Cat Scratch Fever (11 page)

At least with Just and Dog he could relax about that. Next to them, he’d sound like one of those brainy public-TV guys.

‘So, what’s up? This ain’t your kind of cat house. They don’t have that kind of pussy here.’

That got them. He knew it would.

Once they stopped laughing, Just said, ‘We was looking for you. Your cell phone must have lost its buttons or something, so we went by your place and your mama said you were here.’

‘Phone’s dead. I gotta get a new one, but I put some moves on this geek girl at Best Buy and she said they’d have some sweet deals next week so I’m waiting.’

Actually the phone was fine. He just hadn’t called the guys back because…well, he really wasn’t sure why. Now that he saw them again, it seemed stupid. He’d missed them, even if they were asshats sometimes.

Dog looked around several times before he spoke. ‘Isn’t it about time for you to have a smoke?’

Lance had just about quit smoking – he couldn’t do it here, at school or at work and by now he’d almost stopped jonesing – but he got the point immediately.

‘Sure.’ He stuck his head through the gate. Mel wasn’t anywhere in sight, but Gabe was. (That guy was everywhere. What did he
do
, anyway? Right now he was helping with the plants, of course, but usually he was wandering around with a clipboard, looking busy but not actually working in any way Lance could recognise. Whatever it was, it left him with time to bug Lance about his plans for the future sometimes, like he was his social worker or something.) ‘Hey, if you see Mel, tell her I’m taking a ciggy break. I’ll be back in a few.’

He was gone before Gabe could react.

Instead of smoking, though, he headed down the street and climbed into Dog’s car with the guys.

‘So,’ Just said bluntly, ‘you want to help us on a job?’

He shook his head. ‘I don’t do jobs any more. Not while I’m on probation. It’s not worth it.’

‘It’s not stealing or nothing,’ Dog said quickly. ‘Just kid stuff – breaking shit, a little tagging. Stuff we used to do for fun, only we’re getting paid this time.’

‘How much?’ Money was tight. He’d like to move out of his mom’s place, but that took cash. And Mel wasn’t all about the bling, but girls always appreciated a nice dinner out, or real presents, not crap like the coffee mug from the Dollar Store he’d left on her desk the other day.

Just named a figure that sounded ridiculously large for what Dog had described.

Lance whistled. ‘And I’d get a third of that?’

‘Dude, that would be your cut!’

Forget taking Mel out to dinner. He could take her to Vegas for the weekend with that kind of cash and still have money left. (First he’d have to get her to agree, of course, but hey, she was single and he knew women liked his looks, and she’d been working hard and could use a vacation. Why would she say no?)

But something didn’t sound right. Lance hadn’t been a whiz kid in school, but money made sense to him. ‘Wait a minute. If all you’re doing is trashing some stuff, why do you need me? You’re less likely to get caught with just two guys and you’d make a lot more.’

Dog put his hand on Lance’s shoulder. ‘We miss you, man. We want you running with us again.’

‘And it’s no big deal. No stealing, no messing people up,’ Just emphasised. ‘Just wrecking stuff and spray-painting. Almost no chance of getting caught. It’s a nobrainer. We’ve done this a million times.’

‘Only when we’re done, we’ll get some sweet money.’

Lance thought hard. He kind of liked the straight life, not that he’d admit it to the guys – no looking over his shoulder all the time, no worrying about the cops or about stepping on the toes of someone a lot bigger and meaner than he was, and actually getting to meet people like Mel instead of just stealing their wallets – but being goddamn broke all the time was getting to him.

‘Let me think about it. I’ll call you later. But I’ve got to get back to work before they ask too many questions.’

It was tempting. Seriously tempting. But why would someone pay so much for kid-stuff like vandalism? And what weren’t the guys telling him?

Felicia called a meeting in the vet clinic – herself, José, Mel, and Alan. She checked outside the door before she joined the others, propping one hip on the examining table and trying not to think about the raucous sex she’d had on it less than a week ago. José sat on a metal rolling stool, and Mel had pulled out the desk chair and straddled it backwards. Alan stood in a corner, his expression serious; Felicia realised she rarely saw him sit when he was on duty.

