Cat in the Flock (Dreamslippers Book 1)

by Lisa Brunette

  She laughed, but she could tell the intensity of the experience hadn't left Lee, who was still giving off an angry vibe.

  "Wanna take a little road trip?" she asked him.

  "Sure," he said, letting out a breath.

  Soon they were barreling down the highway in the direction of Johnson's Shut-Ins. Logically, it was a long shot. But she kept seeing in her mind's eye the picture of Larry and Jim she'd found in Jim's home office. They looked innocent, fresh-faced, unafraid. She needed to see that place for herself, see if it gave her any insights or clues.

  On the ride down, they stopped once for a quick lunch, and Lee regaled Cat with stories about his advanced training in Virginia with an old drill sergeant type who still thought Vietnam could have been won.

  "He kept telling us the Iraqis just needed to 'pull up their socks,'" said Lee. "It was all I could do not to let him know that the Iraqis don't wear socks; they wear sandals."

  Cat laughed. "And not socks with sandals, as they do in Seattle," she added, making Lee laugh as well.

  It was a weekday, so Johnson's Shut-Ins was deserted and the parking lot empty. She hadn't been in years, and the place caught her by surprise with its lush solitude. She felt her tired, achy muscles relax. She took a deep breath, listening to the soothing rush of the river over the hollowed-out boulders. She'd come here with the soccer player once, and they'd jumped all the way across the river. Just as agile, if not moreso, Lee made it across and back without soaking a foot, but Cat came down once in a bowl, her tennis shoe sloshy. It had turned into a lovely day, despite her one wet foot. The sun came out, and they sat down on a dry rock above the river. They took their time, soaking up the rays.

  "This is quite a place," Lee said, admiring the mounds of granite boulders smoothly sculpted by the rush of the Black River. Over time, the river had carved bowls into the rocks, some of them big enough to sit in, like a natural Jacuzzi. "C'mon, Cat," he beckoned. "It's hot out here. I could use a swim."

  She hesitated, wishing for a guilty split second that he weren't there, so she could be alone with her thoughts. "I can't," she demurred. "Believe it or not, I'm here for an investigation."

  "And I thought this was a date," he laughed, shaking his head.

  "Sorry," she said. "I think my church leader came here with his lover."

  Lee took Cat into his arms then, his hands at the small of her back, pulling her into him. "If we pretend to be them, maybe you'll discover something."

  She felt thrown off balance, though she realized she should have been expecting this. He definitely had an effect on her. Her heart quickened, and then her hands were fingering the back of his head, and the two of them locked in a long, long kiss.

  As soon as they came up for air, a thought occurred to her.

  "You're right, Lee," she said. "We should take a dip. I mean, that's exactly what Jim and Larry would have done." She imagined herself as young Larry Price, with Jim on some lazy summer weekday when they had the place to themselves just like this.

  She and Lee looked for a bowl that would be big enough to fit two men. There were a few.

  "Here," Lee said, but Cat pointed out that it could be seen from the path to the parking lot. They kept hopping until they came across a grand bowl that could easily fit two men and offered total seclusion from the riverbank.

  She crouched down near the lip of the bowl, and then she saw it: an inscription carved deeply into the lip, One in spirit, 1 Sam. 18:1.

  "What does it mean?" Lee asked.

  "I think it's biblical," Cat replied. "From the Book of Samuel."

  She took out her camera and shot several pictures of it. Then she went back to the car, grabbed her backpack, and fished around for a paper and pencil. She took a rubbing of the inscription.

  As soon as she had finished and stowed her camera, paper, and pencil in the backpack, Lee took it out of her hands. He placed it on a dry rock above them and pulled her close.

  "I can't stop thinking about our night together," he said. He kissed her forehead, her nose, and then her lips. He traced his finger across each spot after he'd kissed it. Then he let his finger slide down her neck to her chest, where he began to unbutton her shirt.

  "I didn't bring a swimsuit," she whispered.

