Eddie, catlike, was bent on his new mission, whatever that might be, and launched himself off the bottom step and into the bright late-September sunshine.
I groaned and went after him. Over my shoulder, I called, “Can someone bring me the treats? He might come if I shake the can.”
Once outside, however, I realized that Eddie wasn’t headed for the shrubbery. Or the roadway. Instead he was trotting straight for the only vehicle in the parking lot, a battered pickup truck. Dents and scrapes of all shapes and sizes were scattered all along the doors and sides, some serious enough to have scoured the paint down to the metal.
I leapt to the stunningly obvious conclusion that the vehicle was Leese’s and wondered what a former corporate attorney was doing with an open-bed truck, since at previous bookmobile visits, I was pretty sure she’d been driving a midsized SUV.
Mentally shrugging—I paid about as much attention to cars as I did to the daily temperatures in Hawaii—I trotted across the parking lot, ten yards behind my cat in a very short parade of two. “Eddie, come back here, will you? I thought I only had to run on workout mornings with Ash. I’m not sure I’m ready for more. Think of me, will you? I’m sure you’ve done that once or twice.”
Most days, my inane conversation caught Eddie’s attention, slowing him enough for me to catch up to him. This time, if anything, he sped up. Then he sniffed the air and trotted ever closer to the truck.
“Here kitty, kitty, kitty,” Leese called as she climbed down the bookmobile’s steps. “Come get a kitty treat.” She rattled the cardboard can of annoyingly expensive moist morsels, but Eddie trotted onward.
“Is that your truck?” I asked, pointing.
“For now,” she said, still rattling the can. “It’s a long story.”
Eddie, still ignoring the siren call of cat treats, jumped onto the truck’s rear bumper, then up onto the edge of the tailgate. I slowed from my half-run and started planning how best to snatch him up into my arms. Cornering Eddie was a lot easier than capturing him. “I think he wants to go for a ride.”
“Ha.” Leese, with her long-legged strides, reached my side. “I’ll give it to him with my blessing as soon as my SUV is fixed.”
Eddie’s ears swiveled. Laughing, I edged a few feet closer to the truck. “I think he’s rejecting your generous offer.”
“He’s a cat of good taste.” Leese gave the treat can an extra-hard shake. “That thing’s a piece of junk.”
“Mrrr,” Eddie said, then slid off the tailgate and into the truck’s bed.
Reaching the side of the truck, I stood on my tiptoes and peered in. All there was to see was a large tarp and a black-and-white cat walking over the top of it in an ungainly fashion.
“Fred Astaire, you are not,” I told him. “And please don’t make me come in there after you.”
“Mrrr,” he said, but his tone was different from the usual communicative chirp he gave. It was low and long and almost a growl. He started pawing at the edge of the heavy canvas and trying to poke his little kitty nose under the edge. Of course, he was standing on the edge, which made things difficult, but Eddie didn’t always like to do things the easy way.
I turned to look at Leese, who was now standing next to me. “What’s under your tarp?”
“No idea,” she said shortly. “It’s not mine. Tarp or truck.”
Two minutes earlier, she’d been ready to give away a truck she didn’t own? “I don’t—”
“Mrrroooo!”
I winced as Eddie’s howls penetrated my skull and sank deep into my brain.
Enough was enough. I walked around to the back end of the truck, put one foot on the trailer hitch and pushed myself high enough to grab the tailgate’s edge with both hands.
I swung one foot over into the pickup’s bed, then the other. Eddie was now howling for all he was worth and had managed to burrow his top half under the tarp. I crouched down and took a gentle hold of his back half. “Come on, pal. Let go of whatever it is you’re after, okay?”
But when I stood, cat in hand, his claws were still extended, and they snagged the tarp’s edge, yanking the canvas to one side and revealing what Eddie had been after.
“Oh . . . !” I stumbled backward. “Oh . . .”
Because Eddie had uncovered a body. A dead body. Of a man. A man about sixty years old. With staring eyes of blue.
I scrambled over the tailgate, holding a squirming Eddie close to my chest, and dropped to the ground, panting, and not wanting to see any more.
Leese was standing quiet and tall, her hands gripping the edge of the truck, her mouth working as if she was trying to say something. For a long moment, nothing came out, but when it did, her voice was a raw whisper.
“It’s my dad.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Laurie Cass is the national bestselling author of the Bookmobile Cat Mysteries, including Pouncing on Murder, Borrowed Crime, and Tailing a Tabby. She lives on a lake in northern Michigan with her husband and two cats. Visit her online at catmystery.com
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