Kit gave her a sweet kitty smile and tried not to preen. But then, even with such praise, her attention turned suddenly to Max and Clyde and Scotty, sitting on the low wall of a flower bed; their serious talk, Clyde’s sudden frown, drew her curiosity; she dropped to the brick paving and padded across to listen. Hopping up into the flower bed, she stretched out among the blooms.
“I don’t like what will happen to the Bleak house,” Clyde was saying, “now that they’ve skipped. Ryan could be stuck with a big loss, though she did, after a couple of weeks of Tekla’s crazy changes, demand more money up front.”
Scotty laughed. “Tekla wasn’t keen on that.”
Max said, “Their bank account—the only account we’ve found so far—shows only forty thousand. I expect the mortgage company will attach that, and look for the rest. I’d guess there’ll be a foreclosure, maybe a short sale. If—when—we pick the Bleaks up, bring them in and prosecute, maybe the court will assign what assets they can find to help the victims or their families.”
“What I don’t get,” Scotty said, “is why they ever bought that house, why they ever started on a renovation. If they came here to . . . If their intention was these attacks, they can’t have thought they’d be staying permanently.
“Or,” he said, “did they really believe they’d get away with this, that everyone would think the assaults were some kind of prank—and that the murders themselves were unfortunate accidents? That’s insane thinking. Or,” he added, “was that remodel all for show? For distraction, to put you off the track?”
“Pretty expensive cover,” Max said, “though they’re adept at manipulating money, sliding out from under.”
Scotty shrugged. “The woman’s crazy as a drunk squirrel.” Picking up a canapé, he slipped it down to Rock, who sat watching the three men, the Weimaraner’s eager yellow eyes following each morsel from hand to mouth. Clyde gave Scotty a look; Scotty knew Rock wasn’t allowed a human diet, but sometimes the Scotsman couldn’t resist.
“Well, we’ve got a line on them,” Max said. “That sighting in Arkansas. Too bad the café owner didn’t report it sooner. He didn’t know about the BOL until a couple days later. A deputy stopped in for coffee, mentioned it and described the Bleaks.” Max scratched Rock’s ear as the dog nudged him, but he didn’t feed Rock. “They were headed toward Georgia, if they kept on in that direction.” He sipped his beer. “Maybe we’ll pick them up on the East Coast, maybe the odds will turn.” He looked up when Ryan caught his eye from the kitchen door, holding up the phone extension.
Max rose and headed for the kitchen, but moved on through toward the guest room, wanting that extension where he could hear above the party noise. The minute Joe Grey heard the guest room door close he dropped down from the wall and slipped away through the crowd. Kit, watching them both, hopped off Lucinda’s lap and followed. Pan remained on the wall, stoic and quiet.
Kit, passing the guest room’s closed door, paused to hear Max say, “She gave you this number, and not my cell phone?” His irritation told her he was talking about Evijean. She flew up the stairs as, above her on the desk, Joe Grey eased the phone from its cradle. As she landed beside him, he hugged the headset in his paws and eased it down on the blotter. They hoped Max would hear no small electronic click and no thump on the thinly padded surface. Pressing their ears close, Joe and Kit listened.
There was no break in Max’s voice as if he’d been alerted that an extension had been picked up. Glancing at each other, they tried not to breathe into the speaker; and they watched the stairs warily in case someone started up to the office and studio—why would the two cats have the phone off the hook, crouched over it?
Mice in the speaker? Kit thought, and had to swallow her laugh.
Max’s call was from Georgia, from Sheriff Jimmie Roy Dover. Dover’s drawl was deep and heavy. Kit imagined a portly man who enjoyed his native southern cooking.
“So far, this is the way we’ve put it together,” Dover was saying. “The worst of it is, we’ve got every unit out there looking for wounded, for bodies. And of course evidence is disturbed, stuff flying everywhere.
“Well, when the tornado passed, she must have known Sam’s and Arnold’s bodies were there on the dock, under the fallen roof. Maybe she thinks they’re dead, maybe not. Maybe she runs to help them, maybe not. All we’ve found is a line of muddy footprints where she gets out of her room, where she runs outside—and she doesn’t head their way.
“When she’s clear of the worst of the debris,” Dover said, “she pauses beside the body of a dead woman among the fallen walls. Later, one of our men photographed the body and what may be Tekla’s footprints. The dead woman must still have been clutching her purse. Looks like Tekla—if those are her footprints—grabs the purse, you can see where it was dragged out from under the muddy debris. It took us a while to find this much, with the mess, and with victims needing help.
“We figure Tekla now has the woman’s car keys, fished them out of the purse. She steps on out to the parking strip. The first row of cars was smashed. Tornado sheared through the building neat as a Skilsaw, dumped the fallen walls on that row of vehicles. It missed the more distant cars, she must have bleeped the electronic key until she got a response from one of them, an answering bleep or blinking light. Now she has the right car, she gets in and takes off.”
Max was silent, listening.
“But Tekla’s wounded,” Dover said. “She drives about three miles, then starts swerving, tire marks all over the road. Pretty quick she loses it, runs the car into a tree.”
“You got her.”
“No, we didn’t. She must have sat there for a while, but then you could see where she backed the car up. Apparently didn’t do too much damage, gas line must have been okay, apparently no tires punctured, and she takes off again.”
“Well, hell.”
“Rescue units were on their way to the motel, but in the dark and the hard wind they must have sped right by her, didn’t ever see her.
“We didn’t find the tire marks and the gouge in the tree until the next morning, first light. By that time,” Dover said apologetically, “she was long gone.”
“And Sam and Arnold?”
“Dead,” Dover told him. “Crushed by the fallen roof. GBI has the report. They’ll be calling you.”
Max was quiet for a long while. Joe and Kit felt a surprising twist of pain for Sam and Arnold Bleak. No matter what they had done, no matter whether they’d been a willing part of Tekla’s plan, the two cats didn’t like to think of someone being crushed that way, in that terrible storm—and of Tekla not even trying to save them, just leaving them.
Max gave Dover his cell phone number. As the officers ended the call, Joe used both paws to ease the headset back onto the phone. They waited in the shadows at the top of the stairs until Max left the guest room and moved out to the patio again. Only when he’d gone did they wander casually down the empty stairway—but at the bottom Kit paused, startled, the fur along her back lifting. Joe Grey froze.
A faint ripple of tension ran through those gathered, through not everyone seemed aware of it. A subtle glance across the patio between Ryan and Clyde, between Charlie and Kate and the Greenlaws, a look as meaningful as a whisper—and the Firettis were headed for the front door, John fishing his car keys from his pocket.
“The kittens,” Kit whispered. “Joe, the kittens are coming.” But Joe was gone, racing away, flicking his heels in her face. Clyde bolted across the living room and out of the house, across the yard trying to snatch Joe from the air as the tomcat leaped past John Firetti—and Joe was through the driver’s door into the back of the medical van.