‘No Katherine?’ José asked.

‘She’s got enough on her plate,’ Felicia said. ‘I want to reduce her stress, not add to it.’ She turned to Alan. ‘In no way am I questioning the work that you do – you’re fantastic, and you almost caught the bastards last night. But you’re only one man, and you can’t be everywhere on site at the same time.’

‘Could we get Brett to help out?’ Alan referred to the college student who covered for him two nights a week. ‘Not that I think he does much but hide in the office and do homework.’

‘We can’t afford to pay him for more hours, and he hasn’t been here long enough that we can expect him to just volunteer.’ She looked at all of them. ‘It’s up to us.’

‘I’m already staying on site to watch over Noelle and the cubs,’ José said. ‘They need a couple more days’ attention.’

‘Which is the best thing you can be doing,’ Felicia said. ‘If Mel and I also stay on site tonight, we should be able to patrol effectively.’

‘I’m in,’ Mel said firmly, a determined look on her elfin face.

José nodded, looking like he was about to say something, but then didn’t.

‘I’m not offended – I appreciate the help,’ Alan said. ‘I’ve thought about calling in some favours, but I know you don’t want word getting around that we have a problem.’

Felicia’s jaw clenched. She took a deep breath and forced herself to relax before she gave herself another tension headache. ‘It may be too late for that, but I appreciate the fact that you thought about it,’ she said, and the security guard flushed, ducking his head to hide a shy smile. ‘I want to keep things quiet – I don’t want anyone else to know that we plan to stay tonight,’ she said to the group. ‘I hate to say it, but we don’t know who we can trust.’

*   *   *

‘Who there is trustworthy?’ Tom asked.

Gabe scanned his surroundings before replying, making sure nobody was within hearing range. The tables in the centre of the Sanctuary green were perfect for keeping an eye on a fair radius, but not at all private, except for the fact that nobody could sneak up on him.

Christ. He sounded like a paranoid spy. A spy up to his eyeballs in shit – literally.

‘I don’t know,’ he admitted. ‘I haven’t been here long enough to do psych profiles on the entire staff, OK? Most of them seem to be on the up and up and to really care about the place, but anybody could be a good enough actor when I’m around.’

He’d seen a semi-furtive enclave gather in the vet clinic. At this point, as much as he wanted to believe the people inside were the good guys, he had no proof either way. They could be plotting. They could be having an orgy, for all he knew.

He forced his mind away from that before his body joined the mental party. ‘All I know is that there’s been vandalism, and they don’t have enough security to keep an eye on the whole place. Under normal circumstances, one or two people would be enough, but not now. Too much shit has been happening to be random, Tom.’

‘It’s not your job to play Superman,’ Tom said.

Gabe rubbed a hand over his face, surprised to feel his palm rasp across more than a five-o’clock shadow. Had he shaved that morning? He couldn’t even remember. Oh well. Women liked a roguish stubble, didn’t they?

‘I care about this place, too, Tom,’ he admitted. ‘Even if it’s not going to make it, it needs to be protected from vandals. I don’t want anything happening to the cats or to innocent staff members.’

Was Felicia part of that latter group? The question invaded his mind, not for the first time. She’d been secretive, evasive. Maybe it was just stress, or maybe it was just that he was considered The Enemy and she wasn’t going to admit problems with the Sanctuary unless she was forced to.

He might find out the answer tonight.

‘Don’t get hurt,’ Tom said. ‘And don’t get arrested.’

‘You’ll bail me out if I do, though.’

The vet clinic door opened, so Gabe ended the call, promising to call Tom again if anything major happened.

Now, all he had to do was find a way to get back in the facility after he made it obvious that he was leaving.

*   *   *

Katherine took them all out to dinner at a local Mexican restaurant where they often met after work for margaritas and chips and salsa. It made Felicia feel a little guilty for not telling her boss about their plan to stay on site, but she still felt it was for the best. If something went wrong, the blame wouldn’t fall on Katherine.

