Cattitude (18 page)

To finish the job Deavers had started.

To kill her.

She made herself smaller, flattening her body
on the branch while digging four pairs of claws deeper into the
rough bark. He continued walking away from the car. Stopping at the
edge of the tree line and looking past the expanse of wild grasses
to the sprawling house, he pulled a small pair of binoculars out of
his jacket pocket and raised them to his eyes.

Fear closed her throat, her heartbeat
thundering in her small body, though she knew he wasn’t looking for
Sorcha-the-cat but Sorcha-the-woman.

“Ready for action,” he murmured and hiked
toward the road.

She’d never made demands in her human body,
but felt compelled to send demands to his back:
What are you
going to do? Say something! Right now!

He glanced over his shoulder, his expression
puzzled. “I don’t want to do this. But I have to.”

That wasn’t what she’d hoped he would say.
She’d wanted him to say he was leaving and never coming back.

She remained in the tree and watched him
climb up the ditch to his car. After he drove off, she waited long
moments before retracting her claws from the branch and scampering
down the trunk.

On the ground, she hesitated. She couldn’t go
to the house and look for the cat in her body. Belle, that was the
name the two men called her the day of the accident. The same name
the man had been calling every day, looking for his missing
cat.

If she went down and found Belle and they
switched bodies, Deavers’ brother would find her and then he’d kill
her.

She took a longing look at the house. What if
Deavers’ brother killed Belle, believing Belle was her? Belle’s
death would be on her conscience. Her cat conscience. Because if
Belle was dead, they couldn’t change bodies.

Being a cat for the rest of her life would be
her punishment for being too frightened to act.

“Sorcha,” a woman’s voice called. “Where are
you, Sorcha? You know you have to come to me.”

Sorcha froze. It was Belle looking for her
again, the way she did every day. She should go to Belle so they
could change bodies. It was the right thing to do.

The sound of crunching leaves carried to her
sensitive ears.

Making an involuntary screech, Sorcha jumped,
her fight or flight response kicking in. Or maybe it was her new
body’s feline survival instincts.

“Sorcha!” Belle called.

Shoes crashed over twigs and branches that
had broken off during the storm. Looking toward the noise, Sorcha
saw a slender female running straight toward her. Her own image as
a human.

A silent alarm blared in her mind, loud and
scary, impossible to ignore.

“Sorcha!”

Her heartbeat jackhammering in her ears,
Sorcha pivoted and darted between trees, leaping gracefully over
rocks and fallen branches, going back to the one place she felt
safe.

“Come back.” Belle’s voice sounded more
distant with each word. “We have to switch before it’s too late.
You have to come back.”

Sorcha kept running. She should stay but all
her instincts screamed at her to run, and she was listening. Danger
was behind her, safety was in front of her. Fletcher always called
her a fraidy cat, and he was right. Besides, she didn’t
have
to do anything. When she was a human she had to do what she didn’t
want. But right now she wasn’t a human.

She was a cat.

A young woman with a smile like a sunbeam and
bouncing red hair danced into the great room where Belle sat with a
Harry Potter book on her lap. Tory! It was Tory! An “Eep” came out
of Belle’s throat, and she slapped both hands over her mouth.

She stood and the book tumbled off her lap
onto the carpet. With a swoop, she bent and grabbed the book, then
smoothed out a crumpled corner instead of dashing over and rubbing
her head against Tory’s shoulder. She suspected Tory wouldn’t
understand.

“You must be Sorcha.” Tory sprinted across
the Oriental carpet.

As Tory’s arms curved over her shoulders,
Belle’s breath caught. Did Tory know she was really Belle? Was that
why she was hugging her?

It didn’t matter. Belle squeezed her back.
She missed being petted and hugged.

Tory drew back. “Did you really lose your
memory? That must be horrible. And my mom’s freaking. Jeez,
sometimes I don’t think she ever heard of the feminist revolution.
The way she acts, you’d think she’s seventy-five instead of
fifty-five.”

Belle blinked.

“I can’t believe Max is letting you stay
here,” Tory went on. “It’s like him to think he can fix the world,
but even he has his limits. I think he must be hot for you. How do
you feel about him? You like him?”

