Lola’s solution to everything was a party.
“I’ll invite some of my guy friends.”
Most of her guy friends were unemployed musicians. “No, thanks, I don’t-”
“A tattoo party. How about that? My tattoo artist friend will come, and everybody can get drunk and get tattoos. It’ll be fun.”
Melody was all set to protest, but she didn’t. She kind of liked the idea. “Let’s do that. Maybe all of those things. Fifties clothes, martinis, and tattoos.”
“What kind of tattoo will you get?” Lola asked.
Max was purring away on Melody’s lap. She gave him an extra rub on the head and said, “I have a great idea.”
Chapter 14
The front door slammed, and Max waited for Melody to return. She always grabbed the Sunday paper and brought it to bed so they could read it together. He heard his mistress gasp and he stopped kneading the down quilt.
And then she said, “Oh, my God.”
He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what had caused her voice to take on such a disturbed tone. He heard the snap of the newspaper, heard her bare feet as she made her way back to the bedroom. But he didn’t think there would be any lazy cuddling. She sounded too upset for that.
“Oh, Max. You should see this.”
He was waiting for her to show him the paper when her cell phone rang. She answered. “I just saw it. Haven’t finished reading it yet. Let me call you back.” She disconnected and dropped to the bed, her eyes on the newspaper she held in both hands.
Max squeezed under her arm so he could get a better look. There, on the front page of the paper, in full color, was a photo of him and Melody. She was holding him protectively to her chest, her eyes huge, her lips sad and worried, the blue of her dress and her ruffled white sleeve nicely visible. He was wearing his striped sweater.
Oh, he loved it! Loved it! Even the smear of blood down her cheek, left from that tender moment when Joe’s fingers had caressed her face-even that looked cool. And it was a great picture of him. A wonderful picture of him. Melody liked to take photos of him acting silly. Photos when his eyes were wild and he’d been doing a little too much catnip. But this was sweet. And wow did his eyes ever look yellow. What a handsome cat he was. And how beautiful Melody was. What a pair they were.
She read the article to him. “Cat saves man’s life.” She gave him a hug and a kiss on his head. “That’s you. They’re writing about you.” The article talked about how he’d bravely run into a danger zone, and, when he spotted the injured man, he’d run toward him rather than away. “A cat on a rescue mission,” Melody read. “Oh, how silly. But we don’t care, do we? It’s silly wonderful.” She continued reading, then stopped and said, “That’s not good. They’re using my full name. I don’t think I like that. I didn’t like that sneaky reporter. Maybe I should have talked to him. I suppose I made him mad by refusing to give him an interview, so now he puts his own spin on our story and it makes the front page.”
She set Max aside and grabbed her silver laptop. He didn’t like it when she messed with her laptop, petting it instead of him. He tried to step on the keyboard, but she kept elbowing him back. “Not now, Max.”
Click, click, click. Her fingers flew. Her back was against the headboard of the bed, the laptop on her thighs, her bare feet crossed at the ankles, her face intense as she examined the computer screen. “You are not only the star of the Pioneer Press, you’re also the star of the Internet,” she said, her voice full of amazement, puzzlement, and worry.
He was hungry. She usually fed him his canned food by now.
He put a tentative paw to her shoulder. She ignored him, so he did it again. And again. Then she dropped back against the headboard and stared into space.
Melody was in the kitchen feeding Max when her phone rang. It had been ringing all morning, ever since the paper hit the streets, and she was tempted to ignore it. But she picked it up to check the caller ID. Ellen DeGeneres.
Ha-ha.
How had Lola done that?
Melody would play along. She hit the answer button. “Hi, Ellen.”
“Oh, hi.”
She sounded just like the real Ellen.
“I was reading about Max, your wonderful cat, and I was hoping I could have you and Max and your boyfriend on my show. When he’s well enough to travel. We’ll fly you first class to California.”
She really, really, really sounded like Ellen. “Lola?”
“No, this isn’t Lola. I don’t know who Lola is, but I love the name. Lola.” She started singing.
And Melody started to think that the person on the other end of the line was truly Ellen DeGeneres. “Is this real? Is this a joke? Ellen DeGeneres wouldn’t call me. And not on a Sunday.”
“I use the phone seven days a week. And I also use the Internet every day. Weird, I know. And I love pet stories, and I wanted to talk to you before any of those New York people try to get you to come there. Not that you can’t do both, but wouldn’t you rather come to California? Have you ever been to Burbank?”
“No.”
“There you go.”
“I’ve never been to New York City either.”
“Well, New York. A lot of people running around in dark clothes, drinking lattes. Wouldn’t you rather come to California where people are wearing almost no clothes and driving around in convertibles?”
This was real.
“Let me ask you-where did you get Max?”
“He came from a no-kill shelter in Saint Paul.” She didn’t go into how he’d belonged to David first.
“Okay, so how about this. I will personally donate ten thousand dollars to the shelter if you and Max come to California. And I will kick in another ten thousand if you bring your boyfriend.”
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“For the story in my head, he’s your boyfriend. Don’t kill my buzz. So what do you say?”
Melody looked down at Max. He’d finished is organic salmon feast and was washing his face. Melody hit the mute button. “What do you think, Max? Should we go?”
Max meowed.
“You’d have to fly,” she told him. “In an airplane.”
Max seemed to give that some thought, then meowed again.
Chapter 15
The flight from the Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport took over three hours. Unfortunately someone in Ellen’s staff had purchased two seats together after Melody had requested separate seating. So now she was sitting at the curved window. Max, inside the pink, soft-sided carrier that he detested, was tucked under the seat in front of her while Joe sat beside her on the aisle. As promised, they were in first class. The seats were roomy, and their arms brushed only occasionally.
Two weeks had passed since the accident, and Melody had been unable to ignore the fact that Joe was still moving pretty slowly when she’d spotted him heading toward the waiting area for their gate. She hadn’t spoken to him since the hospital. Just thought it would be better that way. All communication about the trip had taken place through email.
The two weeks since the shooting had been enough time for her fear and worry over Joe to turn into full-blown irritation. She felt tricked by him. He was just another wrong guy in a long line of wrong guys. Max was the only guy for her. And to prove it, she’d had his likeness tattooed on her shoulder at the fifties party Lola had thrown. In the image, he wore his pink-and-black striped hat and a charmingly silly expression. All the guy she needed.
Cop, cop, cop.
Liar, liar, liar.
“Did you say something?” Joe asked.
He was wearing dark jeans and black leather shoes, a plaid cotton shirt with pearl snaps and sleeves rolled below the elbow. She could smell the fabric of his shirt and his shampoo or deodorant or cologne or something. Some smell she associated with him. A smell that used to make her feel all warm and fuzzy.