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There had been a time when the sight of curvaceous Chichi Barbi had sent Clyde straight to the moon. But now, Joe thought, smiling, Chichi hadn't counted on Ryan Fla
Clyde had been dating Ryan for nearly a year, since she moved down to Molena Point from San Francisco. Escaping a difficult marriage, she had started life over in her mid-thirties, establishing her own building contracting business in the village.
Ryan had not only brought out the best in Clyde, had not only accomplished marked improvements in Clyde's appearance and attitude, but, with her impressive talents, she had brightened their lives in other ways. She had turned their dull little bachelor pad into a spacious, handsome dwelling, had changed their boxy, single-story Cape Cod cottage into an imaginative two-story residence with a new facade, new kitchen, new upstairs, to say nothing of the handsome and private outdoor living area where they were now enjoying the morning. She had even designed a private cat tower atop the new second-floor master suite, had built for Joe his own retreat, a six-sided glassed house with shingled roof and an unbroken view of the village rooftops and the sea beyond. A singularly private pad with soft cushions, a water dish, and easy access over the roofs to the peaks and upper balconies of the entire village.
"Say you're right about her deliberately finding me," Clyde said, tentatively abandoning the coincidence theory. "Why would she look for me here? I could have moved anywhere when you and I left San Francisco. Palm Springs. Malibu. Cucamunga. I sure as hell never told anyone where I was going. Well, a few close friends, but no one who'd tell Chichi. And how…?"
"The woman can read," Joe said. "She can get on the Web, punch up the directories and cross-references. These days, you can find anyone. A human has no private life-better you should be a cat. Even for us, it's getting harder. Microchips and these new electronic devices…" But he licked his paw, thinking with anticipation of cell phones for cats…
Though that tempting prospect was a way off yet, and surely would have its downside. He looked levelly at Clyde. "Easy enough for her to find you, and that's what she did."
"Maybe. Maybe not. This is a famous tourist destination, everyone comes to Molena Point. She heads down here for a luxurious vacation, gets settled, and just happens across my address." "Oh, right. And purely by accident, she rents the house next door."
"She isn't renting, she's working for those people. I told you that. House-sitting's a big deal, to ward off break-ins and burglaries. People want house sitters, someone on the premises. And with rents through the roof, people who can't afford to stay here are eager for the job. Those people who bought next door, they've only owned that house a few months. Living in San Francisco, they don't know anyone here in the village. They hire a friend in the city, someone who wants a free vacation."
Joe snorted.
"Makes sense to me," Clyde said. "Chichi is nothing more than the caretaker."
Joe watched Clyde narrowly, then turned his back, washing diligently. Chichi worried him. Clyde didn't need that little baggage back in his life. Chichi Barbi was still as gorgeous as she had been when she'd dazzled Clyde years ago, when the buxom blonde had seemed the answer to a bachelor's dreams.
Joe had been just a young cat then, not full grown but not i
"Maybe you're right," Joe said tentatively. "Maybe she isn't after you, maybe she came down to fleece the tourists-or fleece our rich celebrities." Molena Point was crawling with money. "She finds out you're here, thinks you'd make good cover for whatever she's up to.
"Or maybe she reads the want ads looking for a patsy, sees the Ma
"Come on, Joe. That's…"
"She discovers you live next door, and voila! Opportunities she hadn't dreamed of. She interviews, gets the job, and moves in. What could be simpler. Set up her little schemes, maybe set up the Ma
Clyde's usually agreeable square face and brown eyes were dark and foreboding. "What the hell have you been smoking? You've got a whole complicated crime scene going, and she hasn't done anything. This snooping into…"
"Hasn't done anything yet.''''
"Anyway, she wouldn't believe that she could suck me in again, that I'd fall for a second scam."
"How much did she take you for, the first time? Without a whimper? When you thought she was the love goddess incarnate? Easy as snatching a sparrow from the bird feeder, and in those days, five hundred bucks was like five thousand today- then, you could hardly afford the price of a hamburger!"
"Come on Joe. I was only a mechanic then, I didn't have my own shop, but I had savings, and if I wanted to…"
"If you wanted to be a sucker then, that was your business? Well, whatever you give her this time, Clyde, I swear, if you let her mess up your relationship with Ryan, I'll kill her with my bare claws, then come after you."
Though in fact, Joe thought Ryan had nothing to worry about. Ryan Fla
Compare that with an artificial size 38C and hair bleached to the color of straw, and it was no contest.
"If Ryan were jealous of Chichi," Clyde said, "it wouldn't say much for Ryan, or for what Ryan thinks of me."
"You're right, there."
"Unless…" Clyde looked suddenly stricken. "That can't be why Ryan went off on that pack trip this week with Charlie and Ha
Charlie Harper, the wife of Molena Point's chief of police, far preferred time on horseback or at her easel to a formal social life. Partly because of this, she and Ryan had hit it off at once. When Ryan's sister, Ha
Joe said, "If Ryan were worried, you think she'd leave you alone with Chichi for a week? You think she'd go off on horseback, letting Chichi have her way with you?"