I love him. He’s my Max.
“Yes.”

“He’s pretty hot, huh?”

Belle thought of him last night with the
towel wrapped around his hips and the bulge poking at the towel. As
if she didn’t know what
that
was.

She nodded vigorously. Max was very hot.

Ted sauntered into the room. “Getting
personal, aren’t you?”

“Who asked you?” Tory glared at him like he
was a disgusting bug. With a sniff, she turned back to Belle. “Max
says he’s going away. Are you going with him?”

Leave home? Belle shook her head.
Never.

“First she has to be asked.” Max stood in the
entryway, his voice dry like the inside of the house in winter.
“What are you doing here?”

“Max!” Tory flew across the room and hugged
him.

“Well?” His lips didn’t smile, but the skin
around his blue eyes crinkled and a glow sparked in his eyes.

“It’s Mom. She called last night and ordered
me to come home.”

“Ordered? Since when did you start listening
to Mom’s orders?”

“She paid for my plane ticket.”

Ted whistled. “When Mom shells out money, you
know it’s serious.”

Tory rubbed her thumb and fingers together.
“Dimes squeak when they leave her clutches.”

“Why?” Still standing in the entryway, Max
crossed his arms over his chest.

“To talk you out of leaving.”

“Will you?”

She beamed at him. “I think you should do
whatever you want.”

“Atta girl.” Ted slung his arm around her
shoulder and gave her a one-armed hug. “You’ve got style.”

“You could’ve told me that over the phone.”
Max lowered his head, the way he did when something bothered him.
“Why aren’t you busy being the next Broadway star?”

Belle stared at Max, who looked away so
fixedly she knew it was on purpose. This was the first time she’d
seen him since last night. She’d been outside most of the day,
searching for Sorcha until the soles of her feet were sore and her
calves hurt. When she finally returned to the house, she ate tuna
and an ice cream sandwich, drank water, napped and took a bath.
She’d been reading the second Harry Potter book for only a few
minutes when Tory had come in.

Why didn’t Max want to look at her? He looked
at her last night. And she’d looked right back.

She knew it was wrong, the way she’d felt.
The way she still felt. Like a woman, not a cat. But Max didn’t
know she was a cat. How did he know this feeling was wrong?

“Someone has to be on your side,” Tory said,
her voice strained.

Ted grabbed her suitcase. “You’re getting the
room in the back. If you complain about how small it is, I’m taking
you to Mom’s.”

“It’s still bigger than my studio.” Tory made
a face. “I hate it. I really hate it.”

Max became still. Then he nodded. “We need to
talk. Come into my office.”

A half laugh, half sob came out of Tory’s
throat, and she rubbed her hand over her eyes. “Not now. I’m tired
and might say things I’m sorry for later.”

“Good. Maybe you’ll tell it to me without the
bullshit.”

Her lower lip trembled. “Please, Max.”

He stared at her for a long moment before
nodding. “Okay, later.”

With another sobbing laugh, Tory dashed after
Ted, leaving Max and Belle in the living room.

Now he looked straight at her, and he kept
looking.

She looked back. If he wanted a staring
contest, he’d lose.

His eyelids closed and opened. “How’s the
book?”

“Wonderful.” She glanced at the book and
swallowed. When she was a cat again, she’d miss Harry. Maybe she’d
skip searching for Sorcha tomorrow and stay home and read the next
book instead.

No, no, no! What was she thinking? She needed
to find Sorcha and switch bodies.

“Harry’s in big trouble,” she said.

Max nodded, his arms still crossed, his
shoulders hunched. The thought came to Belle that he was holding
himself back. But back from what?

“You can read any of my books.” He nodded at
the shelf. “One of the books about other countries might jog your
memory.”

“Oh no.” Stepping back, she shook her head.
“I don’t like other countries. I like it right here.”

“That’s a strong reaction.”

“This is my home.” She jabbed her pointed
index finger at the floor. “I don’t ever want to leave.”

“This isn’t your home,” he said, his voice
low, his blue eyes darkening with emotion as he watched her face.
“As soon as we find where yours is, you’ll have to leave.”

