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“Well, sometimes I have to pee so bad that I don’t reach my litter box in time, and since I don’t want to pee on the floor, or, God forbid, in a flowerpot, I often pick the first suitable receptacle I see, and in many cases that’s one of the water bowls.”

We all stared at the cat now.“What water bowls?” asked Harriet.

“Well, I try to be fair and square about it, so if I pick Max’s bowl one day, I always try to pick Dooley’s the next, or… yours…”

Harriet’s eyes were shooting sheets of flame in the direction of her one and true love. “You mean to tell me that you’ve been peeing in my water bowl all this time?”

He gave her a guarded look.“Well, notall the time, if you see what I mean—justsome of the time.”

“Why don’t you pee in your own bowl, Brutus?” I asked. “Why pee in ours?”

He stared at me thoughtfully.“Huh. I guess the thought has never occurred to me to pee in my own bowl. Though now that you mention it, maybe that’s what I should have done from the beginning,” he added when he caught Harriet’s furious look amidships and rocked back a little.

“I can’t believe you’ve been peeing in our bowls!” Harriet cried.

“Just a tinkle,” he said. “The pre-pee, if you catch my drift. To tide me over until I can reach my litter box without having an accident. Just those first few drops, you know.”

“Oh, I do know, and now I understand why my water sometimes tastes a little off.”

“See, Max?” said Dooley. “You’ve been drinking Brutus’s pee all this time and you didn’t even notice.”

“Well, so have you, Dooley,” I pointed out, and watched my friend’s face fall.

“Ewww!” he said. “I’m never drinking from my bowl again!”

Suddenly those water dispensers sounded like a great idea.

At least Brutus wouldn’t be able to take a tinkle in those. Or would he?

Chapter 12

Odelia was hard at work on her article about the attack on her cats that morning when her uncle waltzed into her office. She was surprised to see him, for he was usually not in the habit of visiting her at the Gazette offices.

“Hey, Uncle Alec,” she said. And when she noticed the careworn expression on her uncle’s face when he took a seat, she immediately feared the worst. “Did Charlene break up with you again?”

Immediately he gave her a look of indignation.“No, she did not. What makes you think that?”

“Oh, nothing,” she said. “Just… you have that look.”

“Charlene did not break up with me,” he said emphatically. “Whatever people say.” He eyed her intently. “Have people been saying that about us? Is that it?”

“No, I haven’t picked up any gossip about you and Charlene lately.”

Often people in Hampton Cove, when they had nothing better to do, enjoyed spending their time gossiping about anyone and everyone, and even when they didn’t have time they still considered it their most beloved pastime for some reason.

“Charlene’s uncle died this morning,” he said, glancing around her office for a moment before settling his gaze on her again. “Looks like an accident. He installed pools for a living,” he explained, “and he fell in at the deep end of an empty pool. Died on impact, according to Abe.”

“That’s terrible,” said Odelia. “Was Charlene close with her uncle?”

“Not particularly, but she was fond of him. Well, you know how it is. You’re close to all of your relatives when you’re little, then you go off to college and start your career and those once close family bonds tend to fall by the wayside as you build your own life.”

“Except for us,” she said with a smile.

Her uncle reciprocated with a goofy smile of his own.“Yeah, except for our family. But anyway, I was thinking that if you don’t have too much work on your hands right now that maybe you could look into this guy’s death for me?”

She arched an inquisitive eyebrow.“You mean hisaccident?”

“Yeah, I’m not so sure about that.”

“You think he was murdered?”

He shrugged his broad shoulders.“Honestly? No idea. Call it a hunch, but I have the feeling there’s more to this than meets the eye.”

“Sure, I’ll look into it if you want. But is there a particular reason you’re asking me and not one of your officers?”

“If the police get involved it will be in the context of an official police inquiry, and that’s exactly what I don’t want. I want everyone to think it’s a simple accident.”

“You don’t want to alarm the murderer.”

“If there is a murderer,” he said.

“Gotcha.”

“Oh, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t tell Charlene.”

“You don’t want her to know her uncle may have been murdered?”

“No, I don’t. She’s got enough on her plate as it is. And if I’m wrong about this, I don’t want her to get all worked up about it for no reason.”

“Sure. I’ll be super-discreet.” When her uncle didn’t make any indication of getting up, she frowned. “Is there more?”

He scratched his nose.“Well, um… your grandmother just sent me a text. Looks like there’s going to be a family extension.”

“A family extension? What do you mean?”

“Yeah, a kid just came forward claiming he’s your dad’s son.”

Odelia blinked. Whatever she’d been expecting, it most definitely wasn’t this. “My dad’s son? You mean…”