  "That's why they invented skinny-dipping," he whispered back, continuing to unbutton her shirt.

  She looked around. They'd been there for about an hour and had yet to see a soul. It was early afternoon on a Tuesday. Should she dare?

  Her heart, with a little help from her libido, made the decision for her. She slid her shirt off, and then unbuttoned her jeans and slid them off. It was hot out, and the heat of the sun's rays soon hit her back, making the cool water whirling through the bowl look delicious to her. Nude, she stepped into the bowl and watched Lee disrobe, a satisfying sight indeed.

  The two of them whiled away the afternoon there.

  Later, as they drove home, Cat thought to herself that it was enough of a risk for her and Lee to have made love au naturel as they had. Two men would have been taking a much greater risk, perhaps even risking their lives, especially back then, had they been discovered by rabidly antigay country boys. Then again, someone else might have taken that photo, unless either Larry or Jim snapped it. Back then the equivalent of a "selfie" would have meant propping a camera on a rock and setting the timer.

  Once they got back to her parents' house, Lee announced he had to return to Kansas City.

  "As soon as you get back to Seattle, call me," he told her.

  "I will," she said. "But this case—"

  "I know," Lee said. He grabbed the collar of her blazer and pulled their foreheads to touch. "I... damn, Kitty Cat. You're a hard one to leave."

  "You're a hard one to let leave," she replied. And then he was gone.

  In the wake of his departure, Cat went upstairs to look up the verse inscribed on the boulder. First she checked her family's Catholic bible, and then she looked online to get a few other interpretations. It was from 1 Samuel 18. The full passage was this:

  "After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return to his father's house. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow and his belt."

  As far as Bible verse went, it was pretty saucy, Cat thought, the way it described a deep affection between two men, such that they became "one in spirit" with each other. The part about Jonathan giving David his clothing could be taken to mean giving someone the clothes off your back. Or maybe it was just metaphorical: Jonathan took off his clothes to be open and vulnerable to David.

  But Cat found it hard to deny the literal interpretation. Jonathan took off all his clothes and gave them to David, appearing naked before the other man. There was an offering there, of both the clothes and the naked body. There was definitely a romantic, homoerotic theme in this case, as something Larry and David might carve into that rock all those years ago.

  "Doing research?" Her mother appeared in the doorway.

  "Yes, Mom," she said. "My case has taken a turn toward the homosexual."

  "What?! Not Jim Plantation?"

  "Yep."

  "Well, a man like that will go to great lengths to keep it quiet."

  Cat put her laptop down and turned toward her mother, who sat next to her on the edge of the bed. "But would he kill the man he loved most in the world?" Cat asked.

  "He might," her mother said, sighing, patting her daughter's hand. "If something else is more important to him."

  "But he wasn't that careful about it. He and his assistant director went to gay bars together."

  Her mother bit her lip and looked across the room. "I've seen these religious men make justifications all the time. Denial is a powerful force; if you feed it just a little, it takes over. Say someone s
ees them at that gay bar. Well, what are any of them doing in a gay bar? They might say they gave in to curiosity or temptation and then help each other repent and get back on track. They support each other's denial. And the gay community, they know most of their members are still in the closet. There's a code. No one would out Jim, even if he is a hypocrite."

  "That's why I'm not convinced Jim killed Larry Price. He would have gone out of his way to reform him. I think that's what they were trying to do—Jim married Sherrie. She was his angel, his Jezebel turned into Mary. He was trying to help her and himself at the same time. Or maybe Jim and Larry continued to carry on their secret love affair all these years under everyone's noses."

  "Where is Jim now?"

  "In Seattle, probably trying to hunt down his wife and daughter."

  "Then why are you here?" Her mother smiled. "Don't get me wrong, Cat. We love to have you around. But I wonder if you're not avoiding your new life out there in some way by being here. And maybe that man of yours who just left, too."

