Nina Wright - Whiskey Mattimoe 06 - Whiskey and Soda (24 page)

“You’re not. But no, I didn’t pawn it. I saved it. In memory of Leo.”

“Good. You can give it to Leah.”

There was an upside to Avery’s outrageous rudeness. If she had found Leo’s secret stash of marriage porn, she would have used it by now to blackmail me. I could cross that off my worry list.

“You’re not joining us for lunch, are you, Avery?” That was Chester’s question. He looked a little nervous for my sake that she might say yes.

“Hell, no. I got better things to do than hang out with Whiskey. MacArthur wants me to surf the web for honeymoon locations. We both love a good nude beach.”

I loved watching her walk away. Such a simple thing, and yet guaranteed to improve my mood. After Chester and I placed our lunch orders, I asked if he had known MacArthur was coming back.

“Sometimes you don’t know how or when something will happen,” Chester said. “But you just know it will. I always knew MacArthur would return.”

Our lunches arrived. We didn’t speak again until we had cleaned our plates. For the record, I did make Chester wash his hands before he ate even though there wasn’t much I could do about the cat fur all over his clothes. While he sipped a second glass of milk, I enjoyed a leisurely cup of herbal tea. Only then did we talk shop. Brady had called Chester about decrypting the flash drive, and my neighbor couldn’t wait to get started.

“It’s probably open-source encryption,” Chester said. “The easiest kind to crack. Something more complicated might take me a couple hours.”

“A couple hours? I expected you to say days.”

“Please, Whiskey. I aced the course, and got advance-placement credit at M.I.T.”

“Did your instructor know you were nine?”

“It never came up.”

Chester accompanied me back to the office, where he enjoyed chatting up my mom. Ever the little gentleman, he complimented her hair, her roses, and her smile.

“Aren’t you adorable?” Mom cooed. “Just wait until you’re old enough to date. Oh my, the ladies are going to love you.”

“The ladies already love me. I’m looking forward to attracting bad girls. It’s how a guy learns.”

After he left for the police station, Mom said, “I never told you this, Whitney, but I always wanted a son. Of course, there’s nothing feminine about you, so I almost got my wish.”

Odette the Good Agent was still out servicing clients. She had left Mom a message that she’d come in later to complete paperwork. She hadn’t left me a message, but, hey, I was just the boss.

I told myself this was as it should be. Now that Mattimoe Realty had an efficient office staff, there was no need for the top gun to track everything. Truth be told, I had never tracked everything, or even much of anything. I wasn’t a natural like Odette when it came to sales, but I knew how to leverage the local market, and I was a darned good closer. Adjourning to my office, I prepared to dazzle Pauline Vreelander. I would come up with a strategy for getting her a fine price fast.

When I heard the knock on my door, I was startled to see that almost two hours had passed. I hadn’t made a whole lot of headway. Mom stood in the hall, ready to leave for the day.

“Have a good time tonight, Whitney. More important, make sure Jeb has a good time.”

“He’s treating me,” I reminded her.

She gave me a look that made me want to check over my shoulder, just in case she had hired the Relationship Police to keep me in line.

After Mom left, I reviewed my Fresno Avenue notes one more time. Earlier in the day, I had called a few local residents whom I thought might like the house, and also a couple ambitious Realtors employed at other agencies. I wanted to start a buzz. The problem, of course, was that Christmas was a week away. Realistically, we couldn’t expect much action until after the first of the year. In that sense, Pauline Vreelander might have been smarter to take Bentwood’s cash. I suspected, however, that she just plain disliked the man and his school so much that she couldn’t accept his check.

After I delivered the paperwork to Pauline and told her about my sales strategy, I would retrieve my hound from the doggie sex farm. Hopefully, Abra would be exhausted after making whoopee with Napoleon all day. If Anouk were as pleased as I hoped, she might have even groomed Abra. Sleepy bitch. Sexually satisfied bitch. Clean bitch. What could be better? I would schedule a pet psychic session for Abra and Sandra just as soon as Anouk could put it on her calendar. Jeb and I were going to make everything work out for our dogs as well as ourselves.

An incoming text message from Jeb startled and confused me: Meet me @ Anouk’s ASAP

Uh-oh. Had Abra managed to take off with Napoleon again? Surely they were too tired to run. Besides, Anouk would have called my cell if that had happened. Wouldn’t she? Unless Anouk couldn’t call because something was terribly wrong.

