Bag Bats Bi-Monthly Meeting at the Cafe

Bat books, coffee, and crime…

The Bag Bats return to the café for their book club meeting, their focus on books about bats never wavering. The coffee and atmosphere of Nina’s café give them a place they feel very comfortable. And even Hester’s fussy twin, Heady, approves.

But at this particular meeting, Hester and the others learn a colleague of one of their members has been injured, attacked at the pet rescue where she works. The police show little interest in solving the crime. Leaving the hunt for clues up to the Bag Bats.

Hester knows well their book club of mostly ordinary women probably won’t discover anything unusual. But that doesn’t stop the Bag Bats. Because when one of their own has a problem, they jump in to help. Even without a bat.

BAG BATS BI-MONTHLY MEETING AT THE CAFE is available to read for free until the [DAY] of [MONTH], when another story will be posted. For readers who would prefer to read on a device of preference, or who would like their own personal eBook of this story, you can find it here.

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Bag Bats Bi-Monthly Meeting at the Cafe

A Café Story

Hester rushed through the front doors of the café, late for the bi-monthly book club meeting, and just knowing she was going to have to hear about that from her twin sister Heady. Heady liked punctuality. Hester normally did too, but things happened and time got away from her.

But the Bag Bats waited for no one.

Especially when they had a new book to discuss.

The weekly meeting had to switch to a bi-monthly meeting recently thanks to Donna’s work schedule temporarily interfering. It was tax season and Donna had a lot on her plate. Hester didn’t mind. She loved their weekly meetings, but she’d been busy too, so having the extra week to read their chosen book worked well for her.

The instant hit of coffee and pastry scents had her mouth watering. Nina, the owner of the café, got in the best pastries. Hester headed to the counter to order, scanning the café as she went. The group had gathered in their usual spot near the back, taking up a couch and chair grouping around a low table that made it feel like they were sitting in someone’s living room. Someone who made excellent coffee and had delicious pastries on hand.

She greeting Nina warmly. They’d been coming to the café for months now, and Nina was always gracious and treated them well. She also ensured there were enough chocolate muffins and croissants still available for their evening meeting. Hester knew those pastries didn’t always last to the end of the day because they were just so delicious. She gave the giant Maine Coon cat sitting on the stool next to the cash register—outside the counter of course because Nina ran a clean café—a little scratch around the head.

Boo was a delightful cat. The size of a small house, pale gray with very light blue eyes so he nearly did look like a ghost, which made his name perfect. He was friendly but not in a clingy way, and Hester liked that about him. Really, she liked cats no matter what. Even the distant and disdainful cats were fun.

“What’s on the reading schedule tonight?” Nina asked as she plated Hester’s chocolate muffin.

An indulgence which Hester was going to hear about from Heady and she didn’t care. “Tonight is a thriller that takes place in Mexico.”

“What does that have to do with bats?” Nina asked, sliding the muffin over the counter to her.

That was the specialty of their book club. All the books they read had something to do with bats. And dragons because they’d decided dragons were just oversized bats so they counted. But outside of that extension on the definition of the word bat, everything they read had something to do with bats. From non-fiction to fiction. That was where Heady had gotten their club’s name. Bats, for the subject matter. Bags, because that’s what people sometimes called older women, old bags. Heady had jammed the words together and gotten Bag Bats—not Bat Bags, because that just sounded like a product at a Halloween store according to Heady.

It had all made sense at the time but in hindsight seemed a really odd name and Hester hated having to explain it to the uninitiated.

“There were bats as part of the central storyline,” Hester said. “And anything with bats in counts. Jessica read this one on her own a few weeks back and decided it would work for the group.”

“Sounds fun.” Nina slid Hester’s mug of black coffee across the counter to her.

Heady would also have things to say about black coffee at this time of night, but again, Hester didn’t care. “It was very exciting. And ridiculous. And impossible. I loved it.”

Nina chuckled. “Glad it was a winner.”

