Tomcat Read online

  Next, I headed over to the least enjoyable task of my day - emptying out my cat's litter box. I did my best to breathe only through my mouth as I sifted through the litter with a scoop, digging out the clumps and dumping them into a plastic bag to toss in the garbage bin outside. I ended up pushing a window open a bit to get rid of the smell of old cat shits, although I tried not to crack it wide enough for Whiskers to slip his fat, furry body out in another escape attempt.

  Heading outside to drop the little bag of kitty turds into the garbage, I stopped for a minute and glanced over at the dark, hulking shape of the Winterhearst mansion next door. Most of the windows were dark, as usual, but I saw one light turned on, glowing out of an upstairs window. I wondered if that was Sanford's room.

  For just a second, I looked up at the window, imagining that maybe Sanford would step in front of it. Maybe he wouldn't be wearing a shirt, and I'd get a glimpse of that toned, broad-shouldered body that he possessed. At this distance, I wouldn't be able to see any cruel, angry frown or other expression on his face.

  After a moment, however, I shook myself and turned to head back inside. Just because I didn't have any real dating options, I shouldn't start daydreaming about the arrogant jerk living next door, I told myself. Even though I didn't have anyone else in my life at the moment, I could still do better than cold, stuck-up Sanford Welles.

  Maybe I should think about reactivating some of those old online dating site accounts I'd made, I considered as I headed back inside. I'd been off them for a few months, now, and maybe there would be some winners among the next crop of guys who'd joined during the months I'd been absent.

  Whatever. I went back inside, tried to not think about my lack of a love life or my slowly shrinking bank account balance, and dug around in my freezer to find the carton of rocky road ice cream I'd bought in a wave of self-pity a couple days earlier. I'd go on the stair climber machine tomorrow, I promised myself as I dug in greedily, eating right out of the carton.

  After all, as my mother never hesitated to point out, a moment on the lips, forever on the hips - and no guy liked women with a big round tush. And mine was already plenty round, thanks to stress and not being willing to commit to daily high-intensity spin classes.

  I thought that Della might provide evidence to the contrary, on that last point, but I didn't have the confidence or the natural sexiness that she possessed. For her, ice cream gave her luscious curves that drove men crazy, but for me, ice cream just made me fat.

  I dropped the empty ice cream carton into the garbage, gave Whiskers one last little pet, and then headed upstairs to bed. I left the door to my bedroom cracked, and after a few minutes, I heard the soft footsteps as he padded in and jumped up onto the bed to curl up on top of my feet.

  I petted him a few times in the darkness, eliciting a soft, gently rumbling purr, and then lay back against the pillows. Tomorrow, I promised myself. Tomorrow, I'd somehow manage to find a new job opportunity, a way to turn my life around and end this long, slow decline.

  I drifted off to sleep as I listened to my fat cat's soft purring.

  Chapter Six

  *

  The next morning, I woke up, headed downstairs - and couldn't find Admiral Whiskers anywhere.

  "Oh, not again," I groaned, my eyes falling upon the window that I'd cracked open after cleaning his litter box the previous night. Now, in the thin rays of the morning sun as it peeped just above the horizon, I could see that the window stood a bit wider open.

  In fact, it looked just as if a cat had bumped gently but insistently against it until it had opened up wide enough for him to slip out and escape.

  This time, when I headed outside, I guessed immediately where Whiskers had headed, as soon as he got his first taste of freedom. Sure enough, when I stepped up to my chair against the fence in my backyard and peeped over, I spotted his orange bulk sprawled out on the patio on the Winterhearst side, lying back in the sunbeams.

  "You're a huge jerk, you know that?" I called over the fence to him, but he wisely chose to not respond.

  This time, however, I was going to be smarter about retrieving my pet. I still felt the scabbed-over scrape on my forearm from jumping the fence yesterday, and my foot still twinged slightly when I put my weight on it. I wasn't going to try that approach again.

  Instead, I cut back through my house and headed out the front door, down the sidewalk, and up to the front door of the Winterhearst mansion. The front door had both a doorbell and an ornate, lion's head knocker mounted on it, and I chose to use both methods to alert Winston that I was outside.

