Лори Касс - Cat With A Clue

“Yes, but they tend to stay in their family groups, doing the same things they’ve always done with the same people they’ve always done things with.” She sighed. “It’s hard for a well-adjusted adult to break into an established social pattern, let alone someone with . . . someone like Dana.”

“I think she’s a great kid,” I said.

“You do?” Jennifer looked at me. “You really think so? She’s . . . well, you see what she’s like.”

“Different.” I nodded. Which wasn’t what Jennifer had meant, but that was the root of it. “And being different is hardest when you’re young.”

“True.” Jenny sighed. “My husband and I, we’re not like her.”

I flashed back to how both she and Dana had trod the front steps and guessed that mother and daughter weren’t as far apart as Mom thought.

“We try to understand her, but we just don’t.” Jenny looked back at the house again, then at me. “Do you have children?”

I shook my head. “All I can handle right now is one cat.”

“Well, I hope you have kids someday. You have a knack for drawing them out.”

I was pretty sure she was wrong. Most days I had no idea how to treat kids other than as short adults. People said when I had my own children it would be different, but I was also pretty sure I wasn’t nearly mature enough to have kids. Besides, they’d be embarrassed to death if people knew that their mom talked to cats.

“Stop by again,” Jennifer said. “Anytime.”

I told her I would, wished her a good night, and pedaled off into the darkening evening, thinking about chance encounters and inappropriate gifts and about Talia and about the great mystery of what the future holds for all of us at the end.

* * *

“Minnie? Is anything wrong?” Otto, in jeans and a polo shirt, peered at me the next morning.

I was standing on his front doorstep, my skin prickly in the chill air. “It’s time for breakfast,” I told him.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes it is. It is definitely that time of day.” He raised his eyebrows, still waiting for an answer to the question he’d asked.

“Have you been to breakfast this summer?” I asked, nodding at my aunt’s place.

“Well, actually, no.” He looked at the big house across the street. “I haven’t been invited, and I didn’t want to barge in without being asked.”

My aunt was an idiot. “Come on.” I grabbed his hand and tugged. “I’m inviting you.”

“I can’t possibly.” Otto pulled out of my grip. “Frances will—”

“When’s the last time you saw her?” I asked, crossing my arms. “How many times have you seen her since the guests arrived?”

“Well.” He rubbed his chin. “We had dinner . . . No, that was the day before the first one arrived. I think we had lunch last week. We were supposed to go to a concert in Petoskey the other day, but there was a plumbing emergency at the boardinghouse and she had to cancel.”

“Otto, it’s only June,” I said. “If you don’t make yourself part of the group, you’re not going to see anything of her until after Labor Day.”

He continued with the chin rubbing. “That’s not what she led me to believe.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s because she doesn’t quite get how much work running that place is. Trust me. I’ve been watching this for four summers in a row. If she ever has the time to go out and do something with you, she’s going to be too tired to do it.”

“That sounds remarkably unappealing,” Otto said. “I’d hoped to spend a lot of time with her the next few months.”

“Well, then.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Get over there.”

“Minnie, I’m not sure I should—”

“You may not be, but I am. Come on.” I tugged at his hand a second time, and this time didn’t let go until his front door was closed and we were crossing the street.

The entire way, he was hemming and hawing and sounding more like he’d sounded last December. Back then he’d been hesitant about introducing himself to my aunt, then, after a little push, had blossomed into the confident man who’d been squiring her around town for the past six months.

I ignored every one of his worried comments and practically dragged him up the steps and through the boardinghouse’s front door. “Good morning,” I called out. “Any chance you have a little extra?”

When I’d opened the door, I’d heard a congenial babble of voices and the tinkling of silverware. As soon as I spoke, however, the noises ceased. “Minnie?” my aunt said. “Is that you?”

A chair scraped backward and I knew she’d be standing up. “Not just me,” I said, towing Otto toward the dining room. “I brought an uninvited guest. He said he’s never had a boardinghouse breakfast, and I think it’s high time he gets one.”

“Did you bring Ash?” Aunt Frances appeared in the doorway. Behind her, the sun was streaming through the leaves of the trees in the backyard, slanting into the screened porch and the dining room. Her tall, angular figure was rimmed with sunlight, giving her a dazzling aura and making her look as if she’d walked straight out of the sun.

Otto caught his breath at the sight.

“Not Ash,” I said, shoving at Otto’s shoulder. “Just your across-the-street neighbor. He didn’t want to barge in uninvited, but I made him come over anyway.” I was about to add that I hoped it was okay until I saw my aunt’s radiant smile.

She reached out for Otto’s hands. “Why didn’t I think of this before? Of course you should come over for breakfast. You don’t need an invitation, for heaven’s sake.” She leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek, then turned and escorted him to the dining room.

“Everyone,” she said, “this is my good friend Otto Bingham. Otto, going clockwise, that’s Eva and Forrest, Liz, Morris, Victoria, and Welles.”

All six of them greeted Otto with smiles and cheerful ‘nice to meet you’s. In short order, they were sliding chairs around and setting another place. Liz, who was at the buffet, getting out silverware, looked at me. “Minnie, are you eating?”

I shook my head. “Thanks, but there’s no time. It’s a bookmobile day and Eddie’s in the car, ready to go forth and conquer new bookish territory.”

My aunt wrapped a blueberry muffin in a paper napkin and put it into my hand. “Thank you,” she whispered, “for Otto.”

But there was no need for her words. Seeing the happiness on her face was more than thanks enough.

Chapter 11

“It’s a shame your new young man couldn’t make it tonight.” Barb McCade looked at me over the top of her wineglass.

“That’s right.” Barb’s husband, Russell, looked around as if Ash might be sitting somewhere else and waiting for an engraved invitation. “Where is that boy, anyway? Are we going to have to teach him manners?”

The only people sitting anywhere close were a sixtyish couple who were arguing over the price of something in the six-figure range. It seemed to be real estate, but if they were summer people, it could be anything from new landscaping to a new car.

“The boy,” I said, “is close to six feet tall, runs ten miles a day, has a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice, and is studying to be a detective.”

Barb elbowed her husband. “And he’s a cop. Bet he could take you down, Cade.”

“Of course he could,” Cade said calmly. “I channel my physical powers a different way.”

“You do?” His wife frowned. “What powers are those? I didn’t know you had any.”

“I’m pacing myself.” He grinned.

“Possible,” Barb said. “But probable?” She held out her hand and tipped it back and forth.

Smiling, I shook my head. They were at it again.