Hester gave Boo another scritch, then took her food and drink to the back of the café where the others were waiting. She passed Donna on the way, who was heading to the counter.

“Heady is in a mood today,” she murmured on the way past. “I need a cookie.”

Hester thanked her for the warning. Oh good. First, she was running late because of work. Now she had to deal with her sister in more of a mood than usual. That was always fun.

She slid onto the couch next to Jessica and Maya—whose foot was bouncing more than usual—and greeted everyone with a smile, an apology for being late, and minimal eye contact with her sister. Who was, indeed, in a mood.

As had become their routine, Heady sat at the “head” of the gathered couches and chairs. Zelda sat opposite in a chair that could arguably be called the “head” of the table too. And since Zelda was their oldest member at fifty-eight—fifty-nine in a month—there was sometimes a little tug of leadership between Heady and Zelda. Mostly, though, everyone acknowledged Heady as the club leader because it made life easier.

Donna and Nari sat across the low coffee table from where Hester, Jessica, and Maya were sitting, in a second couch they’d scooted around to make up their club’s seating cluster. Hester always sat next to her sister, mostly to run interference. There were only the seven of them. They’d made noise once or twice about letting in new members, but Heady had always shot the idea down because, according to her, seven was the perfect number and any more would be unwieldy.

This time of evening, the café had more than enough room for them, especially on a random Thursday night. And they’d fallen into these seating habits within a month of coming here.

Everyone had their various drinks in front of them. Cappuccinos tonight for Donna and Nari both. A chamomile tea for Maya who had enough excess energy to run the power needs of the entire city and therefore never drank coffee. Jessica sipped a latte. Zelda cradled a tea mug between her hands, which Hester presumed was Earl Gray because Zelda liked that tea best, though Hester did wonder why she’d forgone her more indulgent caramel coffee. Heady had opted for tea too, which meant she could be smug about Hester’s black coffee. Probably done on purpose after Hester texted that she’d be late. Heady did have a petty streak.

Once Donna returned with her cookie, which Heady didn’t comment on, and Hester took her first bite of her chocolate muffin, which Heady did give her side-eye about, the meeting got officially underway.

And Heady was indeed in a mood. Apparently, this particular thriller was not to her taste. “The way this author writes from women’s points of view is irritating,” Heady insisted. “We do not think about our own body parts that way when we’re assessing our clothing.”

“I think he tried to get it right,” Maya said, always the most forgiving. “I’ve read worse.”

“Yes, yes, boobing boobily down the stairs is a classic,” Heady said. “I still find it annoying.”

“Second that,” Donna said. “I like the story overall. Loved the action and the pacing was good. Kept turning the pages. But he should have stuck to the men’s POV, because I could feel my disbelief no longer being suspended whenever he dropped into a woman’s head and she had something to say about her own legs looking good in her shorts. That woman was on the run for her life. She does not give two flying fucks what her legs look like as she’s climbing through the jungle.”

Heady’s mouth flattened a little at the f-bomb, but since Donna was agreeing with her, she nodded enthusiastically. “Precisely.”

“I sort of skimmed those parts,” Hester admitted, knowing this would earn a look from Heady. She was not disappointed, but she also ignored it. “I really enjoyed the story itself and the adventure. Running for their lives. The ancient relic they found in that cave? And the bats saving them in the end! I loved that part. I would have liked the romance done better. Bit perfunctory for me. But otherwise, I liked it.” She took a big bite of her muffin. Then admitted, “I did have to ignore the writing whenever we were in the woman’s point of view, though.”

“But there have been much worse books that are very successful with the women written just appallingly,” Maya insisted.

“And that’s just misogyny,” Heady said. “I don’t have to like it or forgive it, even if this author did try.”

“Hear hear!” Donna said, raising her cappuccino mug. She and Nari did a little click of a toast in agreement.

“Did those parts bother you, Jessica?” Zelda asked. A good question since Jessica had recommended the book.