  A minute later, Winston opened the door, peering out at me. "Ah, Miss Dean," he greeted me, putting on a polite little professional's smile. "What can I do for you this morning?"

  "Hi, Winston," I greeted him, putting on my most charming smile. "I'm afraid it's my cat, Whiskers - he's gotten into your backyard again. Instead of climbing over the fence, I was hoping that you could just let me into the backyard so I can retrieve him. I'll even let myself out through the side gate."

  "Why, of course, Miss Dean," the elderly man replied immediately, holding the door open for me. "Your cat is quite the escape artist, isn't he?"

  "You'd never guess it from looking at him, but yes, it seems that way," I nodded, entering the mansion. "I'll have to start double-checking all the doors and windows at night before I go to sleep to make sure he doesn't pull any more breakouts."

  After blinking a few times to adjust to the dusty, rather gloomy interior of the mansion, I looked around with interest as I followed Winston through several rooms. Just as Della had suggested, there was a lot of furniture in the rooms, although much of it had been pushed up against the walls and covered up with tarps and sheets. In a living room, however, I paused as I caught sight of an ornately carved leg poking out from under a heavy gray cloth.

  "Hold on," I exclaimed, detouring over towards the covered piece of furniture. I tugged the cloth back, and although my actions raised a cloud of dust that tickled at my nose, my eyes still widened as I revealed the chair beneath the cloth. "Do you know what this is?"

  "A chair?" Winston asked. I glanced over at him, but didn't detect any hint of sarcasm in his voice.

  "More than that," I said, brushing my hand over the chair's cushion to wipe away some of the dust. "This is a Queen Anne, and it's in very good condition! If you put this up for sale, it could bring several hundred dollars - more if you have more of a set!" I looked around at the sheet-covered lumps of furniture, suddenly seeing mountains of treasure.

  "Is it?" Winston echoed, looking at the old chair with new respect. "My goodness. I never would have guessed."

  I hesitated, torn between my protective, mothering urge to go and rescue my cat, and this sudden financial opportunity. "You know, there's probably a lot of other stuff in here that's worth some money," I floated. "Has Sanford - uh, Mr. Welles - ever said anything about getting it appraised?"

  "Why, in fact he has," Winston replied, and for just a moment, I thought that I spotted a mischievous spark in his eye. "He suggested to me that I go about finding someone to come in and appraise the furniture and other contents of the house, so that we could get the insurance forms in order."

  "He said that?" I asked skeptically, struggling to imagine Sanford saying anything like that.

  Winston coughed delicately. "Well, his actual words were 'Winston, find someone to go through all this junk and tell me whether I can smash it all up for kindling', but I believe I properly insinuated his intent."

  My hand had flown up to my mouth at the thought of smashing up all the furniture indiscriminately for firewood. "No!" I gasped. "Uh, well, let me offer my services!"

  "You work in this area?" Winston asked.

  I nodded. "I'm a professional appraiser. I look at art, silver, but I mostly specialize in furniture. I'll research it, figure out if it's worth anything, and will help sell it if the owner wants to get rid of it."

  "And you would be willing to work o
n some of these articles?" Winston asked, capturing the contents of the entire mansion with a wave of his house.

  I tried not to nod too eagerly. "I've got a bit of an opening for the next few days," I said in the understatement of the century. "Of course, we'd need to work out some sort of payment schedule, and my fees would depend on how many items are in the house, but I'm sure that we could find a price that works..."

  I held my breath, hoping that this elderly manservant wouldn't decide that I didn't deserve what could end up being the biggest paycheck of my career. If Sanford wanted to get rid of the contents of the mansion... Dollar signs danced in front of my eyes at the thought of my commission on selling everything.

  Finally, Winston nodded. "I will need to speak with Mister Welles, of course, but I suspect that you are exactly what he's looking for," he said. "Do you perhaps have a card so that we can contact you?"

