Danger in Cat World (Shawn Danger Mysteries Book 1)

by Nina Post

  Comet meowed.

  “I can’t let you out. It’s still a crime scene.”

  He pawed at the carrier and hissed.

  “That’s not helping.”

  Comet stuck out his tongue.

  Against his better judgment, Shawn opened the carrier door. Comet stretched for approximately an hour as though he had been kept in a baseball mitt, not a generous-sized carrier. Comet stepped lightly to the TV and put his paw on the screen.

  “What?”

  Comet batted his paw against the screen some more.

  “Really? You want to see what’s on TV? I can almost guarantee you’ll be disappointed, because I don’t have time to put in the birds cartridge. You already have something better at home.”

  Comet turned his head to Shawn and opened his mouth soundlessly, showing his tiny fangs.

  “I was going to do it anyway.” Shawn put a squat, wide stool on the carpet in front of the screen, then reached out to turn on the TV.

  The screen was just gray at first. Maybe the old electronics had finally fizzled out, but it cleared, and he saw himself, sitting in his own house, the murder book in front of him. The vantage point was, as usual, a little unstable.

  Shawn saw himself up close, at the neck, then saw his hand swat the camera away. Then he saw a good piece of the book — the murder book! His murder book! — then the living floor. “No, go back!”

  There was no way to pause it. Eventually, the view returned to the book.

  The book looked similar to his, down to Haviland Sylvain’s name, basic info, and a timeline. But the timeline — the vantage point moved again. “Dammit!” It moved to a – what was that? Shawn squinted.

  “What the — is that what I think it is?” Shawn shot a pointed look to Comet. “You should verify this, because I’m pretty sure that’s a cat’s crotch.”

  Comet stuck out a paw, then put it back right next to the other one.

  “What does that mean — it is?”

  The vantage point moved back to the book. Shawn tried to focus on the book. The frame wasn’t still and it was giving him a headache.

  From what Shawn could make out, the other Haviland Sylvain had been missing since the date when his Haviland Sylvain was killed.

  This other Shawn Danger’s notes indicated that the other Haviland Sylvain had been reported missing by a Kendall Peterson.

  The vantage point swerved again, this time toward the kitchen and then back to the book. “Will you hold still?” Shawn said to the screen, reading the current date and enough to conclude that she was still missing.

  Shawn also saw that Robert Westrom had been killed the same night that Haviland Sylvain had disappeared. The notes said ME—>WESTROM BLUDGEONED. Then, NO WEAPON FOUND.

  The vantage point turned away, faced down for a second, then was on the floor. It went to a bowl on the kitchen floor and ate something in it. Then it went onto what looked a lot like his trampoline, and the screen went dark. Shawn turned it off. “I’ll be damned. That was my trampoline.”

  Comet wound around his legs. Shawn felt lonely in this house, and had a stab of panic that he would grow old with only Comet, who would live another six or seven years. He probably didn’t need to be in the Sylvain house to think that, but it seemed to encourage it. How did Haviland Sylvain endure in this huge place with only five assorted weirdos and a tortoise? How did it not drive her crazy, especially since she was afraid to leave?

  “It probably did drive her crazy.”

  Comet stopped licking himself and blinked at him.

  Still a bit stunned from what he saw on the screen, Shawn maneuvered Comet back into the carrier then went back down to the first floor to the kitchen. From there, he took the stairs down to the basement door.

  He knocked. “Kendall? Kendall Peterson? It’s Detective Shawn Danger.” He rarely said ‘Detective Danger.’ It sounded like a mascot the police department made up for elementary schools.

  There was no answer. But there was no reason for Peterson to be there. Shawn tried the door.

  “Peterson?”

  He took a quick look inside and didn’t see anything unusual, so he went back up to the kitchen and out the side door to the carriage house, which was a much smaller version of the main house, with its facade made of the same brownstone material and tile roof as the mansion.