Jessica was staring into the middle distance, not participating in the discussion. It was only occurring to Hester that Jessica hadn’t spoken much tonight outside of a few cursory hellos. Not even the usual small talk as they settled.

Hester turned on the couch so she could see Jessica better, around Maya, who had stopped tapping her foot to face Jessica, too.

“You okay?” Maya asked quietly.

Jessica blinked and looked up and around. “Oh. Sorry. I was…thinking about something.”

“Something besides the book discussion?” Heady asked, threading that line between annoyance and concern with such skill Hester was actually impressed.

“Uhm. The book is…” She gave her head a little shake. “No. I’m sorry. My head just isn’t in the book tonight.” She glanced at Donna and Heady. “But for the record, yeah, the female POVs were a little stilted and ridiculous. I did what Hester did and skimmed those scenes because I enjoyed the story so much.”

Heady sniffed and sipped her tea, sort of nodding to herself because her opinion had been confirmed, even if reluctantly.

Nari leaned forward, setting her mug on the low table. “What’s wrong, Jessica? Is it work?”

Jessica worked at a pet rescue, which didn’t pay nearly enough for the amount of love and passion Jessica poured into the work. But Hester figured she didn’t do that work because of the pay. Jessica was the most logical of their little group, the one who needed facts, and followed logical steps. But she had enough compassion and tender-heartedness to fill a stadium. Sometimes, rough cases came into the rescue center. Animals from hoarding situations, from fight pit situations. Or even just animals abandoned who needed a lot of care. When something like that happened, Jessica spent a few days suffering with the animals. Which broke Hester’s heart as much as what was done to the animals.

Jessica pulled in a deep breath. “One of my colleagues was attacked. She’s fine. But in the hospital with broken bones. The police don’t have a motivation for the attack. She was working a late shift at the Rescue. But no animals have come in recently from situations that might have angered some horrible person. Victoria isn’t in a relationship and doesn’t have any angry past romantic partners to point to. She’s been at the Rescue since I started working there. One of the kindest people I’ve ever known. I don’t know how anyone could hurt her.”

“Was it…” Maya sort of waved her hand, wincing. “I hate to ask out loud, but was it…”

“Not sexual assault,” Jessica said, patting Maya’s hand. “Thank goodness. They just beat her nearly to death.”

“I’m so sorry,” Hester said, reaching around Maya to squeeze Jessica’s arm. “Is there anything we can do? Does she need help with the hospital bills or…anything?”

“You’re kind.” Jessica smiled, but it was watery at the edges. She sniffled and took a sip of her tea. “When she wakes up, I’ll ask if there’s anything she needs.” Jessica looked at the group, her gaze skimming over each member of the Bag Bats. “But I could use a favor.”

“You want us to solve the crime,” Heady said. Didn’t ask. Declared.

Hester expected Jessica, being the most logical of the group and the one who preferred leaving crime solving to experts, surprised Hester by saying, “Exactly. The police are not taking the attack very seriously. Or at least they don’t seem to be. They took their reports, but they didn’t investigate. There was no forensics or follow up questions. And when I contacted them earlier today, I got the usual, ‘We’ll let you know when we find anything.’” She sniffled again. “They were actually very nice. There’s a woman detective on the case and I like her. But she seemed…distracted. A lot on her plate and my friend’s attack was a low priority.”

Jessica looked at them all again, tears filling her eyes, the overhead lights reflecting in the moisture. “Victoria isn’t low priority to me. And I’d like to see if we can find something to give the police to make them…do more.”

“Are you sure?” Nari asked quietly. “You were very reluctant to interfere in an investigation the last time we did something like this.”

“I’m still reluctant to risk tainting evidence. But, like with Heady’s friend, if the police aren’t even looking for evidence…what’s the point in being careful?”

Heady gave a sharp nod. “Just so. We will absolutely solve this crime.” At Hester’s raised brows, she said, “The police are busy. We’re just helping.” She waved a hand.

