Chapter Forty-Four
Emily ran up to Harlan and Sarah, clutching a white business card and her blue ribbon.
“Congratulations!” Harlan said.
Sarah gave her sister a hug and raised the arm holding the blue ribbon over Emily’s head. “The champion! You brought it home for you, Mom, Southwind, and the tradition of apple pie. Oops, I mean rhubarb.”
Emily giggled and pulled her arm back down. “You’re being silly.” She leaned her head forward so only Sarah could hear her. “But it does feel pretty good.”
“Winning or beating Jane?”
“Sarah Blair, you’re too much.” Emily swatted at Sarah with the business card, letting it cut through the air without touching her sister. “Truth be told—both.”
“That sounds like it calls for a celebratory drink,” Harlan suggested.
“So does this.” Emily brandished the business card again. “Thomas Howell gave me his card.”
“Who is Thomas Howell?”
“He owns that new luxury hotel that opened in Birmingham, the Howellian.”
“So?” Sarah had heard about the new hotel that featured cat and dog motifs, but she wasn’t familiar with Thomas Howell.
“Mr. Howell came to the Expo to learn about some of the new young chefs exhibiting here. Apparently, he’s been quietly going around and tasting our food this weekend. After I won, he congratulated me on my win and invited me to participate in a competition he wants to hold at his hotel in February. It’s going to be the climax of his year of kickoff events.”
“What did you tell him?” Harlan asked.
Sarah noticed his smile had disappeared. From the way Emily was bubbling over, it was obvious to Sarah that she was oblivious to the change in his expression.
“I told him, ‘Of course. I’d love to.’”
“Harlan? Is there any reason Emily won’t be able to participate? Anything else you haven’t told us?”
“To paraphrase Emily, of course not.” He smiled, but Sarah couldn’t help but notice that, other than relaxing his lips to force the grin, his neck and jaw remained tensed.
As someone stepped up to congratulate Emily, Sarah turned to quietly ask Harlan, “Is there something wrong with Howell?”
“Not that I personally know of.”
Sarah waited. It seemed to her Harlan was weighing whether to elaborate on his statement.
“He’s known around Birmingham for being a ruthless developer and he apparently has some aggressive plans for Wheaton, too.”
A bloodcurdling scream erupted from the far corner of the room. Sarah’s heart skipped a beat. She jerked her head in the direction from which the shriek emanated. A crowd was gathering around someone.
“That monster! I’m going to kill him! Grab him! No, not him—my cat!”
At the clarification that it was a cat at the heart of the melee, the circle of responders splintered. Some drifted away while others bent and bumped into one another in their haste to locate the errant cat.
Sarah knew, even before she could confirm through a break in the group of bystanders, the screaming woman was Jane and the cat, RahRah. What had the witch done to poor RahRah now? Leaving Harlan and Emily behind, Sarah ran toward Jane’s end of the room using the outside aisle, her eyes pinned to the floor. “RahRah, where are you?”
She figured if no one in the more clogged part of the room had spotted RahRah by now, RahRah probably had taken refuge as far away from Jane as he could. Sarah barely missed colliding with a pocket of Expo attendees as she glanced up to see if there was a place or ledge RahRah could have jumped to. There wasn’t.
Dodging other attendees, Sarah concentrated her search efforts on peeking under the tables lining the aisle and checking behind a stack of boxes piled on the wall near the main door. For RahRah’s sake, she prayed she found him before Jane or someone else did. This time, she’d never give him back.
Almost reaching the double glass front doors, Sarah saw Peter push one open. “Watch out!” Sarah waved her hands to catch Peter’s attention.
He waved back. As he did, Sarah caught a glimpse of tan flash by his leg.
“No! Catch him!”
Peter whirled around and shot a questioning glance at Sarah as she raced past him. She had no time to explain.
Outside, she stopped to get her bearings. There was no sign of RahRah, but she felt certain he was hiding nearby. She called his name and waited. Despite her repeatedly saying his name, no cat appeared as she searched the parking area. She checked one row and then another, peeking under cars and around corners.
Giving up, she returned to the front of the building. Peter, Harlan, and Emily stood outside the main door.
“I didn’t find him. Did RahRah come back this way?”
Peter shook his head. She wasn’t sure if the way he squinted and twisted his face was an involuntary response to the sun being in his eyes or her statement.
“We need to find him before he gets hurt.”
Sarah was surprised by the gentle tone of Peter’s voice.
“Each of us can look in a different direction,” Emily suggested. “He can’t be hiding too far away.”
