CELEBRITY STATUS (The Kate Huntington mystery series #4) (23 page)

            Cherise fell into step with her. “I wanted to tell you how sorry I am for all the stress you and your family went through because of the stupid press thinking Skip was my boyfriend. And then they were chasing after you and Rob Franklin. I’m kind of used to the fools, but that must have been horrible for you.”

            “Thank you for your concern, but you don’t need to apologize. You didn’t cause the problem. As you say, the press jumped to conclusions.”

            “Well, I’m glad you don’t hold it against me,” Cherise said.

            They had reached the corner. Kate stopped, waiting for the walk signal. She held out her hand to Cherise. “It was good seeing you,” she said.

            Cherise smiled as she shook Kate’s hand. “Likewise,” she said. “You take care–”

            Suddenly Kate was flying out into the street, right into the path of a taxi speeding toward the intersection. Someone grabbed her arm, yanking her back. Scrambling to keep her feet under her, Kate tripped on the curb. She came down on the sidewalk, landing on her right side. Pain shot up her arm.

            Kate looked up into two pairs of worried eyes, one set blue, the other brown. “Are you okay?” a man’s voice asked.

            “I don’t know. I think so. What just happened?”

            Cherise and the owner of the brown eyes, an elderly gentleman with a thick thatch of white hair, carefully helped her to her feet. “People were pushing and shoving behind you,” Cherise said. “I saw you starting to fall and this gentleman grabbed your arm.”

            The gentleman in question introduced himself. “Anthony Vinzant.”

            Kate extended her right hand, then winced as Mr. Vinzant shook it. “Kate Huntington,” she managed to get out through gritted teeth. “Thank you, sir.”

            “Are you sure you’re okay?” her rescuer asked.

            Kate assessed the damage, as pedestrians continued to surge around them. A few paused for a moment to stare, but most were too intent on getting home on a Friday evening to care about a woman dripping blood on the sidewalk.

            Her jacket sleeve was torn.
Damn!
It was her favorite suit. She flexed her fingers, then carefully bent her arm at the elbow. “I don’t think anything is broken.”

            “You’re bleeding. We need to get you inside and clean that up.” Cherise tried to herd her back toward her building.

            Kate resisted. She just wanted to go home. “It’s not a big deal, just a scrape,” she said.

            “Well, if you’re sure you’re okay,” Mr. Vinzant said. Kate nodded, then thanked her rescuer again.

            “Let me walk you to your car, at least,” Cherise said.

            There was no way Kate could graciously refuse. As the light changed, she and Cherise joined the pedestrians flowing across the street.

            “Uh, Kate, the sidewalk
was
really crowded,” Cherise said, once they’d stepped up on the opposite curb. “But it looked like a man standing behind you pushed you intentionally.”

            “What? Why would he do that?” Kate turned to the left, toward the parking lot where her car was parked.

            “I don’t know, and maybe I’m wrong. It did all happen pretty fast.”

            “What did the guy look like?” Kate asked.

            “I only got a quick impression before he turned away, and then I was focused on you. He was on the tall side, thin. I think he was wearing a tee-shirt. I didn’t see his face. Wait a minute.” Cherise stopped suddenly in the middle of the sidewalk, causing a mini traffic jam. “That’s odd. He had a knit cap over his hair, pulled almost down to his eyes.”

            “That is odd for this time of year,” Kate said, moving forward again.

            Cherise fell in step with her. “It was all so quick, more impressions than anything else. I might be completely wrong. Maybe the guy got jostled himself and bumped into you by accident. Never even realized he’d knocked you off the curb.”

            Kate stopped at the entrance to the parking lot. “Well, it was good seeing you today.” She reached out her left hand to shake Cherise’s. Her right arm was beginning to throb.

            “You too. Take care.” Cherise squeezed her hand, then turned and headed back up the block.

            It never occurred to Kate to wonder where the young woman’s bodyguard was.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

            Despite the delay, Kate still beat Skip home.

            When he came in the door and saw his wife sitting on the sofa, her arm wrapped in gauze with an ice pack on her elbow, he moved quickly to her side. “What happened?”