“Right.” Hester didn’t roll her eyes, but she was tempted. She turned instead to Jessica. “Where would you like us to start? At the Rescue?”

Jessica winced and said, “I’ve brought some records. I’m not supposed to have taken them from the center, but…” She reached under the table and pulled out a large backpack. “These are the last month’s records of animals in and out. I figured this was the best place to start. If there’s really nothing here, we can figure out next steps. But I wanted to eliminate this option first.”

“Very logical,” Zelda said, giving Jessica a sympathetic nod. “Start with the most likely possibility. That something about one of your recent intakes is more significant than previously suspected.” Zelda was a mostly retired lawyer, who specialized in family law, but her knowledge of the law and contracts had helped them all in the past.

“Exactly.” Jessica opened the backpack and pulled out manila file folders. A tidy stack of them.

Maya’s eyes widened. “All those are animals you’ve taken in in the last month?”

Jessica sighed. “It’s been busy lately. Post holidays. Lot of people turning in small animals they got as presents then realized they couldn’t keep or they were going to get too big to fit their homes or whatever. Always heartbreaking.” She handed the folders around the table, a rough handful of them for each woman. “I doubt we’ll find anything, but I need to do something.”

“Of course you do,” Heady said. “We’ll apply all our collective intellect and I’m sure we’ll uncover the culprits.”

This was one of those moments when Hester really did appreciate Heady’s absolute confidence in her own view of the world. Heady was convinced they’d solve the crime. And that was obviously comforting to Jessica. Even Hester believed Heady’s declaration.

They all started quietly flipping through case folders. Some were easy to look at. Just a healthy-looking pet of some kind which had found its way to the rescue center for unfortunate reasons—a human caretaker’s death, a move. One of the folders contained information on a cat who’d been turned in because the family were taking in a family member with severe cat allergies. Another dog came in from a woman moving abroad to a job and situation that just wouldn’t allow her to take her dog with her.

Those were the cases that broke Hester’s heart for the pet owners. Sometimes life was like that. Not fair. And those instances seemed like terribly difficult decisions made by people just trying to do their best. Jessica’s animal rescue center was no-kill and known for being able to rehouse animals with good families, where the animals were capable of being rehoused. They even fostered or rehoused elderly pets to good families who were willing to give the elderly animal a last few months or years of happiness.

Hester only got one file with disturbing details. It involved a group of puppies taken from a puppy mill situation. Their mother was found severely injured and ill and the vets hadn’t been able to save the mother. Three of the six puppies had also been ill. But all six, it seemed, had survived. Hester had to skim through that folder, though, because the details and pictures were disturbing.

She didn’t have a pet of her own. And she and Heady had only had one dog growing up because their mother loved dogs. But neither of them had gotten pets as adults for whatever reason. That didn’t mean that Hester didn’t have a soft spot for animals, though. She was actually surprised Jessica could do the work she did without it breaking her heart completely.

“What’s this case about?” Nari asked, opening the folder she was reading and laying it out on the coffee table so everyone could see.

Jessica glanced at the name and pictures, spreading the file’s pages out. “Oh. I remember this. About a week ago, a cat was brought into the shelter after its owner passed away. Apparently, the owner was quite wealthy but there were no provisions made for her pet in the will, so the executor just turned the cat in to us. She was beloved and well cared for, the cat, I mean.”

Hester tilted her head to one side, looking at pictures of the cat. One picture showed the fluffy white cat wearing a gem studded collar and laying on a puffy red velvet pillow. Another looked like a portrait studio shot of the cat, sitting up, its beautiful white fur floofing around it. A third showed the cat curled in a tight ball on a steel table, looking scared, hissing at someone off camera.

Jessica moved some of the papers to spread them out more. A medical record. What looked like legal paperwork passing ownership of the cat to the rescue center. “The woman who passed had one son, and there were some cousins in the will,” Jessica said. “The executor was a little surprised there’d been nothing in the will about the cat. Said Ms. VanHoven was crazy about her cat.”

