d5e426eccb138e04dab909926b2752c6

Faced with these two options, I have to admit neither one looked very appealing to me. I didn’t want to be protected by a dog, and I didn’t want to be trained as a member of Paw Patrol either. But on the other hand Dooley was right: we had to do something, for it had been proved beyond a reasonable doubt that we weren’t ready in case of an attack.

“Fine,” I said finally. “So maybe we should go ahead with your scheme.”

He perked right up.“Do you really mean that, Max?”

“Yes, I do,” I said, though not wholeheartedly, as you can imagine.

“Great!” he said. “I’ll go and tell Odelia right away!”

And happy as a Paw Patrol puppy, he jumped down from the stool and pranced off.

Sometimes, I thought, Dooley’s excitement was really tiring. Then again, maybe that just proved he was right: I was unfit, untrained, and as such the perfect target.

So… time to get some police cat training in?

Ugh.

Chapter 6

“Bad business, Scarlett,” said Vesta. “Bad business, this.”

“You can say that again,” Vesta’s friend Scarlett agreed.

The two women were seated in the outdoor dining area of the Hampton Cove Star, their small town’s boutique hotel, and sipping from their respective favorite beverages: a hot chocolate with extra cream in Vesta’s case, and a flat white for Scarlett. Both women might be the same age, but they couldn’t have looked more different, and if an innocent bystander were asked to guess their ages, they’d have pegged Scarlett to be in her late fifties to early sixties, and Vesta in her late seventies to early eighties. Vesta, dressed in her usual tracksuit and sensible white shoes, had that whole Golden Girls look down pat, while Scarlett wouldn’t have looked out of place in the best little whorehouse in Texas, with her thick russet curls, her inflated chest, and her face not revealing a single line.

“You simply don’t expect this kind of violence in a small town like ours,” Vesta continued. “Breaking and entering alone is a rare thing, and this attempted murder of four innocent pets? That’s just wicked.”

“Wicked,” Scarlett agreed wholeheartedly. “Probably some uptown lowlife deciding to hit the suburbs for a change. But he’ll soon discover we’re not as soft on crime down here as he might have supposed.”

“I don’t know, Scarlett,” said Vesta musingly. “I mean, you would expect my son to assemble his troops and hunt this animal down, but instead all he can think about is his girlfriend.”

“Charlene Butterwick? Is that still a thing?”

“Oh, yes. Very much so, in fact.”

“I would have thought that after finding out about your cat-talking trick she’d have run for the hills.”

“No, she’s a keeper, that one. Sticking it out. Which may or may not be a good thing.”

“She’s got your son distracted.”

“Exactly. And a distracted chief of police is the last thing we need right now.”

Scarlett shared a keen look with her friend.“I smell an opportunity for the watch, Vesta.”

“I’m way ahead of you, darling. I’ve already told Father Reilly and Wilbur, and we’re going on our first-ever patrol tonight.”

“This night?”

“This night.”

“Woo-hoo!”

“We’re going to patrol this neighborhood to within an inch of its life. And I’d like to see this heartless animal try and strike again. He’s going to have us to contend with.”

“We’re taking that sucker down!” Both women smiled before themselves, thinking pleasant thoughts about the neighborhood watch’s watchful prowess, then Scarlett said, “We’re not going to patrol the neighborhood in that little red Peugeot of yours, are we?”

“I thought maybe we could ask Alec to borrow one of his squad cars. Seeing as he’s not using them anyway.”

“I like your thinking,” said Scarlett, her eyes lighting up. “Ooh—and maybe we should get us some snazzy neighborhood watch outfits, too!”

“Again, way ahead of you.” And Vesta reached into the shopping bag dangling from her chair and took out what at first glance looked like a beige jumpsuit.

“What is that?” asked Scarlett, giving the thing a look of abject disgust.

“The new neighborhood watch uniform,” said Vesta proudly, and unfolded the thing to show it to Scarlett in all its splendor—or horror.

Itwas a jumpsuit, or at least that’s what it looked like to Scarlett. “I’m not wearing that,” she said decidedly after giving the monstrosity a glance. “Nuh-uh. No way.”

“But why? It’s got a logo and everything. See?” Vesta pointed to the little logo sewn onto the jumpsuit’s chest. It depicted a stern-looking figure pointing at the innocent observer and saying, ‘I’ve got my eye on you!’ The figure looked a little too much like Vesta to be a coincidence, Scarlett thought. The whole thing was tacky to a degree.

“You can wear that thing, but I’m not wearing it,” she repeated.

Vesta stared at her creation.“What’s wrong with it?”

“What’s wrong with it? We’re going to look like a couple of morons, that’s what. Have you even tried it on?”

“Sure. I tried it on this morning after the UPS man dropped it off. I ordered them online—I even designed the logo myself.”

“Of course you did.”