Harlan nodded. “Why don’t you two go around the building toward the loading dock while Emily and I scour this side of the building?”
“Let’s meet back here in ten minutes,” Peter said. “If we haven’t found RahRah by then, I’ll call in reinforcements to help us search.”
The four separated. Peter and Sarah stayed together at the front door. “Sarah, if you go straight toward the loading dock, I’ll check out these overgrown bushes and parked cars.”
Peter started to slide behind the bushes planted next to the door, but Sarah remained rooted. This was the second time today he’d mentioned the loading dock. Had he forgotten she’d tripped over Richard’s dead body there? She’d never be able to forget.
Glancing back at her, Peter hit his forehead with his hand. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I’ll check out the loading dock and the parking area the chief of security and I blocked off for our use during the Expo. You can look around this area.”
“Thanks.” Sarah slipped into the space between the building and the entryway beds while Peter made his way toward the loading dock. She tried to make herself think like a cat.
“RahRah, if I had nine lives,” she said aloud, “I wouldn’t want to chance wasting one in this parking lot. No, I’d try to find a space I could crawl into and hide.”
Moving around the plants, Sarah noticed a drainpipe coming down from the gutter at the corner of the building. Its bottom was hidden by the edge of a large bush but she felt sure, if it was like the ones on a house, it curved into a drainage pan that might be holding rainwater. Sarah approached the pipe cautiously, keeping her eyes pointed down.
When she saw RahRah curled against the pipe, his back arched, she was too far away to reach him. She forced herself to move slowly, lest she scare him more. “It’s okay, RahRah. No one is going to hurt you. I’m going to take care of you.”
He didn’t budge, but Sarah imagined RahRah was watching her every movement.
It felt like an eternity until she closed the gap between them, bent, and picked him up. RahRah didn’t fight her. Rather than yell for the others, she simply stood in the flower bed and nuzzled him until everyone straggled back.
Emily was first. She reached out to pet RahRah but clearly thought better of it.
Smart. After being with Jane, RahRah probably was in no mood for company, even Emily. Sarah was happy to note that RahRah clearly considered her as family.
“Are you going to take him back to Jane or do you want me to go get her for you?”
“Neither.”
“But Jane’s looking all over for him.”
“I’m not giving him back,” Sarah said, as Harlan and Peter joined them. “Jane doesn’t know how to take care of RahRah.”
As Sarah hugged RahRah closer to her body, Peter cleared his throat. Before he could say anything, she again declared, “I’m not giving him back to Jane. Surely, under the circumstances we can find a way to thwart the trust?”
Peter ran his hand through his hair. He exchanged a look with Harlan. “It seems pretty clear that Jane is entitled to—”
“But,” Harlan interrupted. “If we all think there is a problem with the care RahRah’s been getting, I don’t see why you can’t put him in some type of temporary protective custody while we try to persuade a court that RahRah deserves a different trustee.”
If she hadn’t been cuddling RahRah, Sarah would have thrown her arms up in joy. This was what she’d been saying for days. Unfortunately, from Peter’s furrowed eyebrows, she could see he wasn’t convinced.
“Peter, you’d be the first one to come up with something creative if we suspected a problem caring for a child,” Harlan observed. “Why should RahRah be treated differently because he’s a cat? If anything, he’s even more helpless because he can’t speak for himself. Remember, Judge Larsen is out of town this week. Do you want to leave RahRah in Jane’s care for a week? Think about what could happen in seven days.”
Peter swallowed. Sarah could almost see the wheels turning in his head. “Well, I don’t see a tag on him, so I’m not really sure this is RahRah. I’ll have to do some checking around as to which cats are missing and who might need to be brought in to identify him. It might take me a few hours or a few days. My jailhouse isn’t the place for him. Any of you have a car here?”
The twins shook their heads.
“I do,” Harlan said.
“Well, until a positive identification can be made of this cat, I think the three of you should get out of here and set up a temporary cat shelter for this little fellow.” He reached out and petted RahRah. “Looking at him, I can see he’s been an indoor cat. I’d hate to see him get hit by a car or be without food while I search for his rightful owner.”
Still holding RahRah close to her, Sarah leaned over and gave Peter a kiss. “Our hero.”
Peter blinked.
“Get out of here, you three.” Harlan and Sarah didn’t wait to be told again. As she followed Harlan, Sarah glanced back at Peter and wondered if he’d shooed them away so quickly to avoid Jane seeing them or so they wouldn’t tease him about the pink tinge on his cheeks and neck.