Persian Penalty

She leaned forward and steepled her fingers. “Angela. I don’t know how to tell you this, but having this gift is a lonely life. Sure, you can talk to all the animals, but you really miss out on the human connections that give life meaning. And that’s why I was so worried you would reject me. No one wants a crazy old woman in their family tree.”

“I do,” I said, unshed tears blurring my vision. “I want it more than anything.”

“I do, too, sweetie. When Octavius here told me you and I shared more than just a passing genetic resemblance, I thought maybe, just maybe I’d found my family again.”

I offered her a smile that started small but then grew to take up a huge portion of my face. I’d sat transfixed for her entire story, and now I just couldn’t help it—I threw my arms around her and gave my grandmother a hug.

The first of what I hoped would be many.

“I’m so glad I found you,” I whispered, not wanting to let go.

“Thank you for not giving up on me. I can’t have made it easy.”

“Actually, when you have a moment, I’d like to teach you about social media safety. That way, the next time you want to hide from someone, you don’t make the same silly mistake.” I explained how I’d determined she wasn’t really out of town, and together we shared a great big belly laugh.

We sat at that rickety patio set for hours, sharing stories of our lives, telling her about what Charles and I hoped for with our wedding, and of course, remembering all the weird and wonderful animals who had enriched our lives along the way.

“Do you promise you’ll come back tomorrow?” my grandma asked after we all shared a delicious dinner of grilled chicken and vegetables.

“You couldn’t keep her away if you tried,” Charles promised, pulling me into his side as we both stood.

“I know that,” Grandma Marilyn said. “I already tried and failed.”

We all laughed again and said goodnight. This didn’t feel like a first meeting. It felt like coming home.

Like family.

17

Charles and I returned to the bed and breakfast well after dinnertime, both with huge smiles on our faces.

“What a day,” he said.

“Yeah,” I said back. It was all either of us needed to express. Our time with my grandmother had said it all.

“I liked Grandma Lyn,” Paisley said as I lifted her into my arms and climbed out of the car.

“She reminded me of Ethel,” Octo-Cat remarked, drawing Paisley’s and my eyes to him.

I didn’t say anything because we were no longer in the privacy of the car, and Millicent had already proven she wasn’t above spying.

“Hang on a sec,” I told Charles and waited.

Luckily, Octo-Cat didn’t hesitate to continue. “What?” he asked, stretching in the backseat while we all waited on him. “She’s a nice, old lady. A nice, old, relatively normal lady. Also, she had tea.”

“I don’t know why I was expecting something more profound,” I murmured to myself.

Paisley squirmed within my arms. “What about the pound?”

I patted her head. “Everything is perfectly fine. Let’s head back to our room,” I said while looking at Charles, just in case Millicent was watching.

The gravel crunched at the edge of the lot as another car pulled in. And not just any car—a police car.

“I smell trouble,” Octo-Cat said with a grin, hopping out of the car and craning his neck to see better while hiding behind my legs. Always hungry for someone else’s drama, that one.

Millicent spilled forth from the entryway, waving her arms overhead. “Officer, officer! This is them!” It looked as if she’d taken great care with her appearance, considering the obscene amount of both makeup and jewelry she now wore. She’d been expecting us.

The policeman unfurled himself from the driver’s seat, reaching an impressive height, close to seven feet, if I had to guess. He tucked his thumbs into his belt loop and approached me and Charles.

Paisley shook and squirmed, not because she was frightened but simply because she was eager to say hello to the new arrival.

Clearly a dog person, the cop reached over and scratched under her chin with his thick fingers, then pulled back and glared down at Charles. “You been giving Mrs. Strobel trouble?”

“No, sir,” he said, standing in place, far more calm and collected than I could ever be in this type of situation.

“Are you kidding me?” I boomed.

Millicent ran in front of us, shouting, “Yes! Yes, they have! Then they refused to leave when I asked them to. That’s why I’d like you to escort them from the property!”

