Notoriously Neat (10 page)

“He’s staying in the Cove?”

“At their home. Well, Gail’s home. Vaughn kept the deed in his name so he could cover their property taxes without legal complications. I mentioned they stayed on good terms, didn’t I?”

I nodded.

“Anyway, Sky, your name came up during our conversation,” Morrie said. “I could tell it pained Vaughn tremendously to find Gail’s clinic a wreck. Then I remembered you used to tidy it up, and gave him your telephone number . . . I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” I said. “It was nice of you to mention me.”

“He can use your help. Not just with the office, but the entire property. Seeing it go downhill would compound the tragedy, don’t you think?”

I hadn’t considered it but realized I agreed. “It would be a shame, Morrie. And I appreciate the referral.” Skiball’s carrier swung hard, almost making me lose my grip on the handle. She was bouncing impatiently inside it again. “I’ll expect Vaughn’s call—”

“Wait. I have his contact info right here.” He pulled his wallet from the side pocket of his shorts, fished out a business card, and slapped it into my hand. “It’s got his cell number and everything.”

Which I’d kind of expected from a business card.

“Thanks again, Morrie,” I said, dropping the card into my shoulder bag. “You’re the studliest.”

He beamed at me, his cheeks coloring a little—whether from embarrassment or the cold was anybody’s guess.

I patted Bits on the head and took a few steps up the street toward my new Versa, but then paused to look back over my shoulder. One favor deserved another.

“Morrie?”

He was outside Dr. Ruthless’s door. “Yes?”

“I should’ve asked . . . Is Bits feeling okay?”

Morrie smiled. “Not to worry; he’s fine. Dr. Lester’s very diligent with her reminder post-cards. She already sent me a few about his regular manicure.”

I stood looking at him. “You sure he needs it?”

“That’s what it said . . . Why?”

“It’s just that you might consider buying a clipper instead.”

“And trim Bits’s claws at home?”

“Right. It’d be less traumatic for him.”

“Hmmm . . .”

“If not today, maybe next time.”

He scratched under his chin. “I don’t know. Dr. Lester’s assistant told me Bits also needed a refill on his vitamin tablets—”

“It’s only a suggestion to keep in mind, Morrie,” I said, and decided to give him something else to contemplate. “You know those prescription eyedrops you sell at your office?”

“Yes . . .”

“According to the consumer Web sites, they’ve got something major in common with the pet vitamins.”

Understanding dawned on Morrie’s face. “I can find the same thing over the counter for half the price?”

I pointed a finger at him.

“There you go,” I said, and turned toward my parking space.

“You want me to drive out and see this ex-Pilsner dude?” Bryan Dermond said.

I was in the kitchen of my Airstream trailer watching him reach into a cabinet above the sink. Exhausted from her trip to the vet, Ski was snoozing obliviously in the overhead compartment to his right, on a shelf she’d staked out as her private loft.

“He’s Gail’s ex-
husband
, not an ex-Pil—” I broke off my sentence. He’d taken some purified sea salt from the cabinet. “You cooking?”

He shook his head. “Gonna mix some salt and warm water in the bathroom.”

“Oh. Any special reason?”

He slid shut the cabinet’s door and faced me. “Tell me you don’t notice anything different.”

“About what?”

“My nose,” Bryan said. “C’mon. Make like I’m Socrates.”

“Huh?”

“We gain wisdom by asking questions. Check out my nose. What do you see?”

“Well, it’s in the middle of your face.”

“Skyster, I asked what’s
different
.”

I sighed. Bry and his girlfriend were film buffs, so I figured they’d seen the old Rossellini movie about Socrates. It went to show how DVD rentals could be damaging to young, impressionable viewers.

I counted his nasal piercings. Ah-hah.

“You got a new ring in your left nostril.”

“A new stud. Right nostril.” Bry tapped it with a fingertip. “You seriously didn’t notice?”

I seriously hadn’t. No surprise, considering the huge number he had in his nose, ears, and lips—and other places I didn’t want to picture. What did kind of amaze me, though, was the realization that I wasn’t too awfully grossed out for a change.

“So,” he said. “Guess I should head over to the clinic.”

