Catnapped (A Klepto Cat Mystery) (9 page)

Savannah watched her aunt lower herself into her chintz flower-print overstuffed chair and then she positioned the matching ottoman for her to rest her foot on. Once Margaret was seated, Savannah turned toward the door, which Max had already opened to let a batch of guests in.

After several minutes—during which people arrived, issued appropriate greetings and chose their refreshments—Margaret scanned the room and motioned for a tall, slim, bleached-blond woman wearing jeans and a black tee shirt with a rhinestone cat on the front to start the meeting.

“Meow! Meow!” Almost everyone stopped what they were doing and turned in the direction of the sound as the woman squeezed a stuffed
talking
cat. “Let’s get started,” she said in a raised voice, because a few people on the other side of the refreshment table were still chatting out loud. “Some of us have to get to work in a little while.” She squeezed the chenille cat two more times as the last of the stragglers complied.

“Meow?”

“What’s that?” she asked as everyone turned toward the hallway adjacent to the large room.

“Awwww,” one older woman said when she saw Rags walking cautiously into the room, “he came in here to check out the cat he heard.”

Everyone chuckled and some of the women clucked and wriggled their fingers near the floor in an attempt to capture Rags’s attention. By then, however, he had spotted the stuffed cat and was on a mission to examine it. As he came closer to the woman holding the toy, he slowed his pace and began sniffing the air while staring intently at the little feline intruder. When he was close enough, he reached up and put his paws on the woman’s knees, still sniffing in the direction of the toy. She moved it closer to him and his next antic filled the room with laughter.

He took the stuffed cat in his mouth, jumped down and, walking like an emperor penguin, carried it off toward the hallway.

“Rags. No. Bring that back,” Savannah scolded as she jumped up from her hard-back chair to retrieve the cat and his new friend.

“Oh, that’s okay, let him play with Meowster. We’ll get it when I’m ready to go,” the blond woman said.

“But what if…” Savannah attempted to protest.

“There are more where that one came from. Just let him go. That was priceless—what a way to start the meeting.” She was still laughing, as were several others in the room. “Well wasn’t that a treat?” she said before getting down to business. “As most of you know, I’m Ida Stone. I run the Tabby Haven Foster Cat program in Haley. I’m also the president of the Hammond Cat Alliance. To my left is…” She paused.

“Oh, I’m Betty Gilbert,” a woman in her early forties responded. She sported a long dark ponytail and a heavy set of bangs. She looked as if she had been active out in the sun most of her life. She was fit and her skin tan and leathery. She nodded toward the large man sitting next to her. “My husband, Gil, and I are on the HCA board and we volunteer at the Hammond Cat and Kitten Rescue.” They both wore jeans, sport shoes and Western shirts in two different blue-and-green plaid patterns. Betty’s was open down the front revealing a bright yellow designer tee. “We also help with a small cat colony out in the industrial area,” she said. “Oh, and we train horses and give riding lessons.”

Gil Gilbert motioned to the person sitting to his left to go ahead, indicating that his wife had sufficiently introduced him.

“Michael Ivey. I’m the vet in these here parts,” he said with a chuckle. Savannah noticed that he was wearing jeans and a tee that molded perfectly to his body. Strands of his straight dark-brown hair hung over one brow. She allowed her eyes to linger even after Margaret took the floor. When his gaze met hers, however, she quickly looked away.
Darn,
she thought to herself,
am I blushing? Oh no, I hope he doesn’t notice.

“This is our hostess, Margaret,” Ida said, motioning toward her. “I want to thank you for putting up with us this early in the morning.”

“Sure. My pleasure.”

Ida gave her an expectant look.

“Oh yes, I’m a sometimes foster mommy to kittens. I’d like you to know that the cat you just saw walking away with our spokes-cat is
not
one of my prodigies.”

Everyone laughed.

“I also volunteer at Max Sheridan’s cat rescue facility.”

“Oh Margaret, you are so modest,” Ida said. “She is the founder of this organization and the past president and will take on and has taken on just about any task we ask of her.”

Margaret waved her hand in the direction of the compliment as if she would rather not have the attention. But many people in the room knew that wasn’t the case. Margaret loved the attention.

“Next,” Ida prompted.

