Of Birds and Beagles

by Leslie O'Kane

  “No, thanks.”

  “I heard you were loaning your German shepherd to Kelsey in the race tomorrow. Is that true?”

  “Yes.”

  He gave Jana a jab on the shoulder. “You got your work cut out for you now. Jana can run almost as fast as me. She’ll give me and Fang a run for our money. But she’d rather die than lose to you.” He waggled his thumb in my direction. “Or to Allie. Nothing drives that woman as much as the chance to outshine other women.”

  “Well, she’ll outrun Doppler and me, at least.” I found myself wishing that I’d refused Kelsey’s request to run with Pavlov. At least it had led to settling Bailey’s vet bills.

  My phone signaled that I had a text. I glanced at the screen. It was from Russell. He’d written: We need to talk. When can you come to the office?

  15 minutes, I texted, thinking, He took the job.

  Chapter 20

  Russell was sitting at his desk, working on his computer, when I arrived at his office doorway. He stood up and greeted me with a soft, brief kiss. “I’ve made a decision, Allie.” He leaned back against his desk, gripping the edges of his desktop. “I called Microsoft while you were gone and accepted the job. I’m hoping you’ll come with me.” He searched my eyes. “If not now, within the year. We’re worth that shot.”

  “Yes, we are.” There was so much going on in my head. I wasn’t surprised, and yet, I’d answered automatically. Certainly, our relationship was worth trying to maintain. But was I really going to miss Russ so much that I would put Pavlov and Doppler in my car and move to Seattle—where I knew Russ wouldn’t be happy to see them? “But I’m staying here. We can see what happens. Or if anything will change in the future. Realistically.”

  “So, in other words, you won’t even consider ever moving there?” Russell asked.

  “No, in other words, if you want to give us a chance to make it, you’ve got to give me time to adjust! You seem to forget that just one week ago, I believed that we were buying a home together, the two of us, here in Colorado. You never shared that you were hoping to accept a job and move halfway across the country! Instead you just sprang it on me, right while I was meeting your crazy ex-girlfriend for the first time and dealing with a murder! I think you gave me no time to express my concerns because, deep down, you knew all along that I was going to be unhappy. And yet now you’re blaming me for not diving in blindly...for questioning if we’re right for each other after all.”

  He winced and shut his eyes for a moment. “That’s where you’re wrong, Allie. I’m not blaming you at all.” He looked at me, his expression full of sadness. “But, realistically, I’m not suddenly going to feel comfortable living with dogs. I may never feel comfortable with them, however hard I try. And you’re never going to be happy living without them.”

  “How long until—” I stopped, feeling foolish and mean for even asking.

  “I’m leaving the end of the month.”

  “That soon?”

  We let my question hang in the air between us. This was really happening. We were really breaking up. “Then that’s our answer.”

  “I guess so.” He was staring at the door, avoiding my gaze. “I’ll give you a check for my share of rent for the two months until our lease on the office is up. You won’t have any trouble finding an officemate, I’m sure, if you decide to keep the place.”

  So now it’s business as usual? Rent money and office-space subletting?

  He shut his laptop. “Feels like déjà vu all over again, but I’m going to head back to my condo and...hell, I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I’m not willing to do it here. I’m coming in tomorrow though. At some point. Maybe. Unless I decide to take the weekend off for a change.” He stuffed the computer power cord into the case but simply tucked his computer under one arm and brought his mostly empty case with him.

  He brushed past me and strode out the office door. I’m sure, like me, he was just too shocked at what was happening and too close to tears to continue talking to me.

  I can’t say that I wasn’t hurt; it felt like I was being ripped into two pieces, even. But I also felt like it was the only path that had existed for us since day one, that sooner or later we would face up to our incompatibility. And we had. It was over.

  I cried during my entire drive home. The dogs greeted me, and I was extremely grateful that all three of them were so happy to see me. On the kitchen table, there was a note from my mother that read: On a dinner date with Frank.

