Dying to Read by Lorena McCourtney Read Free Book Online Page B

a padded scratching pole, and an enclosed litter box with the name Octavia written in gold script over an arched doorway.
    Plus a pet carrier full of spitting, clawing, yowling cat.

 4 
    Cate managed to get the cat to the house without major damage to anything except her eardrums. She installed a still-yowling Octavia in her own bedroom, where the cat’s bed was considerably grander than her own. She wanted to get started on contacting Willow’s former employers, but she decided that a home for the cat took priority at the moment.
    She went around the neighborhood and enthusiastically extolled Octavia’s virtues to several people. Such beautiful blue eyes and classic white fur! Free bed, food, and litter box! Honesty made her add that the cat was deaf, but she also assured potential cat owners that this didn’t appear to be a problem. She didn’t mention that it certainly didn’t seem to hamper Octavia’s own vocal abilities. But everyone was either disinclined to enter cat ownership, already had a lone cat diva in residence, or had a feline or two they tried to pawn off on her.
    Back in her bedroom, she discovered Octavia had calmed down and made herself at home, preferring Cate’s pillow to her own canopied cat bed. The cat had obviously explored her new surroundings. White cat hair decorated everything from Cate’s black sneakers in the closet to the top of the drapery rod at her window.
    “This isn’t home,” Cate warned the cat. “So don’t make yourself too comfortable.” Then Octavia’s blue-eyed stare punched her with guilt. The cat had just lost both home and owner. She had to feel confused and traumatized. Cate amended the statement. “But I’m not going to toss you out on the street to fend for yourself, so don’t worry about that, okay?”
    The cat condescended to offer a purr as she tucked her white paws under her body. Who me, worry?
    Cate took the photocopies of Willow’s employment references into Uncle Joe’s office. She reread the letters. None of the jobs had apparently lasted very long, but the letters glowed with praise. Cate wished she had such enthusiastic references. She picked up the phone to call the name on the top letter.
    Which was when she discovered something peculiar. The letter had a name and address, but no phone number. She flipped through the other references, and the peculiarity expanded. No phone number on any of them.
    A thud, a skid, and papers flew like oversized confetti. And then there was Octavia sitting on the desk with a smug expression, her plump rump anchoring a lone letter remaining on the desk.
    “Octavia! How did you get out of the bedroom?”
    She must not have closed the bedroom door tightly. Cats couldn’t open doors.
    She tried to snatch up the cat, but Octavia eluded her grasp and dashed out to the living room. Cate followed. The cat was faster and more agile than her weight suggested, a Wonder Cat taking sofa and chairs in single bounds, then racing back to the office. She finally thunked down on the desk again, the skid flipping the letter remaining there into Cate’s hands.
    This was a reference from a Mrs. Beverly Easton, with an address on Westernview Avenue. It looked as if it had been written on an old typewriter, a haphazard mixture of lighter and darker letters, the e slightly off-kilter. The woman praised Willow’s “commendable and caring work ethic” and her “cheerful good nature and impressive cooking skills.”
    Cate studied the letter, then the cat, who was now industriously tongue-cleaning her left hind leg. Twice now the cat had targeted this particular letter.
    “Are you trying to tell me something?” Cate inquired. “You think this is the one I should contact first?”
    Nah. What did a cat know? Octavia was an oversized feline, not a PI.
    But neither was Cate a real PI, so maybe this was as good a place as any to start. She found a phone book in a desk drawer and turned to the E’s. No Beverly Easton. Okay, she’d do