A Mew to a Kill (18 page)

“Yech!”

I slid my eyes over to Pandora, who blinked at me innocently from her cat bed. As I got up to get my cleaning supplies from the back room, I could have sworn I heard her chuckle behind my back.

Chapter Eighteen

Halfway through the day, Opal called to talk about George’s arrest and tell me about an emergency meeting of the art show judges. With George in the slammer and Paisley gone, we had a lot of stuff to work out. It was scheduled for 5:00 p.m., so I locked Pandora in the shop and shot over to the town hall after work.

Usually, I felt bad about locking her in while I went out, but not this time. Not after the hairball incident.

I parked in the large parking lot that the town hall shared with nearby shops, walked past the mural and headed to the usual meeting room. Everyone was there before me. Well, except George, of course.

It looked like they were discussing him, though, by the way they were shaking their heads. They all looked up as I came in the room.

“Willa’s here, so I guess we can get down to business,” Opal said with an air of authority that implied she’d elected herself head judge.

Maisie frowned at Opal. “Just what business is that? The only thing we have to do is fill the empty slot and I think we all know it goes to Neil Lane.”
 

Brenda nodded. “That’s right. He was the one we were going to choose before George took the decision away from us.”

Nina Lovejoy blanched at the mention of George’s name. She probably didn’t want to be associated with the killer, even though she was only a part-time real estate agent.
 

“Sure. That makes sense,” Opal said. “But I think we should consider doing some sort of memorial to Paisley’s work.”

Maisie’s face soured. She stood up from the table and started pacing. I noticed she was wearing a brown tweed skirt. Paisley had mentioned something about brown tweed. Who wears tweed in summer? And why was I thinking about things Paisley had mentioned? The case was closed.

“I don’t see the need to clutter up the art show,” Maisie said.

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it cluttering—“

“Anyway, it’s of no consequence,” Brenda said. “Paisley’s portfolio must have been destroyed in the fire. Wasn’t it?”

I was about to say it wasn’t and I had it right in my shop when Opal beat me to it.

“It doesn’t matter whether it was or wasn’t. She kept copies of her photos on her computer.”

“She did?” Brenda pursed her lips. “I don’t know much about computers.”

“Me, either.” Maisie waved her hands and I found myself looking for a charm bracelet. She wasn’t wearing one. “How would we get her photos, then? Print them off?”

“Can we even get her computer?” Nina asked. “I mean, don’t the police have it for evidence or something?”

Everyone looked at me.

That was a good question.
Did
the police have it? I hadn’t seen them take a computer out of her shop, but I hadn’t been watching the whole time. “How would I know?”

Opal rolled her eyes. “You have an ‘in’ with the police. Your sister
and
your boyfriend. Don’t you know anything that’s going on?”

“Not really, just that George was arrested. If they do have the computer, I guess they’d be giving it back now since the case is closed.”

“To who?” Brenda asked.

Good question.
 

“Her brother?” I ventured.

“Well, anyway, I don’t see how including her work will help the art show,” Maisie said.

“I agree,” Brenda added. “Besides, the layout planning is done. All the booths are assigned and the show is in a couple of days so we don’t really have time.”

Opal tapped a cherry red fingernail on her front teeth. “You guys might be right. But let me see if I can pull something together. I’ll ask the police if I can get into the shop and look for her computer and we’ll take it from there. Okay?”

Maisie made a face. “I don’t know…”

Opal glanced at her watch. “Let’s table that for now. We’d better move on to the to-do list. We need to wrap this up in twenty minutes.”

The rest of the meeting was spent going over the list of things we had left to accomplish in order to pull off the art show. Opal assigned tasks. I was lucky—my only task was to call the tent rental place and oversee them setting up tents for each of the artists on the common.

As we left, Brenda walked beside me. “It sounds like you know a lot about computers.”
 

“A little bit. I mean, I use one for my inventory and I know photos and data can be stored on them. What do you want to know?” I slowed to keep pace with her.

“Oh, I was just wondering about storing pictures on them. I’m thinking about taking up photography myself. How many pictures can you store on a computer?”

“Depends on how much memory you have, I guess.”

“Did Paisley have a lot of memory on her computer?”

“I’m not really sure. I didn’t get a good look at her computer, though I did see it in her store once. I’m sure she must’ve had a lot of storage, though. Opal said she didn’t develop pictures so all she had were the digital copies. I assume she would’ve made sure she bought a computer with a lot of memory and a lot of disk space.”

“I see. I guess I never thought about how pictures were stored. Well, I’m parked over there.” She gestured toward an old station wagon at the end of the lot. The lot was practically empty, with only our two cars and Maisie’s old clunker that she was laboriously folding herself into. I resisted the urge to rush over and help her—Maisie did not like to be helped despite the fact that it took her a long time to get herself situated in the car. Apparently, Opal and Nina had already left. There was only one other car—an old Toyota Corolla—that idled at the very far end of the lot near the stores. Probably a shop owner who had just closed up.

“Okay, I'm over there.” My car was in the opposite direction and we parted ways.

I got in my car, started it and backed out. In my rear-view mirror, I could see Brenda pulling onto the main road and the Toyota pulling out after her.
 

A jolt of adrenaline shot through me when I got a quick glimpse of the driver. He looked a lot like Paisley’s brother. I did a double-take, but he’d driven off and I couldn’t verify what I thought I’d seen. He must have just been someone who looked similar. Apparently, Kenny looked like a lot of people. I’d already mistaken him for Neil once before.
 