Enough with the crazy-making speculation. I started my car and phoned Jeb. Maddeningly, the call went straight to his voicemail.

“I’m on my way to meet you,” I said and clicked off.

I just hoped that all the humans I cared about were safe. Jeb’s text message jarred my nerves. Add the fact that his phone was off, and things didn’t feel right.

What I found in the unlighted archery range parking lot caught me by surprise. The sun had set and faded, so the only illumination came from a pair of high-beam headlights aimed straight at me. They didn’t look like Jeb’s headlights or any headlights I knew, and it was impossible to discern the shape of the car or anything that lay beyond it.

I fumbled with my phone and managed to dial Jeb’s number again.

Voicemail.

“I’m here,” I said tersely. “In the parking lot at Anouk’s. Where are you?”

A door slammed. A dark form that could have been a man or a woman emerged from the driver’s side of the shadowy vehicle. If I’d been thinking, I would have simply moved my car so that my headlights exposed the other person. Instead, I did the most aggressive thing. I hit my high beams and leaned into the horn.

The shadow jumped. A dog jumped, too. Straight into the beam of my headlights.

It was Sandra Bullock, gargoyle angel. Dressed in a gauzy silver gown with sparkling wings and a glimmering halo, she froze like the proverbial deer. Her bug eyes shone blankly, reminding me of alien orbs. My ex-step joined the Frenchie in the blinding whiteness.

Shielding her own eyes, Avery bellowed, “Cut the lights. You’re spooking your dog!”

Leaning out the window, I suggested a compromise, that we both notch it down to parking-light level. Avery stooped to scoop up Sandra Bullock. The dog did a forward somersault right out of her grasp.

“Freakin’ Frenchie,” Avery muttered, collecting the beast on her second try. “I keep forgetting they’re front-loaded.”

After we’d both cut our engines and reduced our lights, we faced off in the lot, Avery holding Sandra.

“Where’s Jeb?” I said.

“You don’t know?”

“He texted me to meet him here. I thought it was an emergency.”

“Yeah, well, you might say that. Think about who else was here.”

“Anouk and Napoleon … and Abra. Abra! Oh no, don’t tell me—”

“I won’t,” Avery said. “It’s too much fun watching you guess.”

She stuck out her tongue and told me anyhow.

“Chester phoned me from the police station. I forget what he was doing there, but he said he wouldn’t need a ride home. Jeb was going to pick him up, and they were coming here to fetch Abra. So I came here to get Jeb’s signature on the waiver for Sandra’s photo shoot.”

“You didn’t have that yet?” I arched an eyebrow at her.

“I still don’t. Hey, it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission. Not my fault all hell broke loose when Abra saw Sandra.”

I cringed at the mental image of my Satanic sex fiend attacking Jeb’s little angel, who was dressed for the part. No doubt Abra ate her halo.

“So Abra tried to kill her?”

“After she tried to kill Napoleon for going gaga over Sandra. Abra rammed him so hard she rolled him right over. She attacked Sandra, but Jeb rescued her and asked me to hold her.”

In Avery’s arms, Sandra snort-snuffled. I thought she sounded smugly victorious. For Avery’s sake, I hoped she’d fart.

My ex-step said, “Abra charged Napoleon, and he took off running. They’re both gone.”

“Affies can outrun and outlast standard poodles,” I said.

“Yeah. Anouk’s worried Abra’s going to hurt him.”

“She should be worried. She should be very worried.”

By now I had sagged against Avery’s car, my strength ebbing. “Anouk, Jeb and Chester are out trying to find them?”

“Yeah, and good luck to ’em. Anouk took her bike. Chester went with Jeb in his car.”

At the mention of her master’s name, Sandra whined piteously, and it hit me, my latest epiphany. Avery Mattimoe was like Sandra Bullock, the French bulldog. Both were lumpy, ugly and yet inexplicably attractive to certain members of the opposite sex. Also, they both looked better when accessorized.

“Whose car is this?” I wondered aloud. I was leaning against an extremely expensive vehicle. A Bentley.

“Cassina’s. She keeps it for my use,” Avery said, her tongue flicking. “When MacArthur comes back, we’ll share it, and we’ll live in our own wing of The Castle. Working for Cassina is like a fairy tale.”

