Catnapped! (4 page)

Monday

P
hil’s cell phone broke the silence following Margery’s bombshell. He checked the display.

“It’s Nancie,” he said. “The lawyer. Helen and I have to take this call. Sorry.”

“Go!” Margery said, waving them away. She seemed relieved to see Helen and Phil leave. Peggy used their departure to excuse herself. No one wanted to stick around for a postmortem.

Phil put his phone on speaker as he walked with Helen toward his apartment. “What’s up?” he asked Nancie.

“The kidnapper called with a ransom demand,” Nancie said.

“How much?” Phil asked.

“You know better than to ask that on a cell phone, Phil,” the lawyer said. “Detective Boland finally released Trish at four o’clock.”

“That late?”

“Exactly,” Nancie said. “He’s gunning for her. We need to meet. Now.”

Helen thought she heard an unspoken accusation, but it could
have been her own guilt. Her amateur mistake had set the Peerless Point detective on Trish’s trail.

“Trish is here at my office,” Nancie said.

“We’re on our way,” Phil said.

They stopped to feed Thumbs. Then, for the third time that day, Helen drove Phil to Nancie’s office. Crawled, actually. The highway was clogged with rush-hour traffic.

“How many disasters can we cram into one day?” Helen asked. “In the twelve hours since we’ve met our client, she’s become a widow and a murder suspect, and we’re homeless.”

“Don’t forget Margery’s long-lost ex showed up and she chucked him out,” Phil said.

“I’m still reeling from that news,” she said. “Some detectives we are, overlooking a mystery in our own backyard.”

“Why would we investigate a friend?” Phil asked. “Margery’s past is none of our business. The subject must have been too painful for her to discuss, even with us.”

“I understand that,” Helen said. “I don’t like talking about my ex, either. I just can’t imagine living anywhere but the Coronado.”

“Me, either.” Phil pointed to a new twenty-story condo on the corner. “Certainly not there, in a pink stucco shoe box with palm trees.”

“Didn’t that place sue some poor guy because he put up black curtains?” Helen asked. A yellow Hummer trying to make the light cut her off. Helen slammed on the brakes and the burly vehicle blew through the intersection.

“I don’t want to deal with condo commandos,” she said.

“Yep. The condo rules say all curtains have to be lined in white,” Phil said.

“I can’t live like that,” Helen said. “Besides, most condos don’t allow pets. We’d need to find a place for Thumbs.” She drummed her fingers impatiently on the steering wheel. “These red lights
last forever. No wonder that Hummer ran over me, trying to make it.”

“We could get a house,” Phil said. “That’s a nice one.” The sprawling ranch across the street was handsome. Its white tile roof glared in the heat, but the soft lawn was a cool green oasis. “Plenty of room for Thumbs. But I can’t see myself mowing the lawn.”

“Then we’d have to deal with a lawn service,” Helen said. “And hordes of repair people. Every time there’s a storm, we’d have to put up hurricane shutters.” She sighed. “We can’t leave the Coronado, Phil.” The light changed at last, and the Igloo crept forward.

“We don’t have a choice,” Phil said.

“I know. But Margery’s made our life there so easy. She manages the property and that gives us time to run our business. Now I feel like an orphan.”

“You still have me,” Phil said, and kissed her.

She smiled at her husband. “Yes, I do,” she said. “And my sister, Kathy, and her husband, Tom, in St. Louis. But the Coronado is the closest thing we have to a family here in Florida. Margery is my mother, Peggy’s my sister and Margery’s friend Elsie is our sweet, dotty old aunt. Once we move, it won’t be the same.”

“No, it won’t,” Phil said.

A sorrowful silence descended while Helen thought about the good times they’d had at the Coronado: the countless sunset salutes, Peggy’s schemes to win the lottery, Phil’s careful courtship and their triumphant wedding feast by the pool. It was painful to leave the scene of those good times for an uncertain future.

Helen was relieved when she turned into the lot for Nancie’s neat cube of a law office. Trish’s Mercedes was parked under the same palm tree and Nancie’s practical Honda was still near the back. The place looked the same as this morning, but now everything was different.

Inside, Nancie sat behind her desk, still fresh and energetic. Trish had changed dramatically. Her grim ash-gray pantsuit
matched the smudges under her eyes. She’d tucked her blond hair back into its chignon and put on fresh makeup, but she seemed frail and exhausted.

