Read Angel Sleuth Online

Authors: Lesley A. Diehl

Tags: #General Fiction

Angel Sleuth (7 page)

BOOK: Angel Sleuth
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Dear Kaitlin,

I didn’t know what to do with this, so I thought, since you’re now doing Leda’s column, you would. I worked the ambulance the night she died and noticed something in her hand when we put her on the gurney. It must have slipped onto the floor of the ambulance because I found it there at the end of my shift, and we didn’t have any other transports that night. If I gave it to the hospital authorities, it might get lost. I thought you could get it to her family. It clearly meant something to her. Thanks.

Tom

Tom had taped a gold cross on a broken chain to the bottom of the note. The chain seemed heavy to be a woman’s, but maybe it belonged to Leda’s husband or father. She placed the note and cross back in the envelope and slipped it into her pocket. She’d introduce herself to nephew Will and give it to him. And she’d take Brittany’s suggestion and set up an appointment with Toliver to tour ARC after dinner this evening. But now she needed to get home and work on her manuscript.

* * *

She stared at the blinking cursor on the blank page. While the thought of advice letters and missives telling of thefts at ARC tickled her curiosity, the idea of buzzards in children’s books made her tired. Maybe she’d chosen the wrong animal to write about this time. She yawned. A little nap before dinner and her visit to ARC, then she’d come home and dedicate the entire rest of the evening to her wrinkly-headed avian heroine.

When she awoke from her nap and headed down the stairs to prepare dinner, she noticed an odd odor and it got stronger as she entered the kitchen. She pushed open the door and sniffed. It smelled definitely barnyard-like. She strode to the message board and read a note from Mary Jane saying she and Jeremy had gone to pick up “necessary supplies,” whatever those might be. Next to it was another message, this one from Jeremy:

“Meet Desdemona. She’s little now, but she’s still growing.”

Something warm and hairy pressed against her leg and she looked down. The critter looked up at her with big black eyes surrounded by the longest eyelashes she’d ever seen. Bristles of hair covered its long nose.

She tore Jeremy’s note off the board and sighed. “You could use a wax on that face, Desdemona,” she said.

The animal gave forth a reply somewhere between a squeal and a grunt. Desdemona, the potbellied pig, had moved in.

Chapter 7

“Now what have you gotten us into, Jeremy?” Kaitlin asked herself.

Desdemona rubbed on her leg and looked longingly at the fridge.

“And she’s hungry. Now what do I do?” The pig shoved herself against Kaitlin’s leg once more, this time aggressively enough to knock her off balance.

“All right. All right. I’ll get you something.”

She wasn’t certain what pigs ate but surmised she couldn’t go wrong with cooked beans, squash, corn, and a fresh salad for dinner.
Where were Mary Jane and Jeremy? They should be back by now.

“You know, Mary Jane assured me the animals were Jeremy’s responsibility. But here I am cooking dinner for a pig.” Desdemona grunted and looked up at her, then sat on her foot. “And talking to you, too.”

Kaitlin dumped the canned vegetables into a large dish on the floor, and tossed in some lettuce leaves, a chopped up tomato, and a sliced cucumber. No dressing. Desdemona seemed pleased with the offering, snorting and burping her way through the meal.

She watched the little porker work the dish around the floor with her snout and wondered how offended she would be if they continued to serve meat at meals.

* * *

“Well?” Kaitlin asked. Mary Jane and Jeremy had returned to the house laden with bags of fresh vegetables and huge sacks of something smelling like cow meal.

“I apologize. It took us longer than I thought. We had to go to the feed store to check on food for Dessie… Isn’t she just a honey? And then we decided the best way to feed her was to find over-date vegetables, and there weren’t many at the Shop Mart so we went up the road to…”

“That’s not the issue. Well, not the only issue. This pig has to be the one I read about in one of Leda’s letters. How did you find out about her, Jeremy? Snooping into my work?”

Jeremy turned from petting Dessie, and a red flush worked its way up his neck and onto his cheeks. When he spoke, his voice was high-pitched and squeaky with barely controlled anger.

“I didn’t snoop. I wouldn’t do that. The woman who wrote about Dessie returned your call to her today, and Mom and I went out to pick up Dessie so she wouldn’t get hurt.”

