What the Cat Saw
Page 1
What the Cat Saw
Berkley Prime Crime titles by Carolyn Hart
DEATH COMES SILENTLY
WHAT THE CAT SAW
What the Cat Saw
CAROLYN HART
BERKLEY PRIME CRIME, NEW YORK
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2012 by Carolyn Hart.
Cover photo of tabby cat looking through window by Getty Junophoto.
Cover design by George Long.
Interior text design by Laura K. Corless.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are registered trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
FIRST EDITION: October 2012
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hart, Carolyn G.
What the cat saw / Carolyn Hart.—1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-101-61159-3
1. Cats—Fiction. 2. Extrasensory perception—Fiction. 3. Murder—Investigation—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3558.A676W44 2012
813’.54—dc23
2012022450
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ALWAYS LEARNING
PEARSON
To Trent and Adrienne with love, always.
Table of Contents
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1
On the upside, the airport was small. On the downside, a blustery wind took Nela Farley’s breath away as she stepped out of the terminal, pulling her small wheeled bag. She shivered in her light coat. She’d expected cold temperatures, but she’d not expected a wind that buffeted her like a hurried shopper in a crowded mall. She’d also known she wouldn’t be met. Still, arriving in a strange place without anyone to greet her was a reminder that she was alone.
Alone…
She walked faster, hurried across the double drive to a parking garage. Chloe’s call this morning had been even more fragmented than usual. “…on the fourth level, slot A forty-two. Leland’s car is an old VW, I mean really old. Pink stripes. You can’t miss it.”
In the parking garage elevator, Nela opened her purse and found the keys that had arrived by overnight FedEx from her sister. They dangled from what seemed to be a rabbit’s foot. Nela held it gingerly. In the dusky garage, she followed numbers, chilled by the wind whistling and moaning through the concrete interior.
She spotted Leland’s VW with no difficulty. Why pink stripes? The decals in the rear window would have been distinctive enough. In turn, they featured a mustachioed cowboy in an orange cowboy hat and orange chaps with OSU down one leg, a huge openmouthed bass fish, a long-eared dog with the caption, My Best Friend Is a Coonhound, and a gleaming Harley with the caption, Redneck at the Ready.
Nela unlocked the driver’s door. Soon she would be off on an Oklahoma adventure, all because Chloe had roared off one sunny California day on the back of her new boyfriend’s Harley, destination the red dirt state. Plus, Nela had lost her job on a small SoCal daily and was free to answer Chloe’s call that she come to Craddock, Oklahoma.
Nela was both irritated with her sister—one more call for a rescue, this time to protect her job—and grateful to have somewhere to go, something to fill leaden days. As for Chloe’s job, she would have been pleased if she’d had an inkling of what to expect, but in her usual fashion, Chloe had spoken of her job only peripherally.
Nela expected she’d manage. It definitely would be different to be in Oklahoma. Everything was going to be new, including subbing at Chloe’s job, whatever it was. Knowing Chloe, the job could be raising guppies or painting plastic plates or transcribing medical records. Only Chloe could hold a job for several months and, despite hour-long sisterly confabs on their cells, always be vague about where she worked or what she did. Nela had a hazy idea she worked in an office of some kind. On the phone, Chloe was more interested in talking about what she and Leland had done or were going to do. The wind blows all the time, but it’s kind of fun…Hamburger Heaven really is…There’s a farm with llamas…went to see the Heavener Runestone… However, she’d promised to leave a packet full of “stuff” on the front passenger seat.
Nela popped her suitcase in the backseat. She breathed a sigh of relief as she slid behind the wheel. Indeed, there was a folder and on it she saw her sister’s familiar scrawl: Everything You Need to Know. Nestled next to the folder was a golden box—oh, she shouldn’t have spent that much money—of Godiva. A sticky note read: Road treats. Confetti dangled from the rearview mirror. Taped to the wheel was a card. She pulled the card free, opened the envelope. The card showed an old-fashioned derrick spewing oil. She opened it. Chloe had written: I gush for you. Nela, you’re a life saver. Thanks and hugs and kisses—Love—Chloe
Nela’s brief irritation subsided. She smiled. She wished her little—though so much taller—sister was here and she could give her a hug, look into those cornflower blue eyes, and be sure everything was right in Chloe’s world. So long as she could, Nela knew she would gladly come when her sister called.
She picked up the folder, opened it to find a garage parking ticket, a letter, and a map with directions to I-35.
