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Kat decided to stop by Imogene’s house after saying goodbye to Lady Fairchild. She wanted to check on her friend after what had happened the night before. Such a violent death occurring so close to home had to have left her at least a little shaken.
“Kat!” Imogene said when she answered the door. “What a pleasant surprise.”
“Hi, Imogene. I hope I’m not interrupting anything.”
“Of course not. You’re always welcome.”
“I just came to see how you were holding up after yesterday,” Kat said.
“As well as can be expected.” Imogene pursed her lips. “But it’s not me you should be worried about.”
“What do you mean?”
Imogene darted a look over her shoulder before hunching closer. “Nikita’s mother and sister are here from Wenatchee.”
“They are?” Kat peered past her friend, but she couldn’t see anyone from this angle.
“They pulled up to Nikita’s house a half hour ago to start putting her affairs in order,” Imogene said. “As soon as I saw them I went out to introduce myself and offer my condolences, but they looked so depressed I ended up inviting them over.”
Clover chose that moment to join the humans. The white cat sat down and meowed first at Imogene, then at Kat.
Kat crouched down to stroke him. “Let me guess, boy, one of them is sitting in your armchair.”
Imogene chuckled. “Just wait until he finds out they’ll be sleeping in the guest room.”
Kat glanced up. “You invited them to spend the night?”
“It seemed like the neighborly thing to do. This way they can be close to Nikita’s.”
“Why don’t they just stay at her house?”
“After what happened over there?” Imogene shook her head. “It would be a miracle if they could get any sleep.”
Kat didn’t see how sleeping in a stranger’s spare bedroom would be any easier, but she also wasn’t about to argue over a subject that didn’t concern her.
Clover nudged Kat’s hand with his nose. Kat gave him one last pat before standing up.
“Well, I didn’t mean to take you away from your guests,” she said, stepping backward. “I’ll talk to you later.”
Imogene latched onto Kat’s elbow. “You’re not in a hurry, are you?”
“No, why?”
Imogene hauled Kat inside and kicked the door shut. “I could use your help cheering Melissa and Valerie up.”
Kat had to cling to the banister or risk tripping as Imogene pulled her up the stairs. “I don’t see how I can help. I didn’t even know Nikita.”
“Just being around you is bound to brighten their spirits.”
Kat had her doubts about that, but she dutifully followed her friend.
Clover trotted behind them, a slight bounce in his step. From what Imogene had told her in the past, Kat gathered that the feline was rather territorial. She wouldn’t be surprised if he planned to stick close to his human’s side until their guests departed.
When they reached the second floor, Imogene bent close to Kat’s ear and whispered, “Valerie, Nikita’s sister, can’t be older than twenty-five. It will be nice for her to have somebody of the same generation to talk to.”
“I’m thirty-two. That’s a big gap.”
“Perhaps, but you’re certainly closer to her in age than us fogies.”
Before Kat could respond, Imogene plastered a big smile on her face and breezed into the master bedroom. Kat thought that was an odd place to stash her guests, but when she saw the woman who had to be Nikita’s mother staring at the lake painting on the wall, she understood why Imogene had chosen this room.
“Melissa, Valerie,” Imogene said, her voice a little too chipper, “I’d like you to meet my dear friend, Kat Harper.”
The young woman who had to be Valerie sat in the armchair next to the window. She had her head down and her knees pulled up to her chest, but she glanced up long enough for Kat to count one eyebrow and two nose rings. Without a word, she dropped her head back down, her pitch-black hair falling around her like a curtain being drawn.
Nikita’s mother was a little more gracious. When Melissa faced Kat, she at least made the effort to smile. “Hello.”
“I’m so sorry about your daughter,” Kat said.
“Thank you.” Melissa’s eyes grew wet before straying back to the painting. “She was so very gifted, don’t you agree?”
Kat felt a lump in her throat. “I do.”
Clover leapt onto the bed and sat down. He held his head high and released a long, drawn-out meow that all but declared this was his domain and it was time for the visitors to leave.
Melissa didn’t seem to notice the whiny cat, her gaze fixed on the painting. “Ever since Niki was a little girl I could tell she was going places,” she said. “She had this quality about her. You know what I’m referring to? Some people you can just tell they’re going to make something of themselves.”
Kat thought she heard a noise from Valerie’s side of the room, but when she glanced in her direction she still had her head down.
