gotcha.”

  I cut through the line and stopped close enough to shake his hand. “Shannon Martin?”

  “Yeah?” He swung his head my way with a wide, toothy smile. His whiskey-laced breath nearly knocked me over.

  I covered my nose discreetly. If anyone lit a match while he was talking, the whole place would go up in flames. His outfit hadn’t changed since Chase and I had started tracking him last night. Shannon wasn’t at home nursing a hangover—because he was still going strong in the Quarter.

  “Hi. I’m Lacy Crocker. I follow you online.” I took a big step back and attempted to seem starstruck. “I’m so excited to see you’re in my city. Though I’m also really sorry to hear about your mentor, Annie Lane. That must be really hard for you.”

  The smile melted off his face. “Yeah. I’m heartbroken.” He collected his cup and a napkin from the counter. “I’ve got to go.”

  I followed. “Can you believe someone walked into her house and whacked her on the head like that? I’ll bet there aren’t many people she would’ve let inside.” I sidestepped spilled drinks and fallen napkins as we weaved through the labyrinth of occupied tables. “She would’ve let you in, though, right?”

  Shannon stopped fleeing and turned on me. “Who are you?”

  “Lacy Crocker.” I stretched a hand in his direction. “I run a pet boutique on Magazine Street.”

  He scoffed. “I meant, how are you important? Why are you here? Are you a reporter or something?”

  “I told you. I run a pet boutique. Do I look like a reporter?”