  I reached down for my purse, but stopped as I realized that I'd come over to the Winterhearst mansion dressed in nothing but my bathrobe pulled over my pajamas! Oh god, no wonder I had to work harder than usual to project an air of respectability! "Er, I'll run one over after I bring my cat back home," I said, lamely aware that this didn't sound particularly professional.

  But Winston just nodded. "Very good, Miss Dean. And now, let's go retrieve your errant feline."

  I followed after him as he led me to the mansion's back door, still trying to resist the urge to rub my hands together and cackle wildly at the thought of my potential profit on this job. This was exactly what I needed! If this came through, all of my money problems would be solved. Heck, I could probably even afford to take a vacation!

  In the backyard, Whiskers still lay just where he'd flopped down, his eyes closed in ecstasy as his body drank in the warmth of the sun. I reached down and scooped him up, and he was so relaxed and warm that he didn't even put up any resistance. He just sighed a little and turned his face into me, an utterly pliable lump of fur.

  "Can I offer you some coffee, Miss Dean?" Winston asked me as I picked up my feline companion. "It's freshly ground, and really quite good."

  "I probably ought to get my cat back before he gets away again," I said apologetically, although some freshly brewed coffee that didn't come from freeze-dried crystals really sounded amazing. "But maybe you can bring a fresh cup up to Sanford when you tell him that I can appraise his furniture. It might help win him over."

  Winston hesitated for a moment as he walked over to open up the gate back out of the Winterhearst mansion's backyard. "Mister Welles can sometimes present an intimidating front, but he's not as bad as he appears," he said, sounding very reluctant to share anything about his employer.

  "Really? He's not a mean old jerk, like he seems?" The words slipped out of my mouth before I could pull them back, but Winston just sighed.

  "On the contrary, he can be quite charming when he's in a better mood, and if you got to know him a bit better," he replied mournfully, as if sad that I wouldn't ever see his master through the same rose-tinted glasses that he wore. "Perhaps as you work over here, you can come to see that he's kinder than his first impression suggests."

  "Maybe," I said doubtfully, not wanting to disappoint the old butler, but fairly certain that Sanford and I would never see eye to eye.

  Whiskers squirmed a little in my arms, and I remembered that I needed to get him back to my house. "Anyway, I'll come back over and drop off a business card," I said, once again moving towards my house before Whiskers slipped out of my grasp again. "I've got references, too, if you - er, Sanford - needs them. Really, I'm quite good, and I promise that I'll get a great deal on everything I sell for you."

  "Not to worry, I have full and total confidence in you, young lady," Winston replied, giving me a little bow as he held the gate open for me. "I shall speak with Mister Welles, and shall get back to you as soon as possible with his answer."

  I nodded, and headed off to my own house before I managed to say anything else to put my foot in my mouth and possibly ruin what could be the biggest job of my career.

  Sipping at my coffee once I'd returned Whiskers safely back to the prison of my house interior, I looked out through my kitchen window, up at the Winterhearst mansion. This time, however, instead of just looking at the gloomy exterior of the building, I tried to think about how many rooms were in the interior, and how many treasures might be hidden under dusty old tarps and sheets inside those rooms.

  Yes, this could help pay off my growing credit card bills, restore my flagging bank balance, and even more. If I played my cards right, if I managed to convince Sanford to sell some of the dusty old pieces of furniture in there that he didn't want, I could make this my meal ticket.

  Even the man's scowl, just as fierce in my memory, wasn't enough to dissuade me. If it got me commission for selling an entire Queen Anne dining room set, as well as maybe some gorgeous china pieces and some classic Louis XVI furniture, I could put up with any number of angry glares and dark huffs.

  Or maybe, if he didn't want to deal with any of the stuff at all, he might just let me cart it all off, so that I could sell it on my own... dollar signs danced in front of my eyes.

  "This could be it - just what I've needed!" I said to Whiskers, momentarily forgetting that I was angry at him for pulling his escape act two days in a row.

  He just flicked his eyes and ears at me before strolling away, probably heading off to find a quiet corner to doze, or maybe a windowsill where he could balance and stare out at the chirping birds and frolicking squirrels.

