Never Steal a Cockatiel (Leigh Koslow Mystery Series Book 9) (8 page)

Paige, a frizzy-headed blonde in her early thirties who had been employed through at least four different receptionists now, glanced up at Leigh with a beleaguered expression.
Kill me now,
her eyes seemed to be messaging as she offered a wave of her own.

Leigh waved back and then started up the van to head to West View. According to Bess, Frances had found a smudge on the mirror in the half bath last night and responded by setting up a roster of housecleaning duties for all three of the women to carry out. Frances had also determined that Dr. Koslow “needed his books examined,” and that Leigh’s primary job today would be to “dust all these filthy papers.” Leigh’s first round of duty was supposed to have started ten minutes ago. It wouldn’t end until Cara arrived tomorrow morning.

Kill me now, indeed.

Chapter 7

“Koslow,” Maura’s voice boomed from Leigh’s cell phone. “Are you at home?”

“No,” Leigh answered, staring at the pile of file folders on the table before her with despair. Bess must have scooped them up from the clinic’s basement floor, because their every surface was encrusted with animal hair, dust bunnies, and a gritty veneer of crumbled kibble. Naturally, Frances refused to even look at the papers until they were cleaned, and a card table — “not the
kitchen
table, for pity’s sake!” — was designated as the triage area. Leigh wondered whose bright idea it had been to tell Jared not to touch any of her father’s paperwork. Didn’t they know the diligent yet mentally challenged kennel cleaner took every instruction literally?

“I’m at my parents’ house,” Leigh answered.

“Oh, right. Do you think it would be okay if Eddie and I dropped by?”

Deliverance!
“How soon can you get here?”

Twenty minutes later the doorbell rang, and Leigh leapt up from her chair. “Maura’s here!” she announced to her mother as she headed for the door. Frances, who was planted on the couch poring over another pile of papers spread out on a tray table, dipped her chin to peer at Leigh over the top of her reading glasses.

“How is the file cleaning going?” she asked with suspicion.

“Stupendously,” Leigh replied, hastening to open the door.

Maura Polanski looked down at her with a smile; Eddie Polanski looked up at her with a scowl.

Leigh swung open the door. “Come in,” she invited, gesturing the twosome into the living room.

Frances sat up immediately and pushed her work table to the side. “Maura, dear!” she greeted with enthusiasm. “Oh, bring that little darling over here!”

“Hello, Ms. Koslow,” Maura said cheerfully. She walked over to the couch and stood next to Frances, leaning down to give her and Eddie a better look at each other. Frances reached out a hand and held his, and the infant gurgled with delight.

“Oh, give me a break!” Leigh mumbled.

“All babies like me,” Frances said smugly, making a silly face. Eddie practically contorted himself with amusement, and Maura laughed out loud.

Leigh bit back a groan. “Did you need to talk to me about something?” she prompted, wondering if the policewoman had heard about Skippy and tied the incident to the petnapping rumors.

“That I do,” Maura said vaguely, throwing Leigh a meaningful look. Whatever she had to say, she preferred to say it in private.

Frances’s hawk eyes missed nothing. “Why don’t you take Maura up to your room, Leigh?” she suggested sweetly. “Little Eddie and I can get better acquainted.”

“You don’t have to do that, Ms. Koslow,” Maura remarked.

“Nonsense,” Frances argued. “It would be a delightful diversion. You just leave this little cherub with me and toddle along. I’ll give a yell if we need anything.”

Maura thanked Frances for the offer and lifted the infant out of the belly pack.

“Come here, Peanut,” Frances cooed, taking him deftly into her arms. She looked up at Leigh and Maura, then shooed them both away toward the stairs. “Off you go. We’ll be fine!”

Leigh led the only slightly reluctant new mother up the stairs. The small room that had once been Leigh’s own was now outfitted with bunk beds for the grandchildren, so Leigh steered her guest into the sewing room instead, where they settled on a desk chair and a stool. “What’s up?” Leigh asked nervously, wondering why Maura hadn’t wanted to talk in front of Frances. The petnapping rumors were certainly disturbing, but the Koslow Animal Clinic wasn’t directly involved. Was it?

Maura let out a breath. “Do you know where Mason Dublin is?”

Leigh’s heart skipped a beat. This wasn’t the line of questioning she expected.