  Her mother's words struck a chord in her, and she didn't care for the sound of it. She stood up. "But I haven't solved the case, Mom. I can't go back till I do."

  Her mother stood up and put her hands on Cat's shoulders. "I love you," she said. It had been a very long time since Cat heard her mother say that. Cat broke down in tears, and her mother wrapped her arms around her.

  Cat pulled away. "Mom, please don't think I idolize Granny Grace," she said. "I know she's not perfect, and that you didn't always get what you needed as her daughter."

  Her mother sighed. "I'm sorry I've taken some of that out on you."

  Cat nodded, accepting the apology. "I love you, too, Mom," she said, hugging her.

  After dark that night, Cat was dressed all in black and heading to the Plantation Church. There was more evidence there; she could feel it. She'd never had a chance to explore Larry Price's private living quarters. She turned her lights off before she pulled into the parking lot and drove very slowly.

  She walked through the grounds, circling the main building, which housed Larry's rooms. Calculating the layout from memory, she located the windows that would correspond to his private rooms. They were of course dark, and they were on the third floor. There were no fire escapes, no other ways of accessing the rooms from the outside. All of the external doors were locked, and she knew from having lived there that despite the church's "open door" policy inside, there was good security after hours to keep outsiders at bay. She didn't know how she was going to get inside, and she felt pretty foolish about her plan. Maybe her mother was right. Maybe there was nothing else she could do here in St. Louis.

  She sat down on a brick wall to think. What would Granny Grace do?

  If there were people milling around, she could follow them inside surreptitiously. But dressed all in black, she was probably more conspicuous, not less. And the place was deathly quiet anyway. It was a week night, and late. It was already lights out in the dorms. She could come back during church services, but then Anita would recognize her. She could come back during church services in disguise... But she had the sense that time was running out. Jim could track down Sherrie and Ruthie, or they could flee to Canada under new names, and she'd never find them again.

  She took a deep breath and got very quiet.

  A breeze blew up out of nowhere, and Cat heard the sound of creaking metal. She turned. It was the scaffolding around the new fountain sculpture. Maybe she could use it to climb up to Larry's rooms. She walked over to the sculpture to inspect the scaffolding. It was enormous and might get her up to the third floor, or at least close. Each of the wheels on the scaffolding had a caster brake that was set. She tried to free them, but they were stuck fast, and they required a tool of some sort to loosen. She tried budging the scaffolding, but it weighed a ton; there was no way she could move it. Frustrated, she kicked the caster, which made more noise than she'd intended, causing a ricochet of creaking that ran through the length of scaffolding. She sat back on her heels, biting her lip in frustration.

  And then she saw it. The sculpture. It was Johnson's Shut-Ins.

  The first time she'd seen it, through Larry's office window, she thought it looked familiar, but it was half-finished and partially covered in tarp. It was almost done now, and the distinct salt-and-pepper colored boulders were visible. She thought back to the spot where she'd found the inscription. This was it. She knew Larry had been in charge of the fountain project; it was his baby, and no one else had really been involved, even to the point where Anita once complained about having to pick up where he left off, with very few records to go by. Would he have…? Cat had to find out. She climbed up the boulders till she got to one that was big enough for two men to sit inside. What she saw there brought tears to her eyes.

  It was the inscription, 1 Sam 18:1, etched into the stone like the one at Johnson's Shut-Ins, only much larger and on a raised lip of stone, where it would be seen by viewers below. It was being wired for lights so that when the sculpture was revealed over the coming weekend, this inscription would be lit for the entire world to see. But now from the ground, you couldn't see the words at all.

  Larry had wanted everyone to know about his love for Jim. He hadn't been willing to keep it under wraps. Cat's mind spun. It had to be that no one knew about this except the artist himself, Larry, and now Cat. But the truth would come out as soon as the sculpture was unveiled.

  She climbed down from the sculpture, and as she set foot on the pavement, a voice behind her said, "Just what do you think you're doing?"