She closed her mouth in a tight line.
I’ll
never leave.

A thought slammed into her mind. What if
Sorcha felt the same way about her home? What if she returned to
the place she loved? Although that didn’t make sense. If Sorcha
wanted to switch back to her old body, she should stay instead of
leave. But even though Sorcha was inside a cat body, she was still
human. Who knew why humans did some of the things they did?

Belle’s eyes burned. She felt something she’d
never felt as a cat—uncertainty.

Max was watching her, the expression on his
face hard, and she jutted her chin. She didn’t need hard, she
needed petting.

“Will you hold me?” she asked.

His muscles tightened and his face turned
even harder, like one of the stones on the fireplace. “I might not
stop at holding.”

She knew what he meant. Kissing. Touching.
Rubbing bodies against bodies.

The burn traveled from her eyes down to the
warm place between her legs. She stared into his blazing eyes.

He swore under his breath and stomped out of
the room. She swallowed, then sat, picked up Harry’s book and
started reading again.

But inside her, the human body itched with an
odd emotion that made her throat clog, her shoulders hunch and her
heart feel as though a giant claw reached inside her chest and
squeezed.

She didn’t like it. Didn’t like it at
all.

***

“I’m too busy,” Max said into the phone. The
spreadsheet on his monitor caught his attention. He should’ve
finished yesterday. This was supposed to be his time for knotting
loose ends and training Ted. Between searching for Belle and trying
to find a safe place for Sorcha, he was falling behind schedule,
his normal tightly held control slip-sliding away.

“Tory’s only here for the weekend.” Rose had
a stubborn note in her voice. “If you have a date, you can bring
her along.”

“It’s not a date, it’s work.” Max decided not
to tell her Tory was extending her visit. Let Tory do her own dirty
work.

An exhalation gusted over the phone. “I’m not
asking for the sun.” Rose’s imperious tone changed to a wheedle.
“I’m asking for one dinner. When was the last time we got together
as a family?”

He swore silently. She had him, dammit.
“Okay, okay, I’ll go.” But it wasn’t changing a thing.

“Wonderful! I made reservations for seven
tonight at Morrie’s.”

He glanced at his watch. Two hours away. And
Morrie’s, the most expensive restaurant in the county. For which
he’d be expected to pay.

“I made reservations for four,” she
continued, “but Ted has to work. I’ll be pleased when he starts
working exclusively for you. Bartending is no kind of job for a
college graduate.” Her voice raised an octave. “I know! I’ll call
Caroline. She can take Ted’s place. It makes sense. She’s already
one of the family.”

“Caroline’s visiting a friend in Chicago. But
don’t worry. It’ll be four without Caroline.”

“You’re not bringing
her
.”

“Sorcha is my guest.”

“But, Max—”

“See you in two hours.” As he hung up the
phone, he realized with a sense of sadness that he didn’t like his
mother. She was manipulative, clinging...and frightened.

“Promise me you’ll take care of them.” His
father’s voice murmured weakly in his mind. He was fourteen again,
looking down at his father lying on the floor, the microwave that
had slammed into his father’s head turned on its side, debris all
around them. A jagged branch from one of the trees outside sticking
into his right thigh. The air eerily still after the giant roar of
the storm.

“I promise,” he said, half crying, tears
streaming down his face. “I promise.”

“Your mom too.” The three words came out in a
thin whisper. Blood pooled out of his leg. Twenty years later, Max
could smell the coppery blood, taste his own fear, see the life
force fading from his father’s eyes.

“I promise,” Max said. “I promise. “

The voices vanished. The image faded and
disappeared, and Max was looking at the spreadsheet on his monitor
again, his teeth clamped so tightly his cheekbones hurt.

He’d kept his word. For twenty years he’d
kept it. When was it going to end?

***

“I won’t go.” Belle shuddered. Why was Max
trying to make her leave?

She stood in the middle of the back room
where Tory was throwing clothes onto the pulled-out sofa bed.

“We look about the same size,” Tory said. “Do
you diet like crazy too? Oooh, this top will look terrific on you.
It’ll bring out your green eyes.”