Kaitlin felt like a fool. She had put in a call in response to the letter, and when she got no answer, she left a message on the answering machine with her number and a request for a callback.

“I’m so sorry, Jeremy. I shouldn’t have accused you. I know you’d never snoop in my things.” All of Kaitlin’s determination to order them to remove the pig was replaced by her embarrassment. The look of ecstasy on Jeremy’s face as he hugged the pig to him made it impossible for her to say anything more.

She recovered from her well-deserved distress, and said, “I fed her already. There’s more of the same if we want to join in.”

* * *

Dessie’s stomach seemed bottomless, so they gave her all the leavings from dinner.

“I’ve got an appointment at ARC,” said Kaitlin. They were finishing up the dishes.

“I know you don’t really want a pig in here, but thanks for being so understanding,” said Mary Jane. “We had to rescue her before she became
petit jambon
where she was living.”

“Kidnap her, did you?”

“Kind of. With the help of the woman who wrote the letter to you. She said she’d clear it with the pig’s owner next door. She didn’t think the owner would care much. He said he wanted to give the pig away.”

“Well, she’ll be a help around here, eating all the table scraps,” Kaitlin said.

Jeremy had taken Dessie up to his room to introduce her to the other animals there. She’d already met Hester who’d hissed at her, then made forays from under the couch to smell the pig and dash back into hiding.

Instead of setting up the coffee after dinner, Kaitlin opened the back door, several storage bags in her hand.

“What have you got there?” asked Mary Jane.

“Oh, shh, don’t say anything to Dessie. It’s the bacon and pork chops we had in the freezer. I’m putting them into the garbage.”

* * *

Floyd Toliver, a short man with a narrow face that seemed not to fit his round body sat behind a desk whose surface was bare with the exception of a bottle of Maalox. One hand gripped the bottle tightly, but let go of it when Kaitlin entered. He swept the bottle into the drawer, and cleared his throat. “Have a seat.”

He reached over the now bare surface, offered Kaitlin his hand, and gestured to a chair. She thought his manner toward her just missed being unfriendly, but then, he was the director of one of the most prestigious senior facilities in the state and the death of his ombudsman put him in a pickle. And pressed by the state to replace her, she knew he had to be desperate to choose someone as untrained as Kaitlin for the job.

She felt almost invisible in the room. He made no eye contact with her and had the annoying habit of closing his eyes and quivering his eyelids when he spoke. She was used to men feeling uncomfortable when she towered over them as she did Floyd Toliver. Sitting usually took away the threat, yet Toliver continued to twitch his eyes and move his hands at random over the desk top even after she sat. She wished she were home with the pig, who paid her attention, even if it was aimed at extracting another meal from her.

“For the time being you can just come and visit for a few hours several times each week, get to know the residents. The staff here will be helpful in introducing you around. You won’t see much of me. Busy, busy, you know.”

His high-pitched laughter, almost a giggle of hysteria, sounded forced. His fidgety-widgity manner made him one of the most annoying men she’d ever met. With the exception of her husband, of course.

“Let’s just give you the ten cent tour for now. When you come back here, you can spend as much time as you like in all the areas.” He sprang from his office chair and beckoned her to follow, setting a pace down the corridor that was impressive for a short guy.

“We have apartments for those wishing to live independently. They pay for meals in our dining room only if they wish to dine there.” He hustled her down a hallway leading off to the right from his office. One of the doors in the corridor was open, and they stuck their heads into a small living space.

“As you can see, there’s a full kitchen, attached dining and living areas, bath and separate bedroom.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the apartment before she had a chance to greet the occupant, who sat smiling on her couch. Kaitlin returned her smile, waved, and chased after Toliver.

“Dementia and Alzheimer’s wings are over there.” He flapped an arm toward a corridor on his right.

“Depressing,” he said.
What a curious comment from the facility’s director.
His hand in the small of her back propelled Kaitlin down yet another hallway.

“And these are private or shared rooms. All the residents here take their meals in the dining room. Oh, right. I haven’t shown you the dining area yet, have I? How forgetful of me.”

