Kasey Michaels: High Heels and Holidays

Now for the part I want to clear up for posterity, okay, Fred? You see, Sterling seems to think that Alex and I are meant for each other. You know ... that way? Hey, I'm here to tell you and anyone who finds this, not that way, not no way! Think about it. Alex is here, no getting around that. But for how long, Fred, huh? He poofed in—he could poof out again. And where does that leave me?

Okay, so we know where that leaves me. Lusting after my perfect hero, that's where, and knowing I'd have to be a total idiot to start something we might not be able to finish.

Steve Wendell—he's a cop, Fred—now this is a guy I should be going nuts over, you know? Cute, rumpled, fallible, and incredibly sweet. But every time I look at him, I think about Perfect Alex. The man has ruined me for other men. I always thought that was a dumb saying, and way too melodramatic, but that about says it.

So, Fred, if you've been keeping score here, everything is Alex's fault. Everything. I'm the innocent party here, and none of this imaginary hero come to life stuff was my idea.

I just wanted to make that clear, Fred, okay—for you, and for posterity.

Maggie Kelly

P.S. You know, I feel a lot better now, Fred. Maybe I should keep writing to you once in a while, huh? You're sure cheaper than my weekly sessions with Dr. Bob. That's a joke, too, Fred. Sort of.

Saint Just stood just inside the small wire cage at the very back of the basement of the Manhattan condo building, a scented handkerchief to his nostrils as he looked at the tightly tied green plastic garbage bag lying on the cement floor.

"Grateful as I am, Socks, that you are cognizant of the strictures as laid down by all of the many crime-scene investigation programs on television, I do believe you might have safely disposed of the body. Unless, of course," he added facetiously, turning to his friend Argyle Jackson, doorman of said condo building, "it was your thought that I might wish to perform an autopsy?"

Socks held his hands cupped over his nose and mouth as he shuffled in place, clearly wishing himself anywhere but where he was at the moment. "Hey, Alex, when I called you in England you told me to not touch anything. I'd already opened the box, so I just tossed everything in that bag and brought it down here until you got home. You never said to throw away the body."

"Were there identifying marks with which we could trace the thing, Socks? Scars? Distinctive tattoos? A wooden leg, perhaps?"

Socks shook his head. "Okay, okay, I get the point, Alex. It was a rat. Just like every other rat in Manhattan, except that this one was dead."

"Then you could have safely disposed of the thing, and I apologize most profusely for not being more explicit. Now, before we open it, could you tell me what else is in the bag? And remind me, please, of the particulars of the delivery of the package. I was rather involved with other matters when last we spoke."

"You really want to do this now?" Socks asked, taking another step backward. "You just got home from the airport a couple of minutes ago. Some trip, too, from what Sterling told me before he headed upstairs to see Henry. Isn't that something, Alex? Give one of them a white fur coat and he's a pet, like Henry. Make another one ugly and he's just another damn rat. Would that be discrimination, you think? Sterling said you solved more murders while you were in England, huh? You sure have all the luck."

"We will discuss all of that later, Socks, if you don't mind, as I'm anxious to begin my investigation. According to you, there has been a threat on Maggie's life. I don't believe there is anything to be gained by delay, do you? Besides, Maggie is busy upstairs, undoubtedly cudgeling her brain for reasons to put off unpacking for at least a week, and won't notice that I'm gone."

"Okay, but do I have to be here?"

"To tell me what I've just asked you to tell me, yes, you do," Saint Just said, manfully lowering the handkerchief, because he'd just remembered reading that allowing your olfactory senses to be inundated by the sickening smell of decomposing flesh was the best way to shut down those senses, render himself at least temporarily immune to the stench. Of course, the shutting down part took several minutes, and he only hoped the rather pitiful chicken salad sandwich he'd had on the plane had already been fully digested.

"All right," Socks said, still speaking through his cupped hands, "but I'm going to have to take my uniform to the cleaners again, and I just paid twenty bucks for the first time, when I opened the package. Mrs. Loomis said I smelled like a three-week-old gefilte fish, and threatened to report me to management."

"Remind me to give you forty dollars when we get back upstairs," Saint Just said, breathing as slowly as possible through his nose. Socks might be happy with a newly cleaned uniform, but Saint Just had already mentally consigned every stitch he wore to the dustbin. Which was a pity, for the black cashmere sweater was one of his favorites. Ah, the sacrifices he made for his Maggie.

Socks appeared slightly mollified by the offer to pay for cleaning his uniform. "Okay, Alex, thanks. So the mail came, and there was this package for Maggie, see? Came right through the mail, an overnight delivery package, so you tell me how careful Homeland Security is, huh? Run that sucker through an X-ray machine and, bam, little rat skeleton. Little rat head, little rat teeth. I'm asking you, who could miss that?"

Saint Just continued to eye the garbage bag. "Another topic for some other time, fascinating though it is, Socks. Continue, please."

"I put the package under my desk, like I always do with packages, but when I got to work the next day I noticed the smell. I wasn't sure where it was coming from at first—I always have five or six packages under there—but then Maggie's package started to leak, you know? That's when I opened it, and then I called you."

"So it was a standard overnight packaging?"

"Oh, yeah. Damn. Either one– or two-day delivery—I forget which. Sorry, Alex. But you'll see it—one of those red, white, and blue boxes with an eagle on it, you know? I do remember that it was postmarked here, in Manhattan. Anyway, I opened it and out came two more things—a clear plastic bag and another package. I think the bag had been filled with dry ice—to keep the rat cold, you know?—but that was pretty much gone. And the other bag was really leaking. And really reeking. I brought everything down here before I opened it, and out came the rat." He moved his hands from his mouth and nose, to hold them on either side of his face and make up-and-down motions with his fingers. "Whiskers. Those long, pointy front teeth. Definitely a rat. And then the note."

"Ah, yes, and now it becomes interesting. But you didn't keep the note separate, did you?" Saint Just asked, pulling on a pair of thin latex gloves he'd purchased at a drugstore some weeks earlier, when his own interest in television shows showcasing crime-scene investigation had been piqued. Preparedness was half the battle in crime solving, he believed. Brilliance was the other half, exemplary powers of deduction. His forte.

"It was already all wet, Alex," Socks protested, his hands over his nose and mouth once again. "You're just lucky I didn't just call the cops, or at least Steve Wendell. But then I figured you'd kill me if I did that, so I used my master key to get into Mr. O'Hara's storage locker and used his grabber to pick up everything—you ever see one of those, Alex? They're really cool. Old people use them to reach things on high shelves. When Mr. O'Hara broke his hip and couldn't reach stuff he had me go buy one for him, so I knew where it was, since Mr. O'Hara's been just fine this past year or more. Married again and everything, and by the looks of Mrs. O'Hara, if he didn't know how to use his hips she'd find someone else who could, you know what I mean?"