Софи Райан - A Whisker Оf Trouble

PRAISE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING SECOND CHANCE CAT MYSTERIES

“A surefire winner.”

— New York Times bestselling author Miranda James

“An affirmation of friendship as well as a tantalizing whodunit, The Whole Cat and Caboodle marks a promising start to a series sure to appeal to anyone who loves a combination of felonies and felines.”

— Richmond Times-Dispatch

“Ryan kicks off the new Second Chance Cat Mystery series with a lot of excitement. Her small Maine town is filled with unique characters. . . . This tale is enjoyable from beginning to end; readers will look forward to more.”

— RT Book Reviews

“Cozy readers will enjoy the new Second Chance Cat series.”

—Gumshoe

“If you enjoy a cozy mystery featuring a lovable protagonist with a bevy of staunch friends, a shop you’d love to explore, plenty of suspects, and a supersmart cat, you’ll love The Whole Cat and Caboodle .”

—MyShelf.com

“Enjoyable. . . . Remember—everyone has a secret, even the cat.”

—Kings River Life Magazine

“I am absolutely crazy about this series. . . . The cast of characters is phenomenal. . . . I loved every minute of this book.”

—Melissa’s Mochas, Mysteries & Meows

The Second Chance Cat Mysteries

The Whole Cat and Caboodle

Buy a Whisker

A Whisker of Trouble

OBSIDIAN

Published by New American Library,

an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

This book is an original publication of New American Library.

Copyright © Darlene Ryan, 2016

Excerpt from Curiosity Thrilled the Cat © Penguin Group (USA), Inc., 2011

Penguin Random House supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to continue to publish books for every reader.

Obsidian and the Obsidian colophon are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

For more information about Penguin Random House, visit penguin.com.

ISBN 978-1-101-62595-8

PUBLISHER’S NOTE

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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Contents

Praise

The Second Chance Cat Mysteries

Title Page

Copyright

Acknowledgments

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Excerpt from CURIOSITY THRILLED THE CAT

About the Author

Acknowledgments

Thank you to my editor, Jessica Wade, for finding all the leaps in logic and holes in the plot. Thank you to my agent, Kim Lionetti, who keeps my professional life running smoothly. And thanks as well to John, who answered my questions about wine and never laughed at my ignorance. Any errors are mine, not his.

Chapter 1

Elvis regarded breakfast with disdain. “Oh, c’mon,” I said, leaning my elbows on the countertop. “It’s not that bad.”

He narrowed his eyes at me and I think he would have raised a skeptical eyebrow if he’d had real eyebrows instead of just whiskers—which he didn’t, since he wasn’t the King of Rock and Roll or even a person. He was just a small black cat who thought he was a person and as such should be treated like royalty.

“We could make a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich,” I said. “That was the real Elvis’s favorite.”

The cat meowed sharply, his way of reminding me that as far as he was concerned he was the real Elvis and peanut butter and banana sandwiches were not his favorite breakfast food.

I looked at the food I’d pulled out of the cupboard: two dry ends of bread, a banana that was more brown than it was yellow and a container of peanut butter that I knew didn’t actually have so much as a spoonful left inside, because I’d eaten it all the previous evening, with a spoon, while watching Jeopardy! with the cat. It wasn’t my idea of a great breakfast, either, but there wasn’t anything else to eat in the house.

“I forgot to go to the store,” I said, feeling somewhat compelled to explain myself to the cat, who continued to stare unblinkingly at me from his perch on a stool at the counter.

Elvis knew that it wouldn’t have mattered if I had bought groceries. I couldn’t cook. My mother had tried to teach me. So had my brother and my grandmother. My grandmother’s friend Rose was the most recent person to take on the challenge of teaching me how to cook. We weren’t getting very far. Rose kept having to simplify things for me as she discovered I had very few basic skills.

“How did you pass the Family Living unit in school?” Charlotte, another of Gram’s friends, had asked after my last lesson in Rose’s small sunny kitchen. Charlotte had been a school principal, so she knew I’d had to take a basic cooking class in middle school. She’d been eyeing my attempt at meat loaf, which I’d just set on an oval stoneware platter and which I’d been pretty sure I’d be able to use as a paving stone out in the garden once the backyard dried up.

I’d wiped my hands on my apron and blown a stray piece of hair off my face. “The school decided to give me a pass, after the second fire.”

“Second fire?” Charlotte had said.

“It wasn’t my fault.” I couldn’t help the defensive edge to my voice. “Well, the sprinklers going off wasn’t my fault.”

“Of course it wasn’t, darling girl,” Rose had commented, her voice muffled because her head had been in the oven. She was cleaning remnants of exploded potatoes off the inside.

“They weren’t calibrated properly,” I told Charlotte, feeling the color rise in my cheeks.

“I’m sure they weren’t.” The corners of her mouth twitched and I could tell she was struggling not to smile.

Tired now of waiting for breakfast, Elvis jumped down from the stool, made his way purposefully across the kitchen and stopped in front of the cupboard where I kept his cat food. He put one paw on the door and turned and looked at me.

I pushed away from the counter and went over to him. I grabbed a can of Tasty Tenders from the cupboard. “Okay, you can have Tasty Tenders and I’ll have the peanut butter and banana sandwich.” I reached down to stroke the top of his head.

He licked his lips and pushed his head against my hand.

I got Elvis his breakfast and a dish of fresh water. He started eating and I eyed the two dry crusts and brown banana. The cat’s food looked better than mine.

I reached for the peanut butter jar, hoping that maybe there was somehow enough stuck to the bottom to at least spread on one of the ends of bread, and there was a knock on my door.