Лори Касс - Gone With The Whisker

“Hey, Ash. Long time no see and all that.” I settled down next to Rafe and made a come-hither gesture to my plate. Ash slid it over and I debated my next bite. Chip? Potato salad? Burger?

“How’s she doing?” Rafe tipped his head in Kate’s direction.

“She says she’s fine.” I picked up my fork and aimed it at the potatoes, opting to eat first the food more likely to make me sick if I didn’t eat it soon.

“Takes after her aunt.” Ash eyed an unopened bag of chips. “Is someone eating these?”

“Knock yourself out,” I said. “And what do you mean, she takes after me?”

The two men at the table exchanged a glance. “But what I stopped to tell you,” Ash said, opening the bag, “is about Barry Vannett.”

I sat up straight and leaned forward. “You found a gun in his car, matched the ballistics to the bullet that killed Rex, and you’ve already arrested him.”

Ash paused, looking at me over the top of a laden potato chip. “That’s quite a sequence.” He took the time to eat, chew, and swallow before he continued. “But no. None of that happened.”

I deflated. While I hadn’t been a hundred percent sure of Vannett’s guilt, it would have made for a fast resolution. “What did?”

“The senior generation of Vannetts have a cottage on Janay Lake, and every year there’s a big family reunion over the Fourth. A different family member is in charge every year. This year it was Barry’s turn.”

My deflation continued. I could picture the scene. Multiple generations of Vannetts running around from dawn to dusk and beyond, making memories of boating and s’mores and sparklers that would last a lifetime.

“So Barry Vannett is out as a suspect,” I said.

“Looks like.” Ash glanced at the houseboat. “You going to tell Kate? I could, but—”

“No, it’s my job.” I started to stand, but sat back down again, remembering the closed bathroom door. “It can wait a few minutes, though. Pass the chips, will you?”

* * *

My talk with Kate about the murder investigation didn’t go as expected. When I told her that Barry Vannett had been eliminated as a suspect, but that the investigation was still continuing, she didn’t accept the family reunion alibi.

“But that doesn’t make sense,” she said, crossing her arms across her chest. By the time I’d finished dinner and returned to the houseboat, she had left the confines of the bathroom and gone out to the houseboat’s deck with Eddie and her tablet.

I sat on the vacant chaise—well, vacant except for a sprawling Eddie—and gave her the news, which she didn’t like. “How does it not make sense?” I asked, trying to keep my expression interested, neutral, and not at all annoyed and disagreeable.

“Because,” she said oh-so-patiently, drawing out the word into five or six syllables, “with so many people around, it would be easy for him to go out for an hour without anyone noticing. I mean, how far is the cottage to Chilson? A five-minute drive? Ten?”

She sat up and faced me. “Or maybe, since Barry is dead set against that trail, maybe the whole family is, too. So maybe it wasn’t Barry who killed Rex, but maybe it was someone else in the family.”

My mouth opened, then closed. “You’re right,” I said slowly. “You’re absolutely right.”

“I . . . am?”

“Yep. Do you want to tell Deputy Wolverson about this, or should I?”

She demurred on talking to Ash, so I texted him the theory. He didn’t completely dismiss it, but it didn’t sound as if he took it seriously, either. Not that I told Kate. What I told her was that the sheriff’s office appreciated her ideas and to keep passing them along.

The next morning, I left for the library when Kate was still in her sleeping bag. I touched her on the shoulder. “Time to get up,” I said. “You start at Benton’s in an hour.”

Benton’s was the classic general store, from its wood floors to its tin ceiling, from its stick candy to its shiny brass cash register. It had been run by the same family since its birth, and was now in capable hands. Rianne Howe, a woman a few years older than myself, had been raised in Chilson, left for the big city, but had come home to run the family store.

“Mmm,” Kate said, snuggling deeper into her sleeping bag.

She had my sympathy; the morning was cool and she had to be comfortably cozy in there.

“Mrr!” Eddie jumped from the floor to the sleeping bag, landing on what looked like her midsection.

“Oooff!” Kate rolled over. “Fine, I’m awake, I’m awake!”

I laughed, but it was a laugh of sympathy. “At least I know it’s not personal. He does that to me once a week.”

“Rotten cat,” Kate muttered, but she extracted one of her arms and rubbed the side of his head.

“He is pretty horrible. Sorry, pal,” I said, “but it’s true. Doesn’t mean we don’t love you.”

So I headed up to the library feeling downright perky. I’d had a good night’s sleep, my niece and I were talking, and my cat was wonderfully awful. Sure, the sun was covered with clouds and the air felt more like September than July, but that would pass. I sang cheery morning nonsense songs, waved at Cookie Tom on my way past the bakery, and spent a happy hour in my office reading librarian trade magazines.

“You look pleased with yourself this morning.”

I grinned at Holly, who’d just come into the break room, a room I’d recently entered myself. “Easy to be happy on mornings I get to do this,” I said, hitting the coffeemaker’s Go button.

“Who made it?” Josh asked as he entered.

“You have a gift,” Holly said. “Every time the coffee is fresh, there you are. Have you ever actually made a pot of coffee?”

It was a good question. For the majority of his adult life, Josh hadn’t been a coffee drinker, preferring to get his caffeine via diet soda from the vending machine. That had all changed when he’d bought a house and come to grips with his altered financial status. And now he had a serious girlfriend and they were talking about moving in together. It was a concept hard to wrap my tiny little mind around.

Josh slapped the pockets of his cargo pants. “Nope, don’t have it.”

“Don’t have what?” Holly frowned and I wondered if this was going to turn into one of their sibling-like spats.

“For Minnie,” he said. “An article about these new servers. A little more money than those other ones, but these would—”

Holly made a rude noise. “You’re spending Stan Larabee’s money, aren’t you? New servers might be nice, but the ones we have work fine. The first thing we need to do with that money is buy more computers for the children and young adult sections. And get tablets with educational software so kids can check them out. They’re doing it at the library in—”

“Not a chance,” Josh interrupted. “Who do you think is going to look after all that? I already have too much to do. There’s no way I can support more computers and tablets.”

“If you’re that busy,” Holly said, “why are you in here half the time?”

If there was any chance of keeping the spat from becoming a full-blown argument, I had to do something fast. So I asked the first question that came to mind. “Do either one of you know anyone around here named Vannett?”

They turned and blinked at me.

“I know a Nate Vannett,” Josh said. “He’s a website designer, has a place next to that art gallery your buddy has stuff in.”

Holly said, “There’s a Faith Vannett who works at the eye doctor downtown. Is that who you mean?”

“If she’s related to Barry, then yes.”

“What’s up?” Josh asked, adding more coffee to his coffee.