The officer glanced at each of us in turn, finally deciding on Charles as the most rational one among us. “Would you like to tell me what happened here today?” he asked, pulling out a notebook that looked comically small in his oversized hands.

Charles didn’t miss a beat. “My fiancée’s engagement ring went missing,” he explained, taking care not to talk with his hands the way he usually did. “We reported it to Mrs. Strobel immediately upon discovering its absence last night.”

The officer bobbed his head. “And then?”

“This afternoon, we returned from meeting a friend when Mrs. Strobel met us outside the bed-and-breakfast, demanding to know where we had gone and whether we’d engaged in any illegal activity. She then accused us of stealing the ring, not realizing that we were the same ones who’d reported it missing. When we pointed this out, she accused us of implicating her establishment in a planned insurance fraud, which I can assure you is not accurate.”

The officer raised one eyebrow. “Then?”

“Then she demanded we leave. Naturally, since we had booked our reservation for two nights, we didn’t see any reason to check out before said duration. Also, my fiancée was not eager to leave before we could find her missing engagement ring.”

“Uh-huh. Then?” He glanced sidelong at Millicent, who stood openly scowling at Charles.

“We had lunch with a friend in our room, went back out to visit the same friend that we’d gone to see that morning, and then returned, leading to present circumstances,” Charles concluded.

Millicent shook a finger at us. The sleeves of her oversized mint silk blouse belled in the wind. “You see that? They have too many friends! I don’t trust them one bit!”

The policeman shifted his posture slightly so that he was facing Millicent. “Ma’am, what evidence do you have that these two guests of yours faked the disappearance of their engagement ring?”

She patted her stomach furiously. “I don’t need any evidence. I feel it all right here. In my gut! Always go with your gut!”

The officer pressed his lips into a firm line. “Unfortunately, that’s not how the law works. Without any evidence to go on, I won’t be able to follow through on your request. Also, it seems to me that you are, in fact, the one in the wrong here.”

Her jaw fell open. “What?” she barely managed to gasp. I was guessing that neither Millicent’s brain nor her lungs were getting much oxygen in that moment.

“Quite simply put, you’re harassing these people.”

She shook her head, apparently too angry to argue. Well, good, because I was more than done here.

“There’s something else, too,” Charles shot in, finally speaking freely again, hands and all. “A case of gross negligence. You see, there’s this problem with our door…”

I listened with a smug grin as Charles went on to describe our issue with both the front door and the side door for our room. He also filed a formal police report about my missing ring.

At some point, Millicent stormed off. If she hadn’t hated us before, she definitely did now.

Charles and I laughed the whole thing off as we made our way back to the room. Not even Millicent’s ridiculous antics could spoil the wonderful day we’d had with my grandmother.

“That plan backfired on her, huh?” Charles asked with a wink.

“Oh, spectacularly!” I giggled. “And I loved every moment of it.”

Suddenly, Paisley surged forward, barking as she ran. “Get away, you big bully!”

I just barely spotted the flash of orange as Louis scurried off into the night.

“Paisley!” I lifted her to my face and let her lick my cheeks. “I’m so proud of you! You stood up to him all on your own!”

“And don’t come back!” she yelped into the night, clearly very pleased with herself.

“What a strange trip this has been,” Charles said as we finished the walk to our bedroom. The door, as always, was cracked partially open.

“Strange, but good,” I added.

We bobbed our heads in agreement.

“But let’s stay somewhere else next time we come to pay Grandma Marilyn a visit?” Charles wanted to clarify.

I grabbed his hand and planted a kiss on the back of it. “Definitely.”

Next time we came for a visit, I already knew exactly where I’d be staying. Grandma Marilyn had invited us to come soon and often and said we always had a place to stay.

And who needs decently reviewed bed-and-breakfasts when you have family?

18

“For all its faults, there is one thing I’ll actually miss about this place,” Charles said after we’d both taken a moment to relax following the stressful encounter in the parking lot. Our emotions were ping-ponging all over the place out here, and we just needed a moment to catch up with them.

“Oh, yeah.” I turned toward him with an expectant smile. “And what’s that?”

