Клер Донелли - The Big Kitty

He made his way across the expanse of the car’s trunk. It sloped down to the right, his uninjured side. That was a good thing. Ahead of him rose the side of the truck, which still rose up higher than his vantage point. He still couldn’t see where he’d end up landing.

Would he be able to make it? Shadow knew he’d only have one chance. Already he felt dizzy and sick.

He backed up until his rear paws almost went off the trunk. Then Shadow ran forward, ignoring the pain screaming from his side. At the last moment, he launched himself, trying not to think of the hard concrete flying by beneath him.

Shadow barely cleared the truck’s side wall. But he was coming down into a place of safety—or so he hoped.

He didn’t land well, stumbling instead of catching himself on all four feet.

Red pain flashed all over him.

Then everything turned black.

*

Nothing exciting happenedwhen Sunny crossed back over the street to her dad’s pickup. No sniper fire, no garbage truck careening down the street to run her over.

She started the engine and pulled out, feeling a little numb.

All the way home, she keep looking in the rearview mirrors, trying to spot a tail.

Of course, she had one. Will’s police cruiser rolled along behind her.

I hope he’s looking behind him , she found herself thinking, then shook her head at such foolishness. If someone had been following her, seeing a police car on her trail would probably discourage them.

The lights were still on when she arrived home. Her father was probably still up, watching the late news.

Sunny pulled up in the driveway and got out to wave to Will.

That was when she heard it—a low, mewling moan.

The noise seemed to be coming from the truck bed.

Instead of heading for the door around the front of the pickup, Sunny went to the rear and peeked in.

A furry shape lay sprawled on the metal bed.

“Shadow!” she cried.

She had to climb halfway into the truck to get at the cat.

Usually Shadow was totally aloof, a real “don’t touch me” cat. He darted away if Sunny so much as extended a hand to pet him.

But now he just lay limply, blinking up at her in misery as she gently gathered him up in her arms.

Will came hustling over to see what was going on.

“You remember Shadow?” she said.

He nodded. “From the scene of the crime.”

Sunny probed the cat with careful fingers. Shadow gave another low moan when she touched his ribs.

“He’s hurt!” she said, and then she turned to Will in real horror. “You don’t think that they —”

“Can’t say.” He looked down at the huddled gray form in Sunny’s arms. “But this is really one of those times that I wish cats could talk.”

14

Sunny burst intoher house, Shadow in her arms, Will Price at her heels.

Her dad jumped up from the couch at the commotion. “Constable! What’s going on? Is everything all right?” Then he saw the cat. “Did she have you out looking for this mange-ball?”

“Shadow’s hurt,” Sunny said. “We have to get him some help!”

She turned on her heel, heading for the kitchen, then turned back. “Do we still have a yellow pages?”

“In the cabinet,” Mike said, following after. “You’re not just going to put him on the table, are you?”

“You’re right.” Sunny glanced over her shoulder at Will. “Bring a pillow from the couch.”

Once Shadow had been arranged as comfortably as possible, Sunny attacked the directory. “Pet hospitals,” she muttered, flipping through pages.

Tucking the receiver from the wall phone between her ear and her shoulder while holding a finger on the number she wanted, she punched on the keypad.

On the other end, the phone rang four times. Then came a click, a moment of dead air, and a whirring sound with an obviously canned voice saying, “Thank you for calling the Kittery Harbor Pet Hospital. Our hours of operation are from eight thirty a.m. to four thirty p.m. Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, and from ten a.m. to seven p.m. Tuesday and Thursday. Dr. Rigsdale and our staff offer a wide range of affordable patient care for small animals, large animals, and exotics—”

Sunny hung up. “I’m getting their machine. Where are the white pages?”

Silently Mike dug out the other phone book. “I know that look from her mother,” he muttered to Will. “That’s the ‘don’t argue with me’ look.”

“Rigsdale—good. There’s only one in the book.” Sunny copied the address, picked up Shadow on his pillow, and headed back down the hall.

“Aren’t you going to call?” Mike called after her.

“And give this Rigsdale character warning that I’m coming?” Sunny almost snarled. “He’s not going to hide behind an answering machine this time.”

Will could only shrug and follow her.

When Sunny went to place the pillow on the passenger side of the pickup, Shadow mewled piteously at her. “It’s okay, it’s okay, we’re going to get some help for you, just take it easy.” She clipped on her seat belt, then carefully set Shadow and his pillow on her lap.

It was close to midnight by the time they got to the address. Will got out of his patrol car and came to her driver’s-side window, doing a double take at the sight of the cat in her lap.

“Sunny, the place is dark,” he said, pointing out the obvious.

“And this is an emergency,” she snapped. “I’ll carry the cat; you ring the bell.”

Will muttered something about improper use of authority, but did what she said.

“Lean on it,” Sunny said after Will rang the bell twice without getting any answer. “And if that doesn’t work, we’ll try your siren—wake up the whole neighborhood if we have to.”

He leaned on the bell. A light came on in one of the upstairs windows, and then a head appeared, silhouetted against the light.

“What the hell is it?” a woman’s sleep-fuzzed voice called down.

“We’ve got a veterinary emergency down here,” Sunny said. “Don’t we, Constable Price?”

“Constable Price?” The woman upstairs leaned out farther. “Will?”

Will’s jaw dropped as he peered upward. “Jane?”

A moment later, the woman was downstairs. Even in a bathrobe with bed hair, she was a blond knockout.

Now it was Sunny’s turn to stare. “Jane Leister?”

Jane had been the golden girl of her high school class: valedictorian, most pretty, most popular. While Sunny and most of the girls were killing themselves to get pimply-faced juniors to notice them, Jane was going out with a college guy.

“I didn’t even know you were back in town,” Will said. From the look on his face, he and Jane had History with a capital H .

“Yeah, well, I didn’t know you were, either,” Jane said. “And my name is Rigsdale now. My husband—ex-husband—we were partners in the practice. I got the hospital in the divorce, and I kept the married name since I’m known professionally as Dr. Rigsdale.”

She glanced over at Sunny with a half-puzzled. “Don’t I know you?” kind of look.

Sunny sighed and introduced herself. Jane nodded. “Oh, of course, we went to school together. You were on the yearbook, right?”

No, and I wasn’t part of your fan club, either, that uncharitable part of Sunny’s mind silently answered.

Just as well, because the vet made another connection. “You wrote the article in today’s Crier ,” Jane said. “I’d like to talk to you a bit about what happened to Ada Spruance, and what they intend to do about her cats. But first, we’ve got business.”

She turned to the cat in Sunny’s arms. “So this is the emergency patient? I warn you, I’ll do this once because you’re a friend of Will’s—”