Donally, Claire - Cat Nap (A SUNNY & SHADOW MYSTERY)

Looking for the Featherstone name in local newspapers brought sad news. Both of Dawn’s parents had perished in a house fire while Dawn was away at college.

Some things you’d rather not know, Sunny thought, leaning back from the keyboard. Well, that’s a perfectly good hypothesis shot to hell. Dawn doesn’t have a family to protect her.

She closed out her search window but then paused for a moment. There could be a boyfriend, though.

Unfortunately, she was unlikely to find anything like that online, unless things had gotten as far as an official engagement. So Sunny got her phone instead and punched in Helena Martinson’s number.

“I just wanted to check in and hear how you were doing,” Sunny said.

Mrs. Martinson laughed. “You should coordinate better with your father,” she said. “I just got off the phone with him a couple of minutes ago.”

“I was upstairs doing some work,” Sunny explained. “I haven’t gotten a report from him. So, how are you?”

“I’m fine,” Helena told her. “I rested a bit in my chair, had something to eat, and will probably go to bed a little early tonight. Tomorrow I may be a little stiff, and my knee will be a bit sore. As I told Mike, nothing life-threatening.”

Busily concentrating on the question she wanted to ask, Sunny stumbled a bit. “I’m glad.” She grimaced. “I mean, I’m glad that you’re fine, not that you’re going to be sore.”

“It could have been worse,” Mrs. Martinson agreed. “So what’s on your mind, Sunny? You usually don’t flub things up.”

“It’s just a question that came up, and you might have heard the answer already. When you were asking about Dawn Featherstone, did anyone mention her having a boyfriend?”

On the other end of the line, Mrs. Martinson paused for a moment. “Most of the people I spoke with were in Martin’s social circle, not Dawn’s,” she said slowly. “But there was mention of a serious boyfriend who went into the military—the Army, if I remember correctly. They sent him off to Iraq or Afghanistan, and he hasn’t been back since. Someone mentioned that he’d gotten married and either settled down south somewhere, or he’s on a base down south somewhere.”

Another possibility scratched off, Sunny thought. “Well, thanks, Helena,” she said. “It’s just a question that popped up.”

“Yes.” Mrs. M.’s voice was dry. “I wondered if there might be someone who’d object to Dawn carrying on with Martin Rigsdale. This fellow, Joey Something-or-other, was the closest possibility, but since he was out of the picture, I didn’t mention it.”

“But there you were with the answer,” Sunny said. “Thanks. Look, if you need anything—”

“Your father already volunteered, at least for the daylight hours,” Mrs. Martinson told her with a laugh. “And he said that you’d be on call if I need anything after dark.”

Sunny shrugged. “Well, he’s right to put my name up. Just bear us in mind if you do need anything.” They wished each other a pleasant rest of the evening and then hung up.

Rising from her chair, Sunny stretched and looked around. Usually when she was upstairs this long, Shadow came padding in to check on her. She went downstairs to find Mike watching his football game.

“Hey, Dad,” she asked, “has Shadow been with you?”

Mike’s shaggy eyebrows rose in surprise. “I thought he was upstairs with you.”

15

Sunny flew aroundthe house, calling Shadow’s name and checking usual places where he liked to get out of the way. Top of the refrigerator: empty. Under Sunny’s bed: no cat. She peered under the dining room table—sometimes Shadow perched himself on one of the chairs there—and even got on her stomach to get a look under the couch. That was usually Shadow’s hiding place of last resort.

“Where is he?” she asked, beginning to get worried now.

“Well, he was pretty mad at being chased around by that pup,” Mike said.

Sunny remembered Shadow standing at bay on the living room chair, his tail sweeping back and forth like a metronome. “Maybe he took off to the garage.”

But while the garage was full of a lot of things—like all of the stuff Sunny had saved from her New York apartment—it was definitely devoid of cat.

“That was the last time I saw him,” she said, “up on the chair.”

“A lot of stuff happened after that,” Mike pointed out. “We had that nasty spill for Helena, we rushed over to help her—”

“We left the door open,” Sunny said through a suddenly tight throat.

Mike blinked. “You think he wandered off while we were getting Helena back on her feet? Why would he do that? It had just snowed, for heaven’s sake. And between the wind and the cold, well, I was glad to get back indoors.”

“Maybe he came out to see what was going on, and we didn’t notice him.” Sunny sped back into the house, to the front door.

“We’d have noticed him, all right,” Mike said, coming after her. “That hairball is a regular Pavarotti when it comes to yowling and meowing. I’d have definitely heard him. Hell, you’d have heard him, even upstairs.”

Sunny threw the door open to expose a carpet of white. There were tire ruts and sections of Wild Goose Drive where the snow had been scraped away. But the wind had pretty much erased her footprints coming back from the Wrangler. As for any other marks in the snow from earlier, they were just gone.

A blast of wind froze Sunny’s face and sent a spray of loose snow onto the hall floor. But however frigid it was outside, that was nothing compared to the cold that Sunny suddenly felt around her heart.

Mike gently touched her shoulder. “You thought he might be sitting there, waiting?”

“I guess it was a silly idea, but yes,” Sunny admitted. “It’s freezing cold out there. Where would he go? Why would he go?” That question almost came out as a wail.

“We don’t know that he went anywhere,” Mike told her. “We know he was upset at having his place invaded, and that he can hold a grudge—and sulk—for a while. Maybe he’s found a new hiding place and is using it to punish us. Maybe tomorrow he’ll wake up in a better mood and we’ll find him in the kitchen. I’d leave a little food in his bowl. If anything is likely to bring him out, it’s that.”

“That’s probably good advice,” Sunny said. But she couldn’t keep the quiver from her voice as she spoke.

She did as Mike suggested, even splurging on the canned stuff that Shadow particularly liked. But she spent the rest of the night patrolling the house, looking for any signs of her cat. Then she put on her coat and searched outside, too.

Sunny awoke the next morning bleary-eyed. She hadn’t slept well, worrying about Shadow, and she certainly didn’t feel any better when she came down to the kitchen and found his food and water untouched. Mike was already down, starting on breakfast. He looked at Sunny and just shrugged.

Bracing herself, Sunny opened the kitchen door to test the weather. It was cold and calm—no wind at all. Sunny held tight to the doorknob until her hand hurt. The newest layer of snow on the lawn had been disturbed. She saw footprints, and they were too big to be a squirrel’s.

No, those were cat prints, and they led down to the newly plowed road and disappeared.

*

Maybe I’m beinghasty, Shadow thought as he trotted along the side of the road. He hadn’t seen the usual things that happened before he got kicked out of a house. No arguments, no cutting back on food, no kicks or shouting. They’d just made such a big deal out of that stupid Biscuit Eater.