Her eyes were red from weeping. Helen didn’t know if she’d been crying over her murdered husband or her missing cat.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” she said, hoping that would cover either.

“Mort was a good man,” Trish said, sniffling. She reached for the box of tissues that Nancie kept next to the client chair. “He always wanted what was best for our baby. Even though we disagreed about everything, he put Justine’s welfare first so we could work out a custody agreement.”

She wiped her eyes. “Now I don’t know how I’m going to bring her up alone.”

Another tear storm threatened, and Nancie tried to hold it off. “We did get some good news,” she said. “The catnapper called, so we know Justine is alive.”

“Tell us about the call, Trish,” Phil said, his voice gentle.

“Well,” Trish said, then took a deep breath, “Detective Boland kept me at the police station for hours. Nancie wouldn’t let me say hardly anything, and that made him madder. He kept asking the same questions in different ways. When he finally let me leave, I was so tired I could hardly drive home. I’d barely unlocked my door when my cell phone rang.

“A voice said, ‘I have Justine. If you want to see her alive again, I need half a million in cash.’

“I said, ‘Please don’t hurt my baby.’

“The voice said, ‘I won’t if I get the money. But I’m no cat lover. If I don’t get five hundred thousand, she’ll go to the pound, and you know what they do to strays.’”

She was crying so hard, Helen had trouble understanding her.

“Trish!” Nancie said. “You have to pull yourself together. For Justine’s sake.”

“Yes, yes, you’re right,” Trish said, wiping her eyes. That left muddy mascara smears, but she was too distraught to notice.

“I told him it would take time to get that much money in cash—I’d have to sell some holdings—but I’d get the half million.

“He said, ‘You have until next Tuesday. Used bills. Nothing bigger than a twenty. Miss the deadline and Justine goes to the pound—and not one in Fort Lauderdale, where you can find her. She goes to a kill shelter.’”

Trish erupted into fresh tears.

“You keep saying ‘he,’” Phil said. “What did he sound like? Is the kidnapper a man? Young? Old? Educated?”

“He used a voice changer,” Trish said. “He had a Darth Vader voice. That made it worse. Besides, no woman would be so cruel to a helpless baby.”

A vision of Cruella de Vil flashed in Helen’s mind. She’d wanted 101 Dalmatian puppies to make a coat. Cruella was fiction, but real mothers beat their babies. Helen hastily banished that thought, as if Trish could read her mind.

She glanced at Phil, and he raised an eyebrow, but neither detective said anything. They both knew men and women could be cruel, but why add to their client’s distress?

“We’ll get her back,” Phil said. He sounds so comforting, Helen thought, and looks so strong and competent, Trish has to be reassured. “And if you decide to give the kidnapper money, we’ll get that back, too,” he said.

“I don’t care about the money,” Trish said. “All I care about is Justine. If you do find the money, you can have ten percent.”

A fifty-thousand-dollar bonus, Helen thought. Trish casually tossed in that staggering sum as if it were pocket change.

“There’s a way to mark the money that the catnapper can’t see,” Phil said. “SmartWater CSI. It’s a forensic coding system. A tiny dab on the money and it will fluoresce under UV black light. I can buy a kit for about two hundred dollars, if you authorize it.”

“It’s not like those dye packs they put in bags to stop bank robbers, is it?” Nancie said.

“Nope. SmartWater can’t be seen without a black light,” Phil said. “It’s been used in Britain for years.”

“No reason the bad guy should profit,” Nancie said. “Do you agree, Trish?”

Trish nodded.

Helen jumped in with another question: “Did the kidnapper give any details about what time and where you’ll make the exchange?”

“He said he’d call me the morning it’s due with the details,” Trish said. “He warned me not to contact the police.” She gave a delicate, ladylike snort, almost a dainty sneeze. “As if they’d do anything.”

“He doesn’t want you to make advance plans,” Phil said. “Helen and I will be with you that morning. We’ll stay the night, if you want. Did the kidnapper say anything else?”

“I tried to tell him what Justine eats and the brand of litter she uses, but he hung up on me.”

“Have you filed a police report for your stolen cat?” Phil asked.

“Why? They won’t look for her,” Trish said.

“Good idea,” Nancie said. “We’ll need it to claim the cat and go after the catnapper.”

“How do we prove it’s your cat?” Helen said. “Does she wear a collar and tags?”

“She’s microchipped,” Trish said.

“Good,” Helen said. “What is the kidnapper’s phone number?”

“He didn’t give me one,” Trish said.

