I had friends who wouldn’t hesitate to take him in like a stray puppy or kitten, but I wasn’t in the habit of bringing home strange men, even if they were gorgeous and called me
milady.
No, my life was too ordered for that. I wasn’t a risk taker.
At least I had the next few days off. Starting Friday, I’d be on duty at the emergency vet clinic for most of the weekend, and then back for a couple of nights next week. I filled in at several practices, allowing the vets to sneak in some vacation time before the hectic rush of the holidays, followed by the equally frenetic tourist season.
After the first of the year, the population of Naples swelled with winter visitors, many of whom brought their cats and dogs. I helped out with everything from seeing patients to cleaning cages. Any money I made beyond my merger living expenses, I squirreled away in a special account for the day I could afford my own practice.
It felt decadent to have no errands to run and nothing demanding my attention tonight. I made a cup of hot chocolate, crawled into bed early with a new paperback by my favorite romance author, and settled in with the cats. Hours later, after reading the same paragraph three times, and nodding off before finishing at each attempt, I turned off the lights and snuggled down to let the rain on the rooftop lull me into sleep.
The thunder’s reverberation still hung in the air as I lurched upright in bed, my heart hammering. The cats scattered, scurrying for their favorite bolt-holes. As loud as it had been, the lightning must have struck somewhere in the neighborhood. I scrubbed my hands across my face and checked the clock on the nightstand—nearly two thirty. The blue numbers blinked, warning of a power failure.
I palmed the reset button and started to sink back on my pillow when a rhythmic
bang, bang, bang
echoed
from the front of the house. My pulse spiked, but settled back as I recognized the sound of the porch’s screen door slamming in the wind. I must have forgotten to latch it when I hurried in to get out of the rain. The storm showed no signs of abating, so that racket could go on all night if I didn’t get up and take care of it.
I rolled out of bed, not bothering to turn on the lamp as I padded across the unlit room. I’d roamed around this old house since I was old enough to walk, so I didn’t need light to navigate through the familiar darkness. Patches of shadow skittered across the living room floor. A pair of old trees in the yard blocked most of the glow from the street lamps, allowing only fuzzy patches in through the windows to shift restlessly on the floor.
I shuffled across room, yawning. As my hand touched the front door’s lock, a shaft of lightning split the night. The flash illuminated the porch in a stark chiaroscuro and silhouetted the man standing beyond the glass. A crash of thunder swallowed my scream. I flinched back, stumbled, and fell on my behind. Skittering backward, I labored to draw enough air through my suddenly constricted throat. Adrenaline jolted my pulse to a staccato drumming. Part crawling, part running, I bolted for the safety of the bedroom and my cell phone.
In the no-longer friendly darkness, I blundered into the edge of the bureau. The corner dug into my arm. I clenched my teeth against a curse and groped across the top, rifling through the usual detritus of my life until I touched the thin cord of the phone’s charger. I reeled it in, but found only an empty USB plug at the end.
The phone had to be here somewhere. My fingers scrabbled further, brushing against the smooth square of plastic, but sweeping it onto the floor amid an avalanche of unidentifiable objects. I dropped to my knees and patted around on the rug. Jasmine’s hiss from beneath the bureau warned I was too close her hiding place. By feel, I identified a hairbrush, a scattering of change, and then my cell phone. I snatched it up, its screen emitting a pale but comforting ball of light in the darkness.
I had 9-1-1 on speed dial, but as my finger hovered over the button I paused and listened. Beyond the trip-hammer of my own heartbeat, I heard nothing. No foreign sounds emanated from the front of the house, no breaking glass or footsteps, only the drumming of the rain on the roof.
I crept out of the bedroom and peered down the hallway. The next flash of lightning revealed only emptiness beyond the glass of the front door. I inched my way along the hall to the living room, flattened against the wall, and edged around the perimeter. As I slipped past the fireplace, I snatched the poker from the rack of tools on the hearth. The iron heft of it felt reassuring in my hands. Like an impromptu Excalibur, I held it double handed as I peered out the window.
