“Maybe the shelter isn’t the only thing struggling,” Charles suggested. “This past year we’ve had a pretty high murder per capita. It could be that people are moving away, houses are sitting empty, and the local government has less money to spend overall.”
“Maybe,” I agreed half-heartedly. His logic made good sense, but my gut was telling me something else was to blame here. “But I don’t think that’s it. It seems like something fishy is going on with the shelter in particular.”
Charles played right along. He, too, had learned to trust my instincts, and he never made me feel bad about needing to investigate—or obsessively discuss—a hunch. “And you think that woman we saw… Trish… is at the center of it all?”
“Of course I do.” I accidentally turned around before Charles had finished getting dressed and caught an eye full of his bare legs and chest. “Oops, sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’m not nearly as shy as you are.”
I waited for that tell-tale sound of pants zipping up before turning around again.
When I did, Charles greeted me with a grim expression. “But I can’t help worrying about you. Are you going to at least be careful about inserting yourself into a potentially dangerous situation this time?”
I shook my head and let out a sarcastic huff. “I’m always careful.”
Charles laughed so hard he had to cough. “Yeah, we both know that’s not true, so let’s try again. Can you at least be more cautious than you usually are?”
“Fine,” I acquiesced and let him wrap his arms around me. “Although you know I no longer work for Longfellow and Associates, which means you’re not my boss anymore, either.”
“Yeah, but you mean more than ever to me now. You think I’m only warning you off because I’m your boss? That hurts.”
“No, I’m sorry. You’re right. Any other demands, oh great and powerful boyfriend?”
“Now that you mention it.” He placed a kiss on my forehead first, then my nose, and finally finished up with a lingering kiss on my mouth. “I do have one tiny request.”
Even before Charles said anything more, I already knew I’d grant him any wish he wanted. I was a big pile of cotton fluff in his hands. Literally.
“Let me swing by city hall to see what information I can gather about the budget cuts. Once I do that, you’re free to investigate to your heart’s content.”
“Fair enough.” I pulled his face back down to mine and gave him another enthusiastic kiss.
“What was that for?” he asked with a smile once we’d pulled apart.
“For trying to make me feel better, and then actually doing it.”
“So, you mean I shelled out for this fancy couple’s thing when all I had to do was wave my lawyer card around a little?”
We both chuckled and then kissed again. Even if I kissed Charles every day for the rest of my life, I doubted I’d ever grow sick of it, sick of him.
Still, we had things to do, so I reluctantly pushed him away. “Now turn around and face the wall so I can get dressed in peace,” I instructed, happy to put this whole experience behind me and get back to the real world where people went by their given names and spoke in their actual voices.
Buh-bye, Serenity.
Hello, mystery at the shelter.
I returned home to what could only be described as a war zone. Nan wore pink camo sweatpants to go with her pink Dog Mom shirt, and even her adorable sidekick Paisley had undergone a costume change. The shaking ball of sleek fur now wore a skull and crossbones tank top with a glittery pink bow affixed to one side of the skull.
Oh, brother.
In the dining room, a giant map of the Blueberry Bay region took up most of our large table. Nan had also brought out a fresh piece of poster board and a rainbow array of all her favorite Sharpies.
“What’s going on here?” I asked, not entirely sure I wanted to know the answer.
Noticing my arrival at last, Nan marched straight across the room and put a hand on each of my shoulders. “The check was cashed,” she informed me, eyes flashing with glee.
I frowned. This seemed like a ridiculously over-the-top way to celebrate a check being cashed. Of course, my head was all fuzzy from Harmony’s massage, so maybe my synapses were still slow to fire.
“And you turned our house into a war room, because…?” I asked, anyway.
Nan pointed toward the desktop computer she kept set up in the far corner of the living room for her occasional use and said, “Remember how you taught me to pay all my bills online?”
“Yessss,” I answered slowly, not sure I liked where this was going. It was one thing for me to take risks for a case, but I hated the thought of ever putting Nan in harm’s way.
“Look at this.” She thrust a piece of computer paper at my chest.
Although the image was grainy, I could clearly make out the scan of Nan’s check from earlier that day, along with the sloppy signature and the stamp that read First Bank of Blueberry Bay.
“Check out the address,” Nan urged me with an eager smile.
“Dewdrop Springs, huh,” I read aloud. “But why would the Glendale Animal Shelter be cashing checks in Dewdrop Springs?”
“That’s what I was hoping to learn from you. You were just over there, after all.” She grabbed the paper back and waited for me to explain everything.
I didn’t have the answers she was looking for, but I did have a bit of information that could help us get there. It was my turn to make a big reveal, and I relished it. “Now that you mention it, Charles and I did run into Trish at the massage place. Do you think she’s the one who cashed the check?”
We both studied the messy scrawl of the signature, but it was impossible to decipher without knowing Trish’s last name.
“Weird,” I said at last.
“Definitely weird,” Nan agreed with a nod.
“So what is all this about then?” I motioned around at the giant mess that had exploded in our normally pristine home during my brief absence.
“It’s easier for me to think with all my supplies close at hand,” Nan answered with a shrug.
This made me chuckle. “And what have you thought of?”
“That we definitely need to be investigating that shelter more for a start,” she said without a second’s hesitation.
“Yeah, I kind of have the same feeling, too. Ooh, let me catch you up on what I learned while I was out.”
“Excellent, but first, tea,” Nan declared.
She scurried toward the kitchen with a plucky Paisley in tow, then let out a sharp gasp. “Oh, dear. I think we’ve had another attack!”
I raced after her only to find a pair of coffee mugs shattered against the hard floor.
What in the heck?
Who was breaking all our things?
And how had Nan not heard all this racket from the next room over?
Sigh.
It seemed that we now had more than one mystery to solve.
Chapter Eleven
Despite my niggling dislike of Harmony, even I had to admit she’d gotten one thing very right: I slept like a log that night. It could have been the massage, or it could have been the fact that I’d decided to stop tiptoeing around my angry cat and had actually gone to sleep in my own bed when the time came.
I hadn’t laid eyes on Octo-Cat before tucking myself in but knew he must still be somewhere in the tower bedroom. Not that I cared all that much at the moment. Honestly, I was so done with this tantrum of his. He could either learn to live with Paisley or he could make himself a prisoner in my bedroom until the very last day of his very last life.
I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but he’d made it quite clear that he wasn’t willing to negotiate when it came to our new doggie family member.