  * * *

  Mom got home around ten thirty. I was reading in bed, flanked by Pavlov and Doppler; allowing them on my bed was my escape clause for coping with really bad days. After a few minutes, I put on my robe and came out. Mom was sitting at the counter reading the comics, and munching on some salted peanuts.

  I said hi, and sat down at the stool beside her.

  She studied my features. “You’ve been crying,” she said gently. “Oh, sweetie. You and Russell broke up. I’m so sorry.”

  Our eyes met. Hers were already filled with tears.

  “It’s really the best thing. He’s moving two weeks from now. He says he’ll be in the office on Monday morning.”

  “You’re going to meet the love of your life soon. You’re such a beautiful person, inside and out that—”

  Her words were hitting me like darts. I wanted to die. “Mom, I’m sorry but I don’t feel like talking about this right now. I just...I’m sick of thinking about it. It’s been on my mind constantly this whole week, and I....” I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “How did your date with Frank go?”

  “It was good. He’s a truly nice man and I think we enjoy each other’s company.”

  “That’s great, Mom.”

  There was a lengthy pause. “You don’t think that there’s any chance that Frank is guilty, do you?” Mom asked.

  “No, of course not! For one thing, he didn’t have any reason to kill Shirley. He was as kind to her as he could possibly be. And he’s worked on other elderly widowers’ houses. He’s just a terrific, kind-hearted person who likes to help others.” I hesitated, suddenly doubting myself. He did have the possible motive of inheriting Shirley’s house. “Isn’t he? He hasn’t given you any reason to suspect him, has he?”

  “No, not until he joked about it.”

  “About Shirley’s murder?”

  “No, about my dining alone with a murder suspect.”

  A chill ran up my spine. “Okay. Now I’m getting paranoid. He’s a serious suspect in the police’s view?”

  “Yes, but he blamed it on how he grabbed Kelsey’s gun. He’s a suspect because his fingerprints were in her house and on the gun.”

  “Okay, but...that took place on her back deck, not inside her house. Did he say why he went inside her home, too?” I asked.

  “No, but the implication was that he’d gone inside to put the gun out of sight. Which makes some sense, I guess. You don’t grab someone’s gun only to hand it right back to her.”

  “But he’d said to Kelsey the other day that he had handed the gun back to her. When they were on her back deck...and it had slipped off her lap.”

  I sighed. My life felt ridiculous to me. Here I was sitting with my mother, late at night, after breaking up with my boyfriend. And we were discussing whether or not the man that I’d introduced her to could possibly be a murderer.

  “It all feels so creepy to me, Mom. Two people handling the murder weapon that we’d like to believe are innocent...Tracy Truett and now Frank. It’s truly starting to sound like Kelsey was deliberately provoking people to handle the very gun that she knew was about to be a murder weapon.”

  “I know what you mean. And I don’t know if it’s sensible or not to wonder if that’s what Kelsey was doing...her evil plan. Either way, I’m sure the police are wondering the same thing.”

  “The rifle probably had Malcolm’s fingerprints on it, as well,” I pointed out. “It was his gun in the first place, and yet Kelsey claimed to be sitting
out on her deck pretending to clean it.”

  “Maybe she was actually loading bullets in it. You can’t help but wonder at what point that happened...if people were playing tug-of-war with a loaded weapon.”

  I grimaced at the image that gave me. Maybe I should ask Frank if he knew whether or not the rifle was loaded. Then again, as Russ and my mom had been happy to remind me, this murder was up to the police to solve. “Getting back to Frank’s innocence, this isn’t a crime show on TV. It isn’t going to be the least likely person in the cast.”

  “True. So I’m going to keep on dating Frank. He asked me out again for tomorrow night.”

  “I’m happy for you.” Yet I couldn’t maintain my smile for long. My worries were starting to get a hold on me. “It won’t be all that long before the police put someone in custody.”

  “I hope so.”

  “Just so long as it isn’t Tracy or Frank,” Mom said.

  “With any luck, the culprit will be someone we’ve never met. Maybe what actually happened was that Shirley was in Kelsey’s house at precisely the wrong time...right when someone broke in, and maybe grabbed the gun away from Shirley when she tried to defend herself.”