Rain puddled on the porch, driven through the screens by the storm’s ferocity. Shadows stirred across the wet floor, but none appeared large enough to hide a man. I flipped on the porch light, and its flare of brightness illuminated the familiar, old, peeled, cypress furniture.
I drew a deep, shuddering breath, stepped to the front door, and switched on the carriage lights out by the sidewalk. Nothing moved but shadows.
I unlocked the front door—leaving on the chain—and yelled, “I’ve called the police. They’ll be here any minute.” I slammed the door, flicked the bolt home, and waited for a few heartbeats—quite a few—as my heart raced like a runaway greyhound. When nothing happened, I pulled open the door and advanced onto the porch, fireplace poker held in the
en garde
position. In case I needed to beat a hasty retreat, I left the way open behind me.
I reached for the screen door, but it was closed. And latched. Only then did I realize I hadn’t heard its infernal banging for several minutes. Not since I’d seen the stranger illuminated in the lightning’s glare. I tasted salty sweat on my upper lip as my gaze flickered from one end of the porch to the other. Beneath my bare feet, the floor felt cold and slick. As I retreated, my toes touched a patch of wet, gritty sand. I looked down. Large footprints led onto the porch. Not off, only on. A whimper buzzed in my throat as I raced for the safety of the open door.
“Mew.”
The plaintive cry froze me in my tracks. Had one of my cats followed me out? It wouldn’t have been Jasmine. The Ragdoll hated thunder and probably couldn’t be coaxed out from under the bureau until morning. But her brothers? The tabby terrors were always up for some kind of mischief, and I could imagine one, if not both, venturing out onto the wet porch behind me.
When the cry came again, I realized it wasn’t one of my brood, but a strange cat—frightened and in pain. I followed the sound to the loveseat and found a disheveled mound of fur. As I approached, the cat raised its head, and I saw the familiar wedge-shaped white blaze and two-tone ears.
“Bob?”
His mouth moved in answer, but no sound came out. Damp sand caked his paws, and the white fur of his flank was matted and dark with blood. I snatched my comforting hand back as my professional training took over. The most docile of cats could lash out with teeth and claws when in pain.
Old Mrs. Hanson’s poodle had chased the tiny scrap of fur into my yard that long ago summer and cornered him under the gardenia bush by the back porch. Despite being out-classed, the kitten had held his own against his larger assailant earning him the nickname of Bodacious Bob. Now, sixteen years later, he seemed to remember the kindness I’d shown him and returned to me when he once again needed help. That wasn’t inconceivable. There was more in heaven and earth and the minds of animals than most people were willing to believe.
“Wait right there.” I dashed back into the house, corralled my cats in the bedroom, and gathered an armload of clean towels from the laundry room. With my box of first aid supplies on a chair nearby, the kitchen table would serve as an examination area. In case I needed to rush Bob to the emergency clinic, I set up a carrier with the top open.
I carefully bundled the cat in a towel, but my caution wouldn’t have been necessary. He didn’t struggle, but instead nestled against me. That behavior was worrisome; he was too lethargic. He might be in shock from blood loss. I’d take a quick look at his wounds and rush him to the clinic. My friend, Richie Akiyama, was on duty tonight, and if it wasn’t busy, he’d let me use an exam room to treat the cat.
Bob watched me with an intelligence I found almost unnerving as I carried him into the kitchen and laid him on the table. He didn’t protest when I pried open his mouth and checked his gums. They were pink and surprisingly healthy looking, considering the circumstances, so he probably wasn’t in shock from blood loss. His breathing and heart rate actually appeared normal. I flushed the wounded area with a saline solution to get a better look at the damage.
There were two long, razor-thin gashes on Bob’s flank, about four inches apart. What could have caused that? I’d have expected a raccoon’s or another cat’s claw marks to have been much closer together and, while a large dog’s paws would be wide enough to leave a wound like that, their claws were blunt, tearing more than slicing. Also, almost all dog attack wounds were bites. This looked like the cat had tangled with a bobcat or even a Florida panther, but that didn’t seem likely in the middle of downtown Naples.