“Why didn’t the executor just take the cat?” Donna asked, picking up one of the pictures. “Sell that collar and you could pay for the cat’s food for the rest of its life.”

Jessica said, “The executor said he couldn’t take the cat because they had a child with severe allergies. He said he’d have to change clothes and shower at a friend’s before he could go home because his kid was so allergic. But he did seem sad about turning the cat over to us.”

“And the son or cousins didn’t want her?” Zelda asked.

“Apparently not.” Jessica sighed. “Not a completely unique story for us. Though the sheer wealth of Ms. VanHoven and the luxury the cat had lived in prior… We don’t see that very often.”

“Any medical problems with the cat?” Heady asked, frowning at the pictures, her tea mug cradled between both hands in her lap. She’d set aside the folders she’d been looking through and seemed very intent on the pictures on the table.

Hester gave her twin a look, then stared down at the pictures closer. What was Heady seeing that had put that frown on her face…

“None that we’ve been able to find so far,” Jessica said. “She’s not eating well, of course, but that can happen when beloved pets lose their humans and are abandoned with us. We’ve been giving her infusions to keep her healthy. She’s beloved of the center because after the initial hissing and anger, she sort of…collapsed into the humans looking after her and started making these very sad mewing sounds.”

Jessica blinked and looked up. “You know, it’s funny. Victoria took a special interest in Ms. Kitty—that’s the cat’s name, Ms. Kitty—and Ms. Kitty had really taken to Victoria. Victoria was the one of us Ms. Kitty allowed to handle her the easiest. Victoria doesn’t look anything like Ms. VanHoven, from the pictures the executor gave us. But something about Victoria must have made Ms. Kitty feel comfortable. Do you suppose that’s a coincidence?”

“Maybe,” Nari said. “Are there any other animals that are close to Victoria?”

“Oh quite a lot. She’s got a really good feel for the animals, especially the ones who are mourning. They relax and trust her before they learn to trust the rest of us.” Jessica sniffled again, like she might cry, but didn’t in the end. “Ms. Kitty has been hiding in her kennel since Victoria’s assault. She refuses to come out for anyone.”

“Do you suppose she witnessed the assault?” Heady asked.

“I mean, it’s possible,” Jessica said. “It happened outside the kennel area. But it’s possible, likely, the animals heard the attack. Shame we can’t talk to them.”

“Yes,” Heady said, but her attention was turned inward.

“You think this has something to do with Ms. Kitty?” Jessica asked her.

“Possibly. Or possibly it’s just a coincidence. But do you notice something about Ms. Kitty’s collar in the picture at the rescue center?”

All seven women leaned in to look closer at the picture of Ms. Kitty on the steel table, hissing at whoever was off camera. Then they all looked at the original pictures of Ms. Kitty in her glamourous poses. And back at the center intake picture again.

“The collar is blue in the picture at the center,” Donna said. “It’s red in the others.”

“She could have had more than one gem studded collar,” Zelda said, reasonably.

“The gems on the blue one are fake, though,” Heady said. “The ones on the red collar are real diamonds.”

Hester frowned at her sister. “How on earth can you tell that from a picture?”

Heady dropped her chin. “A woman should always be able to tell the difference between real and fake jewels.” She sniffed. “And Trevor, rest his soul, taught me how to spot paste gems early in our relationship.”

Heady’s husband, Trevor, had passed away a little while ago. He’d worked at a jewelry store when they’d met, though he went on to get a job in finance, and while Heady was, surprisingly, not the sort to demand expensive jewels from a suitor, she and Trevor had bonded over the fact that modern emeralds were not as beautiful as antique emeralds.

“How can you tell their fake in a picture?” Donna asked. She held the picture from the center up close to her face, staring at the collar. “There’s no way you can tell that in a picture.”

