Ник Сайнт - Purrfect Rivalry

“You’re telling me you steal cats from all over the place and then you foist them on some unsuspecting preteens?! You steal my cats and treat them as hand-me-downs?!”

He rubbed his hairless chest and giggled. “I wouldn’t put it that way, babe.”

A red mist drew up in front of her eyes. “HOW WOULD YOU PUT IT, THEN?!”

Chase, who saw she was about to throttle the Dieber, pulled her aside. “Please don’t kill him, babe,” he said. “He’s a moron. I know that. You know that. Heck, I think even he knows it. But if you kill him I’m gonna have to arrest you and that would break my heart.”

The red mist evaporated. “Arresting me would break your heart?”

“It would. So please calm down. We’ve got a murder to solve, and you going off on the Dieber isn’t helping.”

She threw up her hands. “It’s fine. It’s just that… the gall of the guy!”

“I know, I know. Deep breaths, babe. Deep breaths.”

“Aargh!”

“In. And out. That’s it.”

She took a steadying breath, fists planted on her hips. “Stealing my cats.”

“Well, technically Diego is my cat, Shanille is Father Reilly’s cat, and Harriet is your mother’s pride and joy.”

She turned, watching Charlie play with the latest additions to his cat menagerie. Harriet seemed to enjoy the attention, and so did Shanille. Diego? Not so much.

“Okay,” she said, closing her eyes. “Let’s pick up where we left off. Where’s Toby?”

They walked out of the living room and onto the deck, but the thickset bodyguard was gone. They returned inside, and mounted the stairs, then set foot for Roulston’s office, hoping to find Toby ensconced there. The only one present and accounted for was Roulston himself. He quirked an eyebrow at them. “You were right, Miss Poole. Turns out Charlie was having some fun last night, picking up cats left and right.”

“Stealing cats, you mean,” she said.

“Deep breaths,” Chase whispered.

She sucked in a few more breaths.

“Any idea where we can find Toby?” asked Chase. “We need to ask him a couple questions.”

Roulston heaved the sigh of a long-suffering security man. “What has he done?”

“He—” Odelia began, but Chase shut her up with a glance.

“We just need to have a word with him, if that’s all right with you,” he said.

“Last room on the right. And please tell him to get his act together.”

“Why is that?” asked Odelia.

“He’s been acting weird all morning. Cagey, if you know what I mean. And he and Regan aren’t on speaking terms for whatever reason.” He shook his head. “Place is falling apart. Cat-napping pop stars, drama queen bodyguards, murder and mayhem…”

Odelia exchanged a look with Chase, and they went in search of Toby. They passed a room whose door was open and saw Regan lying on the bed, tossing a tennis ball at the wall and deftly catching it. She was frowning so hard and lost so deeply in thought she didn’t even notice Chase and Odelia looking in on her.

“Last room on the right,” Chase muttered. The door was closed, and he gave it a knock. Loud techno music was coming from inside the room, a pulsating beat that drowned out any other sound “Toby?!” he yelled. “We never finished that conversation, buddy!”

When no response came, except for the staccato thump of the speakers, he pushed down on the door handle. The door swung open, and the next moment Odelia clapped her hands over her mouth to stifle a scream.

There, on the floor of the small room, lay Toby Mulvaney, his eyes open and staring unseeingly up at them. In his hand, a small-caliber gun. And in his temple, a nice round hole.

Chapter 22

Brutus, Dooley and I were watching as Tex and Uncle Alec worked on the pet door. It was a fascinating sight. Like watching a train wreck in slow motion. The two men had had some trouble removing the door from its hinges, but had finally managed to place it on top of a workbench Tex had dragged over from his garden shed. They’d hemmed and hawed for a while, scratching their heads and trying to decide how to do this thing, and had then both decided to take a break and had gone inside for a cup of coffee and a chocolate donut.

When they came out again, the door was still there, the pet door was still too small, and so they went straight back to dilly-dallying and drawing up a plan of campaign.

They kept darting furtive glances in my direction, and at one point Tex came over with a tape measure, wrapped it around my belly, then returned to the door and scratched his head some more.

“He’s measuring you for your coffin, Max,” said Brutus, who’d become very morbid since he’d begun his transition into Bruna. “Soon they’ll lay you to rest in the backyard.”

Dooley’s eyes went wide. “They’re going to bury Max? But why? Are you sick, Max? Is there something you’re not telling me?”

“I’m not sick, I’m not dying, and nobody is going to bury me,” I assured him with a reproachful look at Brutus, who merely lifted his shoulders. “They’re simply trying to make the pet door fit to my particular… size.”

“Which is considerable,” Brutus commented nastily.

“Which is normal for the type of cat I am,” I corrected him haughtily.

“A fat cat.”

“A big-boned cat. I simply share more of my DNA with the big cats of the jungle than most,” I told him, reciting something I’d seen on the Discovery Channel. “Your tigers, your lions, your leopards, your jaguars…” I shrugged. “I guess you could say I’m part domestic cat, part member of the Panthera genus—the big cats that roam wild and free on the Serengeti.”

Brutus rolled his eyes. He was clearly not in the mood for a lesson in biology. Dooley was staring at me, though, clearly impressed. “Wow, Max. I never knew you were a tiger.”

“Yeah, well,” I said, flicking a speck of sawdust from my fur. “Scientia potential est. Knowledge is power.”

“Michael Jackson?”

“Francis Bacon.”

“Is he the one who invented bacon and eggs?”

“He could very well be, Dooley. He could very well be.”

Just then, Grandma came strolling through the hole in the hedge that divides our two gardens. She was frowning, and talking animatedly into her phone. “Of course, Mr. President. I know, Mr. President. You’re absolutely right, Mr. President. Yes, I’ll get on it right away, Mr. President. Yes, I agree with you that world peace is what we should all be striving for, but at what cost, Mr. President? At what cost?!”

She disappeared through the hedge again, and Uncle Alec directed a puzzled look at his brother-in-law. “Is she talking to the President?”

Tex sighed. “Yeah, looks like. I don’t know what’s gotten into her lately, but she’s been consulting with world leaders all week. Some guy called Ban Ki-moon, the Pope, of course, and now the President… She even talked to Bill Gates the other day.”

“But why? And how come they even listen to her?”

“Beats me, Alec. What I’ve learned over the years is to simply let Vesta be Vesta. If these world leaders want to take advice from your mother, they have my blessing.”

“And mine,” said Alec, looking slightly taken aback. It’s not every day that your mother becomes the go-to person for the top leaders of the world.

Just then, my cat ears pricked up, and so did Dooley’s and Brutus’s. We exchanged a look of understanding, and simultaneously said, “Odelia!”

Then Brutus sniffed, and his face lit up. “And Harriet!”

Moments later, Odelia came walking through the kitchen door opening—now without door—and smiled when she saw her dad and uncle hard at work—or at least thinking hard about work. “Hey, you guys. Am I glad to see you.”