Софи Келли: A Case Of Cat And Mouse

Russell smiled when he saw me. “And you brought Hercules,” he said.

Stacey smiled at the cat. “Hello, Hercules,” she said. She looked at me. “It’s okay, Russell told me I can’t pet him.”

“What are you doing here?” Russell asked. “Everyone’s gone.”

“There’s something I wanted to ask Stacey.”

“What is it?” She looked a little uncertain.

“Did you give Kate one of your pills the day Kassie was killed? I know what happened on the set when you were all filming the promos. I know Caroline dumped a bowl of flour on Kassie and Kate broke a jar.”

Her pink cheeks and guilty expression told me yes before she spoke.

“She was so upset she was shaking and she couldn’t seem to stand still. I . . . I didn’t know what else to do. I gave her two.”

I reached out and touched her arm. “Hey, you were just trying to help. It’s okay.”

“Is that it?” Russell asked.

“It is,” I said.

“Let’s go, then.” He flipped the light switch, closed the door and we started down the hallway.

“Kathleen, we’re going over to Fern’s,” Stacey said. “Would you like to join us?”

“Merow,” Hercules said. It seemed he’d forgotten we were meeting Ruby.

“Yes, we know you would,” I said, scratching behind his left ear. I smiled at Stacey. “Thank you, but we’re going to tai chi.”

“I didn’t know cats did tai chi,” Russell said.

“Are you kidding?” I said with mock surprise. “You should see his Cloud Hands.”

My phone rang then. Marcus, finally. “Go ahead,” I said. “I need to get this.” They headed for the stairs.

But it wasn’t Marcus. It was Abigail. “I’m sorry to bother you, Kathleen,” she said, “but I’m having trouble with that monitor again, the one closest to the front desk.”

“Have a good night,” Russell called from the end of the hall.

I waved and he and Stacey were gone. “Whack it with the heel of your hand on the right side right in the middle of the top edge,” I said to Abigail.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

“Just try it.”

I heard a thump and then Abigail exclaimed, “It worked!” She sounded surprised.

“Well, one of these days it won’t,” I said. “And it probably won’t last. I have another cable I can try. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

Abigail thanked me and said good-bye.

“I’m going to take you over to Maggie and Ruby and then just run over to the library for a minute,” I said to Hercules.

He wasn’t listening. Something behind me had caught his attention. The hairs rose on the back of my neck as I turned around.

Kate was pointing a gun at me.

chapter 19

Maybe I could bluff.

“Kate, you scared me,” I said. “Could you put that down, please?”

She smiled but there was nothing warm about it. “Seeing as how I’m planning on shooting you, no, I can’t,” she said. She held out her free hand. “Give me your phone.”

Bluffing wasn’t going to work.

I handed her my cell. She turned it off and put it in her pocket.

I glanced over my shoulder. The stairs were half a hall away. “Harry will hear you if you shoot me.”

“I’m not going to shoot you here,” she said. “C’mon, I’m smarter than that. After all, I killed Kassie and no one figured out it was me—well, except for you.” She was wearing another of her long loose sweaters and her free arm hugged her midsection. “Besides, at this time of night Harry will have closed the doors at the bottom of the stairs. They’re fire doors. You could kill someone up here and no one would hear a thing. Ask me how I know.”

“You found out that Kassie was connected to the woman who owned the skincare company that made the mask you had the allergic reaction to,” I said.

“Monique Le Clair. They’d been friends since high school. Kassie told my lawyer that she had no idea where Monique was, but I knew that was a lie.”

“That morning when you were all filming the promo on the set and Kassie was on Caroline about being a helicopter parent, she mentioned Saint Barthélemy. You finally knew where Monique Le Clair was.”

“Eugenie showed you the video this morning. I walked past the door. Neither one of you noticed me.” Her eyes narrowed. “How did you figure it out? I knew it was just a matter of time before you did, but what gave me away?”

My mouth was dry. “The glass jar you dropped.” Maybe if I kept her talking Harry would wonder what was taking me so long.

Kate frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“I kept thinking about what happened. Caroline upended the bowl over Kassie’s head; the jar slipped out of your hands; Ray pulled a pot off his stove and bolted toward Caroline. I was replaying it over and over in my head and I realized that the sound of the jar hitting the floor came just a fraction of a second before Caroline tipped over that bowl. It was like a storm. You always see the lightning before you hear the thunder because light travels faster than sound.”

“She said, ‘ No harm was done ,’” Kate said. “She was the one who suggested putting chemicals in what was supposed to be a natural product. Kassie and her friend ruined my life and it was like it was nothing. And she was trying to do it again. She was trying to undermine me on the show, for no good reason, just because she liked to stir up trouble.”

“The show was your way to get close to Kassie. To find out what she knew. You paid Dorrie Park to drop out of the qualifying competition so you’d be in the top three.”

Kate gave a sigh of exasperation. “And she just had to go to Paris and put a whole bunch of photos online. What is wrong with people?” She gestured with the gun and I put my free arm protectively around Hercules as if it could somehow stop a bullet.

Kate noticed the gesture. “I won’t hurt him.” She seemed almost offended. “I’m not a monster. Kassie was the monster.”

“Why didn’t you tell Elias, tell everyone?”

She gave a snort of derision. “Like that would do a lot of good. Elias wouldn’t have done a thing. Do you know what Kassie’s real name is? Do you know who her father is?”

I nodded. “I do.”

“Then you know telling Elias, telling everyone, would have been a waste of time. It’s not like I had any actual proof.”

I glanced over my shoulder again.

“Mr. Taylor isn’t coming to rescue you,” she said. “And as far as he’s concerned I left a little while ago. I was on the sidewalk when you got here. I had a feeling you’d figured everything out so I came back.”

“How did you get back in the building just now without Harry seeing you?” I asked. At some point soon Harry had to wonder why I hadn’t come back out.

Kate smiled again. “There’s an alarm on the other door now. But not on the windows. Sloppy, don’t you think?”

The only thing I could think of was to keep her talking. Maybe she’d have second thoughts about killing me if she had some time to think about what she was planning on doing. “So what happened the night Kassie died?” I said. “I know you’d taken her phone earlier in the day and then pretended to find it.”

“Oh, so we’re going to do the Miss Marple thing.” Kate looked around. “Well, it’s not an English country manor house but this will have to do. Yes, I borrowed her phone. There wasn’t anything useful on it.”

“But that’s how you knew Kassie had a son.”

“I knew that was a mistake as soon as I spoke.”

“You went down to Eric’s with everyone else.” I glanced at the nearest office door. What were the chances it would be unlocked?

“Yes. Then I walked back because I didn’t feel like socializing. The thing is, when you’re quiet, people don’t notice when you’re gone.”