Блейз Клемент - The Cat Sitter And The Canary

“Bad day?”

I nodded. “More like a bad week.”

“Oh, dear, and here I’ve been babbling on about my silly problems while you … Well, you look like you’ve been rode hard and hung up to dry. Why don’t you go on in and lie down.” She nodded toward the living room. “And drink that tea right up. It’s delicious—elderberry, cinnamon, licorice root, plus a little secret ingredient of my own. It’ll make you feel better right away.”

I felt like a child being fussed over, but Cora was right. I was exhausted. And I knew if I stood there any longer, gazing into her clear blue eyes, so full of love and concern, I’d start crying like a baby. I did as I was told and ambled into the living room.

She was right about the tea too. It was delicious, with something vaguely sweet, yet spicy. I’d never tasted anything like it, but I knew right away it was exactly what the doctor ordered. I made a mental note to ask her what that secret ingredient was. I practically downed the whole cup by the time I got to the couch.

As soon as I laid down, my eyelids felt as heavy as a couple of sandbags. I could hear Cora fussing around in the kitchen, quietly talking to herself, or maybe humming some indecipherable song, one I thought maybe I’d heard before, and then I heard something low and rumbling in the background. I couldn’t tell if it was coming from the kitchen, like an electric mixer or maybe (I hoped) a bread machine, but it didn’t matter.

Within seconds, I was out like a light.

25

I knew he was there before I even opened my eyes.

I was on my side, curled up in a fetal position half buried in the overstuffed pillows on the couch, and right away I sensed it. A presence in the room. Something foreign. When I lifted my head, one of Cora’s pillows toppled over the edge and landed on the floor. I reached out, feeling for it, and my hand touched what at first I thought was the leg of the coffee table.

I was wrong.

It was a man’s knee. He was sitting in one of Cora’s chintz armchairs next to the couch. Light was streaming in through the window behind him, so at first all I could make out was his trim, broad-shouldered silhouette. He was dressed in a dark suit and tie and had curly, unkempt hair. He had one long leg crossed over the other, his arms folded politely in his lap, and my first thought was that he must have been Cora’s suitor. What was his name? Reggie?

The man tipped his chin and said, “Gid mornin’, lass. Fancy a cuppa?”

That voice … I recognized it immediately. I squeezed my eyes shut and opened them again, but he was still there, watching me with a slightly bemused look in his eye.

It was Mr. Scotland.

“Have a nice kip, did we?”

I clenched my teeth. How could I have been so stupid? So naive? I’d gotten a weird feeling the moment I met him, and now here he was, sitting in Cora’s apartment like he owned the place, watching me as I slept. I sat up slowly, my mind racing a mile a minute. I knew I needed to stay calm.

I growled, “What have you done with Cora?”

A smug smile appeared on his lips. “Not to worry, Miss Hemingway. I just need to ask you a few questions, that’s all.”

I wanted to leap off the couch and tear him apart with my bare hands, but I knew I couldn’t. I needed to find out what was going on first, and I needed to know where Cora was.

I said, “I don’t know who you are, or why you’re here, but you need to tell me that Cora’s okay.”

Just then, there was a shuffling sound. I turned to find Cora making her way toward us, dressed in a pink frock with matching pink house shoes. She was holding a small silver tray with four steaming cups of coffee. My eyes grew as big as saucers, not only because Cora seemed to be completely oblivious to the fact that she’d allowed a crazed killer inside her home but also because tagging along right behind her, carrying her pink crutches over his shoulder, was Paco.

He said, “Hey, kiddo.”

Cora said, “Of course I’m okay, dear. What did you think?”

I tried to stand up, but immediately my head started spinning. I crouched over the sofa for a second or two and then lowered myself back down. When I finally spoke, the words came out haltingly, like I was spitting watermelon seeds.

“Somebody … tell me … what’s going on.”

Paco handed Cora her crutches and then joined me on the left side of the couch. I was staring at him, waiting for an answer, but then I felt movement on my right. I turned to find Ethan sitting down next to me, holding a little cream pitcher in one hand and a crystal sugar bowl in the other. He put them on the table and then gave me a slightly chagrined smile, squeezing my knee with both hands.

He said, “Yeah, you might wanna stay sitting for this.”

I leaned into him as he wrapped his arms around me. For a moment, I tried to block everyone else out. I pressed my cheek into his chest and shook my head. “Ethan, what the hell is happening?”

Mr. Scotland stirred a spoonful of sugar into his coffee cup. He said, “She’s a wee bit doilt, I think.”

“And what is he doing here?” I sat up and searched Ethan’s face for answers. “Or for that matter, what are you doing here?”

Paco said, “Dixie, you told Michael you’d meet him at the firehouse. He called me and Ethan when you didn’t show up. We were all worried where you’d gone, so Ethan just made an educated guess.” He glanced at Cora. “Turns out he was right.”

Cora said, “I’m sorry, Dixie, but you know very well once you get an idea in your head it’s damn near impossible to shake it.”

I said, “ What idea in my head?”

Paco said, “It was just too dangerous to let you go running off into the night alone. Ethan had a feeling you might come here, so we gave Cora a call and asked her to try to keep you here.”

“By any means necessary,” Cora said with just a tinge of guilt in her voice. “Those were his exact words.”

“By any means…” I glanced at my empty teacup, which was still sitting on the coffee table from the night before. “No…”

“I slipped you a Mickey.” Cora turned to Mr. Scotland. “I believe that’s what you spy types call it?”

Mr. Scotland said, “Sure.”

I gasped, “You drugged me with your pain pills?”

“Well, Dixie, somebody needed to knock some sense into you.”

“Cora! You didn’t knock some sense into me—you knocked me out!”

She waved her hand in the air. “I know. And you can be angry if you want, but as soon as Paco told me what was going on, I knew I didn’t have a choice. You’d have done the same thing yourself, and you know it.”

I turned to Ethan. “Did you know she drugged me?”

A slight smile played across his lips. “No, not until I got here, but I have to say, I’m kind of…”

I waited. “Kind of…?”

“I’m kind of glad she did.”

Mr. Scotland said, “But it’s ower noo. We cot the bass.”

My eyes narrowed as I turned to Paco. “Who is this man, and what did he just say?”

Paco smiled. “This is Rupert Wolff. He’s a U.S. marshal. I believe he’s saying you’ve got nothing to worry about now. We caught the ‘gentleman’ who was after you. He was downstairs in your car.”

My eyes widened. “He was what ?”

Ethan said, “It’s okay. He put up a fight, but they got him. He followed you here last night, and they found him hiding in your car. He was crouched down in the backseat, holding a…”

His voice faltered.

I turned to Paco. “What was he holding?”

Paco said, “A butcher knife in one hand, and a note in the other…”

“A note…”