Софи Келли - A Night's Tail

She pointed from herself to me to Roma. “White wine, white wine, ginger ale and a large fries.”

“No problem,” he said.

While Zach and Maggie made small talk I studied the bartender. As I’d noticed the first time I’d seen him, his deep blue eyes were his most striking feature.

The band started to play as Zach slid a glass of white wine in front of me. They weren’t as good as The Flaming Gerbils but they weren’t bad. The number of customers looking for a drink was already thinning out as people started listening to the music.

“You’re Kathleen, right?” he said. “You were here last Friday night. I never forget a face.” He snapped his fingers. “Your brother and his band sat in with Backroads last weekend. The Hamsters?”

“The Flaming Gerbils,” I said.

He grinned. “Now, how could I forget that?”

A waitress came from the kitchen then and handed him a basket of fries. He set it in front of me with a flourish since I was sandwiched between Maggie and Roma. Roma immediately grabbed a couple of the French fries, dipping them in the little metal bowl of spicy ketchup.

“I owe you an apology,” I said, taking a sip of my wine.

“Why? What did you do?” he asked. He was flirting with me, leaning in, smiling a lot.

“Not me,” I said. “But one of my friends was the guy who punched that guy who kicked the service dog.”

“Then you don’t owe me an apology, but I do owe your friend a beer on the house next time he’s in here. The guy was a jerk.”

“That sounds like you knew him,” Maggie said.

“I know his type,” Zach said. “Big shot ex-jock thought the rules didn’t apply to him.”

“You know he’s dead now?”

“You know what they say about karma,” he said, shrugging one shoulder. He gave me another smile. “If I can get you anything else, let me know.” He moved down the bar and once he was out of earshot Maggie leaned close to my ear.

“Did you get what you needed?” she asked.

I thought about the gleam in Zach Redmond’s eye when he’d said, “You know what they say about karma . ” “It’s a start,” I said.

chapter 11

Zach stayed busy after that. It wasn’t difficult to see he was avoiding Maggie and maybe me as well. “I’m sorry,” I said to Maggie. “I know you like Zach but I have a feeling there’s something he didn’t tell us. His disdain for Lewis Wallace is too deep to be just over him kicking that service dog.” I had told them about Redmond Signs on the drive out to the bar.

Maggie ran a finger down the side of her glass. “I know,” she said. “You think it has something to do with his grandfather’s business. But I just can’t see Zach killing someone. He helps out with the seniors’ yoga class. I know he’s a bit of a flirt, but he’s not a creep.”

“Lewis Wallace died from an allergic reaction, didn’t he?” Roma asked.

“Yes,” I said, snagging three fries from the basket. Roma had already eaten half of them.

“So maybe Zach didn’t kill the man. Not deliberately, I mean. Maybe when Wallace couldn’t breathe Zach didn’t realize the significance and just walked away. Maybe it was a crime of omission, not a crime of commission.”

I shrugged but didn’t say anything. Smashing food into someone’s face was a deliberate act. So was keeping an EpiPen away from someone who needed it.

Roma’s words seemed to cheer Maggie up a little. “When are the guys coming back?” she asked.

“Sometime on Monday,” I said.

“Aside from the thing with Wallace and the dog it was fun Friday night. We should do it again before Ethan leaves.” She looked at Roma. “At a time when you and Eddie can be there.”

Roma nodded. “I’d like that.”

“We could even go to Barry’s Hat,” Maggie said, nudging me with her elbow.

“I like that idea,” I said, making a face at her. “And Ethan wanted to check the place out.”

“Oh, he already did. That’s where we went the night we were celebrating Derek being cleared as a suspect.”

We?

“I didn’t know you went out with the guys that night.”

She reached over and grabbed a French fry. “Yeah,” she said. “Ethan invited me and it sounded like fun.” She smiled. “It was.”

So Maggie had gone out with Ethan and the guys. Maybe Ethan’s interest in Maggie had gotten a bit of inadvertent encouragement.

On my other side, Roma was still eating the crispy fries as though she expected them to disappear without warning.

“Roma, did you eat anything today?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. Then she frowned. “Maybe. I’m not sure. I know I cooked a lot. Hockey players eat a lot. Even ex–hockey players.”

I pushed the basket sideways so it was directly in front of her. I had a feeling Roma had done a lot of cooking and very little eating for the past several hours. “Maybe they could all go to Fern’s for breakfast tomorrow. The big breakfast sounds like just the thing for them.”

Roma licked ketchup off of her thumb. “Maybe I should go to Fern’s for breakfast. A big breakfast sounds like just the thing for me .”

Maggie and Roma dropped me off at Marcus’s house at about ten thirty. I hugged them both and thanked them for their help and I promised I would talk to Ethan and work out a way for us all to get together before he went home.

As I climbed out of the SUV, Maggie turned and said, “You know, I still have those strands of fairy lights from Roma and Eddie’s wedding.”

“And, as you know, my living room is the perfect spot for a wedding,” Roma added.

“What are you two, the marriage police?” I asked.

“Yes,” they both said and then dissolved in laughter.

Maggie and Roma had conspired to get Marcus and me to a happily ever after from pretty much the moment he and I had met. Roma had paired us up to volunteer with the feral cats at Wisteria Hill and Maggie had sent Marcus and me on our first date of sorts by giving Marcus her ticket to the final concert at the Wild Rose Summer Music Festival but “forgetting” to tell me what she’d done. They had all but wrapped me up with a red ribbon and deposited me on his doorstep, and the only reason that hadn’t happened was because the idea hadn’t occurred to them.

“Good night,” I said as I closed the car door. I waved over my shoulder as I walked up the driveway. I was pretty sure they were still laughing as they drove away.

Micah was waiting for me on the railing of the back deck, her eyes gleaming in the darkness. “Hi, puss,” I said.

She meowed a hello and I stroked her marmalade-colored fur. Once again I felt a twist of guilt knot in my chest. I’d suspected very early that the little cat had the same sort of abilities as my two did and I wasn’t really that surprised when she had winked out of sight one day. But I hadn’t said a word to Marcus. I kept avoiding it, making excuses, and I didn’t really have a good reason. I trusted him, didn’t I?

Micah jumped down from her perch and crossed the deck to the back door. She looked over her shoulder at me and meowed once again. I knew she was telling me to hurry up.

Marcus smiled when I stepped into the kitchen and pulled me into a hug. “Hi,” he said. “I didn’t think you’d be this early.”

“Roma ate all the French fries so we figured it was time to leave,” I said.

“Want some hot chocolate or are you too full of fries?” he asked as I shrugged off my jacket and draped it over the back of a chair. Micah had disappeared somewhere. I hoped not literally.

“First of all, there is no such thing as being too full for hot chocolate,” I told him. “And second, Roma really did eat most of the fries. It seems that she’s been feeding some of Eddie’s former teammates but hasn’t been feeding herself.”