Kelly Sofie - Curiosity Thrilled The Cat

I couldn’t help thinking that if I were in that position it would sound a lot like someone deboning a turkey.

“And worst of all, he’s a feelie.”

“A what?” I said, pulling at the neck of my T-shirt. I was sweating.

“A feelie. You know, he has to put his hands on your shoulders to fix your posture. He has to put his hands on your diaphragm to check your breathing. A feelie.” Ruby laughed, which sounded more like a snort because she was upside down. “I had to put my elbow in his diaphragm a couple of times. To check his breathing, of course.” She began walking her hands back to her feet again. “If I were Ami Lester . . . boy.”

Ami Lester? Right. A pretty strawberry blonde who’d borrowed all of Diana Gabaldon’s books from the library. She was one of the summer interns at the Stratton. “What do you mean?” I asked.

“Ami has two solos,” Ruby said. She pulled her head in against her tanned legs, and her voice was slightly muffled. “Easton likes her. I don’t mean holy-crap-can-she-sing likes her. And yeah, she can. I mean, he’s-a-dirty-old-man likes her.”

She slowly unrolled so she was standing up again. “I told her if it were me, he wouldn’t be a baritone anymore. He’d be singing soprano.” She grinned, shrugged and then walked over to the table in the corner where Maggie kept the cups and tea.

There was a noise at the door. Rebecca was standing there. She bent to pick up the shoe she’d dropped. I walked over to her. She watched Ruby choose a mug and take a chamomile tea bag from the box before she turned to me. She looked tired.

“Thanks for taking care of the house for me, Kathleen,” she said.

“Anytime.” I pushed my hair back and sighed in frustration. Why had I cut it? Oh, right. Because I’d changed; new place, new job, new life, so new hair.

Rebecca reached over and ran her fingers through my straggly layers, lifting the hair and letting it drop. Her hand trembled a little and her scarf brushed my cheek. “You have lovely hair, dear,” she said. “It’s grown down over your ears now, which is the hardest part. Come over this weekend and I’ll shape it up a little.”

I smiled. “Thank you. I will.” She went out to the bench to change her shoes.

Maggie walked over to me, carrying a mug of tea. “Matt’s ahead in the voting,” she said with a grin.

“There’s no way you can know that,” I told her.

“He is going to win the coveted crystal-globe statue,” she said.

“Never going to happen.”

“I suppose you think that would-be superhero in a loincloth is going to win,” Maggie said.

“ Mr . Kevin Sorbo is not a would-be superhero. He was the very yummy Hercules, and he can dance Matt Lauer under the table.”

She just rolled her eyes and shook her head at me.

“I have to get back to the library,” I said. I looked around and lowered my voice. “Owen’s in my office.”

“Was today Bring Your Cat to Work Day?” Maggie said. “I thought that was next week.”

“Very funny,” I said. “He climbed into my bag. I didn’t know until we got to the library and he jumped out.”

“Not on the checkout desk, I hope.”

I tugged at the hem of my T-shirt. “No,” I said. “That would have been all right. He jumped onto someone’s head.”

She really did try not to laugh. “Owen jumped onto someone’s head. I wish I’d been there.”

“No, you don’t. The someone was Gregor Easton.”

Maggie almost choked on her tea. “You’re kidding.” Then she saw my face. “You’re not kidding.”

I shook my head. “I’m sending breakfast over to his suite. I hope that’s enough.”

“Poor Owen,” Maggie said. “He’s probably traumatized.”

“I’m traumatized,” I said. “I better go. I’ll see you tomorrow night.” I started down the stairs, then stopped half a dozen steps down and turned back to Maggie. “Veggie sticks or brownies?” I asked.

“Brownies,” she said.

Of course.

“And don’t try to sneak any pureed prunes in these, either,” she called after me.

I walked back to the library as fast my achy legs could move. Susan was at the desk. “How’s everything?” I asked.

“Not a meow out of anyone,” she said with a grin.

I hurried upstairs and unlocked the office door, wondering what I was going to find. Owen was sitting on my desk chair. “Hey, fur ball,” I said. “I didn’t figure you’d stay on the floor.”

I opened my bag and pulled out my shoes. “C’mon,” I said, offering him the empty case. Owen jumped onto the desk and walked across to peer inside. He looked up at me as if to say, What—you expect me to get in there?

“You came down here that way and that’s how you’re going home.” I gave his backside a gentle nudge. He meowed what I was fairly sure was a swear word in cat and climbed in. I left the zipper partway open.

It was almost dark by the time we’d walked up the hill to the house. Now that it was August I could see the days getting shorter. I turned on the lamp in the living room and let Owen out of the bag. He glanced at me, shook himself and sauntered in to the kitchen. I sat on the edge of the black leather chair and picked up the phone. I knew the number for Will Redfern, the contractor on the library renovation, by heart. The call went to voice mail. Calls to Will always went to voice mail. I couldn’t decide if the man was avoiding me or the job, or if he was just a totally disorganized person. I left my name and number and wondered what excuse he’d use for not getting back to me. He’d already used Dead Grandmother twice.

Hercules twisted around my legs. I picked him up and went out to the kitchen. “Do you know what your brother did?” I asked him. Herc tipped his head to one side and looked at me quizzically. I told him what had happened with Owen, and he made sympathetic meows every time I paused.

I put him down on the floor and he watched while I poured a glass of milk and made toast with peanut butter. Then I sat at the table, feeding bits to Hercules and Owen, who had appeared the second the toaster popped.

“I need that computer room set up,” I told them. “If the rest of the carrels and the chairs were put together I could at least unpack one computer and get it up and running.” I broke off another couple of bites of toast, one for Owen, who immediately dropped it on the floor, and one for Hercules, who licked off the peanut butter while I held the bread.

“Redfern’s not going to call me back, is he? He’ll say a raccoon stole his phone or his tools fell off the back of his truck.” I slumped in my chair. “Should I call Everett?” Everett Henderson had hired me to supervise the library renovation. He was financing the entire project. His gift to the town for the library’s centennial.

“Merow!” Owen didn’t even stop chewing.

“You’re right,” I said. “I’m supposed to deal with this kind of thing, not Everett.”

Hercules pulled the soggy bit of toast he’d been licking from my fingers and dropped it on the floor. Owen looked at him, whiskers twitching. Herc nudged the bread toward his brother, then went around the table and sat in front of the refrigerator.

“What? You don’t like peanut butter anymore?” I asked.

“Merow!” Owen yowled, louder than the last time, again without even bothering to stop eating.

Hercules looked over his shoulder at the other cat. Why did I have the feeling they were talking about me?

Then suddenly Herc jumped, swiping his paw at the Gotta Dance magnet on the refrigerator door. The magnet went skittering across the tile in one direction and the scrap of paper it had been holding floated to the floor at my feet.