  After a minute, he entered the first floor of the carriage house, then took the short flight of indoor stairs up to the second floor, which was crowded with canvas-covered equipment. Letting out a breath, Shawn set down the carrier, and collapsed in a big, soft, plaid chair that looked through a large window to the main house. There was an edge of something almost completely obscured by a large piece of equipment.

  He pushed himself off the chair and crouched in front of a small, round table, with intricate lattice wood carving around the center and on top, Balinese style. He found a knob on the side. He pressed it, which did nothing, then turned it. A panel slid open. Inside the opening was a notebook.

  Was there anything better than that feeling? His chest flooded with warmth and he couldn’t help but break into a pleased grin. He paused for a minute to put on gloves before pulling out the soft, creamed-coffee leather with a strap in the middle.

  Inside were handwritten notes, in what he recognized as Haviland Sylvain’s script. The letters were small and the lines were straight on the graph paper. There were notes on her experiments that he didn’t understand at all, some very specific notes on the weather — did she have her own Doppler radar kit? — and notes on the performance and progress of her employees, which made him want to sink back into that soft chair and read.

  He flipped through a few pages, slowly, reading Haviland’s observations about Robert Westrom’s work habits, which seemed to amuse her. Haviland Sylvain’s employees thought she was understanding and kind, but they had no idea how closely she was watching them. She kept notes on their personalities, their strong points, their flaws, what they were capable of accomplishing, and their potential downfalls. She tracked their progress, their reactions, and how they handled certain situations, all with titles like ‘Carolyn and the Plumber’ or ‘Vincent and the Landscaper.’

  He flipped to a page with a sketch – a finely-drawn sketch of the same kind of coon cat that was multiplying in his house. It was lovingly detailed, expressing personality and fondness. He wondered if it was Haviland’s cat, but there was no trace of a cat in the house — he would know.

  Was it a cat she once had? Was it a coincidence? What did this sketch, of a cat that looked exactly like the cats showing up in his house, have to do with his own situation?

  In his peripheral vision, he saw a light. There was a light on in Lyle’s playroom.

  He bolted out of the chair, still holding the phone, leaving Comet there. Shawn ran like hell down the stairs and out into the cold night, briefly, before fumbling with the door to the main kitchen. He took the stairs three at a time to the second floor. Lyle’s door was closed. He checked the room, then all the rooms on that floor.

  Hearing a noise, Shawn looked out the window of one of the smaller bedrooms that overlooked the front drive and saw a car pulling out onto the street, but couldn’t tell anything beyond ‘it was a car.’

  Cursing, he waked back to the carriage house to get Comet and the notebook.

  Shawn sat at his desk in the squad room with Haviland’s notebook positioned on the desk surface in front of him. He had dropped Comet off at the house earlier.

  After almost two hours of work — checking with the lab, updating the murder book, making more calls, some to people he had already spoken to — his phone rang. Sarah.

  “Hi.”

  “You sound tired.”

  “I must also sound like a guy who’s happy to hear your voice.”

  “Maybe. But one who’s tired.”

  “I haven’t gotten a good night’s sleep in ten years. Maybe that’s why.”

  “I know, if you don’t solve this case —”
she started, facetiously but not unkindly.

  “The world ends,” he said, making fun of himself. “Are you free next weekend?”

  “I could be if I wanted to be.” He heard the smile in her voice. “Why?”

  “I want very desperately to take you on a real date.”

  “What about this case?”

  “I don’t see it as an either/or proposition.”

  “What makes it real?”

  “It means that I don’t embarrass myself or my entire gender just because I want to spend time with you.”

  “Like buying cat food and kitty litter?”

  “I am capable of more.”

  “Well, that time is now reserved for you. I won’t take any freelance assassin jobs that weekend.”

  “Good, those things tend to run over.”

  “Also, I need access to your house in about ten minutes.”

  “You’re been using me just so you could rob me? You’re especially welcome to more than a few dozen cats.”

