“I had to get your attention somehow,” Mom groaned, trying desperately to flip herself over.
“Well, you got it,” the officer said, grinding her hand into my shoulder as she forced me down the porch steps. “My attention and a one-way trip straight to county jail.”
No, no, no. This was all wrong. I hadn’t had time to finish putting together the clues to figure out why Thompson would want to murder Harlow and then me. But I trusted my mom. If she said she saw him, then he was probably still here somewhere.
“Thompson!” I shouted, trying and failing to get away from my captor. “We know you’re out there.”
“Stop deflecting,” the officer spat. Why wouldn’t she just listen to us? If she hauled Mom and me away, then Nan would be in definite danger and Thompson would most likely never be brought to justice.
Officer Raines pushed me toward her cruiser with Nan hitting her every step of the way. “You let my granddaughter go!”
This was all going very wrong very fast. There was only one person left to turn to now. Well, not person exactly…
“Octo-Cat!” I screamed, craning my neck over my shoulder to glance back toward the house. “Help us!”
Right on cue, my dear, sweet tabby came running through his special electronic door flap and looked up at me with shaking eyes. “Angela, I’d never, ever hurt you.”
“I know,” I said tenderly, which was difficult considering I was still in police custody. “Help us. Help us catch Thompson. He’s the killer, not the cats.”
Officer Raines regarded me with a piteous look. “You might be able to get off on an insanity plea,” she said, and clearly this dissatisfied her greatly.
Octo-Cat ran into the yard and started shouting at the top of his lungs. We all watched as he cried, “Jacques! Jillianne! Now is the time! Let us bring your human’s killer to justice! Do as cats do! Do it now!”
I don’t know whether he actually knew where they’d been hiding, but a moment later a terrible growl sounded on the roof, followed by a hiss, and...
Thompson staggered into view, away from the spot he’d been hiding in behind the turret. My turret!
“There he is!” I shouted to Officer Raines, twisting violently to force her to look.
“Sir,” the cop shouted, spotting him at once. “Why are you trespassing here?”
“Oh, um,” My boss sputtered, running hands over his suit jacket. His face had fresh blood dripping down the side, and I instantly recognized the work of one ticked-off kitty—maybe two.
Thompson reached beneath his jacket, then pulled out a gleaming pistol. For the third time within a span of fifteen minutes, I was at risk of dying. What a day this was.
“Sir! Drop the weapon!” Officer Raines yelled, pushing me to the ground presumably for my safety.
Octo-Cat sprinted over to me and began to lick the dirt away from my cheek with his sandpaper tongue. “I’m so sorry, Angela. To think, I was used like that. I would never hurt you. You’re my human, and I love you.”
“I know,” I said, wishing I wasn’t cuffed so that I could stroke his soft, fluffy head. “I love you, too.”
A terrible scream ripped us apart. I looked just in time to see Thompson hit the ground. His leg twisted at an unseemly angle following his two-story fall, and he cried out in tremendous pain.
Rolling onto my side, I looked up and saw the previously missing Jacques and Jillianne sitting at the edge of the roof licking their hairless paws happily. And suddenly it all clicked into place. I still didn’t know why he’d done it, but Thompson had used the Sphynxes to trip the senator the same way he’d used Octo-Cat to trip me, the intelligent jerk. No wonder the poor, distraught cats had confessed to the crime.
Octo-Cat glanced toward Jacques and Jillianne on the roof and cried in delight. “They did as cats do!” he enthused, rushing toward Thompson’s prostrate form.
What happened next wasn’t pretty. He walked right onto Thompson’s back and popped a squat. A wet spot quickly darkened the light suit jacket, and the unmistakable smell of ammonia mixed with the fresh evening air..
“That’s for trying to kill my human!” he yelled, proceeding to scratch Thompson with his hind legs in a fury.
Nan laughed and clapped her hands together. Honestly, I’d have done the same if I wasn’t cuffed at that particular moment. “Wonderful,” she squealed.
“Officer Raines,” I mumbled, my face squashed to the ground. “That man broke into my house and tried to kill me. We’re pretty sure he’s also the one who killed Senator Harlow and tried to make it look like an accident.”
Thompson just moaned in agony.
“You’re lucky a fall like that didn’t snap your neck,” the policewoman said, taking the cuffs off me and my mom, then going over to snap a pair on Thompson. “Or maybe not, seeing as you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do once we get you to the station.”
She forced him onto his feet, and he cried out in pain again.
“Serves you right!” Nan shouted as Officer Raines stuffed him in the back of her cruiser and fled into the night.
So, now that we knew whodunnit, it was time to figure out why…
Chapter Nineteen
Mom, Nan, and I gathered around the formal dining table, the same table that had been used to serve the poisonous meal that caused the late owner of this estate to lose her life. I tried not to think about that too much, though, as I dug into the delicious and hard-earned meal before me.
Despite our posh surroundings, we were eating tuna noodle casserole with a Vienna sausage and breadcrumb topping.
“I can’t believe Mr. Thompson killed his friend. I can’t believe he tried to kill me,” I said, shaking my head sadly.
Octo-Cat sat beside me slurping a fresh dish of cream. He lifted his head, burped, and smiled at me unapologetically. It was amazing how quickly things reverted to normal around here.
“Well, you said he wasn’t a very good boss,” Nan pointed out, stabbing a mini sausage and taking a bite out of it, extreme bliss apparent on her face.
“Not a good boss and murderer seem miles apart to me,” Mom pointed out. She’d found an old bottle of pinot noir in the cellar and was now taking generous sips from an overfull wine glass.
“You solved it,” I said, giving her my best, most daughterly smile. “You’re the one who figured everything out. How?”
She hesitated for a moment, took another drink, and then said, “Well, it wasn’t easy, but I knew when the death had been ruled an accident that it just couldn’t be the truth. Since you and Nan seemed to have formed your own investigative club, I decided to stake out the forest and watch. It’s what any good journalist in my position would do.”
“And then you saw Thompson creeping around,” I provided.
“Yes. It was especially suspicious when I saw him climbing out of a second-story window. Invited guests just don’t do that.” She took another slow sip and sighed. “I still don’t know why, though.”
“Harlow was planning to retire. She was grooming him for her spot,” I revealed. “Charles told me earlier today.”
“Hey, you never told me that!” Nan protested, setting her fork down and pressing a napkin to her lips.
“I didn’t tell either of you. I didn’t get the chance.”
“So, it seems,” Mom said, rubbing her finger around the top of her wine glass as she spoke. “That Charles tipped off Thompson, which is why he came sneaking around here.”
“Charles would never put me in danger,” I argued, dread pooling in my stomach once again.
“Not knowingly,” Nan agreed. “Do you think he was tricked?”
“It was my fault,” I mumbled, seeing now what had happened. “I asked Charles to talk to him about why he’d visited the crime scene on day one.”