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“You seduced my husband! My husband—my rock—you took him from me!” Alina was clutching a fist to her heart, pounding her chest.

“Oh, she’s good,” said Chase. “She’s very good.”

“I didn’t take your husband, Alina,” said Kimberlee. “I swear to God. I would never—”

“Liar!” Alina bellowed. “Cheat!” she added when her husband tried to place his hands on her shoulders and she slapped them away. “Oh, I know how it is. Dump the old girl and replace her with a younger model—but you’re not replacing me, buster! I’m leaving you! And I’m taking the kids!”

“But honey!”

“You brought this all on yourself—I’m divorcing you, Reinhart. Do you hear me? I’ve had enough of your philandering and your lying and your cheating. And you,” she added, viciously turning on Kimberlee. “You stole my husband—you try to steal my career—laughing behind my back—making cracks about my age and decaying beauty! ‘Oh, she’s lost it. She’s a wreck.’”

“But Alina, I never—”

“Shut up!” Alina screeched. “Shut up shut up shut up!”

“If this were a movie, someone would slap her,” said Chase.

“Only if this were a movie from the forties,” said Odelia.

But it wasn’t a movie, from the forties or otherwise, so no one slapped anyone, and a good thing, too, cause it would only make matters worse.

“I’m going to bed,” said Alina suddenly. “And you can sleep inher bed for all I care!” she added, pointing an accusing finger at Kimberlee.

Kimberlee was shaking her head, looking distraught. Alina’s husband, meanwhile, hurried after his wife. “But, Alina!”

“I’ve had it with you! You can find your own way home!”

And then she slammed the door in his face and he stood there for a moment, staring at the door, as if he couldn’t quite believe what had just happened. He then pounded the door with his fist. “Alina! Alina, sweet pea!”

Emerald stepped forward and placed a hand on his shoulder.“Reinhart, I’ll find you another room. You can sort this all out in the morning.”

He nodded and followed her, looking like a beaten man.

Gradually, the others all filed back into their respective rooms, and so did Odelia and Chase.

“What a circus,” said Chase.

“I really had no idea they were as passionate in their personal lives as they are on the screen,” said Odelia as they got into bed.

“Passionate? Berserk, you mean.”

She snuggled up to Chase. Neither of them was in the mood for nookie now, so she just lay there, going over the events of the evening in her mind.

And she’d just nodded off when her phone chimed. Dazedly, she picked it from the nightstand. The first thing she heard was the voice of her grandmother.

“Odelia, honey, I’m sorry to wake you, but the little ones are going nuts.”

And then she heard the voice of Max, clear as a bell in her ear.

“You had us NEUTERED???!!!!!”

Chapter 10

“Wait, I thought you knew.”

“No, we most certainly did not know!” I said.

It had come as something of a shock when Kingman broke the news to us that we were… that way. The snip, he called it, and the word made me shiver. Snipped! Someone—probably Vena, who I could totally see doing a horrible thing like that—snipped something where nothing should have been snipped!

“And what about me?” said Harriet, struggling to get to the phone. “It was that Vena woman, wasn’t it? She did this to me! She turned me into a travesty of what a cat should be!”

“But you guys!” Odelia cried. She sounded weird. As if she’d just woke up. Which probably made sense. Humans like to sleep at night. A weird habit, if you ask me, and probably unhealthy. Nighttime is prowling time, after all.

“This snipping thing,” said Dooley. “Did it hurt? Cause I can’t remember.”

“It happened when you were very young,” said Odelia. “And no, it didn’t hurt. Vets always use anesthesia when they perform the procedure.”

“I’m pretty sure I wasn’t snipped,” said Brutus gruffly. “Kingman said as much. He said he couldn’t be sure, and I’d remember if someone tried to mess with my plumbing. In fact I’d give them a punch in the snoot if they so much as tried to touch me down there, vet or no vet. I don’t stand for nonsense.”

“Look, this is better for you,” said Odelia. “For one thing it prevents you from spraying urine all over the house. It also—”

“Spraying!” I cried. “I would never lower myself to such a foul practice!”

“Well, that’s because of the snip,” said Odelia.

“But Odelia! You could have at least asked!”

“Who are you talking to?” a voice sounded on the other end. I recognized it as Chase, who was probably wondering what all this talk of snipping and spraying meant—in the middle of the night.

“My grandmother. She, um, had something urgent that couldn’t wait.”

“If she’s spraying urine all over the house she should probably talk to your dad.”

“It’s not—I wasn’t…”

“Hey, it’s nothing for your grandmother to be embarrassed about, babe. When you get to a certain age, these things happen.”

“Chase…”

“One word. Adult diapers. Actually, that’s two words.”

Gran, who’d been slowly turning red in the face now cried, “Hey, for your information I’m housebroken, young man!”