…turn south. It’s an hour and a half drive to Craddock. They say Hiram Craddock, a rail gang supervisor for the Santa Fe railroad, took a horseback ride one Sunday in 1887 and saw a cloud of butterflies stopped by the river. When the tracks were laid, he quit his job to stay and build the first shack in what later became Craddock. This fall when the monarchs came through, I loved thinking about him seeing them and saying, This is beautiful, I’ll stay here. He married a Chickasaw woman. That was real common for white men who wanted to be able to stay in the Chickasaw Nation. He opened a trading post. Anyway, I don’t know if I explai
ned about staying at Miss Grant’s apartment after she died. I did it as a favor and I know you won’t mind. It’s because of Jugs. You’ll love him. In case your plane’s delayed, there’s plenty of food and water, but the last I checked, your flights were on time. Anyway, it’s sad about Miss Grant but I didn’t mind helping out. Nobody knows you’re coming in today and I didn’t take time to explain but I left a note and said Jugs was taken care of. But they do expect you Monday morning and there are directions in the folder. The key with the pink ribbon is to Miss Grant’s place. Oh, I left my car coat in the backseat. I won’t need a coat in Tahiti! There’s a pizza in the fridge. Anchovies, of course, for you. (Shudder.) When you get to Craddock…
Nela scanned the rest of the disjointed message, obviously written in haste. But Chloe could have a day or a week or a month at her disposal and her communications would still careen from thought to fact to remembrance to irrelevance. Nela retrieved Chloe’s map and the ribbon-tagged key. She placed the map on the passenger seat and dropped the key into her purse.
Nela drove out of the garage into a brilliant day. She squinted against a sun that was surely stronger than in LA. Whatever happened, she intended to have fun, leaving behind the grayness now that was LA, and the sadness.
Bill wouldn’t want her to be sad.
Occasional winter-bare trees dotted softly rolling dun-colored countryside. Nela passed several horse farms. Cattle huddled with their backs to the north wind. The usual tacky billboards dotted the roadside. Nela felt more and more relaxed. The little VW chugged sturdily south despite its age. The traffic was fairly heavy and it was nearer two hours when she turned onto the exit to Craddock. After checking the map, she drove east into town, passing red-brick shops, several banks, and a library, and glancing at Chloe’s directions, turned off again to the south on Cimarron. Ranch-style houses predominated. After a few blocks, the homes grew more substantial, the lots larger, the houses now two and three stories, including faux colonials, Mediterranean villas, and French mansards.
Nela noted house numbers. She was getting close. She came around a curve. Her eyes widened at a majestic home high on a ridge, a Georgian mansion built of limestone with no houses visible on either side, the grounds stretching to woods. Nela slowed. Surely not…Chloe had clearly written of a garage apartment.
Nela stopped at stone pillars that marked the entrance and scrabbled through Chloe’s notes.
…so funny…I use the tradesman’s entrance. Keep going past the main drive around a curve to a blacktop road into the woods. It dead ends behind the house. That’s where the old garage is and Miss Grant’s apartment. It’s kind of prehistoric. You’ll see the newer garages, much bigger, but they kept the old one. It isn’t like Miss Grant rented it. People like Blythe Webster don’t have renters. Miss Grant started living there when she first came to work for Harris Webster. He was Blythe’s father and he made a fortune in oil. That’s the money that funds everything. She went from being his personal assistant to helping run the whole deal. Now that she’s gone, I imagine they’ll close up the apartment, maybe use it for storage. Anyway, it’s a lot more comfortable than Leland’s trailer so it’s great that someone needs to be with Jugs. Be sure and park in the garage. Miss Webster had a fit about the VW, didn’t want it visible from the terrace. No opener or anything, just pull up the door. It’s kind of like being the crazy aunt in the attic, nobody’s supposed to know the VW’s there. It offends Miss Webster’s “sensibilities.” I’ll bet she didn’t tell Miss Grant where to park! Anyway the Bug fits in next to Miss Grant’s Mercedes. Big contrast. The apartment’s way cool. Like I said, nicer than a trailer, but I’d take a trailer with Leland anytime. So everything always works out for the best. I mean, except for Miss Grant.
Even with the disclaimer, the message reflected Chloe’s unquenchable cheer.
Nela pressed the accelerator. Names bounced in her mind like errant Ping-Pong balls…Grant, Webster, Jugs…as she chugged onto the winding road. If delivery trucks actually came this way, their roofs would scrape low-hanging tree limbs. In the second decade of the twenty-first century, Nela felt sure that FedEx, UPS, and any other delivery service would swing through the stone pillars into the main drive. Tradesmen entrances had gone the way of horse-drawn buggies, milk bottles, and typewriters.
As the lane curved out of the woods, she gazed at the back of the magnificent house. A rose garden that would be spectacular in summer spread beneath steps leading up to a paved terrace. Lights blazed from huge windows, emphasizing the gathering winter darkness that leached light and color from the dormant garden. Lights also gleamed from lantern-topped stone pillars near the massive garages Chloe had described as new. Almost lost in the gloom was an old wooden two-door garage with a second-floor apartment. The windows were dark.
Nela coasted to a stop. She put the car in park but left the motor running while she pulled up the garage door. The Bug fit with room to spare next to the Mercedes coupe. She glanced at the elegant car as she retrieved her suitcase. Very sporty. It would be interesting to see Miss Grant’s apartment. It would be odd to stay in the apartment of a woman whom she’d never met. But ten days would speed past.
And then?