Melissa traced the eagle in Nikita’s painting with the tip of one finger. “She always had such a good eye for detail. Even before she was old enough to hold a paintbrush, she used to notice the most minute things. Once I had put on two different earrings, and when it was time for me to drive her to school she said to me, ‘Mommy, your jangles don’t match.’” Melissa let out a sob. “That’s what she called earrings way back when, before she learned the proper term.”
Imogene patted Melissa’s arm. “She sounds like a delightful child.”
Melissa swiped at her eyes. “Oh, she was.”
Clover marched over to the edge of the mattress closest to Melissa and let out a piercing cry.
Melissa spun toward him, her hand floating to her chest. “He sounds like he’s in pain.”
“He does,” Kat agreed. Her eyes flitted over the cat in search of obvious injuries.
Clover’s apparent distress even elicited a response from Valerie, who lifted her head up just high enough to look at him.
Imogene flicked her wrist. “Don’t worry about him. He does that when he’s being ignored.”
Clover jumped onto the floor and padded over to the door. When nobody followed him, he turned around and howled.
Imogene laughed. “He’s trying to coax us into the kitchen. You can probably tell by his size that he never gets enough to eat.”
Kat thought it was more likely that Clover was showing his unwanted guests to the door, but she didn’t contradict her friend.
“Why does he keep staring at me?” Valerie asked.
“He thinks that chair belongs to him,” Imogene told her. “He’s not accustomed to seeing somebody else sitting in it.”
Valerie set her shoes on the floor. “I should leave then.”
“Nonsense.” Imogene waved her back down. “You’ll stay right where you are. Clover can find somewhere else to sit.”
Valerie shrugged and fingered her eyebrow ring.
The edges of Melissa’s mouth dipped down. “That’s going to get infected if you keep playing with it, Val.”
Valerie’s eyes bored into her mother’s. Without a word, she tugged the eyebrow ring harder.
Melissa sighed before addressing Imogene. “Could I trouble you for some water?”
“Absolutely. Bottled?”
“Hot, if you don’t mind.”
“Would you like some tea?” Imogene asked. “I have several varieties you can choose from.”
“Imogene, you are a most gracious hostess.” Melissa strode across the room. “I’ll join you downstairs.”
The two older women left with Clover right behind them. Kat glanced at Valerie, the burden of entertaining the young woman weighing on her shoulders now that they were alone.
But Valerie spoke before Kat could. “You see how they didn’t ask if I wanted tea?” she said.
“Oh.” Kat was a little taken aback by the sharpness of her tone. “I’m sure Imogene will make you some.”
“I hate tea. My point is, she didn’t even bother asking.” Valerie made a face. “It’s like I don’t even exist.”
Kat sat down on the bed. “I don’t think she meant anything by it. Imogene probably assumed you would speak up if you wanted some.”
“I’m not talking about her, I’m talking about my mother.” Valerie swiped her hair away from her eyes. “She’s always been like this. Honestly, I’d bet money she wishes I were the daughter who died.”
Kat’s insides knotted. “I doubt that.”
“Yeah, well, you don’t know her.”
Kat folded her hands in her lap. She didn’t know what to say to that. After all, Valerie was right.
Valerie shifted positions so she was sitting cross-legged in the chair. “Ever since I can remember it was ‘Nikita this’ and ‘Nikita that.’ Nikita always did things better. She could run faster, her grades were better, she made prettier paintings. Me, I can’t do anything right in Mom’s eyes.”
Kat watched as Valerie started playing with her eyebrow ring again, silently questioning whether all the facial jewelry was Valerie’s way of rebelling. It seemed counterintuitive, but if Valerie believed she couldn’t do anything right in Melissa’s eyes, why not go to the extreme and do everything she could wrong?
“You have any sisters?” Valerie asked.
Kat shook her head. “I’m an only child.”
“You’re lucky. It bites knowing you’re always being compared to somebody better.”
Kat found herself wondering how much Valerie had resented always being in Nikita’s shadow. Enough to kill? Perhaps she’d finally grown tired of coming up short all the time and had decided to eliminate her biggest rival once and for all.
As heinous as the theory was, Kat couldn’t rule out the possibility. Taking in Valerie’s hard face and flashing eyes, she certainly didn’t seem to be shedding any tears over Nikita’s death.
In fact, Kat thought with a chill, the expression on Valerie’s face almost seemed to suggest that she thought her sister had had that accident coming to her.
