Софи Келли - Hooked On A Feline

“Okay,” he said with a shrug.

I got him set up at the machine and showed him how to scroll through the pages. “Try looking for references to the school in articles and photographs but keep an eye out for any ads for classes or recitals.”

He nodded. “I can do that.”

“If you have any problems, I’m around and Susan is at the desk.”

I left him to it, thinking how much he reminded me of Mike, who had also spent some time going through back issues of newspapers. It wasn’t that they looked alike, but Lachlan seemed to be capable of the same level of concentration and the ability to tune out everything else that Mike had had. Right now Lachlan was leaning forward, watching the screen, just the way Mike had, his eyebrows drawn together in a frown in exactly the same fashion.

I was in the staff room about half an hour later getting a cup of coffee before I started to work on the staff schedule when Harry appeared in the doorway.

“Hi,” he said. “Susan said you were up here.”

“I’m getting fortified for some paperwork,” I said, holding up the pot. “Would you like a cup?”

He shook his head. “No, thanks. I just wanted to let you know that I talked to Ritchie and he wasn’t spending Wednesday nights with Mike.”

“Thanks,” I said. “It was a bit of a long shot.”

“Do you really think it’s important?” Harry asked. “Maybe Mike was seeing someone and just wanted to keep it to himself.”

I leaned back against the counter and folded my hands around my cup. “You’re probably right.”

“I have faith in you, Kathleen,” Harry said. “I know you can figure out what happened.” He gestured toward the back of the building. “I’ll be out at the gazebo if you need me.”

Instead of going back to my office, I stayed where I was, leaning against the counter. Harry had faith in me but I wasn’t so sure that I had faith in myself.

Mike had probably just been seeing someone that he wasn’t ready to introduce to his family and friends. And he’d likely been killed by some random prowler. It happened, even in a place as small and safe as Mayville Heights. My problem was the fact that I couldn’t shake the feeling that that wasn’t what had happened. I didn’t know why I felt that way. I just had some feeling, some instinct that there was more to Mike Bishop’s death than it seemed on the surface. I thought about what Harrison had said to me, “Just rely on your instincts and everything will be just fine.”

I was probably tilting at windmills à la Don Quixote but I wasn’t going to give up on figuring out where Mike had been on Wednesday nights for the past couple of months.

I did some work on the schedule and then went downstairs to give Susan a break at the front desk.

“It’s been quiet so far,” she said. “Did Harry find you?”

“He did,” I said. “Thanks for sending him up.”

“Lachlan Quinn is still on the microfilm reader and the monitor on the second computer is acting up again. I did your ‘whack it on the side’ thing and it seems to be okay for now.”

“The board meeting’s this week. After that, I should be able to order the new computers.” I held up my crossed fingers.

“I can’t wait,” Susan said. “I may make a bonfire out of the old ones and dance naked around it in the moonlight.”

“I’m pretty sure you can’t burn computers,” I said. “They release toxic chemicals into the air.”

“Okay, so naked dancing in the moonlight it is.” She grinned.

“Or we could just have cake.”

She thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, or we could just have cake.” She stretched and yawned. “Please tell me there’s coffee.”

I smiled. “I made a new pot.”

Susan smiled back at me. “I knew there was a reason I like you.”

There were three books sitting on the counter. She put a hand on top of them and her smile faded. “Mike requested those,” she said.

It wasn’t the first time books had come in for someone who had died. That little bit of unfinished business always left me feeling sad, even if I hadn’t known the person beyond what they had liked to read.

The top book on the stack was about the Mayflower , the second one was about life in England in the early 1600s and the last was The Genetics of Eye Color .

“I’ll send them back,” I said. “Go take your break.”

She headed for the stairs and I picked up the books. I had suggested the one about the Mayflower and another source had mentioned the book about life in seventeenth-century England. The genetics text had to have something to do with those Punnett squares.

Holding the book in my hands, I had a crazy thought that maybe Mike had gotten the idea that Leitha wasn’t a Finnamore because of something he had learned during his research. I thought about the picture he had shown me of Leitha with her parents. Leitha didn’t look a lot like them but that might have been her stern appearance in the photograph. Was it possible? And if bizarrely it was true, then did that have anything to do with either of their deaths?

chapter 17

I spent the rest of the afternoon with questions about what Mike had been trying to work out turning over in my head. If she’d been faced with proof that she wasn’t a Finnamore, what would Leitha have done? It had been such a huge part of her identity. If—and that was a very big if—Mike had found some reason to suspect she hadn’t been part of the Finnamore legacy, I didn’t see her just accepting that. She would have needed more solid proof than just his suspicions. And the color of her eyes proved nothing with respect to whether or not she was biologically part of that family.

Mike was smart enough not to just rely on eye color to prove something like that. Maybe I needed to look at another Finnamore family trait that was more genetically straightforward. I was probably tilting at windmills again. I rubbed both temples. I had a headache again.

Lachlan had found some information about the music school in the newspaper. “I’m on the right track,” he said to me. “I know it. Thanks for suggesting the newspaper and showing me how to look at it. I’ll be back to see what else I can find.”

I was happy to see him smile.

“Do you know where Levi is?” I said to Susan. “I need some help carrying in some boxes.”

“He’s scraping gum off the bottom of one of the tables in the children’s section,” she said. “What is it with people and gum in the library? Don’t they know what garbage cans are for?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

Gum stuck all sorts of odd places in the building was a chronic problem for us.

“Would it be okay if I made some signs?” Susan asked. “Just something that says, ‘Please put your gum in the garbage can,’ or something like that?”

“It’s fine with me.” I wasn’t sure signs would make a difference but it wouldn’t hurt to try.

Levi was on his hands and knees under one of the big round tables in the children’s department, scraping at the underside with the plastic scraper. His mind was clearly somewhere else because, when I called his name, he started and banged his head on the table.

“I’m sorry,” I said as he backed out from underneath. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just need some help carrying some boxes up to the workroom.”

“It’s not your fault,” he said. “That’s the second time I’ve done that in the last ten minutes. My brain can’t seem to remember there’s a table just four inches above my head.” He held one hand just above his hair and moved it through the air.

Levi looked tired. He’d missed a patch on his left jawline when he’d shaved and he wasn’t quite looking me in the eye.