  Chapter Seven

  *

  Once I'd pulled on some actual clothes, dressing in what Della referred to as my "slutty real estate agent" outfit, I headed back over to the Winterhearst mansion to hand over a business card to Winston. The butler greeted me at the door, thanked me sincerely for the card, but gave no indication of whether he'd spoken to Sanford yet, or if the master of the house had shown any inclination towards hiring me. I went back home feeling frustrated and already sweating a little bit in my professional blouse, jacket, and pencil skirt (although on my hips, the thing was more like a fat-tipped marker skirt).

  I peeled off the clothes as soon as I got home and, spurred by a sudden burst of energy and drive, changed into my workout gear. Normally, I'd just spend fifteen minutes on the stair climber in my basement, maybe while watching Dr. Phil yell at some woman on daytime television, but I was filled with energy, and didn't want to lock myself up in my basement.

  Besides, it was a beautiful day outside! A gorgeous, sunny day, made even brighter by the possibility of a job. No wonder Whiskers wanted to get out and lay in the sunbeam.

  I tugged a sports bra over my chest, found a pair of leggings that didn't seem to have any overly large holes in awkward locations, and laced up my running shoes. I popped my earbuds into my ears, cranked up some motivating tunes, and headed out to jog around the neighborhood.

  "The judge pulled me aside, said se la vie," I sang out loud as I settled into my run, feeling the comforting thud of my shoes hitting the pavement. "Shut up, shut up, it's a kangaroo court..."

  Up ahead of me, I saw a jogger headed towards me, coming down the sidewalk in the opposite direction. I frowned at him. He was taking up the whole sidewalk, and he wasn't moving aside! Besides, he was dressed all in black, which looked ridiculous on a jogger, even if he was clearly buff underneath it...

  My mouth dropped open. That was Sanford, jogging towards me! I froze for a moment, trying to figure out which way he'd zig-zag around me, but he seemed to have his thoughts turned inward, not even looking forward. I saw his eyes finally dart up and widen as he spotted me, squarely in his path, but it was too late for either of us to dodge.

  "Oof!" I grunted as we collided, and he let out a similar exhalation as the air was knocked out of his lungs. My hand, flailing about, closed on his shirt, and before I could release him, we both tumbled off the sidewalk and onto the grass beside the path. My earbuds slipped out of my ears as we fell, and m
y Capital Cities music cut off halfway through the song.

  "What the hell?" Sanford was trying to sit up, but I'd fallen across him, holding him down. He pushed at me, even as I still struggled to catch my breath. Man, he was in good shape. I saw a slight sheen of sweat glistening on his exposed arms and around his neck, shimmering in the sun and distracting me a little. "Elaine? What are you doing?"

  "Jogging, same as you!" I retorted, once I'd drawn breath. "At least, I was jogging before you came along, hogging all the sidewalk!"

  "Let me up, you're lying right on top of me!" Sanford's hand reached down, presumably to push me off, but his palm instead landed right on top of my ass. He pulled his hand away immediately, as if touching a hot surface.

  Finally, after a bit of fruitless attempting to gain traction against the slick grass, I managed to roll off of him, and he climbed up to his feet. "Ugh. Unbelievable," I heard him mutter, presumably to himself.

  "Hey, you're at fault here!" I fired back. "What are you doing, running down the middle of the sidewalk and not even looking where you're going?"

  "I'm trying to focus on running!" Sanford looked down at me, and I saw the now almost familiar scowl dance around his face. After a moment, however, he held out his hand to me. I would have felt a little better if he didn't roll his eyes as he did so.

  Still, practicality won out over my injured pride, and I accepted the helping hand. The man pulled me easily up to my feet, and I dusted myself off, checking surreptitiously to make sure there weren't any new rips in my leggings. Fortunately, all the sensitive areas still felt covered.

  "So, uh, did Winston get a chance to talk to you?" I asked, figuring that I might as well take advantage of the chance meeting.

  He raised an eyebrow at me, but didn't say anything.

  "About looking at all of the old furniture in your mansion," I went on, filling up the silence. "I'm a furniture appraiser, although I also do some other stuff. When I was passing through this morning-"