            “I got jostled in the crowd waiting to cross the street after work and fell on the sidewalk.” She had decided not to tell Skip how close she had come to becoming a taxicab’s hood ornament. She had already dismissed Cherise’s belief that the man behind her might have pushed her on purpose, coming to the conclusion that the young woman had a lively imagination.

            “I just scraped my arm and banged up my elbow a bit. It’s not as bad as it looks. The kids insisted on helping me bandage it. They got a little carried away.”

            Skip chuckled when he took a closer look at the gauze. “How many rolls did they use?”

            “Two. They started fighting over the first one so I had to give each of them a roll. It’s a little hard to play referee one-handed. Uh, would you sit next to me at dinner tonight? Otherwise, they’re going to insist on cutting my food for me and maybe even feeding me.” Kate grimaced.

            Skip laughed out loud as he gently wrapped his arms around her, bulky bandage, ice pack and all. He kissed her, decided she tasted good and kissed her again. Then he held her tenderly against him, burying his face in her hair. She rested her cheek against his shirtfront and sighed, letting the tensions of the long and crazy day drain out of her. The sound of children squabbling in the kitchen finally penetrated their little bubble.

            Skip escorted his wife into the kitchen, then distracted Edie from tormenting her brother by recruiting her to help set the table. “So other than that, how was your day?” he asked Kate.

            “Ugh, I don’t even want to talk about it, I’m just glad it’s over. Hey, you’ll never guess who I ran into today. Your famous client.”

            “What the... H,” Skip caught himself.

            “Whada H,” Billy sang out from where he was playing with his cars on the floor.

            “Skip!” Maria scolded as she brought the last of the dishes of food over.

            Skip looked chagrined. Kate grinned. “Why is it they
always
repeat the words you
don’t
want them to learn?” she said.

            Skip shook his head and grinned back at her. “So what was she doing there?”

            “She said she just happened to be in the area. She was actually there when I fell. She and an elderly gentleman helped me up.”

            Skip started to take his seat, then veered over to sit in Edie’s usual spot. “You sit in Daddy’s chair tonight, Pumkin, so I can help Mommy, okay?”

            “Okay, Daddy.”

            “I say blessing,” Billy yelled.

            “Not so loud, son, but okay, go ahead,” Kate said.

            “Godz great, Godz good, now I lay me down to sleep. Amen!”

            “Wrong prayer, dummy,” his sister informed him.

            “Never mind, Edie, he’s only two,” Kate pointed out.

            “Two an’ half,” he insisted.

            “I stand corrected.”

            “So where was Ben?” Skip asked, as he cut up her chicken breast for her.

            Picking up her fork awkwardly in her left hand, Kate said, “I didn’t see him around. I’m sure if he’d been with her, he would have come running when I fell.”

            Skip caught the expletive before it made it to his lips. “What’s she doing going around town without him?”

            “Maybe she’s getting tired of constant company. Ben’s a sweetheart but he was starting to get on my nerves a couple weeks ago,” Kate said.

            Skip was making a mental note to call Ben after dinner, when his phone beeped in his pocket, indicating a text message had been received. He pulled it out and looked at the screen. It was from Rose.
Ben says client slipped leash this afternoon. Home safe now.

            He stifled another expletive, then shook his head. Turning the phone so Kate could see the message, he said, “I’ve had this happen a few times before. Why is it someone would pay for a bodyguard and then ditch them?”

            Kate shrugged. “Everybody needs alone time but introverts need it more than most people. Being around others all the time drains them.”

            Skip gave her a funny look. “Cherise is an introvert?”

            “Yes, I think she is, somewhat at least, but her profession forces her to be more outgoing. That’s probably why she bought the farm and cherishes her privacy there so much. It’s where she recharges her batteries.”

            Skip shook his head again, then changed the subject. “We think we know who’s been sending the notes and packages. Another former boyfriend. We can’t prove anything, although a good police interrogator could probably break him in about ten minutes. I threw a little fear of God into him this afternoon, hopefully, until we can talk to her about pressing charges.”