  Cat turned around, and there was Anita, shining a flashlight at her.

  "Checking out the view," Cat replied.

  "I'm calling the police," Anita said, pulling her cell phone out of her pocket.

  "Don't bother," Cat announced. "I'm leaving."

  "What is it you're looking for here?" Anita asked, putting her phone back in her pocket. "You had me convinced, you know. I thought you were really listening for God. I thought He brought you here."

  Cat took a step toward Anita and softened her voice. "Maybe He did, Anita. Just not in the way you anticipated."

  "What are you going to write about us, Cat?" Anita demanded.

  "I haven't decided yet," Cat said. "I'm still trying to get to the truth."

  "And you think you can get there by trespassing."

  "Only because you threw me out."

  "I had to. You betrayed us."

  "I'm sorry, Anita," Cat said. "I really am."

  "That's fine," Anita said. "But I still need to know what you're doing out here this late at night."

  Cat feigned giving in with a sigh. "Okay, I was trying to see if I could use this scaffolding to climb into a window upstairs. You never let me see Larry's rooms. I want to see his rooms."

  "You have a morbid curiosity about a dead man."

  "It's for my story. A prominent church leader commits suicide. Why? I can't just write about the church and not ask that question. No one here seems to be able to explain it. Who was he? Why did he do it? His rooms might help tell the story."

  "Show me your press credentials," Anita ordered.

  "I don't have them with me," Cat said.

  "Who's your employer?"

  "I'm a freelancer."

  "Who commissioned the story?"

  "No one. I'm writing it on my own and plan to shop it around when it's done."

  "You're lying, Cat." Anita's voice took on a sinister tone. "Tell me why you're really here."

  "I have," Cat said, backing away.

  "You are of your father the devil," Anita said in a deep, raised voice.

  Cat turned around and began to walk away, toward the parking lot.

  "You are of your father the devil," Anita screamed at Cat's departing back, "and there is no truth within you!!!" Her voice echoed across the empty campus.

  Cat couldn't get out of the parking lot fast enough. She kept glancing in her rear-view mirror, half-expecting to see Anita followin
g behind her.

  Chapter 14

  Cat was working behind the scenes with a news crew covering a strange, futuristic Olympic sport that looked like underwater bumper boat racing. She was on a submerged set, a large glass bubble overlooking the racecourse near the ocean floor.

  Cat wasn't anyone important on the job, just a part of the crew helping to set up the underwater cameras and attend to the racers, who were dressed in elaborate superhero costumes. Apparently measuring tape was a really important tool in underwater bumper boat racing, and the racers were unduly impressed that Cat not only had one, but knew how to use it. They made a big deal about it, and one of the cameramen saw the interaction and decided to film it for a little behind-the-scenes vignette. So Cat began to ham it up for the camera, taking her measuring tape out and acting as if she were measuring the body of one of the racers: his pectoral muscles, his arm, and lower down, where other measurements were of chief consideration to men.

  The viewers apparently loved it, with the online forums and chats lighting up immediately. Cat was a relative peon at her job, but she possessed an irrepressible competence. She laughed to herself, thinking that the racers really didn't measure up, and her laughter woke her up.

  Cat awakened to hear the woman behind her laughing. Then the woman yawned audibly and stretched, knocking the back of Cat's seat. She must have picked up her handheld gaming device, which beeped once before the woman either shifted it to headphone mode or muted it. Cat had heard her playing games when they were sitting on the tarmac in St. Louis before the plane took off.

  Was this a good dream? Cat woke feeling amused, but she also felt more than that in the residue of the woman's psyche. The woman had seen herself in a subservient role at work but knew she was much more. It seemed as if even in their recognition of her, her male coworkers were sort of treating her as an amusing source of entertainment. Yet the woman had a lighthearted outlook on it: she knew who she was, the woman who could whip out her measuring tape and see that these guys, despite their schlocky attempts to be superheroes, just didn't measure up.