More like a circle of hell. Celebrities as spoiled and addled as Cassina invite chaos, and MacArthur would likely remain a man of many secrets. I couldn’t imagine Avery ever being content for long.

When I heard what sounded like a tiny bell, I assumed it was part of Sandra’s costume until I spotted the pinpoint of light coming toward us on the Rail Trail. A cyclist approached.

“I know where they are, and we will need my van!”

The French accent revealed her identity before she drew close. Anouk wasn’t upset, just slightly winded from her fast ride. I jogged alongside her up the path toward her house, which was barely visible in the night.

“Whiskey, wait!” Avery shouted from the parking lot. “What about the waiver for Sandra Bullock? What should I do?”

“Your job!” I yelled back.

Dismounting, Anouk assured me that both big dogs were fine.

“How about Jeb and Chester?” I said.

“Also fine, and with the dogs, not far from here. Jeb called my cell. He cannot transport them in his Z4.”

When I pictured the two humans wrestling the two canines into that tiny sports car, the Keystone Cops came to mind.

“The dogs will require crating,” Anouk said.

I had expected her to say “sedation.” Although I would have offered to transport Abra in my own vehicle, it lacked anything resembling a crate. I loathed the prospect of trying to drive while she bounced off every interior surface, so I rode shotgun in Anouk’s well-equipped van.

“Now that I have seen the interaction between Abra and Sandra, I understand your concerns,” Anouk said.

“They only have one kind of interaction,” I said. “Abra attacks Sandra.”

“Clearly, Abra feels a deep psychic conflict.”

“Really? I think she’s just jealous. All the boys love Sandra, including Napoleon.”

“It’s a French thing,” Anouk said.

“What is?”

“French bulldog, French poodle. Like French people, French canines are natural lovers. Free with their bodies and their hearts.”

“That also describes my Afghan hound, except she’s a thief and she wants to kill Sandra.”

“She was also furious with Napoleon tonight,” Anouk said.

She fell silent. I couldn’t tell whether she was pondering my dog’s many issues or concentrating on the dark highway. As near as I could tell, we were on County Road H heading into wine country. Anouk had said that the dogs weren’t far away.

“Where exactly are Abra and Napoleon?” I said. “I know Abra’s fast, but I don’t think she could have run all the way over here.”

Anouk drove on without speaking. I was about to pipe up again when she turned her van onto a gravel road and cut the engine.

“The dogs are here?” I asked.

I knew they weren’t. I knew I was in trouble.

“I brought you here because I need your full attention,” Anouk said. “I couldn’t get that with your obnoxious stepdaughter in the way.”

“Obnoxious ex-stepdaughter,” I said.

Anouk flipped on the overhead light, and I blinked. She held something out to me, something shiny and gold. A bangle bracelet almost a half-inch wide.

“Read the inscription,” she said.

I held the bracelet near the dome light, tilting it back and forth to find the optimal angle. Although my vision was keen, the engraved letters were tiny and difficult to decipher.

“Love … Gale. No, wait—Yale.”

Anouk said, “Does that mean anything to you?”

“Should it? What’s this about?”

“Whiskey, I believe that bracelet belongs to the person who killed Mark.”

I stared at the engraved gold bracelet.

“Where did this come from?”

“Abra found it when she took off with Napoleon. I saw her snatch something shiny from the grass where the archery range meets the Rail Trail, so I commanded her to drop it.”

“And she did?”

Amazing. Abra never surrendered sparkly objects on request.

“What makes you think it belongs to Mark Vreelander’s killer?” I said.

“I know who Yale is, and that narrows the field of suspects.”

Did it? I had never heard of anyone named Yale in Lanagan County, and I told Anouk as much. In response, she insisted on showing me what I needed to know. First, though, I insisted on seeing Jeb and Chester.

“They are fine,” she assured me. “The dogs ran to a barn on Uphill Road.”

“Jeb can’t put them in his Z4,” I reminded her.

“Which is why I called Robin to retrieve them.”

“You called Camo-Mom?”

Even after hearing Jenx’s story, I wasn’t sure I trusted Robin Wardrip any more than I trusted this woman, or any woman I’d met lately except Stevie McCoy.

“Camo-Mom?” Anouk was amused by the nickname. “Robin has two poodles sired by Napoleon and a big SUV with dog crates in the back. Plus, she owes me.”

I detested Anouk’s games and wondered if she were setting me up. But for what? If she wanted my dog, all she had to do was ask.