  “I found someone who wants to take five of them, but I need to get them now. Should I wrap my hand in a jacket and punch the window?” she asked.

  “I’d recommend getting the spare key from the bottom of the troll on my porch.”

  “His name isn’t Rumpelstiltsken, is it? Because I suck at weaving.”

  “No, his name is Hugh, after the homicide captain. Don’t tell him that.”

  “We don’t talk much. Not since I left him at the altar.”

  And she hung up. This date would have to be three regular fancy dates in one.

  Shawn put on another set of gloves and began paging through Haviland’s notebook again. He wanted the techs to dust it for prints in the morning. If one of the employees got their hands on this, that would be enough motive, though he didn’t think Haviland meant any harm. She was just an acute observer. But one of them might have taken it the wrong way.

  The most interesting notes, though, were about Vincent. The heiress wrote that when he first came to work for her, she offered him the job of taking care of Lyle because Vincent seemed “gentle, humble, and compassionate, devoted to serving others.”

  Over time, she noticed he wanted her to depend on him. He made efforts to become, or at least seem, indispensable. He reminded her of Lyle’s “emotional connection” to him and which tasks he took over because other employees were too lazy or incapable to do them. He became increasingly overbearing about it, making more demands on her time.

  Shawn was especially interested in the heiress’s observation that Vincent had started to fret over his health, convinced that a mild symptom meant the worst possible outcomes.

  The phone rang again. Sarah.

  “You would like a ski lesson, ja?” he said, in a ridiculous German-Swiss, or possibly quasi-Austrian accent that he should not have attempted.

  “You should come home.”

  “Why?” Hearing the fear in her voice.

  “I hate that we were joking about this before, because someone broke into your house,” Sarah said, in a low, serious tone. “They completely trashed it, too.”

  “On my way.”

  He left the murder book and Haviland’s notebook in his desk drawer, unlocked, so he could ask someone to get the notebook photocopied.

  Shawn felt some relief when he saw that the outside of his house looked intact. He quickly parked behind Sarah’s car in the side driveway, then rushed in through the back kitchen door. Sarah was waiting at the kitchen table, dressed in a yellow sweater, jeans, and the same duck boots. He crouched in front of her and took her hand. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” She shook her head. “Your house, though? Not so good.”

  This was obvious enough from the kitchen. Everything in the fridge had been thrown onto the floor, as though someone swept their arm across the levels. There hadn’t been that much in there — he didn’t spend a lot of time at home — but there was spilled beer from broken bottles, milk, mustard, horseradish sauce, cracked-open eggs, onions and peppers, a few squashed bananas and tomatoes, a head of garlic, pickles and a pool of pickle juice, some frozen meals, frozen pizza.

  The burglar had done the same with the cabinets, so the floor was also covered with dried pasta, olives, chips — everything had been ripped open and spilled out on the floor. The worst part, though, was that the pricey Kona coffee he had shipped to him monthly had been poured out in a perimeter along the kitchen, as though protecting it from demons who fed on coffee.

  And the French press he used every day since his early twenties was in shards in the sink, probably down the disposal, too, the filter and shaft bent severely. He would have to get the whole mechanism replaced, but he needed to, anyway. A cup of water overwhelmed it, and dammit, he worked too hard to have to deal with a feeble sink disposal.

  “Comet gets really mad at you when you’re gone too long,” Sarah said.

  “We’ve been through all the anger management classes and workshops.” Shawn called for a crime scene tech while he headed into the small dining room.

  The old nineteenth-century phone he had inherited from his aunt was on the floor and in shards, like it had been destroyed by a big hammer. The old nineteen-forties-era radio, also from his aunt, was crushed in the middle, as with a single blow from said hammer. Both of those were irreplaceable and had deep personal significance to him. His forehead flushed with anger. The nineteen-fifties-era dining room table was gouged on top, like his car.

