A Familiar Tail (28 page)

“Yeah, I've heard.” I rubbed Alistair's ears. My head was spinning, and for once, the coffee and the cat weren't helping clear anything up.

“This whole mess revolves around five people,” I said slowly. “Dorothy, Frank, and Brad. Ellis and Elizabeth.”

“And now two of them are dead.”

“Yeah.” I shivered. “But that's not the question. The question is, Which of them were working together? Was Dorothy working with Brad? Or was Brad working with Elizabeth, and Dorothy found out about it?”

“Or was Brad working with Ellis, and Dorothy found out and ratted them out to Elizabeth?”

“Yeah, there's that possibility too.”

“Or Ellis found out Dorothy and Brad were involved in Elizabeth's fraud, and killed them to keep them quiet.”

“I don't like that idea,” I whispered.

“Yeah, I can see that,” answered Martine with a lot more calm than most people would. “Because that would make you a target now too.”

“Yeah.” I gathered Alistair even closer. He made no protest. “Me and . . . oh, crud.”

“What?”

I jumped to my feet, and Alistair jumped to the floor with an annoyed rumble. “The coven's been so focused on Brad and his family, I bet nobody's checked in on Frank Hawthorne.”

38

I SENT MARTINE
back to the Pale Ale, reminding her she had actual work to do. She didn't want to go, but I held firm. The truth was, I didn't want her to see what I really planned to do next.

Frank, it turned out, lived in an apartment in a large Italianate mansion that had been subdivided sometime during the Great Depression. It was one of those places that's so old the stairs have been creaking and grumbling to one another for longer than anyone in town's been alive.

I carried an aluminum pan covered with plastic wrap and foil up three flights. I didn't pick up any Vibes, thankfully. Unfortunately, the building completely lacked air-conditioning, and I was perspiring by the time I made it to the top landing. I didn't want to imagine what it must be like up here in August.

I balanced the baking pan against my hip and knocked on Frank's door. There were thumping footsteps and creaking floorboards and the door opened a few seconds later.

“Oh. Hi.” Frank looked like he hadn't slept in a week. His hair was tousled and his face was drawn tight across the bones.

“Hi,” I said. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah, sure.”

It was cooler in here, because the kitchen windows were all opened wide. A gigantic chestnut spread its branches right outside, making the whole place feel like a tree house. A black cat with bright gold eyes sat on the windowsill and watched as I followed Frank into the living room.

“So, this is it.” He spread his hands. “The inner sanctum.”

Frank might have been a longtime bachelor, but his place was in no way the stereotypical man cave built around a massive flat-screen TV. In fact, it took me a while to see the TV stuffed back in its corner. The most prominent feature of Frank Hawthorne's apartment was books. There were books on shelves and books on top of shelves and books on tables. Books waited in stacks on the desk and on the floor. Paperbacks, hardbacks, new, used, all mixed in with piles of newspapers and magazines. The wall behind the desk was a mosaic of corkboards with papers, maps and photos pinned to every inch.

“It's nice,” I told him. “It looks like you.” Which it did. It was the home of someone who preferred comfort over appearance, who was insatiably curious and a little offbeat.

The cat jumped off the sill and came to curl around Frank's ankles. The animal moved so easily, it took me a minute to realize it was missing a back leg.

“And this”—Frank stooped down and picked the cat up—“is Colonel Nick Kitty.”

“Great name.” I held my hand out. Kitty sniffed and licked my fingers enthusiastically.

“It's after Colonel Nick Fury. You know, from the Avengers?”

I nodded. I had a friend who worked on the comic books for Marvel. Plus, the guy who played Thor in the movies? Totally swoon-worthy. “Is he a rescue?”

“Kind of. The day after I moved in here, I opened the window to get some air, and he jumped in and didn't leave.”

Colonel Kitty finished licking my fingers and moved to my thumb. Frank raised his eyebrows.

“Tuna,” I told him and held out the aluminum foil pan. “I made you a casserole.” Tuna noodle casserole, specifically, made with cream of mushroom soup and Velveeta. I'd just have to hope Martine never found out. I'd never hear the end of it.

“Thank you.” Frank put down the cat and took the pan. “I guess you heard about Brad?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I wanted to see how you were doing. I stopped by the paper, but they said you went home early.”

“Not setting the best example there.” Frank stashed the pan in the battered Frigidaire. Colonel Kitty watched wistfully.

“Do you want to sit down?” Frank started clearing books off a worn leather armchair. “Can I get you anything?”

“I'm good, thanks.” I sat and put my purse on the nearest pile of books. “I'm really sorry about Brad.”

Frank dropped onto a sofa about the same vintage as my chair. His hands dangled between his knees. “I looked for him everywhere I could think of. I even tried that stupid tiki bar. I asked Sean and his dad, but they hadn't seen him. I thought . . . I thought maybe he'd just gone on a long drive someplace. And I went home.” He ran both hands through his hair. “I should have kept looking. I should have . . . done
something
.”

“Like what?”

“I don't know.” Colonel Kitty loped over to his side and, with only a little bit more strain than for the average cat, jumped up onto the sofa's seat and then onto the back. The cat hunkered down and started nuzzling Frank's neck. This
was clearly something they were both used to, because Frank just smiled a little and rubbed Kitty's ears. “I mean, I
knew
things were bad. If I'd started looking earlier, if I hadn't been so afraid of what I'd find . . .”

“You were trying to protect your aunt and her memory.”

“And myself,” he said. “Don't forget myself.” He folded his arms, which meant he wasn't scratching the cat's ears anymore. Colonel Kitty mewed in protest. “Some crusading journalist I make. What if . . .”

“What if what?”

“What if the reason I haven't tried hard enough to find out what was really happening to Aunt Dot is because I don't want to find out I was the one responsible for her death.”