Nela shook away any thought of the future. For now, she was hungry and looking forward to pizza with anchovies and taking sanctuary in a dead woman’s home. Miss Grant, wherever you are, thank you.
She didn’t take time to put on Chloe’s coat, which surely would hang to her knees. She stepped out of the garage and lowered the overhead door. Pulling her suitcase, carrying Chloe’s coat over one arm, she hurried to the wooden stairs, the sharp wind ruffling her hair, penetrating her thin cotton blouse and slacks.
On the landing, she fumbled in her purse until she found the ribbon-tagged key, unlocked the door. Stepping inside, she flicked a switch. She was pleasantly surprised. Despite January gloom beyond the windows, the room was crisp and bright, lemon-painted walls with an undertone of orange, vivid Rothko matted prints, blond Danish modern furniture, the sofa and chairs upholstered with peonies splashed against a pale purple background. A waist-high blond wood bookcase extended several feet into the room to the right of the door.
Her gaze stopped at car keys lying there next to a Coach bag. Had the purse belonged to Miss Grant? Certainly Chloe had never owned a Coach bag and, if she had, she wouldn’t have left it carelessly in an empty apartment. Nela shrugged away the presence of the purse. The contents of the apartment were none of her business.
As for Miss Grant, she wasn’t the person Nela had imagined. When Chloe wrote, Too bad about Miss Grant, Nela knew she’d been guilty of stereotyping. Miss Grant was dead so she was old. Until she’d read Chloe’s note, Nela had pictured a plump elderly woman, perhaps with white curls and a sweet smile. This apartment had not belonged to an old woman.
So much for preconceived ideas. Nela closed the door behind her. She set the suitcase down and turned to explore the rest of the apartment. She took two steps, then, breath gone, pulse pounding, stared across the room. She reached out to grip the back of a chair, willing herself to stay upright. She began to tremble, defenses gone, memory flooding, not hot, but cold and dark and drear.
The cat’s huge round eyes seemed to grow larger and larger.
Lost in the intensity of the cat’s gaze, she was no longer in a strange apartment half a continent from home. Instead, numb and aching, she was at Bill’s house with Bill’s mother, face etched in pain, eyes red-rimmed, and his sobbing sisters and all of his huge and happy family, which had gathered in sorrow. Bill’s brother Mike spoke in a dull monotone: He was on patrol…stepped on an IED…
Unbearable images had burned inside. She had turned away, dropped into a chair in the corner of the room. Bill’s cat was lying on the piano bench, looking at her. Splotches of white marked Big Man’s round black face.
Big Man stared with mesmerizing green eyes. “…He’s gone…dead…yesterday…legs blown away…blood splashing…”
Th
rough the next frozen week, Big Man’s thoughts recurred like the drumbeat of a dirge. But, of course, they were her thoughts, too hideous to face and so they came to her reflected from the cat Bill loved.
The next week an emaciated feral cat confronted her in the alley behind the apartment house. Gaunt, ribs showing, the cat whirled toward her, threat in every tense line. She looked into pale yellow eyes. “…starving…That’s my rat…Get out of my way…”
Rat? She’d jerked around and seen a flash of gray fur near the Dumpster. Back in her apartment, she’d tried to quell her quick breaths. Her mind had been jumbled, that’s all. She’d seen a desperate cat and known there was garbage and of course there might be rats. She had not read the cat’s thoughts.
Of course she hadn’t.
Like calendar dates circled in red, she remembered other episodes. At the beauty shop, a cuddly white cat turned sea blue eyes toward her. “…The woman in the third chair’s afraid…The redhead is mean…The skinny woman’s smile is a lie…” At a beach taco stand, a rangy black tom with a white-tipped tail and a cool, pale gaze. “…rank beef…People want the baggies from the blue cooler…afraid of police…” On a neighbor’s front porch swing, an imperious Persian with a malevolent face. “…I’m the queen…I saw the suitcase…If she boards me, she’ll be sorry…”
Now, a few feet away from her, a lean brown tabby with distinctive black stripes and oversize ears stood in a circle of light from an overhead spot—of course the cat chose that spot seeking warmth from the bulb—and gazed at Nela with mournful eyes. “…Dead…Dead and gone…She loved me…board rolled on the second step…”
Nela fought a prickle of hysteria. She was tired. Maybe she was crazy. Boards didn’t roll…Unless he meant a skateboard. Skateboards were rolling boards. Was that how a cat would describe a skateboard? Was she losing her mind? Cats and a board that rolled and skateboards. How weird to think of a skateboard on a step. She hadn’t thought of skateboards in years. Bill had done the best ollies in the neighborhood. His legs were stocky and strong. The IED…Oh God. Maybe it was because the cat had such distinctive black stripes. Bill’s skateboard had been shiny orange with black stripes. She had to corral her mind, make her thoughts orderly. No one saw what was in a cat’s mind. She was making it up. From a board that rolled to skateboards. Maybe she needed to see a doctor. No. This would pass.