He turned and began a dash back toward his office. Kaitlin waved at residents as they hurried past.

“Mr. Toliver.” She grabbed at the back of his suit jacket as they raced around a corner. “Could we just stop a minute? I have a few questions for you.”

“Like what?” His tone seemed to express irritation that she had interrupted his tour, and she caught a note of defensiveness in it.

“Like what’s with all the animals?” In their marathon run through the hallways, she had noted residents holding cats, birds chirping, and a man walking a dog past Toliver’s office.

“The doctor who founded this place had some crazy notion that animals were good for the elderly.” He drew a handkerchief out of his jacket pocket and wiped his sweaty forehead.

“It certainly is noisy in here. Sounds like everyone is having a lot of fun. I was expecting something, well, something less happy, but this, well, this is just…wonderful.”

“Glad you like it.” His facial expression said he couldn’t care less if she liked anything about the place.

“Don’t you? I mean, aren’t you proud to be associated with this place? I heard it was state of the art, but I never guessed how impressive it was,” she said.

“Thank you.” He matched his words with the smallest of smiles. “But we have extra worries with all the animals. Cleaning for one. And the paint color, of course. It would be cheaper to use institutional grey and who would notice?”

“I’ll bet Desdemona would love it here.”

“A relative? We have a waiting list, you know.” He once again grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the dining area.

As they approached the dining room, she observed the entire west wall was made of glass. Because the founders of the facility located it on the highest point overlooking the town, the view from those windows had to be breathtaking during the daylight hours. And sunset dining? Almost better than any four star restaurant.

Tonight the tables were moved back against the other wall. A small woman with bluish-white hair played the piano and a few couples danced to a foxtrot.

“How about picking it up a bit, Lily?” asked one man from across the room.

Lily ended the song and nodded at the man’s suggestion. Her hands hovered over the keys for a moment, then her fingers picked out a rock and roll tune. The man who suggested the change in music spied Toliver and Kaitlin from across the room and approached. He threw his arm around Kaitlin and swung her onto the dance floor.

“C’mon, young lady. Let’s show ’em how to do it.” He grabbed her hand and began the jitterbug. She stumbled into the moves, then caught his rhythm and whirled under his arm. It had been a long time since she’d danced with anyone this skilled. They ended their dance to the applause of the onlookers. Everyone seemed delighted at the performance, with the exception of Toliver who stood at the back of the room staring at his shoes.

“The name’s Paul, Paul Lamb.”

“Kaitlin Singer.” They laughed and shook hands.

“Lived here long?”

“My wife and I moved in four years ago. I lost her to lung cancer just this past year.”

“I’m sorry for your loss.” They both paused to look out the windows. Only the lights of the town below were visible.

“But it’s a wonderful place to live. I have my own apartment. And I’m pretty busy here. Tennis, golf, swimming, and I love to dance.”

I’ll bet you have no lack of partners, she thought, taking in his tall frame and angular features. Her eyes wandered to his abundant white hair. He caught her glance and blushed.

“I’m growing it out from a crew cut. What do you think?”

“Good.”
Better than good
.
You won’t have a moment to yourself with all the women buzzing around.

“You’re kind of young to be here, aren’t you?” he asked.

She laughed and explained to him she would be filling in as an ombudsman until the Office for Aging could appoint a permanent one.

“I’d love to talk with you sometime when I visit to get a sense of how this place is perceived by the residents.”

They agreed to meet on Monday afternoon for a cup of tea in the dining room.

Kaitlin waved good-bye to him and the others and joined Mr. Toliver.

“You made quite an impression,” Toliver said. She was getting accustomed to the scowl on his face. This one said he thought she’d overstepped her bounds.

“Sorry if I was out of line, but who could resist Paul’s charming invitation?”

“Watch out for that old codger. He’s nothing but trouble around here.”

Toliver hurried her down the hall. As usual. The tour of the facility was over. He shook her hand and reminded her to get in touch with the Office for Aging for her brief training as an ombudsman, then turned abruptly and headed for his office. As Kaitlin turned toward the exit, she felt a small boney hand grab her arm. Lily, the piano player, smiled up at her.

BOOK: Angel Sleuth
2.75Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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