Блейз Клемент - The Cat Sitter's Cradle

My head was spinning. Mr. and Mrs. Harwick were supposed to be in Tampa, more than an hour away, so what was Mr. Harwick doing here? I thought of the gun that August had, and how he’d reacted so nonchalantly at the suggestion that there was possibly someone in the house, almost as if it were something that happened every day. I could hear Michael’s voice saying the Harwicks’ world was filled with cutthroats and thieves and Mr. Harwick was hated all over the world. Then, the thing that I had been avoiding the entire time, the thing that I could hardly even thing about, hit me like a brick to the side of the head.

Michael had said it was all over the papers that Mr. Harwick was giving a speech in Tampa. That made his house a pretty good target, especially if someone was in the market for some priceless artwork. If Mr. and Mrs. Harwick had come home unexpectedly and walked in on a burglary in progress, it was entirely possible that the intruder could have killed them. But where was Mrs. Harwick? Barely a minute passed by before I saw a pair of flashing red and blue emergency lights coming up Jungle Plum Road.

I opened the pet carrier and gently maneuvered Charlotte inside.

“Okay, Queen B, you have to wait in the car for a little while. I’ll be back to check on you.”

I got out of the car and toweled myself off as the police cruiser approached. It pulled up alongside me, and the window rolled down. The man at the wheel was wearing mirrored sunglasses that hid his eyes, but I recognized his short-cropped hair and sharp cheekbones. It was Deputy Jesse Morgan.

He nodded at the house. “This it?”

I said, “Yeah, the owners are away, and I’m taking care of—”

He held one hand up like a school guard stopping traffic and said, “Stay right there, please.”

Jesse Morgan is the Key’s only sworn deputy, which means he carries a gun. I didn’t know him when I was on the force, but I’ve gotten to know him over the years since. He’s about as fun as a root canal, but he’s an impressive figure: broad shoulders, buzzed military haircut, a chin so sharp it looks like you could peel an apple with it, and a diamond stud in one ear. I didn’t think he was all that surprised to see me. In fact, it hadn’t been that long ago that he’d been the first to arrive when I stumbled upon another crime involving a famous model and a pro football player, but that’s another story. My work puts me in a lot of people’s homes, so it makes sense that I might run into something fishy now and then, but I could tell Deputy Morgan was beginning to wonder what kind of hex I had that was always plopping me down in the center of a murder scene. I couldn’t blame him. I was beginning to wonder myself.

He pulled the cruiser up in front of my Bronco and got out, leaving the emergency lights flashing, and walked over. He didn’t seem one bit fazed that I was soaking wet. I knew the 911 dispatcher would have told him everything that had happened while she was on the phone with me.

He nodded. “Dixie.”

I smiled weakly. “Deputy Morgan.”

“You alright?”

For a moment, I thought I was going to burst into tears, but I stopped myself. I bit the inside of my cheek and looked away, waiting for the feeling to subside. Deputy Morgan had the grace not to notice. Instead he adjusted his belt, which was weighted down with all the tools of his trade: nightstick, handcuffs, flashlight and a 9 mm semiautomatic pistol, securely seated in a black leather harness.

When I had gathered myself back together, he turned and walked toward the front gate, pausing long enough for me to catch up. For a split second it felt like I was back on the force, and this was just another day on the beat. Two deputies checking out a crime scene. I had to remind myself that not only was I no longer on the force, I doubted seriously that Deputy Morgan was thinking anything along those lines. Not to mention the fact that I was as damp as a wrung-out mop from head to toe.

As we walked up the driveway he said, “So what’s the story?”

I told him all about how the Harwicks were out of town, and how they had hired me to take care of their cat and their aquarium, and how I had noticed that the alarm was off, even though it was super early, and how I couldn’t find Charlotte anywhere. I told him about the fish tank, and how one of the fish had been in a state of alarm, and how I’d gotten spooked and called Sergeant Owens.

We were almost to the front porch when he stopped abruptly.

“You called Owens before you found the body?”

“Yeah, I did.”

He nodded. “Go on.”

“So the Harwicks’ son came home, and he searched through the house and didn’t find anything out of the ordinary, and it turned out Charlotte was on the lanai. How she got out there I have no idea. But that’s when I noticed something at the bottom of the pool, when I went out to get Charlotte.”

“And where was the son?”

“He had gone upstairs. I think he was out all night.”

He nodded. “Mm-hmm. And where is he now?”

“He’s still up there. I didn’t wake him.”

“Why not?”

“I wasn’t sure if I should.”

He nodded again, silently acknowledging what I couldn’t say out loud—that I wasn’t completely sure August wasn’t involved somehow.

I could hear the low, distant wail of a siren, and from the direction of it I knew it wasn’t coming from the police station but from the north, which meant it was an ambulance dispatched from Sarasota Memorial Hospital. It had probably come over the bridge on Siesta Drive. I hoped Charlotte wasn’t too freaked out by the noise, and then I remembered I hadn’t yet fed her. It was too late to go into the kitchen and grab some of her food. The entire house was a crime scene now. Soon there’d be technicians covering every inch of the property, checking for signs of anything out of the ordinary, brushing every surface for fingerprints, looking for any clue that might shed some light on what had happened. A crime scene is a very delicate thing. A change to even the smallest, seemingly unimportant object can have catastrophic effects on the outcome of an investigation. I didn’t want to tamper with any more evidence than I already had, so Her Highness would just have to wait a bit longer for breakfast.

We had stopped at the front door, and I realized Morgan was waiting for the other units to arrive before we went inside.

Finally, after a few moments of awkward silence, he said, “So, how you been?”

“Good. You?”

“Good.”

I nodded. That was about the longest personal conversation I’d ever had with Morgan.

We watched as the ambulance came slowly up the driveway and pulled up alongside August’s black sports car. A green-and-white sheriff’s van pulled in behind it, closely followed by two squad cars and finally an unmarked sedan. Sergeant Owens got out of the sedan and waited for the other deputies. There must have been at least eight of them. I wondered if Owens hadn’t called up every unit in the county, trying to make up for not taking me seriously on the phone before. They met in a group in the middle of the circular drive and then followed Sergeant Owens up to where Morgan and I were standing.

Owens took off his sergeant’s cap and said, “Well, Dixie, I suppose I owe you an apology.”

I could feel myself blushing. “No, it’s alright, sir. I probably wouldn’t have believed me either.”

“Well, then, I at least owe you a beer.”

I smiled. “I’ll take you up on that, sir.”

He turned to the congregation of men behind him and said, “Gentlemen, this is Dixie Hemingway.”

Just then, the front door opened to reveal August, bleary-eyed and shirtless in a pair of jeans. He looked around at all the deputies and the squad cars with their flashing emergency lights filling the driveway.