Лори Касс - Lending А Paw

I felt a tug on the hem of my crop pants.

“Miss Minnie? Miss Minnie?”

I looked down into eyes so brown they looked almost black. “Well, hello there, Brynn.” Brynn and her mother and brothers came to the library as often as they could, which wasn’t as often as any of them would have liked because of their ancient and undependable station wagon. The children’s father had a high-level position with a boat-building manufacturer, but he had to travel on a regular basis.

While no one in the family liked his absences, he had to keep the job for the sake of top-quality health insurance. For Brynn’s sake, for the sake of treating the leukemia she’d been diagnosed with two years ago, for the sake of this cheerful, clever little girl. Though I would have gone to the stake rather than publicly name a favorite library patron, Brynn was high up on the list. And if there was a Kids Only list, she’d be—

“Where’s the kitty cat?” she asked.

She’d be sliding down toward the bottom.

I crouched down and spoke in a quiet, low voice, the kind of voice no one would overhear. “What cat?”

“You know.” Brynn’s gaze darted around the bookmobile. “Eddie the bookmobile cat.”

Not only did she know there’d been a cat on board, but she knew his name. “What makes you think there’s a cat?”

She stomped one small foot. “Rosie Engstrom told me so. She said his name is Eddie and he’s black and white and real fuzzy and that I’d be able to pet him and he’d purr.”

Rose. The Princess Girl. Naturally, she’d be the one to rat me out. Just like high school, the princesses always win. “Brynn, I’m sorry, but Eddie can’t come on the bookmobile. He—”

“But I want to see the kitty,” she said, her lower lip trembling. “I want the kitty!”

“Brynn—”

“I want to pet Eddie.” Tears gushed out of her eyes and down her face. “I want to make him purr. Why can’t I see Eddie? Rosie wasn’t making things up, was she? There is really an Eddie, isn’t there? She said he was so nice.”

What had I done to this poor, sick little girl? Unintentionally, sure, but that didn’t matter. Not to her and not to me. This lovely child had already dealt with more pain in her life than most people would ever endure and I was not going to add to her burden. “There is most definitely an Eddie.” I leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “He’ll be on the very next bookmobile trip. I promise.”

• • •

Thessie looked at me sideways the rest of the afternoon. Her comments, dropped every ten miles or so, ranged from “You have a cat named Eddie?” to “In the cabinet?” to “I can’t believe you have a cat named Eddie,” to a sad look and a slow headshake that said, Gee, it was nice knowing you and I hope you find a new job soon.

When we reached the Chilson city limits, I swore her to secrecy.

“But Mr. Rangel’s going to find out,” she said. “You know he will.”

I shook my head. Not in disagreement, but in denial. “I told Brynn I’d bring Eddie to her.” Michelle, Brynn’s mom, had the schedule and we’d figured out the next stop closest to their house. “I said I would and I will.”

Thessie sighed as she unbuckled her seat belt. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

I did, too.

• • •

After putting the bookmobile away for the night, I hauled a milk crate full of books to the bookmobile room. The light switch, like most light switches in the world, was too high for me to turn on with my elbow, so I turned toward the wall and pushed it up with my shoulder. Which is why I didn’t see the person huddled at my desk until I turned back around.

“Holly! What are you doing?” I put the milk crate down and leaned backward, stretching. “Hiding from Stephen?” I chuckled, but she didn’t say anything. “Are you okay?”

She gave a muted sniff. “Kind of.”

“‘Kind of’ means no, not really.” I walked to the desk and saw her face. Her puffy, red-eyed face. “Hey,” I said softly. “What’s the matter?”

“It’s . . . it’s . . .” She buried her face in her hands. “The police. I couldn’t go back to the front desk, I just couldn’t.”

“The police talked to you again?”

She nodded and swallowed a sob. “Just now. They asked all these questions and . . . and they think I killed Stan Larabee, I just know it. What am I going to do?”

I wanted to give her comforting platitudes, tell her that since she didn’t have anything to do with the murder, there was no way she’d ever be arrested. That everything would be fine. But the police had talked to her twice. They hadn’t talked to anyone else at the library twice. Or . . . had they? I didn’t know, so I asked her.

“Only me.” She sniffed. Sniffed again. Hung her head. “Minnie, I’m in so much trouble,” she whispered.

“No, you’re not,” I said. “The police are talking to lots of other people.” They had to be. “They’ll find the killer and—”

“But what if they don’t!” she wailed. “I look like a good suspect—I asked Stan Larabee for that loan and sent him a nasty note when he wouldn’t do it and what if the police decide I’m the killer and don’t find the real one? What will happen to my kids?”

“Holly—”

She seized my hands. “Minnie. Will you help me? Please say yes. The real killer is out there somewhere and the police are going to arrest me instead and I need your help. You notice things. You know you do. You were the only one to notice old Mr. Wednesday—I can never remember his real name—that he didn’t come that one Wednesday and you went to his house and found him lying on the floor with a broken hip. And you were the only one to smell how hot that printer was and saved the library from burning down. You’ll find something that’ll prove I’m innocent. Please say you’ll help me. Please.”

The naked need in her eyes was too painful to see. I drew her to me in a hug. “Of course I’ll help.” And then, for the second time that day, I said, “I promise.”

• • •

Kristen sighed. “I can’t believe your mother lets you go out alone.”

Though part of me wanted to roll my eyes at her statement, part of me agreed with it.

“I mean, honestly.” Kristen pushed aside the paperwork in front of her, parting it like the Red Sea, and thumped her elbows on her desk’s scratched surface. She put her chin in her hands. “Two career-killing moves in one day. I’d say it’s a new record.”

“At least I’ve never told my boss he was an addlepated nincompoop.”

She grinned. “We’re discussing you, not me. Why didn’t you tell Brynn you’d drive Eddie out to see her in your car?”

“She wants to see the bookmobile cat, and he wouldn’t be a bookmobile cat that way, would he?”

She squinted at me, then nodded. “True enough. But what on earth made you promise Holly Terpening you’d help find Stan’s killer? You know what’s going to happen. By ‘help,’ Holly means ‘You go do this while I sit here and feel sorry for myself. Pooooor me.’” Kristen clasped her hands to her chest and batted her eyelashes.

“She’s not the same person you knew in high school,” I said. “And what makes you think helping Holly has anything to do with my career?”

“Because I know how she works. She’ll whine and moan and be on you to help poor little her every second of every day, and you won’t get any work done and Stephen will fire your skinny little butt because it’ll take you more than ten minutes to reply to his e-mails since you’re spending too much time helping Holly.”

I’d never understood the raw antagonism that existed between Kristen and Holly and I probably never would. “Well, anyway. What I really wanted to talk to you about was Stan Larabee.”