I was quiet a second. Since hiring Bry, I’d learned that not all my clients readily accepted his body jewelry, tattoos, and burgundy-streaked Goth black hair. Bry’s appearance was extreme to put it mildly. While trying to be sensitive to his feelings, I also granted that some people needed a little prep work.

“The salt and water for cleaning off the stud?” I stalled.

“Yeah,” Bryan said. “And the crud.”

I pulled a face.

“Sorry,” he said. “What I meant is it helps heal the skin too. But don’t worry; I’m sanitary.” He cocked a thumb over his shoulder at the bathroom door. “Got my own glass, cotton pads, and disposal bags in there.”

“Thanks.”

He shrugged. “So what’s the verdict? Do I head over to the clinic when I’m done?”

I hesitated a moment. “I think maybe we should both meet Vaughn,” I said. “Together.”

“How come? I know the joint inside out. Been cleaning the office and kennels for two months on my lonesome.”

“I know.”

“And you’ve got, like, three jobs lined up today. Besides our usual at City Hall.”

“Two.” I glanced at my Felix the Cat clock on the trailer wall. His pointing white-gloved hands told me it was almost eleven a.m. “The first’s in about an hour. Second’s at three this afternoon, but it’s a quickie . . . that little summer bungalow down on Periwinkle Road.”

“Somebody renting it already?”

“No,” I said. “But Mrs. Filbert likes it dusted and vacuumed once a month starting in the spring. In case any tourists show up to give it a look.”

Bry grunted. “I heard those goobers who broke into the clinic did a real number on it. On Doc Pilsner too.”

I nodded slowly.

“Really, Skyster, I’ll handle this,” Bryan said. “You take care of other gigs and split for home. Maybe catch a nap.”

“What about City Hall tonight?”

“We can take my wheels . . . I’ll pick you up around sevenish.”

I expelled a deep breath, looking him straight in the eye. “Bry, listen, I appreciate what you’re trying to do. But Vaughn Pilsner’s a retired corporate investment broker who still kind of dabbles for the fun of it.”

“Square as a cube, huh?”

I nodded. “I doubt he’ll be into the piercing experience.”

“Or charmed by my ink?”

“To know you is to adore you,” I said. “I just think I ought to make the introduction.”

A couple of seconds passed. I hoped I hadn’t hurt Bry’s feelings. If I had, he was good at hiding it.

Finally he shrugged. “I got five minutes to do my dabbing before we leave?”

“Dab to your nose’s content. I’ll put out some cat food in the meantime. Ski hasn’t had much of an appetite lately. If she wakes up hungry, I’ll be on my way to being relieved.”

Bry glanced into the cabinet where she was curled in a sleeping ball. “You never gave me the four-one-one on her trip to the vet,” he said. “How’d it go?”

“Pick your term for the opposite of calm and relaxing,” I said, and then gave him an instant recap. “I’m still not sure what’s wrong with Skiball. Or that anything
is
wrong with her. She’s just kind of . . . I don’t know. Logy, I guess. But I’m definitely not turning her over to the mad Dr. Ruthless.”

“There an option B?”

“I’ll wait till later to see if she’s back to her normal irritating self,” I said. “Otherwise, I’d better have the clinic in Gloucester squeeze her in for an appointment.”

Bry grunted and carried his sea salt to the bathroom sink, closing the door behind him. I poured some kitty kibbles into a bowl, then sat down at my desk to wait. With everything that had gone on over the past couple of days, I decided to check the calendar appointments on my cell phone and make sure there weren’t any that had slipped my mind.

I hadn’t even gotten the phone out of my bag when its ringtone sounded. That’s Coldplay’s “Yellow,” if you’re curious.

“Grime Solvers,” I answered. “Sky speaking.”

“Hey there, gorgeous! I see you’re up and at ’em early today!”

I suppressed a groan. “I guess I am,” I said, and swiveled around toward my window. The Getaway Groves model unit was a few hundred yards behind Abe Monahan’s old stone wall—the one he’d built around the property before I inherited it. In fact, the unit’s second-story terrace faced my trailer and the little unpaved parking area in back. Something told me that if I held a pair of binoculars to my eyes while looking out at the terrace doors, I would see Bill Drecksel right behind them, scrutinizing me through his own binoculars.

“This is your buddy Billy,” he said.

“Uh-huh.”