I trimmed the thick fur around the slashes to get a better look and drew back blinking. These wounds weren’t fresh. They appeared to have been made several days ago. While still a little red and slightly raised, they were scabbed over and healing up nicely. What I’d taken for fresh blood must have been dried clots dissolving from the drenching he’d gotten in the rainstorm.
I got out my clippers and shaved the area around the scratches. I wouldn’t put any antibiotic creams on it, as he’d only lick that off, and cats were notorious for removing any dressings, so the best option was to leave it alone and let his tongue take care of it. He seemed to have done a rather good job of it so far.
He must have been injured when I’d seen him this afternoon, but he’d showed no signs of his wounds then. His coat had been glossy, and he’d stretched and moved freely. As I played the incident back in my mind, though, I realized he’d never turned his damaged left side toward me.
I checked my handiwork one more time, and the world seemed to drop away beneath my feet. The wounds were flat with no trace of redness and the scabs appeared ready to slough off. That wasn’t possible. I’d just seen the half-healed wounds, the swelling and redness. Just seen…I was no longer sure what I’d seen. Was I losing my mind or—worse yet—losing my powers of observation?
It had been one of those Twilight Zone kinds of nights, what with the intruder and…I groaned, my gaze flickering around. In my rush to help the cat, I’d forgotten about the intruder.
Bob regarded me with wide green eyes, gave the slow blink of a cat smile to reassure me, and purred like an expensive, Italian sports car. The soothing sound reached deep into the coiled knot of tension in my chest and unwound it. He stretched out a paw to touch my arm, and my anxiety melted away.
I cleaned the sand from the proffered foot with a baby wipe, talking to him in soothing tones as much for my benefit as his.
“I searched the neighborhood after you disappeared, plastered silly little handwritten signs on all the telephone poles and trees pleading for your return. You made me realize how important it was to help other animals, so I gave away my fantasy books, forgot about wizards and unicorns, and began studying to become a veterinarian.”
The cat’s soft meow sounded remorseful, and his sandpaper tongue caressed my fingers.
I laughed. “Apology accepted. Tomorrow, uh, I guess that’s actually later today, I’ll try to locate your owner. We need to find out if you’re up to date on all the vaccinations, especially rabies. If not, well, we’re going to have to keep an eye on you for a while.”
Rabies wasn’t common in this area but continued to crop up in the raccoon population often enough to make it a worry, particularly because of the dire consequences to all involved.
“You don’t have on a collar, but I wonder if you have a microchip?” I didn’t have a scanner, but I could usually feel the tiny chip in the loose skin between the shoulder blades. Not this time.
“If you do have people, I can’t say as though I’m pleased with the way they take care of you. Letting you run around the neighborhood with no identification and staying out all night to get in catfights at your age. And then there’s that whole thing about not having you altered.”
Bob fixed me with a stern stare and flicked his ears back.
“If no one owns you, or if they don’t want you, what would you think about coming to live with me again? I’m sure my cats would get their noses out of joint for a while, particularly Jasmine, but they’d get over it.
“And I would have to get you fixed.”
Bob surged to his feet with an indignant hiss. His back end twitched as his muscles tried to lash his abbreviated tail.
“Whoa,” I said, backing up. “I guess you know that word.” That notion didn’t seem at all bizarre in an evening of strange happenings.
“I think it’s time both of us got some sleep.” I bundled the cat up in a clean towel, purposely not looking at his side for fear the wounds would have vanished, along with the remaining shreds of my sanity.
I ensconced him in a nest of towels on the porch loveseat, and provided him with all the kitty necessities—food, water, and a clean box. The storm had rained itself out and left the sound of frogs peeping in its passing, punctuated by the noise of the town waking up. I went back inside to tidy up the kitchen, disinfected all the surfaces, and threw the soiled towels and clothes into the washing machine. By the time I put on a clean pair of pajamas and fell into bed, dawn tinted the sky.
I opened one eye to the view of a cat’s nose. Castor or Pollux? From this perspective, it was hard to tell them apart. The angle of the sun streaming through my bedroom window announced it was hours past my normal wake up time. Confusion muddled my mind for a second, as I tried to remember what day it was and if I would be late for an appointment. Then I recalled the surreal events of last night.