‘You’ve all been working so hard, such long hours,’ Katherine said, forestalling their protests at her paying for everything. ‘Overtime, coming in on your days off and today was really above and beyond the call of duty. I wanted to thank you all for that.’

The restaurant was crowded, unsurprising for a Saturday night. They were seated at a table in a far corner of the patio. Felicia realised they probably all reeked of sewer filth, even though they’d washed up before leaving the Sanctuary. Oh well, at least they were all in it together, so to speak.

Felicia sat as far away from Gabe as possible, not trusting her body’s reaction if she sat next to him or across from him, with the possibility of their thighs brushing together again, of their hands bumping when they both reached to scoop salsa with a warm tortilla chip. But with only six of them, including John from maintenance, ‘far away’ just meant they were at opposite corners of a small rectangular table, and she was still keenly aware of his presence.

He asked Katherine some probing questions about how people might be sneaking into the facility, whether more security might be needed, or at least a change in the way the area was patrolled – and what was that exactly? His questions seemed constructive, but they put Felicia on edge. What did he really want? And, worse, could he be responsible for the latest crises plaguing the Sanctuary?

Magnolia had escaped from her cage the night before Gabe had shown up on site (but he would have flown in the day before, so he was already in the area), and the rest of the vandalism and strange occurrences had happened since. He’d admitted to the temptation of causing problems at facilities that he couldn’t substantively prove should be shut down.

She didn’t want to believe he was involved. But she couldn’t shake the nagging suspicion prompted by his questions. Anybody she didn’t know well loomed as a suspect in her mind.

‘I really need a shower,’ Gabe said as they wandered out to the parking lot, pleasantly full and tired after a day of hard work and an evening of burritos and tacos. ‘I’ll see you all tomorrow.’

‘I’ll drop you off so you can pick up your car,’ José said to Mel, a plausible excuse because they had driven to the restaurant together.

Felicia offered to deliver the take-out they’d ordered for Alan, who’d obviously stayed on site. Katherine didn’t seem to notice anything amiss, and Felicia sighed with relief as she watched her boss’s car’s tail lights grow smaller in her rear-view mirror.

The Sanctuary was quiet and mostly dark when she got there. Only Alan’s truck was in the parking lot. The plan was that José and Mel would enter via the service entrance in the back, leaving their cars a few blocks away.

Felicia slipped inside, resetting the alarm for the front door and windows of the administrative building, and ducked into the ladies’ room. She’d worn black jeans, and now she changed from her grubby T-shirt into a black long-sleeved knit top. She braided her hair back, relieved that the foul smell was no longer near her face.

Speaking of which…She reviewed herself in the mirror. Her pale face was going to bob around like a disembodied ghostly head when she got outside. She had camo makeup somewhere in her apartment, bought on sale after Halloween and used once during sex games with a former boyfriend who had a minor Navy SEAL fetish. She’d decided against going home and getting the makeup now, though. If something did go horribly wrong and the police showed up, she’d look even guiltier with her face smeared with olive green and tan paint, looking like a terrorist.

She sighed. Her muscles ached and she was exhausted. What she wouldn’t give to go home and soak in a long, hot, jasmine-scented bath. Gabe’s comment about a shower had really killed her and not just because a shower sounded like the most amazingly wonderful thing in the world right now.

But no. They had vandals to catch, and a Sanctuary to save. Super sleuths didn’t have the luxury of long, hot, jasmine-scented baths (or long, lovingly detailed erotic fantasies) until the Bad Guys were behind bars.

‘Here I come, to save the day,’ she sang under her breath, and headed into the night.

She delivered Alan’s supper to him. The security guard had just done a complete circle of the area and found nothing amiss.

‘The cats are restless,’ she said unnecessarily, for he’d just been outside himself. ‘Something’s upsetting them.’

Pancho Villa, the oft-vocal panther, had started the noise, a low growl that you could feel in your bones, occasionally punctuated by a louder roar that made your teeth rattle. Pancho’s sounds were echoed by Brutus and Estella. It truly was a heart-stopping noise, especially at night when there was less of a sense that a sturdy enclosure separated you from the stunningly beautiful, but no less powerful and dangerous, panthers.