“Or your Billy buddy, you want to flip it around,” he said. “That’s a joke; get it? Billy buddy. Like those kids’ toys—”

“I got it,” I said. “Bill.”

He cleared his throat. “So what’s with you today?”

“I’m not sure what you mean—”

“You sound in a lousy mood.”

“Actually, it’s that you caught me at a busy time.”

“Why?”

“Why am I busy?”

“No, why ain’t you in a better mood?”

“I just said—”

“ ’Cause busy, schmizzy, I know you’d feel better if you tasted my quiche last night,” he said. “Or Chloe gave you a warm slice for breakfast like she promised.”

“I left in a rush,” I said truthfully. “She didn’t have a chance to put it in the oven.” Which
might have
been the truth, not that I’d checked.

Drecksel exhaled at his end, a big, gusty mouthful of air that was loud enough to hurt my ear.

“Don’t think I’m pokin’ for compliments,” he said. “People know what kind of quality to expect when I bake something for ’em.”

“Without a doubt.”

“So what’d you decide? Gonna ditch your junk-heap trailer?”

I wanted to bite my tongue. His unmitigated gall was beyond belief. “Bill, I really do have to run . . .”

“Go ahead. I don’t mean to put the squeeze on you.” He blew more wind. “But keep in mind the advantages of sharin’ my office space. And that I can’t hold the offer open forever.”

“Right,” I said, about to cut him off. “Talk to you another time—”

“Incidentally, you see any bears this morning?”

My thumb paused over the phone’s End button.

“See
what
?”

“Bears,” Drecksel said. “Wild ones.”

I shook my head.

“No, Bill,” I said. “I haven’t.”

“Not that I ever heard of tame bears. Except maybe in the circus or Vegas. Even then I ain’t so sure. There’s a difference between
training
and taming ferocious animals. Remember that time with Siegfried and Roy? I know they fooled with tigers—”

“Bill, what’s this about?”

“Just that I got reports they been spotted in the woods around here.”

“Wild bears.”

“Right. A whole herd of ’em. Couldn’t say what kind . . . You got any idea if we got grizzlies in this part ’a the country?”

“No, Bill.”

“How about black bears? Or maybe brown ones?”

I suddenly had a weird sense of déjà vu. It was almost as if I were talking to Hibbard and Hornby again. Except they were idiots without being hustlers to boot. “I told you. I don’t know. But I’m pretty sure bears don’t roam in herds.”

“I’ll remember that next time I’m on
Jeopardy!
” Drecksel sounded indignant. “Look, I wanted to give you a heads-up, is all. Say there’s a bear outside the trailer. That could mean trouble, dependin’ if it’s hungry and spots that little cat of yours in the window of the trailer. Or maybe sees you gettin’ in or out of your car . . .”

“Bill, I haven’t read a single report about bear sightings. And I write for the local newspaper.”

“Who said it was in that rag? We real estate developers got our own insider sources. When there’s bears in the neighborhood, lemme tell you, property values go down. So you might wanna cash in before the public gets wind of it. Do yourself a favor ’n’ vacate the trailer. I’ll scrape together a few bucks for the ground it’s sittin’ on.”

How sweet and considerate. “Aren’t you worried they might scare people off from buying units at Getaway Groves?”

“Huh?”

“The bears. What’s to prevent them from licking their chops over the residents of your condos?”

Bill chortled. “C’mon, Sky, be real. A wild bear looks one way and sees that pile of rocks Abe called a wall around your trailer. Looks the other way, it sees a seven-foot-high steel gate . . . Getaway Groves bein’ a gated community. Which one ’a those two obstacles is it gonna hop lookin’ for easy chow? Especially since you got a little cat in the window?”

I weighed several replies. But I was trying to avoid profanities and ruled them out. So I did the next-best thing and finally pressed the button to end the call.

“Bry?” I could hear the sink running in the bathroom. “You almost done?”

“Washing up—I’m zipping!”

Zipping?
I shrugged, grabbed my bag, and headed out back to wait in the Versa. When Bry appeared from the trailer, I was sitting with all the windows rolled down to let in some fresh air, blithely unconcerned with big, bad bears.

“How do I look?” he said, opening the passenger door.

“Freshly dabbed,” I said. “C’mon, it’s getting late.”