I drove off, convincing myself the driver must have just been a look-alike. Because if it really was Kenny … why would he be following Brenda?

***

After the meeting, I had a few hours to kill and an empty fridge. I decided to pick up some food before I collected Pandora and went to my house to meet Striker. I got sidetracked shopping for shirts that were dressier than the usual, plain T-shirts I wore. I didn’t veer too far from my normal garb, though, and settled for a light blue T-shirt with birds on it and a grayish shirt adorned with the Eiffel Tower and French words plastered all over it in fancy script. Apparently, Paisley’s fashion advice had been getting to me.

I got back to the shop around eight o’clock and was surprised to discover that Pandora hadn’t left me any presents … or none that I could readily find, anyway. I was just getting ready to close up when a flash of light over at the photography store caught my eye.

Why would someone be over there?

Maybe it was the police getting some last-minute evidence. I pressed my face closer to the glass window so I could see what was going on. No police cars were parked out front. In fact, no cars were parked out front at all. Maybe it had been my imagination.
 

I was turning away from the window when I saw it again. A flash of light. Someone was in there with a flashlight.
 

Had someone broken in, knowing that Paisley was dead? Maybe they were planning on stealing her things. There’s nothing worse than stealing from a dead person.
 

Anger bubbled up in my chest. I yanked my door open and strode across the street, ready to confront the thief.

I tried Paisley’s front door, but it was locked. I knew the back door was boarded up and I wondered how the thief got in. Maybe the front door was just stuck. I pulled harder on the knob. The glass in the door rattled. I heard something smash to the floor inside the shop.
 

The thief had seen me!

I figured he must be parked in back. If I hurried, I might be able to catch him red-handed. I ran to the side of the building and turned down the alley.

As I rounded the corner, I heard the squeal of tires and saw the grill of a truck speeding down the alley toward me.

“Look out!” a man’s voice yelled. It sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it.

I jumped to the side, out of the way of the oncoming vehicle, but the alley was too narrow. My shoulder exploded in pain as the rear-view mirror slammed into it and threw me against the side of the building. My head smashed into the corner and the rough bricks on the side of the building scraped my back as I slid down it, struggling to hold on to consciousness.

I was losing the struggle, though. My brain might have been playing tricks on me because I thought I saw someone running toward me and the back of a black truck driving away from me, just before I lost the consciousness battle for good.

Chapter Nineteen

Pandora stared out the window in disbelief as the truck bore down on Willa. Her heart knocked against her rib cage as she saw the truck strike her human and throw her against the wall. Pandora felt a flutter of helplessness. She was trapped inside the bookstore and could do nothing to help Willa. She pressed her face tight against the window and watched Willa slide down the wall into a heap on the ground.
 

Thankfully, another human was there. A tall man rushed over to Willa, whipping his phone out of his back pocket. He made a quick call, which Pandora hoped was for an ambulance.

She could see the man checking Willa’s pulse and arranging her in a more comfortable position which seemed to indicate Willa was alive because if not, why bother making sure she was comfortable. But how badly was she hurt?
 

Pandora rotated her ears like satellite dishes, straining for the sounds of sirens that would signal help was on the way. Relief flooded through her a few seconds later when she heard them. About thirty seconds after that, the man must have heard them, too, because he shoved his phone in his pocket and took off toward the back of the building.

Pandora’s whiskers twitched with curiosity. Why would the Good Samaritan run away?

The ambulance arrived and Pandora watched with rapt attention as the EMTs converged on Willa, leaning over her, taking her pulse, prying her eyelids open. They attached an oxygen mask to her face and then pulled the stretcher out of the ambulance. Pandora didn’t see much blood, other than a little smudge on her forehead. Hopefully, the human was not hurt too badly.

Two sheriff cars squealed to a stop in front of the store. Their driver side doors flew open. Gus leapt out of one, Striker out of the other, both running to Willa’s side.
 

Pandora couldn’t see what was happening now with so many people crowded around Willa, but after a few seconds, they ratcheted up the stretcher and loaded her into the ambulance. Gus took off in her car and Striker turned and started walking toward the bookstore.

The bells over the door jangled and Striker entered, his attention focused on Pandora in the window.

“Don’t worry.” He picked Pandora up gently. “Willa will be just fine.”

His voice broke on the last word and Pandora’s heart twisted. Striker was obviously pretty broken up about what had happened to Willa. Pandora hoped his words about her human being just fine were true. But why would he lie to a cat? It had to be true.

Striker’s gaze drifted over to Paisley’s store, then back down to Pandora. “I bet you saw the whole thing. If only you could talk and tell us what happened...”
 

“Meow!” If only you would open up your telepathic pathways, maybe I would, Pandora thought.

“They’re just taking her overnight for observation.” Striker put Pandora back down in the cat bed and went over behind the counter. “I’ll take you home and make sure you’re fed.”

“Murrr.” Pandora had been wondering who would feed her. It was way past suppertime.

Striker grabbed Willa's purse from behind the counter and then came and scooped Pandora up. He stroked her behind the ears. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of you.” He put his cheek on top of her head. “Hopefully, it won’t be for long, I’m sure Willa will be just fine and home in no time.”

Cripes, the guy sounded like he was near tears and that was the second time he’d said she’d be just fine. Who was he trying to convince, himself or the cat?
 

Pandora did hope that her human would be fine, but she had a sixth sense about these things and she felt that she would be. She wasn’t a very sentimental cat and the sniveling human was starting to get on her nerves, now. Yet, she’d better stay on his good side as he had promised to feed her.