Then, Felicia had passed by the cheetah enclosure and Caramel had been pacing. That itself wasn’t unusual. What was disturbing was when the cat stopped pacing and stared past Felicia with a frightening intensity she usually reserved for small crawling children who might turn out to be a tasty snack if only they would come just a little closer, oh please oh please. Felicia had looked over her shoulder, but hadn’t seen anything. Caramel had excellent eyesight, so all it meant was that she was seeing something Felicia couldn’t.

‘They know when something’s not right,’ he said, unwrapping the foil from one end of the burrito. ‘I don’t think anyone’s out there – at least, not yet – but they know things haven’t been right for a while.’

‘I meant to ask you,’ Felicia said. ‘What happened to the wire cutters you found?’

He swallowed his mouthful of tortilla, beef, rice and beans, and said, ‘I gave ’em to a buddy of mine to dust for prints. He owed me a favour, and didn’t ask any questions. Don’t know how soon we’ll hear back, though.’

‘You rock, Alan,’ she said, and stood. ‘I have to check in with the others. You’ll be back on patrol soon?’

He glanced at the clock. ‘Inside of fifteen,’ he said.

*   *   *

Gabe turned off his rental car headlights, and coasted slowly into the Sanctuary’s parking lot. A lone street-lamp by the entrance walkway dimly illuminated two cars in the lot. He recognised the Cabriolet as Felicia’s; the truck probably belonged to Alan.

He drove out of the lot and parked around the corner within sight of the parking lot exit, and waited. After about half an hour, he was convinced Felicia wasn’t coming back out. There were any number of things she could be doing in there. And he was going to find out just what she was up to.

He left the car and hiked around to the back side of the facility. One of his tasks here had been to evaluate the security system, and he knew the service entrance wasn’t alarmed, because too many deliveries were made after hours. Besides, if someone wanted to steal something, they were more likely to try and break in through the front, where the computers and cash register were, rather than deal with the hassles of getting through the loading dock.

Despite the lack of alarm, the service door was solid metal and heavily locked.

He paused, listening. He heard some of the big cats grumbling. He sympathised; he could feel the tension in the air, too.

He reached into the inner pocket of his jacket and withdrew several long thin metal rods. There were times when his chequered past came in handy.

The lock was a tough one, but he was a patient man. His large hands were surprisingly nimble – something more than one satisfied bed partner had commented on.

Finally, he felt the tumblers shift deep inside the lock. He eased the door open and slipped inside. The room was dark, and he turned on a penlight, holding it between his teeth while he ensured the door was firmly locked behind him.

He took a quick survey of the cavernous, warehouse-like room. Cement floors, metal walls. Metal roll-up door for large deliveries, locked firmly in place. Van for transporting big cats or bulky supplies. A couple of transport cages, broken down flat for storage. Metal shelving along one wall, half-full of boxes.

His footsteps echoed as he crossed the area and slipped into the attached storage room. From there he exited on to the Sanctuary grounds, turning off his flashlight. The storage-room door came out near a long building that ran along the back of a row of cages. You could go inside that building and access each cage, via a door into the cage itself. From the reinforced door that went into the long building hung an industrial padlock. He grasped it and pulled. Solidly locked. Good.

Just to be on the safe side, he was going to check every damn last one of them.

*   *   *

‘See anything out of the ordinary?’ José asked. They’d agreed to meet in the vet clinic at hourly intervals to check in with each other, and it was time.

Felicia shrugged. ‘Nothing much. The cats are cranky, though.’

‘They’re not used to so many people here after – what was that?’

It had sounded like a clank, and then something or someone moving.

‘Maybe it was Alan.’ Mel didn’t sound convinced. ‘But I don’t think so.’

‘Mel, you stay here and be the point person,’ José said, grabbing a Maglite. Felicia pulled her own flashlight out of her pocket. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’ he asked. ‘You should stay here, too.’