His words jolted me hard. “What do you mean?”

“I'd been so focused on getting the newspaper up and running, I didn't pay attention to what was going on with Aunt Dot.”

He was obsessed,
Laurie Thompson had said.
He didn't care.
But Laurie was angry, and from the outside, it could be tough to tell the difference between passion and obsession.

“I was so used to her being able to take care of . . . well, of anything. If I look into this stuff, into the house and Brad and the Maitlands . . . what if I find out there was something I could have done, or should have done, to save her life, and Brad's?”

“Then you need to know that.”

“Why?” he asked me, and Colonel Kitty, and the world in general.

“Because no matter what you find out, not knowing is worse. You'll never be able to stop imagining the possibilities, and it'll eat you alive.”

His jaw tightened, and for a minute I thought he was going to argue. Colonel Kitty licked his cheek. Then, in a display of that special feline indifference, he turned around and started vigorously cleaning his hindquarters.

I watched for a minute. “Frank?” I said.

“Yeah?” He blinked heavily.

“Um, I've got some news for you.”

“What?”

“Colonel Nick Kitty is a girl.”

Frank stared at me. Then he stared at the cat. Colonel Kitty lowered her one back leg and turned, and Frank stared again.

“Awww, Nick,” he groaned. “You been holdin' out on me!”

“Maybe she was afraid you wouldn't respect her lifestyle choice.”

“I'm a bleeding-heart journalist. I am all about diversity!”

I laughed and he laughed and Colonel Kitty got to her feet and stalked away to the windowsill with great dignity, which just got us laughing again.

“Thanks,” said Frank when we finally quieted down. “I needed that.”

“Thank the cats,” I said. “Alistair's been a real help since this whole thing got started.”

I expected him to make some snarky comment, but he didn't. “Well, maybe I can start living up to the family standard. I started looking into a few things since we talked.” He waved one hand toward the map of Portsmouth taped to the wall. I went over to get a closer look. “Maitland and Associates has been on a buying spree.”

“Maitland and Associates has?” The map was decorated with red and blue pushpins as well as lines of yellow highlighter. “The company itself? Are you sure? Have you got copies of the documents?”

“Yes, I'm sure, and of course I do,” Frank said as he came to stand beside me. “I was trying to find some kind of pattern in the purchases, or any significant difference between the properties Brad handled and the ones Ellis handled himself, and . . .”

“Can I see them?”

Frank frowned, but he shrugged and rifled through one of the stacks of folders on the coffee table. Colonel Kitty strolled over to sniff my Keds in case I'd accidentally dropped any bits of tuna. I perched on the sofa arm and picked her up. Alistair was having a bad effect on me. I was finding it hard to think straight without a cat to hold on to.

Eventually, Frank came up with a thick sheaf of legal-sized paper. I had to set the cat down so I could flip through it. I also may have uttered a few of my brothers' more colorful exclamations.

“Something wrong?” inquired Frank.

“I can't tell if they're the same ones!”

“Same ones as what?”

“I went to Brad's office before . . . before I'd found out he was dead. I thought with all his talk about Dorothy having copies of something important, there might be some clue there, or maybe even the originals of whatever the heck had gone missing.”

“And?”

“I was right. There was a whole file there, with Dorothy's name on it, or at least her alias.”

“Aunt Dot had an alias?”

“Or maybe Brad assigned it to her. I don't know. It was Dorothy Gale.”

“Why am I not surprised? What happened then?”

“I didn't get out fast enough,” I admitted. “I ran into Ellis Maitland instead. Anyway, he looked over the documents and said they were for a whole set of properties he knew nothing about. He also said the papers had all been signed by his mother.”

Frank stared at the map and ran his hand through his hair. “Did you actually see the signatures? Can you remember any addresses?”

I shook my head. “He put the file away before I could see anything at all.”

“Okay. Okay. We need to be logical about this. We cannot be talking about the same set of properties. Ellis isn't stupid. If he was committing fraud, he wouldn't be altering documents that had already been filed. It'd be too easy to check.”

“Darn. I was hoping it would be something obvious.”

“Maybe it is. Maybe Brad was working with Elizabeth Maitland to commit real estate fraud.”

Brad and Elizabeth in this business together? That wasn't a combination I'd considered. I'd been too fixed on Brad and Dorothy.

“They could be buying properties up cheap and then flipping them, or something like that. Or using shell companies or straw-man buyers to hide the profits from the IRS.”

“I thought the Maitlands were rich. Why would they need to do something like this?”

Frank made a face. “I've never met a rich person who didn't want to be richer. It also means Elizabeth could afford to bribe Brad to help her.”

Brad, who had been out of work for so long, and who had a house and a car and two kids who would eventually need college tuition. He must have been going out of his mind trying to figure out how he was going afford it all. I could tell Frank was thinking something similar.

There was another possibility. I bit my lip. If Brad was taking bribes from Elizabeth to help commit fraud, he could also have been taking them from Dorothy, who might have wanted to expose Elizabeth.

I was still figuring out how to say this to Frank when a hard knocking sounded through the door. We both jumped.
Colonel Kitty meowed loudly and disappeared behind the couch.

“'Scuse me a sec,” said Frank as he went to open the door.

I saw Kenisha first. She was in uniform, radio clipped to her shoulder and sidearm clipped to her belt and everything. I swallowed. This was an official visit and she wasn't alone. A short, white, beefy man in a pale blue sports coat stepped into the apartment and held out his hand.

“Hello, Frank.”

“Hi, Pete.” Frank shook the man's hand. He looked disappointed, but in no way surprised. “Hello, Officer Freeman. I thought you guys might be coming around.”

Pete shrugged. “It's the job.”