His cheeks lifted in that signature smile I loved so much. “Beach access.”

“There are a million beaches back in Glendale,” I reminded him, wrinkling my nose playfully.

“Yeah, but none are right outside our back door.” He stood and offered me his hand. “One more moonlight stroll?”

“Oh, you hopeless romantic, you,” I teased. Really, Sharon was right. I was, in fact, the luckiest woman alive.

I followed Charles in a lovesick daze until a short way from our room, I tripped and stumbled forward.

Thankfully my knight in shining armor caught me before I could connect with the ground.

“What was that?” I asked, glancing back but unable to see what had tripped me up.

Charles took out his cell phone and shone the flashlight onto a small pile of assorted beach bric-a-brac.

“Just some random nature stuff,” he said with a shrug. “At least I believe that’s the technical term for it.”

“Wait,” I shouted as he moved to slide his phone back into his pocket. “Go back over that stuff again, but a bit more slowly this time.”

Charles shrugged and did as I asked, moving the light back and forth until it caught on a shiny black rock.

No, not a rock.

“That’s a clam, right?” I asked, remembering the scene with Paisley earlier.

He shrugged again. “Yeah, I think so.”

I ambled over and pointed at a pink shell. “And that’s a shell?”

“Yes, that one I’m sure of. I’m absolutely certain that is a seashell.” He poked me playfully in the side, but I was too focused to return his silliness in kind.

“Paisley,” I called into the night, turning back toward our room, which was still in sight. The little black dog nudged the glass door open and then came bounding toward us.

“Yes, Mommy?” she asked, one ear tall and pointy and the other flopped forward.

“Do these things belong to you?” I said, motioning toward the upset pile.

“My treasures!” she cried, running to them and rolling around. “What happened?”

“Yup, that’s what I thought. Case solved. Well, almost. Maybe. C’mon, we need to talk to Octo-Cat,” I told Charles.

But Paisley whimpered and refused to follow along, “No, please don’t tell him about my treasures. I don’t want him to steal them from me like he does at home.”

“I promise I won’t tell him about your secret hoard,” I assured the distraught pup.

She followed, albeit somewhat reluctantly.

“What’s going on?” Charles wanted to know as we approached the cabin.

“I have an idea about what might have happened to my ring,” I told him right as I pulled the door to our room wide open and the three of us stepped inside.

“What do you want now?” my cat demanded. “I thought I was finally getting a bit of me time, but noooo. Here you all are. Again. Story of all nine of my lives. Ugh.” He let out a long sigh, but I refused to fall prey to his dramatics.

“You’re a cat. Literally every second of every day is your you time,” I told him.

Octo-Cat scoffed but said nothing more.

When it was clear he’d yielded the floor, I said, “Listen, I need your help.”

“Yup, there it is!” he spat and flicked his tail. “You’d be lost without me, admit it.”

“If I do, will you help?” If my pride was the price of his assistance, I’d happily give it up. I’d lived with a cat for long enough to know how this whole thing worked. Which meant I also expected what came next.

Octo-Cat flopped onto his side and yawned. “I’ll think about it. Really, I’m quite tired. Between sleuthing and helping you sort out your cloying human emotion, you’ve been working me hard all weekend. I need some time to rest and recharge.”

“Shut up, you!” Paisley barked and kicked her feet back. “If Mommy needs our help, then we’re going to give it to her!”

“Paisley!” I said in shock. She almost never took a tough approach to anything, especially not when it involved the big feline brother she idolized.

Octo-Cat stared at Paisley with large amber eyes.

Paisley stared back with shiny black eyes.

And I couldn’t believe what happened next.

“Whatever,” Octo-Cat backed down, blinking his eyes slowly as he turned to me. “Just tell me what you need, so we can get this over with.”

Knowing better than to waste time questioning the madness I’d just witness, I moved ahead with my original intent. First, I explained the theory I’d developed after stumbling over Paisley’s beachy hoard, then I told them what I needed them to do.

Octo-Cat rolled onto his feet. “C’mon, Mutt. Let’s go do the thing.”

