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An hour later, I finally shut down the computer, dazed and hungry but satisfied.
I’ve figured out what’s wrong with this picture.
* * *
It’s a lovely warm evening, the sun is low in the sky and casts a golden glow around the dogwood blossoms, but I’m in too much of a hurry to get home and tell the Chief what I’ve found out to appreciate it.
The Chief’s car is in the driveway, so he’s probably home, though with the hours he works, who knows for sure. But when I let myself in and glance out the sliding glass door that leads to my patio, I catch a glimpse of him sitting on a deck chair on his patio, Jackie curled up on the ground beside him.
I take a closer look. He’s got a book in his large hands. Pure prejudice, maybe, but I didn’t take the Chief for being much of a reader. I’m curious about the book, but mainly I want to tell him what I discovered. I push the door open and step out.
The Chief startles and quickly puts the book cover down on his lap. Then he recovers and gives me that big, slow smile I’ve come to expect from him. “Howdy, neighbor. Are we friends or enemies tonight?”
“I figured something out about Scarlett’s presentation,” I reply, still a little breathless from my speedwalk home.
His smile gets bigger. “Friends, then. Come and have a seat.” He gestures to an empty chair on his patio.
I go over and sit down. Jackie gets up and trots over to me, and I bend down to pet his silky ears, grateful for the distraction. Being this near the Chief always makes me feel like I have a mild case of vertigo.
“What are you reading?” I ask in an effort to make polite conversation before jumping to what I’m really here for. Also, I’m genuinely nosey.
The smile fades into a mild frown, then, with some obvious reluctance, he holds the book up.
I laugh. “Seriously?”
He shrugs sheepishly. “I wanted to know how it ended.”
“What do you think of it?”
“Well, once you get over the fact that it’s totally unbelievable that a bunch of cats would behave like this, it’s not a bad story.”
“Did you buy it? We have it at the library, you know.”
He looks even more sheepish. “Yeah, I bought it before… I just thought it would be easier to just buy it. You know.”
In other words, he bought it before we formed our weird little alliance and he didn’t want to risk running into me at the library. Fair enough. It’s not like I’d have gone to the fire station for anything less than actually being on fire.
The upside is that seeing the bold, confident fire chief actually embarrassed makes me feel more relaxed. “We’ve got the whole series at the library,” I point out.
“There’s more?”
“Dozens. There’s a main series and a bunch of spin-offs. You’ll go broke buying them all yourself. Might as well check them out of the library.”
He changes the subject. “So, what did you find out about your friend Scarlett?”
“Not a friend,” I respond. “In fact, I think she’s more like a corporate shill.”
He frowns again, curiously this time. “What do you mean?”
I lean forward in my chair. I’m kind of proud of how I figured this out and I’m eager to tell someone. “Okay, so you know the slides she used in her presentation? I thought they were all stock photos, but I noticed that in one of them, the attendants had a little logo on their uniforms. So I took a screenshot and zoomed in, but I couldn’t tell what it was. So I did a reverse image search, and guess what?”
“What?”
“The photo belongs to a corporation called VivaVentis. It owns a chain of day spas mostly on the West Coast, but it looks like they’re starting to branch out into the Midwest and maybe even the East Coast—like upstate New York.”
I lean back in my chair and smile triumphantly.
Chief Wainwright doesn’t look quite as impressed as I’d hoped. “Okay… sounds like good detective work, and I guess it’s a little odd she never mentioned the company, but how does that help us?”