  In the living room, he immediately looked for his trampoline. It seemed okay from a distance, but when he got a little closer, he saw that it had been torn apart. Long rips ran through the whole width of it.

  “Don’t worry, we’re going to catch this bear,” Shawn said to Sarah.

  “I told you it wasn’t a good idea to keep a pet bear.”

  “Where’s Comet?”

  “I haven’t seen him.”

  In the living room, the first thing he noticed were his thirty-two cats clustered around something in the corner. He went over and they parted, winding around his ankles, to reveal his cheap hobby telescope, which was barely better than binoculars.

  “You guys guarding this?” he asked. The cats broke away and scattered. Some ran toward nothing in particular, some rolled over and fell asleep, and some wandered around the room, sporadically batting at one another and hissing.

  His TV — his flat-screen LCD HDTV, with LED backlighting — was on the ground, the screen smashed. It smelled like fried electronics. It was as though the burglar knew exactly what meant the most to him, or what would cause him the most hassle and inconvenience and money to replace.

  The sofa had something darkish red all over it. He reached out a finger and held it up to his nose.

  “Ew,” Sarah said, as he tasted it.

  “It’s just tabasco, and I think, mm, worcestershire sauce.”

  Sarah breathed out her nose and shook her head. “Do you just drink condiments? Is that what you subsist on?”

  “Sometimes I make a smoothie.”

  He ran upstairs and checked his bedroom, Sarah coming up behind him. He almost knew what he would find, and proving himself right: all the covers and sheets had been thrown out the second-floor window onto the ground. He had felt the breeze from the open window as soon as he stepped in past the door. A robin sang as he noticed that his memory foam mattress and pillows — you really appreciated good bedding when you were a homicide detective — had been gouged just like the table and the trampoline.

  He braced himself and opened his closet door.

  “Oh my god,” Sarah said, as though this space was a particularly egregious violation. All of his detective suits, many bought on his generous department-provided clothing allowance, were given special treatment. They had been doused liberally with bleach, then cut up with scissors as though the burglar started to make Christmas decorations.

  Shawn’s breath caught in his throat and his pulse quickened as he shoved the suits to the side to get to the garm
ent bag-covered item on the far right. His grandfather’s Army Air Corp uniform and leather bomber jacket. His father’s father’s things.

  His heart pounding, he fumbled with the zipper on the garment bag and pulled it down, hoping that somehow the burglar was too preoccupied with his suits to notice it.

  It was ruined, same as the suits, bleach poured over both the uniform and the jacket. And then the asshole put both back in the intact garment bag so Shawn would think that it was okay, that it hadn’t been noticed, would have hope that it had been overlooked.

  The burglar wanted Shawn to feel that hope, and they wanted to crush it.

  “I’m going to tear them apart,” Shawn said through a clenched jaw.

  “I think the crime scene unit’s here.” Sarah hurried downstairs.

  Three people from the unit appeared upstairs a minute later, with Sarah behind them.

  “Holy shit, Detective. This is your house?” one of the techs said.

  “Yeah.” Shawn shrugged and flashed a tight smile, which made the tech step back. “Pet grizzly. What are you gonna do, right?”

  They looked at him blankly.

  “Joke.” If this happened to be the same person who killed Haviland Sylvain, the burglar would probably have been just as careful with his tracks, at least finger-print-wise, as with that scene.

  “Okay.” Shawn crossed the hall to the bathroom, which reeked of cologne. “I want you to find and print the scissors, the bleach bottle, condiment bottles, the fridge handle, and the empty cabinets. Print the smashed phone and radio in the dining room. Bag the banana peels and check for shoe prints. Check the whole kitchen for shoe prints.” He gestured to the dining room. “You’re too young to be able to even recognize those items as phones or radios, but that’s what they are. You can find them on the floor. I also want you to print my largest knives,” in case the burglar had used Shawn’s on his mattress and trampoline. “I want you to find and print my hammers or other tools that look like they could have caused the damage to the phone and radio,” he added.