It’s been a couple weeks since Nan, Octo-Cat, and I moved into our new home, and now it really does feel like home. The best part—well, other than us all being together, of course—is the new home library Cal made just for me. I moved my desk in there and now spend hours, reading, researching, or just browsing social media. I try to stay better informed about current events now that current events almost got me killed.
Mom couldn’t be prouder.
My former boss, Mr. Thompson, pled guilty to manslaughter. As Charles had suspected, he never meant to kill the late senator Lou Harlow—just rough her up a bit. He confessed to tampering with the stairs and slipping something into her drink at the charity fundraiser that night. And, yes, he’d used her own cats against her. By means of a shiny red dot, Jacques and Jillianne ended up becoming a deadly murder weapon. Thompson had meant for the entire thing to look like an accident, but he hadn’t counted on me and my team of super sleuths getting involved.
He claims he hadn’t tried to kill me, either—only give me a fright—but I was not buying it. He didn’t need to convince me, though. He didn’t really need to convince anyone, because he’d already been disbarred and would never ever get the chance to serve in the Senate. Now it was merely a question of how much jail time he would get. I hoped it would be a lot.
Jacques and Jillianne finally seem to have forgiven themselves, and though they missed their former owner dearly, they now have a really good cat dad. It wasn’t Matt who adopted them both, but rather Charles Longfellow, III. I knew he’d been lonely ever since Yo-Yo the Yorkie moved out and, seeing as he was putting down roots, two kitty roommates seemed the perfect way to make a house a home.
He didn’t even find them creepy. I guess being from California meant he could handle a lot of weird things without so much as batting an eye.
The senator’s son, Matt, decided to stay in Blueberry Bay, too. He said he wanted to continue his mother’s legacy and is currently battling his ex for summer custody of their two kids. He hopes to give them the kind of dreamy, ocean-side childhood he had growing up. He makes a nice neighbor now that I’m not afraid of him anymore, although he does plan on selling and moving into some place smaller so he has more money to contribute to the Lou Harlow Scholarship Fund.
The late senator left her mark on Washington, too. While Matt was sorting through her things, he found a mostly finished proposal for a new wind turbine farm, right here in the great state of Maine. She hadn’t gotten the chance to present it to her Senate committee yet, but Matt is making sure it gets into the right hands.
So, everything’s getting wrapped up nicely. Not exactly with a bow, but… you take what you can get.
Now we just had one major matter left to handle, and that would happen today. My new doorbell chimed, playing a cute old-timey jingle that Nan picked out from the huge list of options.
“Coming!” I cried racing down the stairs and flinging open the door.
Mom looked nervous, but I wasn’t. I gave her a tight squeeze and then led her up to my new library.
She gasped at the big reveal. “Oh, Angie. It’s a dream.”
I motioned for her to take a seat at the window. I’d already opened it wide to let the balmy spring air circulate through the room. This room was no longer a prison, but rather a sanctuary.
“It is,” I agreed with a blissful sigh. “But that’s not why I invited you here today.”
“Oh?” Mom folded her hands in her lap and waited.
“There’s someone I want you to meet. Octo-Cat!” I hollered, and seconds later my kitty partner in crime came running to join us.
Mom laughed. “I already know Octo-Cat,” she said, reaching out to stroke his soft, striped head.
I smiled and shook my head. “Not like I do. Do you want to talk to him?”
Her brows pinched together, and her eyes darted from me to Octo-Cat and back again. “How?”
“Through me.” I put my hand on top of hers, and her eyes lit up with true mirth.
“Really?”
“Really.” I squeezed her hands and let go.
Mom couldn’t hide her excitement even if she’d tried. “I have so many questions! How does it work? Can you understand other animals, too? Can he understand me? How does the coffee maker factor into all of this?”
I laughed again. Mom’s face fell, but I wrapped an arm around her to show her that it was okay.
“Those are all good questions,” I said. “Let’s take them one at a time.”
What’s Next?
Apparently I’ve been slacking on the job as a paralegal, even though the firm doesn’t know that I’m secretly working as the area’s premier Pet Whisperer P.I. to solve our toughest cases behind the scenes. Now they’ve hired an intern to “help” me manage my workload…
But what the partners don’t realize is that they’ve let a nefarious criminal into our offices. Trust me—Octo-Cat can smell this guy’s stink from a mile away.
The worst part? I’m pretty sure he can talk to animals, too… and he most definitely isn’t using his talents to solve crimes and defend the innocent.
I’ve always wondered how that zap from an old coffee maker landed me with supernatural abilities. Now it’s time to find out once and for all. Otherwise I fear I may wind up losing them—and my trusty talking feline sidekick—for good.
Pre-order to save! DOG-EARED DELINQUENT is just 99 cents until it releases on June 27.
Sneak Peek of Dog-Eared Delinquent
Hi, I’m Angie Russo, and my life is way harder than you’d expect for someone who lives in an old East Coast mansion. Well, it’s not really my house—more like my cat’s. After all, it’s his trust fund that pays the bills.
It may seem like I’ve won the lottery, but think again. Times are tricky when you have a talking cat bossing you around day in and day out.
Yeah, I said it.
My cat can talk.
As in, we communicate, have conversations, understand each other. I’m not sure how or why our strange connection works, only that it does. And as much as I wished I knew more, sometimes you just have to accept things at face value. It all happened so fast, too. I went to work unable to talk to animals, got zapped by a faulty coffee maker, got knocked unconscious, and when I woke up again—bada bing, bada boom!—now I’m talking kitty.
I’ve decided to think of it as a stroke of fate, because it really does feel like Octo-Cat and I were meant to find each other. In the past six months alone, we’ve worked together to solve three separate murder investigations. I guess that’s why I’m considering my mom’s advice and officially looking into starting a business. She’s dubbed me Pet Whisperer P.I.—not because I want anyone else to know about my strange abilities, but because we needed some kind of excuse for me to take Octo-Cat around on my sleuthing calls.
After all, I wouldn’t be much of a Sherlock without my Watson. Okay, I’m probably the Watson in our relationship. If you’ve ever been owned by a cat, then you should understand.
Regardless, I’ll be the first to admit that my whole life changed for the better once Octo-Cat became a part of it. Before then, I was just drifting from one thing to the next. I’d already racked up seven associate degrees due to my unwillingness to commit to any one major long enough to secure a bachelor’s.
I guess you could say nothing ever felt quite like the perfect fit, but I kept trying anyway. I knew that somewhere out there my dream job was waiting… even if I didn’t quite know what it was yet.
You see, greatness kind of runs in my family, and for the longest time I’d worried that particular trait had skipped right past me without a second thought.