It did not bode well.

“I talked to him yesterday,” she answered, considering her words. Lying to Maura was pointless, but she was loath to get Mason in trouble, accidentally or otherwise. “He told me he was flying out to a pawnbrokers’ convention in Las Vegas.”

Maura’s face bore no expression. “That’s what he said?”

“Yes,” Leigh answered honestly, her anxiety rapidly increasing. “What’s this about?”

Maura watched her closely. “Do you know where he is, Koslow?”

Leigh swallowed with discomfort. “No. I don’t.”

Maura seemed disappointed.

“I repeat, what’s this about?” Leigh pressed.

“Hopefully nothing,” Maura answered, the muscles in her lower jaw working as they often did when she was thinking. “Look, you know I have nothing against Mason. I never have, even if he’s not so crazy about me. I’m not on the job right now and I’m not doing this in any official capacity, but I’d like to speak with him.”

Leigh tensed. “You want his number?”

“I have his number. He isn’t picking up. I was hoping you could convince him to call me.”

Leigh studied her friend’s earnest face. The situation was awkward, to say the least. Leigh was under no obligation to pass along any information about Mason, or any other family member. She did believe that Maura’s motives were good. But good for whom? “You’ll have to give me a little more to go on,” she requested.

Maura straightened. “Okay. A buddy of mine called this morning; said he wanted to catch me up on a few things before I came in next week. Clearly, he’s betting on the ‘Polanski will come back’ side.”

“Clearly,” Leigh agreed, smiling a little.

“So he was trying to whet my appetite,” Maura continued. “He gave me the rundown on a couple of cases, and Mason’s name came up. Mason’s not suspected of anything, but he might know something important. The Bellevue police have already talked to him; nothing I’m telling you is a secret. It’s just that he picked a really bad time to leave town. Whether the timing is a coincidence or not, it looks suspicious. They can’t order him to come back, not at this point. But I’d like to explain to him that he needs to tread carefully.”

Leigh breathed out slowly. “Does this have anything to do with the break-in at the apartment next to his? Cara told me they called her about that.”

Maura nodded. Her face took on a pained expression. “The occupant of that apartment has been MIA for a couple days now, which is a problem, because he’s wanted for questioning by the state police. Mason may have nothing to do with this guy’s disappearance, but they did know each other, which makes the whole business pretty damned messy. And potentially dangerous. Can you convince him to call me?”

“I don’t know,” Leigh replied. Although Mason had gotten used to Maura’s presence at family functions, his cop-avoidance instincts were still firmly ingrained. “I’ll try.” A heaviness arose in her middle that she knew she would not easily be rid of. Mason was definitely acting weird. Mason suddenly had money. If after all this time on the straight and narrow the man had fallen back onto the wrong side of the law, it would break his daughter’s heart. And Leigh’s.

Maura rose.

“Wait,” Leigh said, getting up herself. Did the police think that Mason had helped Kyle escape the law somehow? If so, they were wrong. She was certain that Mason hadn’t known Kyle would leave when he did. Mason had clearly been put out about the timing of his cat-care duties and hadn’t expected the bird at all. But she couldn’t explain that to Maura without breaking her promise to Mason to keep quiet about the pets.

What a mess.

She decided not to elaborate, at least not now. It would be better if she could convince Mason to talk to Maura himself.

The policewoman stood looking at Leigh expectantly.
Oh, right.
Leigh had been about to say something. She said something else instead. “Have you heard anything about the petnapping rumors? Skippy Titus certainly seems to believe them.”

Maura grimaced. “A lot of people do. The locals PDs are aware of what’s being said. But no one’s filed a complaint, so they’ve got nothing to go on.”

Leigh exhaled. “I see.”

With her mind full of thoughts, none of them pleasant, she accompanied Maura to collect the baby and then walked the policewoman back out to her car. No sooner were the mother and son down the street and out of sight than Leigh pulled out her phone and tried again to reach Mason.

Her call went straight to voice mail. Leigh left a second message, then walked back into the house with a sinking heart.

What the hell was the man up to? When he’d said Kyle had “people after him,” Leigh hadn’t thought he meant the law. She’d been thinking more along the lines of creditors. But why would Mason even bring up the ruse about a pawnbrokers’ convention? Could he be running from the law himself?