“The number he called you from should be in your cell.”

“Oh. Right,” Trish said. “I didn’t think of that. Here. You look. I’m afraid I’ll hit the wrong button and wipe it out.”

She handed Helen her cell phone, and the detective checked the incoming calls list. “There’s a call at four seventeen p.m. today
with a 713 area code,” she said. “It’s your only call after you called Nancie at eleven fifty-six.”

“That’s a Houston area code,” Phil said. “Do you know anyone in that city?”

Trish looked puzzled. “No,” she said. “I don’t know anyone in Texas.”

“My guess is the catnapper’s cell phone is a throwaway,” Phil said. “To know for sure, we’d have to get the records from the cell phone company, which takes a court order or a subpoena.”

“Don’t you know a friendly cop who can check for you?” Trish asked.

“That only works in the movies,” Phil said. “The laws and department oversight have been tightened. Now cops risk their jobs for a stunt like that.”

“Let’s assume we have a sensible catnapper who used a burner phone,” Nancie said. “We have more important things to investigate. Find the kidnapper and you’ve got Mort’s killer.”

Trish melted into tears again. “Mort loved Justine,” she said. “He wouldn’t let anyone take our baby. He fought for her to the death.”

Murder has transformed Mort into a saint, Helen thought. We need some information before Trish completely canonizes him. “Who would want to kill your husband?” she asked. “Did Mort have any enemies? Maybe an unhappy client?”

“I don’t think any of his financial clients were unhappy. I didn’t understand the details of what he did, but he made lots of money.”

“What about his love life?” Phil said.

“Mort is—I mean, was—seeing two women. One is Jan Kurtz, an assistant for Deidre Chatwood. Dee breeds and exhibits prizewinning show cats—Persians. Her cattery is called Chatwood’s Champions. She’s had at least one national champion in the Gold Cup Cat Fanciers’ Association.

“Mort’s other girlfriend, Amber Waves, calls herself an actress,” Trish said, and sniffed. She wasn’t crying, she was sneering. “Some career. She had a scene as an extra in the movie
Rock of Ages
with Tom Cruise. That was filmed in Fort Lauderdale, you know. Amber was in the pole-dancing scene.

“Two seconds of show business went to her head. Now she wants to open her own studio. She tells everyone, ‘Pole dancing is a respectable fitness workout, and I’m an actress. Did I tell about my scene with Tom Cruise?’ Whether you want to hear it or not, she’ll give you the details.”

“Is Amber Waves her real name?” Phil asked.

“Nothing on that girl is real,” Trish said.

“Mort was also giving financial advice to an important cat show judge, Lexie Deener. He thought it would help Justine win in the big Gold Cup Cat Show. I said Justine would win without bribes, but he insisted, and I figured it couldn’t hurt. Mort knew money. Besides, if Justine does lose when that woman judges her, well, I’ll be able to appeal her decision.”

Do cat shows work that way? Helen wondered. Now wasn’t the time to ask.

Trish lowered her voice. “Mort said he knew a major secret—a very damaging secret—about Lexie, but he wouldn’t use it.”

“What kind of secret?” Helen asked.

“He wouldn’t tell me. For all his faults, Mort wasn’t really a bad guy.”

“Was he keeping it in reserve, in case his financial advice went bad?” she asked.

“Mort didn’t give bad advice,” Trish said. “He almost never failed. That’s why people fought to be taken on as clients.”

Phil tapped his cheek, a signal he was asking a tough question.

“And who are you seeing?” he asked.

“Why is that important?” Trish hissed. Helen expected her to swipe at Phil with her pink claws.

“An attractive woman like yourself might incite jealousy. It’s important to know about your life as well as Mort’s if we’re going to save Justine.”

“I can’t see why you need to know, but I’m dating an attorney, Arthur Goldich,” she said. “But only after my husband moved to our other residence. Everyone likes Mort and he’s successful, but an attorney has more prestige.”

She’s said “attorney” twice, Helen thought, and that so-called prestige is debatable.

“What kind of lawyer?” she asked.

“Arthur specializes in foreclosures.”

“Oh,” Helen said. After Florida’s real estate tanked, foreclosure lawyers were as prestigious as roaches.

Trish heard her disapproval. “Don’t believe what you see on TV,” she said. “The media likes to show veterans and old people getting thrown out of their houses. The truth is, most people who lose their homes are gamblers, flipping property for profit. Arthur says they should honor their financial commitments.”