He immediately put a paw on top of the severed catnip-filled head. It looked to me like the same Funky Chicken head that had ended up under the TV stand earlier in the week. I’d managed to bat that one free with the broom handle.
I got to my feet again. “Remember what Eddie said. It’s not enough to have a blistering slap shot. You need some finesse as well.”
Roma and Eddie had come for dinner—along with Maggie—just before hockey season started. Maggie had picked Eddie’s brain for stick handling tips, while Owen sat at her feet seemingly captivated by the conversation. Mags was a good skater, but as Mary put it, she couldn’t hit the broadside of a barn with a puck—or anything else.
Owen made another crabby murping sound, almost under his breath. Then he picked up the Fred head and stalked toward the living room.
Hercules kept me company as I got supper ready. I told him about my day, including what I’d learned from Olivia and Abigail about the boxes of chocolate truffles.
“And Burtis invited me for breakfast,” I said. “At least I think he did.”
Herc cocked his black-and-white head to one side. I related the parking lot conversation with Burtis.
“I think I’ll go,” I said. “Dayna’s death doesn’t make any sense. What are the chances a pistachio nut ended up in the one chocolate she bit into?”
Hercules’s whiskers twitched. He might have been considering my question or he might have been enjoying the aroma of a fat, dill-scented fish cake sizzling on the stove.
I slid the hot, crispy fish cake onto the whole grain bun I’d just toasted and added sprouts, Swiss cheese and my homemade tartar sauce.
“Maggie thinks I’m looking for a crime where there is none,” I told the cat as I set my plate on the table. “Marcus all but said the same thing.” I reached for the dish of plain poached white fish I’d saved for the boys. “I just . . .” I shook my head. “I’m not wrong. You know what Old Harry says: If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, you’d better start making the orange sauce. And all I’ve heard since last night is a lot of quacking that hasn’t made me change my mind.”
My extended metaphor had gone completely over Hercules’s head. But he’d had Harry Junior’s barbecued duck on a beer can, so he knew the word “duck” meant something good and he licked his lips. I decided to see that as a vote of support for my side.
* * *
Roma and Rebecca picked me up right on time for our shopping trip. Owen had disappeared again, but Hercules gave Roma a soft meow.
“Hello, Hercules,” she said with a smile as I pulled on my boots and zipped my jacket.
The cats had never been that crazy about Roma—after all, she was the person who poked them with needles and warned us all not to feed them “people” food. But over the last few months Hercules and Roma had been inching toward a friendship of sorts. Early in the fall I’d gone over the embankment by the water along the Riverwalk downtown. I’d ended up bruised and scraped, and Roma, without being asked, had shown up to make me dinner, throw a couple of loads of laundry in the basement washing machine and feed Owen and Hercules.
“I won’t be late,” I said to Hercules. I grabbed my purse and followed Roma out to her SUV, where Rebecca was waiting in the front passenger seat. She half turned to smile at me as I slid along the backseat.
“Hi, Kathleen,” she said.
I smiled back at her. “Hi, Rebecca.”
Roma slipped into the driver’s seat and turned to look at me. “Where are we going first?”
“Abel’s,” I said.
“They’re a little expensive,” Rebecca said slowly.
Roma and I exchanged looks.
“How much did you spend on your dress the first time you were married?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Rebecca said with a smile. “My mother made over a dress that had belonged to my cousin.”
“Did you like it?”
“It was pretty,” she said. I noticed that not only had she not answered my question, but she’d hesitated before telling me her first wedding dress had been pretty.
“Abel’s,” I said to Roma. Then I leaned back and fastened my seat belt. “Randy says every woman should feel beautiful in her wedding dress.”
“That might have more meaning if I had a clue who the heck Randy is,” Rebecca commented, looking at me in the small lighted mirror on the windshield visor.
Roma and I both laughed.
“Randy is a wedding dress expert on a television show, Say Yes to the Dress,” Roma said as she backed out of the driveway.
Randy to the Rescue was Maggie’s new favorite reality show. Since her not so secret crush, Today Show host Matt Lauer, had successfully defended his title on Gotta Dance and hung up his dancing shoes, Maggie’s enthusiasm for that reality show had waned. Then she’d discovered Randy to the Rescue. She’d roped Roma and me into watching a couple of episodes of the show, and even the cats had seemed to enjoy it. Randy was a cross between Tim Gunn and Cinderella’s fairy godmother, who dropped in on unsuspecting brides and helped them find the perfect gown. It was a lot of fun, mostly because Randy and the show didn’t take themselves too seriously.
“So, what’s your wedding dress wish?” I asked.
Rebecca sighed. “I think that’s the problem,” she said. “I don’t know. Every wedding dress I’ve seen so far looks like it was made for someone who’s twenty-five. Not for an old lady.”
“You’re not an old lady,” Roma said. “You don’t look it and you don’t act it.”
“And I don’t have the bosom for a strapless wedding dress, either,” Rebecca said. “That ship sailed . . . and sank.”
It took a moment for me to realize that she was making a joke. Then I saw her blue eyes twinkling at me in the visor mirror.
After I’d stopped laughing I leaned forward on the seat and put one hand on Rebecca’s shoulder. “Okay, no strapless dresses. In fact, how about no wedding gowns at all? Let’s just find you something you like so you can marry the man who’s been in love with you since you were six.”
Rebecca put her hand over mine and gave it a squeeze. “That sounds wonderful, my dear,” she said.
“Kathleen, have you talked to Marcus today?” Roma asked. “Have they figured out if it was an allergic reaction that killed Burtis’s ex-wife?”
“It looks that way,” I said.
“The police were at Olivia Ramsey’s business most of the day,” Rebecca said. “Earl had to cancel his lunch run.”
Earl was the Earl of Sandwich, who ran two lunch trucks and shared kitchen space with Olivia’s business, Decadence Chocolatier, and Georgia Tepper’s cupcake bakery, Sweet Thing.
“So they were looking for what? Nuts?” Roma said, turning right toward Mayville Heights’ downtown shopping district.
“That’s what Olivia said.” I started watching for a parking spot. “I talked to her this morning.”
“Heavens! They let her out of the hospital already?” Rebecca half turned in her seat.
I nodded. “Her reaction wasn’t as severe as Dayna’s.”
“I’m sorry that Dayna didn’t make it,” she said. “But I can’t help wondering, why now, of all times, did she decide to come back to Mayville Heights?”
“Maybe she just wanted to see her children,” Roma said. A half-ton truck was pulling out of a parking spot just ahead of us and she slowed to let it out so we could take the space.
“Maybe,” Rebecca said, though she didn’t really sound convinced.
I didn’t say anything, even though I’d been wondering the same thing.
It was busy downtown. I wasn’t surprised. Even though it was early December, I knew a lot of people were doing their Christmas shopping. Thorsten and his crew had spent the first of the week hanging wreaths and twinkling lights, and the entire downtown looked like a scene from an old Christmas card.