“I’m Max Sheridan. I rescue feral and stray cats, and with our wonderful volunteers,” he nodded toward Margaret, “we do our best to find forever homes for them. I keep those that are unadoptable or place them in suitable colonies in the tri counties. Some, of course, wind up as barn cats—whatever works for the particular cat…”

“I’m Hildy Barnett,” a plump woman with long graying hair clipped back in a ponytail said, by way of introduction. “I breed Himalayans.”

The woman sitting next to her looked around the room and said, “They are absolutely yummy Himmies.” She smiled and then realized everyone was waiting for her to introduce herself. “Oh yes, I’m Karen Waxton and I raise Brits—uh British shorthairs.” She was striking, with light-brown curls soft around her face, lovely skin and large blue eyes accentuated by plenty of eye makeup.

“And you, hon? Are you a relative of Margaret’s?” Ida asked.

“Yes, I’m Savannah. I’m here taking care of my aunt.”

“You have your job cut out for you if you hope to keep that gal down,” Betty remarked.

There were chuckles all around.

“And the cat burglar is yours?” Ida asked.

“Yes, that’s Ragsdale.”

“He has a beautiful coat. What’s his background?” someone asked from across the room.

“He’s a rescue.”

A few people applauded quietly and made comments, “Good for you.”

“We love rescues…”

“Well, welcome to Hammond, Savannah,” Ida said warmly. She then looked at the woman to Savannah’s left and asked, “And you are?”

While everyone else in the room focused on the woman sitting next to Savannah, Michael’s eyes lingered on the tall blond.
What a fascinating woman—and a veterinarian, at that! She’s beautiful. I can’t keep my eyes off her.

Savannah looked toward Hammond’s veterinarian and caught him staring at her.
Gosh he’s a hunk,
she thought as she lowered her eyes and blushed a little. At least she was pretty sure she blushed. She felt like she was virtually glowing.

“Anna Robles,” the stout Hispanic woman next to Savannah said. “My cat is gone like others in our neighborhood. Gina, Kitty and Clarice came to the meeting last time. We need help finding our cats.” She hesitated for a moment and then choked up, saying, “We miss our Rascal.”

A fragile-looking elderly woman in a housedress, her white hair in tight curls close to her head said, “It’s just awful to think that someone is picking up our family cats and running off with them…to do what? I can’t imagine why. One of the missing cats is on medication, for heaven sakes!” She looked around the room. “Can’t the sheriff do something?” she asked. She then put her hand up to her mouth for a split second, lowered it into her lap and said, “Oh, I’m Kitty Wilson. Our Brillo is gone, too.” She hesitated, and wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. “Just gone,” she said choking up.

“You shouldn’t let your cats out, you know,” Karen Waxton said in her naturally husky voice. “They’re vulnerable to all sorts of dangers. You’re lucky they weren’t picked off by coyotes or owls.”

“We know that,” the woman to Kitty’s left said while smoothing a strand of her light-brown hair behind one ear. “We all take precautions with our cats. Some of them are so unhappy as inside cats that we can’t keep them in.”

“I have three inside cats,” Kitty interjected. “Brillo just wouldn’t stand being cooped up all day and night. We were in the process of building him an outdoor run when someone snatched him.”

“How do you know someone took him and that it wasn’t a coyote?” Gil asked.

“Gina saw him!” Kitty said, obviously excited. “Tell them, Gina.”

A thin pregnant woman in her early thirties cleared her throat before speaking. “I’m Regina. Yes, I saw a kid—he looked young—come right up on my walkway not ten feet from my porch and pick up one of my cats. Right in my yard! I yelled at him through the window and a neighbor heard me. He was watering his lawn. When he saw what was happening—that this kid was running past him with Patches in his arms—he turned the hose on him. Thankfully, this freaked out Patches. She started clawing the guy and he let go. Patches ran under the first shrub she saw and then went up a tree. The kid ran off around the corner. We don’t know where he went or who he was. We finally coaxed Patches down and into the house at around dusk, and she even agreed to stay in for a few days after that,” she said, smiling slightly.

She lifted her long black hair off her neck and shoulders, tying it back with a band that she slipped off her wrist. Addressing Karen Waxton, she continued, “I work at home and have two children running in and out. I try to keep the cats inside or at least in the backyard as much as possible. But, cats do have minds of their own. And with small kids…” her voice faded. And then she said, “Now our old boy Buster’s missing.”

