eb93c43e214c621f9157c05b4b6a6878

I must say she proved quite a hit. It may be the fact that she looks like a bird, and everyone knows that cats are very fond of birds. Or the fact that her sunny disposition was finally asserting itself, after the distressing time she had spent at the shelter. But she soon proved the life and soul of the party, to the extent that Dooley and I were relegated to the sidelines watching on as Windex became the center of attention and we… didn’t.

“I don’t know what to think about her, Max,” Dooley confessed.

“Me neither,” I said. “Is she a psychopath dropped in our home to destroy us? Or a sweet soul who’s going to make our lives more enjoyable? The jury is still out, I guess.”

“She does seem very different now than she was this morning.”

“She was fresh from the shelter, Dooley. She was traumatized.”

“So why do I have the feeling that soon she’ll be settled in our home and we’ll be in that shelter, Max?”

“Odelia would never do that.”

“I don’t know. Maybe Windex is right? Maybe dogs are better suited for when people have babies than cats? They are man’s best friend, after all. And we do have sharp claws.”

“I know. But we never use them.”

“I overheard Chase talking to Odelia about declawing the other day.”

I gulped in shock.“Declawing?”

“Yeah. He was asking her if it was a common practice.”

“It’s a very painful practice, that’s what it is. Bordering on the criminal.”

“It just goes to show, doesn’t it? That Chase and Odelia are concerned.”

“They’d never dump us at the shelter,” I repeated, but I realized even as I spoke that my words lacked the true ring of conviction. “Well, they just wouldn’t… would they?”

Chapter 13

At least the next day Odelia took us along with her and Chase to continue their investigation into the recent murders, so maybe she wasn’t thinking of replacing us with Windex just yet. Hard to conduct a murder inquiry from a kennel at the pet shelter.

And then of course there’s the fact that Odelia can’t talk to dogs, so the new acquisition wouldn’t perhaps be as useful to her as we have always been.

Something to consider as I still pondered our future fate.

Chase had made an appointment to talk to Dotty’s boyfriend Mitch Utz, who worked in the kitchen of The Bonny Piper, a popular restaurant. When we got there they were just getting started on lunch prep. The young man with carrot-colored hair and a florid complexion was due his first break of the day, and took us outside to have a chat. And ashe lit up a cigarette, he listened as Chase explained to him what it was exactly that his girlfriend did for a living.

“My God,” Mitch said finally, a deep frown of concern cutting a groove in his youthful brow. “A call girl? Are you sure?”

“You mean you didn’t know?” asked Chase.

“No, of course not. I thought she worked for a caterer.”

“She quit that job ten months ago,” said Odelia. “And started to work for Calista Burden. Though she also called herself Calista Dunne—her professional name.”

“Just like Dotty was also known as Dotty Berg,” Chase explained.

“I’m sorry, but this is all news to me,” said the young man. “She told me about the catering stuff. Even told me stories about her colleagues, about their customers, the jobs she did. Last week she told me about a wedding party they were catering. Her job was the reason she always had to work nights and why we hardly ever saw each other. I’m always here during the day, you see, and she mostly worked evenings, sometimes late at night.”

“You never noticed anything out of the ordinary?” asked Odelia. “The fact that she invited men to her apartment?”

“Strikes me as odd you wouldn’t have known about that,” said Chase. “When even the neighbors knew that the place was always full of strange men coming and going at all hours of the day or night.”

But Mitch stubbornly shook his head.“I swear she never told me anything about that.”

“So what did you fight about the day before yesterday?” asked Chase, deciding to take a gamble. “One of the neighbors heard you and Dotty. Said it sounded as if furniture was being thrown around.”

“That wasn’t me, sir,” said Mitch earnestly. “Must have been one of those other men.”

“When was the last time you saw Dotty?” asked Odelia.

He thought for a moment.“Must have been… a week ago? We were actually going to spend Monday night together.”

“The night she was killed?”

Mitch nodded.“Monday is my day off. We were going for dinner and a movie. But something came up. She had to leave early because one of her colleagues had called in sick. So she ended up bailing on me and I went to see the movie by myself.”

“What movie was that?” asked Chase casually.

“Turtle-Man 4. The new Marvel movie with Al Pacino and Meryl Streep.”

Just then, Mitch’s boss stuck his head out the door to see how much longer we were going to keep the kid, and Chase’s phone chimed and he reluctantly picked up.

“Do you believe him, Max?” asked Dooley as Chase talked into his phone and Odelia wrapped up the brief interview and offered Mitch her card.

“I’m not sure. He seems sincere enough.”