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“Did I just say that out loud? I’m sorry.” When her friend didn’t respond, but merely gave her a sour look, she sighed. “I’m sorry, okay? I know you’re worried about your cat, and about your daughter falling head over heels in love with that fitness clown.”

“Would you call Randy Hancock a clown?”

“Yeah, I would. I never liked the guy. He doesn’t even look like a fitness instructor.”

“Not all fitness instructors look like Chris Hemsworth, Scarlett.”

“Well, they should, all right? Just like all bakers should be round and jolly, and all butchers should look like they’re ready to chop you up into little pieces. It’s part of the deal. If you’re going around promising to make people fit and muscular, you should look like a hunk and not likea vertically challenged clown.”

“Okay, fine. Point taken. So how do we go about this? How do we get my cat back? And how do we make sure Marge doesn’t dump my son-in-law for the fitness dude?”

“I think what Tex needs is that virility women fall for in a man. I’m sorry to tell you this but Tex looks like a wuss. And women don’t like a wuss. They like a caveman.”

“So you suggest we turn Tex into a caveman, is that it?”

“Of course! No woman can resist a caveman, Vesta. It’s built into our DNA ever since we lived together in caves.” She gave her friend a curious look. “Are you sure you want to keep Tex around, though? You’re always on the guy’s case.”

“I’m always on the guy’s case because I like him.”

Scarlett chuckled.“You’re a strange one, Vesta.”

“And still you like me.”

“Oh, sure. Life is never boring when you’re around. So let’s start with your cat. Where could he have gone off to?”

“No idea. But seeing as we gotta start somewhere, I suggest we ask his friends.” And she darted a look across the street, where Wilbur Vickery’s General Store was located. In front of that store sat Kingman, Wilbur’s piebald, best-informed cat in Hampton Cove. Behind the counter, though, sat the guy she dumped last night. But since finding Brutus was more important than her own wounded pride—or Wilbur’s, she drained her hot cocoa and got up. “Let’s go,” she said. “We’ve got a bruised male ego to massage.”

Chapter 27

The house where Randy Hancock lived was pretty impressive I had to admit. Just like in the video we’d seen, there was the white wrought-iron access gate, the white columns supporting the portico like a Greek temple, and the house itself, done in pink stucco.

Once inside, the same sweeping marble staircase as in the video led upstairs, presumably to the same bedroom, where an unknowing Randy had been injected with a mysterious and deadly toxin.

Randy’s housekeeper Floralba was a lady in her sixties, with dark curly hair and a round face. She looked at us sternly, her dark brows stuck in a frown.

“I not understand,” she said when Odelia asked her what she knew of the death threats made against her boss.

“Well, Randy asked me to conduct an investigation into these death threats,” Odelia repeated, “and so now I’m talking to all the people who know him, trying to find out who could have sent that video. It wasn’t you by any chance, was it?” she asked, eyeing the woman closely.

It’s a technique detectives often use: they drop a bomb like that and then look closely for a reaction. Most people aren’t trained actors, and their emotions are reflected on their faces for everyone to see.

Floralba, though, merely looked amused.“Me! Try to kill Mr. Randy! You must be mad woman, Miss Poole. I love Mr. Randy. I work for Mr. Randy thirty years! Mr. Randy and I are like this!” And she squeezed her index finger and thumb together, presumably to show how much she liked her boss.

“So you have no idea who could have sent him that video?” asked Odelia.

“No idea,” said Floralba.

We were still in the entrance, an atrium that was as impressive as the front of the house: it was two stories high, and contained a very large portrait of Randy Hancock, dressed in his token sequined outfit and looking very fit indeed. There was also a large lion to our right—luckily not a real one but a marble representation of the lord of the jungle, and another large statue of a puma to our left.

“Mr. Randy is beloved, Miss Poole—beloved by all. Everybody love him. His clients. His family. His people. Even the pool boy love Mr. Randy. And Mr. Randy love pool boy, too. Very much. And gardener, and masseur, and—”

“Did Mr. Hancock ever talk to you about this video?”

“No, he did not. He does not like me to worry. Mr. Randy like me too much and hate me to worry about him. Like with his hips. He in a lot of pain. Lot of pain. And I see it in his face. I say Mr. Randy you so much pain, you poor thing. Let me take you to my daughter—my daughter she doctor but use traditional Colombian medicine to heal people. Mr. Randy go to my daughter one time, and she treat him with smoky leaves. Mr. Randy like smoky leaves little too much. Sing songs for two days and no more pain! But Mr. Randy doctor says no good for Mr. Randy. He in the AA and can’t smoke. Too bad.”