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“Or else what? You’re going to denounce me on your vlog?”

“Oh, darn it!”

“What?”

Gran held up her phone.“Forgot to film the interview!”

And a good thing, too, Odelia thought as she put the car in gear. She needed her grandmother vlogging her way through this investigation like she needed a hole in the head.

“Maybe you should give up this vlog,” she suggested, waving to Helena and Fae as they pulled out in front of her and merged into traffic.

“I’ll never give up flogging,” Gran said stubbornly. “I live to flog.”

And wasn’t that the truth.

Chapter 14

That night, Odelia was chopping tomatoes while watching something on her iPad, the frown cutting her brows indicating absolute focus. When she’s working on a case she’s often like that: utter concentration. I admire that about her. I sometimes have to contend with a lack of focus. Then again, I am continually faced with a lot of distractions, and I was looking at three of those distractions at that exact moment, namely Bim, Bam and Bom.

Odelia had finally named the kittens, which I thought was a dangerous sign. It meant she was probably going to keep them. I wasn’t particularly fond of the names either. Who wants to be called Bom for the rest of his life, unless they plan to be a suicide bomber?

Bam was dangling from the curtains, Bim was trying to remove all the water from my bowl with her paws, and Bom, living up to his name, was climbing the couch and dive-bombing into the deep, landing on the plush carpet every time he did. He was having a ball.

They still weren’t talking, which I guess was a good thing. I’d never realized kittens only babble in nonsensical vowels and consonants until they’re a little older. Then again, human babies don’t conduct entire conversations when they’re in the cradle either, right? And they’re supposed to be the top species on the planet.

“Listen to this, you guys,” said Odelia now, reading from her iPad. “Jeb’s last movie completely bombed at the box office, even though it had cost a quarter of a billion dollars to make, causing the studio that had green-lit the movie to file for bankruptcy, and the woman whose series of books the movie was based on to lose a big chunk of her fortune. Like Fitz Priestley, she put her own money into the production, and lost it all. She’s allegedly furious with Jeb for allowing himself to be dragged into this whole divorce thing and blames him for ending her Hollywood ambitions and putting a huge dent into her bank account.”

“Ouch,” I commented.

Odelia looked up triumphantly.“And guess what? She has a second home in Hampton Cove! So she could easily be behind this whole thing.”

“Who is this writer?” I asked.

“Prunella Lemon. She wrote thoseChronicles of Zeus novels. About a young girl, Ellie Zeus, who accidentally discovers her father is actually the Greek god Zeus and she has all these godlike powers. Jeb played her mentor, the quirky genius inventor Florida Stopper.”

“Right,” I said. I’d heard about those. They were a big success back when they were published, almost as popular asHarry Potter. I hoped they hadn’t put a nasty cat in them, though, like Mrs. Norris in the Potter books. Creatures like that give us cats a bad name.

Brutus and Harriet came trudging through the cat flap. But when Harriet saw the cavorting kittens, she hesitated, then cut a curious glance to Odelia.“Um, Odelia?” she said.

“Mh?” said Odelia, still reading on her tablet, while her tomatoes had been reduced to pulp by her unfocused hand.

“About those kittens?”

“Uh-huh?”

“Are we, um, going to have them with us for a long time? I mean, can you give us a time frame? Just so we know how long we’ll be able to enjoy their pleasant company?”

Odelia was still frowning.“Listen to this. ‘Jeb Pott was the wrong choice to cast as Florida Stopper. If I’d known then what I know now, I’d never have asked him. He’s the reason this project turned into an absolute nightmare.’” She looked up. “Prunella Lemon.”

“Yes, that’s all very interesting,” said Harriet, “but what about the kittens? We do love those little babies so much, and we’re hoping they can be with us for… a day? A week?”

“I can’t believe this,” said Odelia, shaking her head. “I mean, Jeb has so many enemies you wouldn’t believe. And anyone could have sent those text messages to Camilla, right? Or greeted her at the door while Jeb was passed out in bed.”

“Whoever this person is would have had to have intimate knowledge of Jeb’s habits,” I said. “His whereabouts, the fact that he was drugged out most of the time. And Camilla’s private number so they could text her, pretending to be Jeb, and lure her into a trap.”

“You’re right absolutely right, Max,” said Odelia, nodding. “Which still makes me wonder if Jeb isn’t the one behind this after all. I mean, the simplest solution is often the right one, right? Camilla ruined him. She destroyed his life and his career. So maybe he thought he’d lost everything anyway so why not kill her and get it over with?”