Ник Сайнт - Purrfect Rivalry

“For your information, Stien is currently between boyfriends if that’s what’s got you worried,” he said.

A glimmer of hope appeared in the policeman’s gentle eyes. “And what about Strel?”

“Strel is dating some bar owner at the moment. Dunlop Bard? Runs Puppy Power over on Franklin Avenue? You know the place.”

The hope in Pierre’s eyes died away. “Oh,” he said quietly.

Sam frowned. “Hey, I thought you had the hots for Stien?”

“Well, I like Stien a lot,” said Pierre. “But…”

“But you like Strel even better, is that it?”

Pierre nodded. “Oh, I know she’s way out of my league, Sam. Strel is on her way to becoming a star. She’s going to be the next Taylor Swift and her career is going to take her into the stratosphere, far removed from mere mortals like me.” He gave Sam a sad look. “But one can only dream, right?”

Sam clapped a hand on his partner’s shoulder and growled, “Let’s talk to Skip, and then we’ll visit the triplets.” He crooked an eyebrow. “Unless your scar tells you otherwise.”

But it was clear from Pierre’s mournful expression that this was not the time for levity. Whatever his scar was telling him, it obviously wasn’t a message of joy and good cheer.

Chapter Two

I woke up with a start. It took me a few moments to get my bearings, and to realize what had awakened me. As far as I could tell, it wasn’t my alarm clock, which was a relic from the eighties: an alarm clock radio that was tuned to an eighties music radio station and usually eased me from my usual dreamless state to full wakefulness to the tunes of popular eighties superstars such as Modern Talking, Bonnie Tyler or even The Human League.

Now, however, another singing voice had dragged me from my peaceful slumber, and if I wasn’t mistaken it was my sister Strel’s awful caterwauling that had done the trick.

“Ugh,” I grunted, and covered my face with my pillow in a bid to drown out the terrible noise.

To no avail, of course.

Strel’s shrill voice was so powerful it could easily penetrate a brick wall, or possibly even a concrete underground bunker. Scientists at the Department of Defense’s DARPA would probably be most interested in harnessing its power as a weapon of mass destruction. It could also come in handy in the interrogation of unusually shy terrorists, who would snap like twigs under the strain.

With another tired groan, I swung my legs from between the covers and rubbed my eyes. Ever since Strel had gotten it into her head to revitalize her fledgling singing career, she’d been absolutely intolerable. She’d all but given up on her dream of being the next Katy Perry when a new houseguest had arrived at Casa Cassie, as we liked to call our ancestral home. Helmut Totti was a Belgian singer, vacationing in New York, and of all the places in this fair town of ours he could have chosen to grace with his presence, he’d chosen us.

I dragged my hands through my red mane in an attempt to tame it, smoothed down my Simple Minds T-shirt, and pushed myself up off the bed.

Swinging my door wide, I stalked over to Strel’s room, where the racket seemed to originate.

Without bothering to knock, I barged in and yelled, “Strel! Will you please cut it out?!”

Only then did I see that Strel wasn’t alone. She was accompanied by a young man with a slight hint of peach fuzz on his chin—Shaggy Rogers style—and a goofy expression on his face—Scooby-Doo style. The young man was clutching a guitar and was obviously doing the honors of accompanying Strel.

“Oh, hey, honey,” said Strel in her usual chipper way. “Did we wake you?”

“I’m so sorry, Edie,” said the young man who was, of course, none other than Helmut Totti himself. He was smiling apologetically. “We thought it would be a nice treat to wake you guys up with a pleasant little song this morning. You know, put you in a good mood before starting your day.”

“Trying to put Edie in a good mood in the morning is hopeless, Helmut,” said Strel. “She’s Miss Sourpuss and nothing we do will ever change that.”

I planted my hands on my sizable hips. “If you learned how to sing, I might wake up in a good mood for once, and not ready to commit murder.”

“Oh, here we go,” said Strel with an expressive eyeroll. She pushed at her long blond hair, which was draped across her slender shoulders. When I looked closer, I saw that she was actually wearing a flower in her hair, as if channeling Joan Baez or Joni Mitchell, about to conquer Woodstock.

“Why don’t we sing you a nice ballad?” Helmut suggested, and before I could stop him, he struck a chord on his guitar, and the both of them launched into a harrowing and painfully bad rendition of Bridge Over Troubled Water.

I pressed my hands to my ears and removed myself from the room as fast as I could, haunted by twin wails of ‘When you’re weary, feeling small.’

Well, they sure were right about that. I was feeling pretty weary right now.

“Why?” I muttered as I hurried out. “In the name of everything that is holy, why, oh, why?”

I almost bumped into my sister Ernestine who had also come out to trace the source of the terrifying noise.

“Is that Strel singing?” she asked as she pushed her glasses further up her nose. Stien is the brainy one in our family. She’s also the legal beagle.

“Yup. She’s found a partner in crime, apparently.”

Stien frowned, her default expression. “A partner in crime? I didn’t know Strel was into crime these days.”

“It’s an expression, Stien. She’s doing a duet with Helmut.”

“Oh,” said Stien, understanding dawning. “I thought I heard a second, even more awful voice dueling with Strel’s.”

I nodded somberly. “We’re doomed. He’s encouraging her, Stien. After everything we did to discourage her, he’s simply adding fuel to the fire.”

Stien shrugged. “Maybe it’s a good thing. Maybe he can finally teach her how to sing properly.”

We both listened to the dueling caterwauling for a moment. It sounded like two cats fighting in a back alley for possession of the same white mouse.

We both shook our heads. “No, he can’t,” I said. “No one can.”

Chapter Three

Cassandra Beadsmore—Cassie to her friends and Gran to the triplets—was busily enjoying the early morning in her precious garden. Ever since she’d retired from running a national chain of flower shops to take care of her granddaughters, she’d transferred her love of flowers to her own garden, and had managed to turn it into a feast of floral delight.

She had a greenhouse, where she kept her most precious blooms, and the garden itself was now crisscrossed by small cobblestone pathways that took visitors past every flower, shrub, perennial and tree that would grow in the New York climate and even some that wouldn’t. But such was the power of Cassie’s green thumb that she managed to make even those grow abundantly.

Neighbors up and down Nightingale Street often wondered how she did it, and regularly sought her advice on how to deal with some tricky issue like aphids chomping on their flowers, or weeds threatening to break down the fragile eco-structure of their backyards. She was always happy to help, and had become the go-to person for Gardening First Aid.

She was now knee-deep into yanking out some pesky weeds that were threatening to choke the life out of her rhododendrons, and as she worked, her knees on one of those colorful memory foam kneeling pads, she hummed a pleasant tune.

If she could spend her every waking hour in her beloved garden, she would. Unfortunately she hadn’t been able to resist the siren song of creating another business, and had recently turned her home into an Airbnb, taking in paying guests. And since paying guests also like to pay to enjoy a meal at regular intervals, she’d become an innkeeper in these, her golden years.