Софи Райан - The Whole Cat Аnd Caboodle

He did. I explained about Maddie being arrested and filled in what few details I knew.

“I’ll go,” he said. “Give me a number and I’ll call you when I know what’s going on. It’ll probably be a while, though.”

“I understand,” I said, feeling some of the tension seep out of my body. I gave him my cell number. “Thank you,” I added.

“I’m happy to help,” he said. “You can buy me dinner when this gets straightened out, and catch me up on your life.”

“Absolutely,” I said.

I thanked him again. He repeated his promise to call me when he had news, and I hung up.

“Maddie has a lawyer,” I announced.

Rose smiled at Charlotte and gave her arm a squeeze. “See?” she said. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

Charlotte got to her feet, still holding her cup of tea. “Thank you, Sarah. I don’t understand what the police are thinking. And Nicolas.” She shook her head. “He’s known Maddie since he was a little boy.” She smoothed the sleeve of her jacket. “I should go down to the police station.”

Rose leaned just a little to the left, caught my eye and shook her head almost imperceptibly.

I walked over to Charlotte and put my arm around her shoulders, leaning my head against her. “I care about Maddie, too,” I said. “I’ve known her since I was a little girl. But right now we need to let Josh handle things.”

She looked at me, lips pressed together. “Maddie didn’t kill Arthur Fenety,” she said. I could see the fear etched into the tight lines on her face but there was no trace of it in her voice.

“I know that,” I said. I glanced at my watch. Everyone was looking at me. I wished Gram wasn’t on her honeymoon. She’d handle this a whole lot better than I could. I took a deep breath and pasted on a positive face, even though I didn’t exactly feel it.

“It’s time to close up,” I said, grateful there hadn’t been any customers in the past fifteen minutes or so. “It’ll be a while before I hear from Josh. There isn’t anything that we can do right now that will help Maddie.” I gave Charlotte’s shoulders another squeeze. “I’m going to Sam’s for supper. Who wants to come with me?”

“Meow,” Elvis said. He was sitting on the stairs about halfway down. His enthusiastic response broke the tension.

“Elvis is in,” I said, looking around. “Anyone else?”

“I’ll come,” Mac said.

I shot him a look of gratitude.

“Me too,” Avery chimed in.

Rose got to her feet. “What a good idea,” she said, tugging the bottom of her apron to straighten it out. “Everything will look better once we’ve had something to eat.”

“You always say that,” Charlotte said, and I thought I saw a tiny hint of a smile.

Rose shrugged. “I’m old. I repeat myself sometimes.”

Charlotte shook her head and this time I did see a smile.

“Since you’re here you could help me refold the quilts,” Rose said.

“The front window needs a little rearranging, too,” Charlotte said.

Rose turned, hands on her hips, to consider the wide, high window behind her.

Mac caught my eye. “I have some things to put away.” He pointed toward the back.

I nodded. “I’ll get the deposit ready.” Avery was already pulling out the vacuum without even being asked.

“Thank you,” Charlotte said softly to me.

I smiled. “Anytime,” I said. “Once when we were kids, Josh got five of us free chocolate-dip cones at Hawthorne’s because he argued that their sign was deceptive. It read FREE KIDS’ CONE WITH ADULT PURCHASE. They forgot to put the apostrophe before the s in kid’s .”

I couldn’t help smiling at the memory of a ten-year-old Josh, with his spiky haircut, standing his ground with an annoyed Nathan Hawthorne. “Josh was smarter than most adults when he was ten,” I said. “Maddie will be okay.” I headed over to the cash register.

Avery was plugging in the vacuum cleaner. “Nonna’s going to pick me up,” she said, shaking her hair back off her face. “Is it okay if she comes, too?”

“Of course,” I said. I knew Liz would help lighten the mood.

I had the deposit ready when Mac came back in. “Shed’s locked,” he said. “And I can drop off the deposit on the way to Sam’s.”

“Thanks,” I said, leaning against the counter, “and thanks for coming with us for supper. I know you probably have better things to do.” When Mac wasn’t working he was generally crewing for someone or hanging around the boatyard, learning everything he could about wooden boats so he could eventually build his own. He was a very private person. I’d never been to his apartment in the four months we’d worked together, and if he was seeing anyone, I had no idea who it was.

“I like Charlotte,” he said, looking over to where she and Rose were rearranging several stone flower urns in the window to the left of the door. “There isn’t anywhere else I want to be.” He smiled at me. “And Sam makes a great cheeseburger.”

“Oh yeah, he does,” I agreed, thinking about Sam’s cheeseburger with two kinds of cheese, onions, mushrooms and a spicy tomato sauce that could spoil you forever for generic ketchup.

“So, you and this lawyer, Josh Evans, knew each other when you were kids?” Mac asked, pulling a hand over his neck.

“Yeah.” I traced the curved edge of the counter with one finger. “He was a summer kid like I was at first, and then his parents moved here full-time. Josh was a pretty persuasive little guy.” I sighed and pushed myself upright. “I hope he can convince the police that Maddie didn’t do this.”

Mac looked down at the floor for a moment and I heard him exhale softly.

“What is it?” I asked.

His dark eyes met mine. “Sarah, please don’t take this the wrong way, but are you one hundred percent positive she didn’t?”

Chapter 9

Liz arrived to pick up Avery and agreed to join us all at Sam’s. I pulled her aside for a moment. “You suspected, didn’t you?” I said.

“Suspected what?’ she asked.

“That Arthur Fenety wasn’t what he seemed.”

She brushed lint off the front of her sweater. “I thought maybe he was married,” she said. “If I’d had any idea of the truth . . .” She shrugged. “I wouldn’t have killed him but he would have been singing soprano.”

I slipped away to my office and called to give Sam a heads-up that we were coming and why. I hesitated and then I punched in Nick’s number, hoping I wasn’t interfering in something that I should be keeping my nose out of. I got his voice mail.

“Hi, Nick,” I said. “It’s Sarah. Call me, please.” I hesitated. “Or just call your mom.” I recited my cell number in case he hadn’t kept it.

I looked at Elvis, who was sitting on the edge of my desk. “I suppose you really do want to come with us,” I said.

He murped his acknowledgment.

“You have to go in my gym bag.”

He blinked at me, jumped down from the desk and walked over to the nylon bag sitting on the floor of the tiny closet tucked under the eaves.

“You’ll have to stay in the truck—I mean the SUV,” I warned. He really seemed to think about it, wrinkling up his face and scrunching his whiskers.

“Meow,” he said finally. He put a paw on the top of the bag and scratched at the fabric.

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” I muttered as I unzipped the top of the black gym bag and pulled out my running gear. I’d been planning to run after work today. Tomorrow, I promised myself. Elvis stuck his head through the opening and sniffed, whiskers twitching. Then he looked up at me.

“All those things were clean,” I said. “It smells fine.” He put a paw inside and gave me his best pathetic cat look, head tipped to one side so it was impossible to miss the scar on his nose.