Cat Trick

I wondered what Burtis would do if I didn’t stop asking questions about Mike Glazer’s death. I rocked back in the chair. I was going to find out because I wasn’t going to back off. Burtis wasn’t the only one with a loyal streak. I’d given Harry Taylor my word that I’d see what I could find out about how Mike Glazer had died, and I hadn’t exhausted all the possibilities yet.

I twirled around in the chair and reached for the phone.

Lise Tremayne answered on the fifth ring. “Hi, Kath,” she said. “How are things in the Hundred Acre Wood?”

“Beautiful,” I said. “The sky is blue. The sun is shining. And I think Pooh and Piglet just walked by my window.”

Lise laughed. “No fair. It’s rainy and windy here.”

“You could always come for a visit.”

“I should do that,” she said. “Before you come home.”

Lise was my closest friend in Boston. She assumed I’d be heading back to the city when my contract expired. So did Ethan and Sara. I knew my dad wanted me closer, but he wouldn’t say it. And my mother, who had an opinion on everything, was for once keeping her opinion to herself.

“Lise, I need a favor,” I said.

“Favors are my specialty,” she said. I pictured her in her office at the university, her feet in some ridiculously high heels propped on the edge of her desk.

“I’m looking for some information. Do you have any contacts in Chicago?”

“Absolutely. What do you need?” Lise had contacts everywhere. She came from a big family—eight brothers and sisters. Her husband was a very talented jazz guitarist who had played all over the place. And she was warm and down-to-earth. She could talk to anyone about anything.

“Anything you can find out about Alex and Christopher Scott. They own a tour company in Chicago.”

“Wait a second. Are they both lawyers?”

“Yes,” I said, stretching one arm up over my head. “But as far as I know, they’re not practicing. Why? What do you know?” Not only did Lise know people everywhere; she also had a mind like the proverbial steel trap. I heard a squeak, which told me she was leaning back in her desk chair.

“Do you remember about five or six years ago there was a story that went viral online? This guy talked himself into a job with one of the top law firms in Chicago by paying off the caddy of one of the managing partners and then somehow improving the man’s golfing score so he won a bet with some other lawyer. The partner was impressed with the would-be lawyer’s initiative.”

“The story sounds familiar,” I said. “Then didn’t it turn out that the guy failed the bar exam?”

Lise gave a very unladylike snort of laughter. “Five times. Someone from his class outed him online.”

“It was one of the Scott brothers.”

“Uh-huh. I’m pretty sure it was Alex. And even more embarrassing, his brother passed the first time.”

“Ouch.”

“It gets better,” Lise said, “or worse, depending on your perspective. Their father was a lawyer and his father and his father. And no Scott had ever not passed the bar exam on the first try.”

I switched the phone from one hand to the other so I could stretch my other arm. “That’s a lot of pressure.”

“It is. So what do you want to know?”

“Anything you can find out about their business, Legacy Tours. Rumors, gossip, anything that’s not common knowledge.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” Lise said. “You notice I didn’t ask if this has anything to do with a dead body.”

“I appreciate that,” I said, wishing I could somehow reach through the phone and hug her.

“I’ll talk to you soon,” she said.

The parcel from Mom was sitting on my desk. I reached for it, wondering what she’d sent me as I pulled the tape off the end flap.

It was a small picture of a tiny cottage, with two cats sitting on the front steps and the caption Home Is Anywhere You Are. I felt the pinch of tears and had to swallow and blink a couple of times. I knew this was my mother’s way of saying she’d support whatever decision I made. It made me miss her even more.

I took a deep breath. Then I got up and set the picture in my briefcase. I took the foil-wrapped package of brownies down to the staff room, where I put one on a plate and left the rest in the middle of the table. I poured a cup of coffee and took it and my brownie back to my office, where I ate lunch backward—brownie first, salad last—and went over paperwork.