Leigh stubbornly dismissed the notion. When he’d awoken her before dawn, he hadn’t seemed like a man who was sweating over a pursuit by the police or anyone else. He had seemed like a man who was anxious to go somewhere, but was being frustrated by an unexpected nuisance: a.k.a., a neighbor’s pets. Once Leigh had said she would take care of the animals, Mason had acted downright chipper.

So where
was
he going?

She returned to her parents’ living room to find her mother staring at her with arms crossed and reading glasses removed. “Now,” Frances said crisply. “You can tell me what that was all about. What kind of trouble are you in this time?”

“I’m not in any trouble!” Leigh protested, knowing it was pointless. Never mind that she really wasn’t in any trouble. This time. She had given the same answer too many times before when it was… perhaps slightly less applicable.

“Oh, patoot!” Frances retorted.

Leigh sighed. Where was the kindly granny who’d been making goofy faces at little Eddie just minutes ago? “I’m
not
in any trouble, Mom,” she repeated. Then inspiration struck. “It’s just that there’s something pet-related going on in Avalon and Ben Avon.” She explained about the petnapping rumors and Skippy’s overzealous defense of her parrots. “But Maura says the police can’t really do anything until an actual crime victim comes to them,” she finished.

“I see,” Frances said thoughtfully. With one brisk motion, she replaced her reading glasses. “Well, we’ve got work to do. Well begun is half done. Spit spot!”

Leigh’s teeth gritted. She rued the day her mother had ever watched
Mary Poppins.

After what seemed like a hundred hours — but was actually more like six — Leigh was thrilled to hear the sound of car doors slamming out front. Cara was scheduled to deliver Randall back to the house, and she would have the entire Pack in tow. If Leigh was lucky, Cara would also bring along some sort of food for Leigh to microwave for her parents’ dinner.

“So, how did it go?” Leigh asked as she held open the door for her father to hobble inside. It took him a while. “It was frustrating,” Randall said tiredly. “But I’ll make it.”

“We took a bit of a spill on the steps outside the clinic,” Cara lamented, walking close beside him with both hands out. “I’m not very good at this, I’m afraid.”

“Nonsense,” Randall insisted. “I just lost track of my feet.”

They moved on through the door, and Leigh looked behind them. Lenna and the boys were waiting in the van, but Allison was standing on the porch holding the cockatiel’s cage. “Why do you have that? Aren’t we taking the bird back to our house?” Leigh asked, confused. The plan was for Allison and Ethan, along with the corgi, to spend tonight at Cara and Gil’s, since Leigh would be in West View and no one knew how late Warren might get home.

“Grandpa wants to watch him here,” the girl answered, walking inside.

Leigh closed the door and turned to see Cara helping Randall onto the edge of the inflatable bed. “You should lay down and prop those feet up,” Cara suggested, fetching pillows.

Frances’s eyes fell on the bird cage. “Ack!” she erupted, her finger wagging in Allison’s direction. “You leave that thing right there on the tile, young lady.”

Randall sighed. “I thought it would be best if I kept the bird here,” he said to Leigh. “I don’t believe there’s anything physically wrong with it, but having a strange cat and dog around could certainly be a stressor. A little more human activity, on the other hand, could be helpful.”

“Excuse me?” Frances protested, glaring at her husband. “Have I been consulted on this matter?”

“We’ve had birds before,” Randall reminded. “It’ll only be for the rest of the week.”

“The birds we’ve had before,” Frances said slowly, enunciating each word, “have scattered seed husks, feathers, and that deplorable dust throughout the entirety of our home. Which is why we no longer have any.”

Leigh looked anxiously from one parent to the other. She remembered well the insane schedule of vacuuming and dusting her mother had insisted on whenever they’d had finches or budgies in the house. When Leigh was very small, there had even been an Amazon that Frances herself had been fond of, despite its nasty tendency to bite anyone or anything that came near its perch. The bird had sealed its place in Frances’s heart by learning to screech “clean that up!” every time anyone dropped anything.

“It’ll only be for a few days,” Randall repeated calmly.

Frances continued to glare at her husband even as her hand reached for her clipboard. “I’ll adapt the cleaning schedule,” she said dryly.

Leigh and Cara exchanged a look of dread.

“I’m trying to reach the owner to come pick him up,” Leigh assured them all. “Hopefully it won’t take long.”