  “I hope so.” Mom paused, then shook her head. “Speaks to just how strange this all is, when I’m truly hoping an acquaintance of mine was shot to death by a stranger.”

  * * *

  The next morning, I went straight to a client’s home for an appointment, then stewed about it as I drove to the office. Frankly, I didn’t feel like I’d given the woman her money’s worth today. She’d hired me to restore order to her household in the wake of her terrier mix and her cat getting into a fur-flying fight. To my credit, I had warned her that I’m not knowledgeable with cats. I felt as though we’d spun our wheels for an hour, leaving us in the same place as before—with the cat sequestered to the upstairs and the dog reigning free over the downstairs.

  When I arrived at my office, Tracy Truett was sitting on one of the concrete steps that led down to the front door. At first I thought she must have somehow heard word of Russell’s and my split and wanted to console me. But as she turned and met my gaze, I dismissed the idea; she was too anxious-looking. It reminded me how she was when she’d first learned that she was a suspect in Shirley’s death.

  “You’re finally here,” she said, standing up as I descended the stairs. “I didn’t know who else to talk to.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “Didn’t you listen to the radio?”

  “No, I was listening to a playlist on my phone.”

  “Aw, geez. I’m surprised the police haven’t contacted you. They talked to me right away. At least this time they won’t be finding any more of my fingerprints at Kelsey’s house.”

  “At Kelsey’s?”

  Tracy nodded. “She’s dead.”

  Chapter 21

  “It happened sometime last night,” Tracy said.

  I stared at her, barely comprehending what she had just said.

  “The cleaning lady found her at eight a.m. She overdosed.”

  My heart was in my throat. “Kelsey committed suicide?”

  “They aren’t sure. She had pieces of a brownie next to her on the bed, and it was drugged.”

  “A regular brownie? Or an edible-cannabis brownie?” I asked, stunned. I unlocked the door and held it open for Tracy, not feeling like this was a discussion that we should continue this close to sidewalks, where passersby could overhear.

  “Cannabis.”

  I nodded. Pot was legal in Colorado, so it was hardly surprising.

  “A boatload-worth of ground-up sleeping pills was baked into the mix. I didn’t ask the police this, but I’m assuming, at least, that if she was expecting the brownies to contain pot, she might have ignored any peculiarities with the flavor or consistency. Maybe the soporific sensation as well.”

  “Eww. That’s horrible.” I sat down on the futon, feeling a tad dizzy.

  Tracy marched straight over to Russ’s door, which I’d left open the night before. She poked her head in. “Russ isn’t here yet?”

  “Apparently not,” I answered, glancing at my watch. It was a few minutes after 11 a.m.

  “He might be with the police himself by now. The officer who took a report from me asked me about him.”

  “I don’t understand. Why would he ask you about Russ?”

  Tracy grimaced. “I guess there was a picture of him on her cell phone. Sounded to me like she took a selfie of the two of them.”

  I was too stunned to reply. Russ must have gone to her house for consolation after storming out of the office last night.

  “My studio’s putting on a fill-in for me. She’s airing the bit I did on tomorrow’s Dog Jog, at least.” She was pacing between Russ’s door and my desk. “I don’t know what to do. I talked to my lawyer already. He came with me for the interview. That’s probably why I got in and out of there so fast. I haven’t seen Kelsey since that little business at the park yesterday, when she gave me the check for Toofroo’s vet bills.” In her anxiousness, she was twisting one of blue-tinted spikes of hair. “Like I told them, though. It’s not like I could have coaxed her into eating a poisonous brownie, or sneaked it into her fridge. We hated each other. And I was nowhere near her house last night or this morning.”

  “Sounds like you have no worries,” I replied, finding my voice.

  She started to say something to me, but I was distracted by the sight of Russell, descending the stairs. He couldn’t have looked much more downcast if he was openly sobbing.

  He took in the sight of Tracy, now standing with crossed arms near my desk, gave her a nod by way of a greeting, and asked me, “You heard about Kelsey?”

  “Tracy told me, just a minute ago. I’m so sorry, Russ.”