            “You didn’t...” Kate stopped, not wanting to say “hit him” in front of the children.

            “Oh, no. I just stretched.” Skip demonstrated, lifting his arms high above his head and arching his back until his muscular chest almost popped the buttons off his shirt. Kate snickered and the kids giggled. Maria had no clue what they were talking about but she smiled at her happy little family.

            “Then I said, in my best Texas drawl, ‘Y’all be good now, boy, ya hear.’ Not sure about the last note, but I’m pretty sure he’s our culprit up through the dog.”

            “Dog?” Edie said. “Did somebody get a doggie?”

            “No, it was just a stuffed one,” Skip ad-libbed.

            “Time for a change of subject, I think,” Kate said. “But I did want to mention that Cherise was particularly nice today.”

            “Oh yeah?” Skip asked as he held up the bowl of wild rice. Kate nodded and he spooned a second helping onto her plate.

            “Yeah, and I’m not sure what that means. I could have been too hasty with the narcissism label. Someone in her position, who’s being catered to all the time, might naturally become more self-centered, and that would get worse under stress.”

            Skip nodded. “I met with her earlier today. She was much calmer, and saner, than I’ve seen her in awhile. She even apologized for, uh, some things.”

            “What things?” Kate asked.

            Okay, now it was definitely time for a change of subject. He wasn’t about to tell Kate that Cherise apologized for implying his wife wasn’t attractive. He just tilted his head in the direction of the kids. “I was thinking we should do something tomorrow as a family. Any ideas?”

            “Has to be something I can do one-handed, or one-armed rather. This elbow’s probably going to be pretty sore for a few days.” They finally settled on a drive out Cromwell Bridge Road to the park next to Loch Raven Reservoir.

            “Good,” Skip said. “We can consider it a little celebration. I think this lousy case is finally coming to an end. But I need to talk to you some more about our suspect, once little ears are bedded down.”

            After dinner, Maria said she would supervise baths, something their mother usually did. Kate offered a feeble protest, since Maria was theoretically off duty. The nanny just arched an eyebrow in the direction of Kate’s bandaged arm and then shooed the children toward the stairs.

            Once they were out of earshot, Skip said, “Remember you said this guy could be a full-blown psychopath?”

            “Yes.”

            “Well, I’m trying to figure out if he is or not. Some of the things Cherise told me about him would fit. But he didn’t really strike me that way when I was with him today. I dealt with my share of psychopaths, when I was a state trooper. They were a lot more ruthless and nasty than this guy seems to be.”

            As he cleared the table, Skip gave her a summary of what Rose had found out and his conversation with Cherise. Kate joined him at the sink and rinsed dishes one-handed, while he loaded the dishwasher and told her about the confrontation with Thompson.

            “This guy may have been fairly bright once upon a time, but his brain isn’t firing on all cylinders now,” Skip concluded. “I find it hard to believe he’s got it together enough to sneak onto the farm and kill the cat, or get into Cherise’s dressing room with that bouquet.”

            “Three things to keep in mind,” Kate said, as she handed him the last plate. “One, antisocial personality disorder, like all disorders, is on a continuum–that’s the official diagnostic label, by the way–so he may be pathological enough to hurt animals but not be as blatantly aggressive as the guys you’ve encountered before.”

            Skip started the dishwasher and they went back over to sit at the table.

            “Second, as I mentioned before, psychopaths can look quite normal. And third, his level of lucidity would vary, based on how many and which kinds of drugs he has in his system at any given time.”

            Skip grinned at her. “I love it when you talk psychobabble. It’s so sexy.”

            She gave him a mock scowl, then returned his grin.

            “I’m gonna add psychological consultations to Cherise’s bill, by the way,” Skip said. “So you think Thompson could have antisocial personality disorder?”

            “If this is an official consultation, let me make sure of what I’m saying.” Kate got up and went into the study to retrieve a thick, gray-covered volume from a shelf. Carrying it awkwardly to the table in one hand, she plopped it down and leafed through the pages.