But Paisley didn’t follow. “It hurts my feelings when you call me that,” she said firmly.

Seriously? What the heck was going on here? Octo-Cat was showing his softer side while Paisley was standing up for herself. Nothing made sense anymore. Perhaps this place emanated some kind of strange magic.

Ha, as if!

Once the animals departed, Charles held his hand out to me. “Now about that walk.”

19

“Is every trip with you going to be like this?” Charles asked, kissing the back of my hand.

“Yup, and you’re stuck with me now,” I laughed.

“I don’t mind,” he said, pulling me close to gaze into my eyes. “I know your grandmother had a hard time because of her gifts, but I want you to know that I plan to always be here for you, no matter what.”

“Thank you,” I said. “I can’t imagine what it must’ve been like for her back then. To be so alone and for so long.”

“Well, you might have to keep the secret from everyone else, but you’ve got a lot of us who are there for you.”

“Yeah, I know, and I—”

“Mommy!” a little voice interrupted.

I pulled away from Charles and looked out into the night to see Paisley bounding up with Octo-Cat hot on her heels.

Octo-Cat held up a paw, struggling to catch his breath. “We…we…we found it. Which means… You owe me… A lobster roll.”

“Okay, so where is it?” I asked, excitement crashing over me. Ahh, what a rush! This was one crime I couldn’t wait to solve once and for all, not only because of what had been stolen but also because of who was at fault.

Tugging Charles along, I followed the pets inside and went over to the front desk where Millicent sat grumbling to herself while she read her book.

“Excuse me,” I said, ringing the bell on the desk.

Millicent rolled her eyes and moved the bell. “Go away,” she grumbled, adding in a few choice words under her breath.

“I just wanted to let you know that we’ve caught the thief that’s been plaguing your bed-and-breakfast,” I revealed with a self-satisfied smirk. Okay, so I wasn’t being the most professional in that moment, but Millicent hadn’t actually hired me, so I was justified in my approach. At least that’s what I told myself now.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve,” she said, slamming her book onto the desk.

Instead of baiting the old woman further, I walked over to the antique armoire Octo-Cat and Paisley were patiently sitting by. I pulled on the door, and it swung open to reveal…nothing but an empty armoire.

“Behind it,” Octo-Cat whispered.

“Oops,” I said, closing the door. “Charles, could you help me here and move the armoire over a bit?”

Nodding his agreement, he got low on the furniture piece and slid it across the floor, revealing a large hole in the wall with a fat, orange cat asleep on a pile of valuables like a flugly—that’s fluffy and ugly—dragon. Near the top of the horde sat my ring, shimmering in all its matrimonial magnificence.

“It looks like your cat has been taking things from your guests and stashing them here,” I said, triumphantly plucking my ring from the pile and allowing Charles to slide it back onto my finger where it belonged.

The old lady’s skin went pale, and she stammered a bit before finding her voice. “I’m so sorry. To the both of you. I had no idea Louis was using his nap spot for something so… so… That’s a bad kitty!” She scooped the pile out of the nook, jostling the cat from his place.

“I’m so sorry,” she said again. “I honestly thought that my guests were lying and trying to sink my business. A developer had offered to buy the place a year ago, and I thought because I’d turned him down, he was trying to run me out of business. I guess that’ll teach me to get too involved in my stories. Oh, I owe so many people apologies, and I’ve got to make sure all of these things get back to their rightful owners. Thank you so much for helping me out, and after I was so rude to you.”

“So can we be friends now?” I asked.

Her face soured. “I still don’t approve of your shenanigans. And also your beau scratched my floor when he moved that armoire. Expect the repairs to be added on to your bill.”

My jaw dropped. From sour to sweet and back again almost instantaneously. I swear, there was no winning with some people.

“I still don’t care for you much, but since you managed to help me, I’ll let you stay until check-out tomorrow morning,” she said reluctantly. “But I don’t want you two back here until you’re well and properly married. I run a wholesome business here. Now go, get out of here, before I change my mind.”