  He gave me a grim nod. “The police need to interview you, too.”

  “I...can call the station and go talk to them now.” I glanced over at Tracy, wishing I could talk to Russ alone. “Tracy, I’m sorry, but could you please—”

  She held up her palms. “No problem. I’ll be back later. Hopefully not in handcuffs.”

  Russ forced a smile, and he and Tracy exchanged “See ya’s.” She left.

  “Are they going to consider me a suspect?” I asked Russ. “Thinking I felt threatened by her where you’re concerned?”

  “I already told the police about you and me, and my new job, and our...unwillingness to see long-distance working for us.”

  His statement felt like he’d kicked me in the stomach. “Kelsey’s death is the last thing I wanted.”

  “Me, too. And before you ask, I wasn’t dating her again. I just went out with her for a happy-hour drink last night. She was upset about Tracy...wished she’d paid for her vet bills right off the bat. Said she felt like all of Boulder thought she was another dog-hating Cruella Deville, modeling a Dalmatian coat. She took a photo of us at the bar without asking if I minded.”

  “It doesn’t matter now.”

  “Except it does matter to you. I can see it in your eyes.”

  “Well, of course I’m not thrilled.”

  “She was needy. I knew that was just her game...how she drew people like me in. She made everyone feel like they were her hero, coming to her rescue. Then you’d find yourself doing one favor after another for her. That’s how she pulled people into her web.”

  “Yet you went out with her anyway.”

  He glowered at me and said, “We had a beer, Allie. Then I left.”

  “And she got a laced brownie from some place.”

  “She told me at the bar that she’d baked special brownies for herself a couple of days ago and she was planning on reheating one.”

  “Reheating one?” I repeated.

  “I assumed she kept them in the freezer. Anyway, she invited me to her place to share it. Obviously I declined the offer and went home.”

  “Most likely, someone swapped out her marijuana brownies with spiked ones.” Unless it was suicide, I
thought, but for Russell’s sake, I didn’t say that aloud. I wondered, though, if she was so unhinged that she had wanted to take Russell out with her, in a murder-suicide attempt. “I can’t believe this. How could this have happened? I mean, she was just...we were just talking to her yesterday.” Her final words to me had been to tell me that she wasn’t the evil other woman. I felt sorry for her.

  “Well, the police fingerprinted me, and I should be in the clear. I haven’t been in her house in two years.” He entered his office, saying over his shoulder, “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got work to do.” Then he shut his door.

  I called Sergeant Neustrom and told him on the phone that I’d talked to Tracy and Russ, and that I hadn’t seen or spoken with Kelsey since yesterday afternoon. I described the events at North Boulder Park in what was probably too many words. He listened without comment, then said, “Thank you for calling me, Allida. I’ll call you back if anything comes up that we need to double check.”

  “Okay.” I didn’t know what else to say and was nervous, so I babbled, “So, well, I’m easy enough to get ahold of. Thanks.” I hung up, and promptly called Tracy and arranged meeting her for lunch.

  I then had a brief panic attack, thinking I had a gig lined up for a demonstration with Pavlov on dog safety to a girl scout troop, but checked my calendar and saw that it was a week from today. I did, however, have to leave for another home-visit appointment. I weighed telling Russ versus leaving without a word and couldn’t decide what to do. Realizing that I would feel like a fool whatever I did, I wound up texting him that I was off to an appointment. And felt like a fool. As I reached my car, I got his reply: “Have fun.”

  * * *

  While driving home, I mulled how painfully slowly the day had passed. Tracy and I had, at least, managed to share an enjoyable lunch. She was wonderful at discussing every little nuance of Russell’s and my breakup and being completely supportive. By then, she was feeling confident that the police weren’t going to arrest her for Kelsey’s overdose. She was still terrified at the lack of an arrest over Shirley’s shooting, though, thanking God more than once that she’d never touched the refrigerator or freezer in Kelsey’s house. She told me that her lawyer had learned that the police had apparently found trace evidence of the soporific powder and brownie crumbs in Kelsey’s kitchen freezer.