Regina continued, “I live in the same neighborhood as Kitty, Clarice, and Anna. And we’re not the only ones who are missing cats. But no one we’ve spoken to has seen a coyote or an owl—well, you wouldn’t see an owl in the daylight and most of these cats come in at night.”

“I think we’d be seeing herds of coyotes, due to the number of cats that have come up missing just in our tract over the last six weeks,” Clarice said. “How many is it now, Anna? Eight? Just in Ravenwood. Cats are starting to disappear from a newer development near us now. I think they’ve had four or five go missing from over there.”

Regina interjected, “Another neighbor we talked to said he saw an old dark-colored pickup truck driving slowly up and down his street—two streets over. He said that he watched as a blond boy—around thirteen or fourteen—got out of the truck and approached some children who were playing with a cat across the street on their front lawn. The man picked up his cell phone ready to call the sheriff—he thought the kid was after one of the children. When this guy approached the children, the cat got spooked and ran off. One of the little girls must have gotten scratched because she screamed. The kid hurried back to the truck and they took off.”

“Okay, this item is on our agenda,” Ida announced in an attempt to get everyone’s attention. Then she turned to the four women and said, “Thank you for updating us on the situation. We will be talking more about it. Let’s finish introductions so we can get on with the meeting. Looks like we have just a few more. Would you two ladies introduce yourselves?”

“Sure,” a heavy woman dressed in a faded smock dress and Croc clogs said, as she squirmed in the wing-back chair she was seated in. “I’m Olivia Hershner. I have Cat’s Cradle Rescue and Boarding over in Mason.”

“Barbara?” Ida acknowledged the woman sitting next to Olivia.

“I’m Barbara Rinaldi,” the sturdy thick-bodied woman with a boyish haircut said. “My husband Howard and I manage several cat colonies throughout the tri counties.”

“Okay, thank you,” Ida said. And then motioning toward an olive-skinned man wearing a plaid beret, she said, with a smile, “Rudy?”

“I’m Rudy Silva, private investigator.”

“Oooooh,”

“Coooool,”

“All right.”

“Right on!”

Comments were being repeated in unison.

“Thanks Rudy,” Ida said. “For everyone’s information, Rudy is here at my request. It is true that the sheriff can’t do much to help us with the cat-disappearing problem, based on what we know so far. So we’re hoping that we can get enough incriminating information to make a case that the sheriff’s office
will
pursue. We need to know something about who’s taking the cats and where. However, there’s a long-standing belief that cats can’t be owned. This could put us at a real disadvantage when it comes to protecting our pets.” She looked down at the notepad in her lap and then continued, “It’s rather frightening to think that if someone wants one of our cats, they can take it and the authorities would or could do nothing.”

Ida paused for a moment, crossed her legs, and continued, “Do any of you remember the scandal with Natalie Wood’s sister’s Siamese cat? You folks over forty might. For the rest of you, Lana’s cat was stolen out of her apartment. I think she even knew or suspected who took it. But the police said that even if they found the cat, there was nothing they could do because a cat is an independent agent.” She looked over at Rudy Silva before saying, “And this was a registered cat.”

She continued, “But it seems that the laws now are vague and adapted for various situations and regions. With the advent of micro-chipping, the laws may have or will have to change.” She took a deep breath before going on, “Here, in this county, the people at the sheriff’s office seem to have more pressing things to worry about than missing cats. However, Rudy believes that if we work together to gather some facts and maybe even get a license number or photo of the suspected catnapper, they might be able to help us find out where the cats are being taken and why. Rudy, do you want to speak to that?”

The stout sixty-five-year-old, who looked to be around fifty, shared his understanding of laws involving cats. “As Ms. Stone explained, there are no hard-and-fast laws involving cat ownership, and this is complicated by the attitude of and pressure on the particular police force or sheriff’s office and even the individual officers.” While he cautioned members of the group against doing anything that would put them in danger or get them in trouble with the law—such as trespassing—he encouraged them to be vigilant. He outlined the safe zone in so doing: “Create a neighborhood-watch system, and be diligent in keeping watch. Encourage your cats to stay indoors or at least in your view at all times, and report anything suspicious to the authorities.”