“Well. Distrust my eyes if you like,” Heady said primly, “but I’m telling you, the blue collar has fake diamonds and the red collar has real ones. It’s possible Ms. Kitty did have both fake and real bejeweled collars for a variety of reasons. And it’s possible she just happened to be wearing a fake gem collar when the executor turned her into the rescue center.” She glanced at Hester. “But that feels like something of a coincidence given what happen to Victoria, since Victoria was Ms. Kitty’s favorite shelter human.”

“It’s also possible this has nothing to do with anything,” Maya said, her leg bouncing as she leaned forward to shuffle the pages around, her long nails tapping at the picture with Ms. Kitty on the pillow. “Coincidences do happen.”

“One way to be sure,” Heady said. “We could go to the center and I can examine Ms. Kitty’s collar in person. It won’t supply the answers to who assaulted Jessica’s colleague but it might lead to some…well, leads.”

“Or it’s just gonna get us covered in white cat hair,” Donna said. She looked around at the others. “But I’m okay with a fieldtrip. It’s not bats. But cats are cool too.”

“Cats are a bit like dragons, though, aren’t they,” Nari said, looking at everyone. “And we’ve already established that dragons count in the bat category for the purposes of our reading because of their wings. So, in a way…”

“Cats are also bats?” Zelda said, her eyebrows raised in amusement as she took a sip of her tea.

“They don’t have wings,” Heady said. “I think you might be pushing the comparisons a bit.”

“But it’ll do for now,” Hester added, giving Heady a quelling look. To Jessica, she said, “Can you get us into the shelter to look at Ms. Kitty’s collar without getting into trouble?”

“I can. There’s been more security in the evenings, but we could go tonight and I can tell the guard and staff on hand we’re just there to give the animals some attention.” Jessica shrugged. “We like bringing in volunteers to pet and hold the animals willing to be held and petted. Keeps them socialized and helps with their mental health.”

“Mental health of pets?” Donna asked.

“Sounds very sweet,” Nari said.

“So.” Heady looked around. “Are we in agreement?”

“I think we should finish going through the files first,” Hester said, earning a little frown but a reluctant nod from her twin. “And then we can go into the shelter.” She shrugged. “I don’t mind petting a few scared animals either.”

In fact, given the stress she’d been under at work this semester, a little pet therapy might be just want Hester needed.

***

The front of the center was quiet and dark. There were exactly three people on duty that night. A security guard—added since the attack on Victoria—and two of the attendants that looked after the animals and took in any that came in overnight.

“That doesn’t happen all the time,” Jessica said. “In fact, it’s rare. But occasionally, someone drops a box off. The staff learned a long time ago that having no one on duty could cost a small, helpless thing hours of needed medical care if no one was here overnight. So we usually take turns managing the night shift for a week.” She winced. “Normally, it’s just one of us, but after the attack…”

Jessica stopped to talk to the security guard, sitting at a small desk that looked temporary just inside the front door in the open lobby area. He had a computer screen on the desk and thermos sitting beside it. The screen was turned away, though, so Hester couldn’t see what he was watching. He was a big Black man who looked like he could be intimidating or perfectly sweet depending on his mood, and wore a dark blue uniform that looked very official for an animal rescue center.

Jessica showed him her work i.d. and explaining that the other six women were her book club and we were volunteering to pet animals. It wasn’t something that normally happened at night, especially after ordinary closing hours, but the security guard was new and didn’t realize that. Hester might have felt bad about fooling him, but since they were going to pet some animals, it wasn’t a complete lie.

After the security guard, who’s name according to his name tag was Dwayne Klein, cleared them to enter, Jessica led them through the main lobby, an open and airy space, painted in whites and yellows, and black and white linoleum floors scrubbed clean. A glass covered window at the reception desk revealed a cluttered back office, with one giant black cat sleeping on a stack of papers.

“That’s Horowitz,” Jessica said with a fond smile. “He will ignore us. He’s our center cat. One of those that just never got adopted back out but we all sort of adopted him here. He’s half deaf and his eyesight is bad, so he just hangs out in the office.”

The smell of animals was present but faint in the reception area, a sort of dog-treat kind of smell that Hester wasn’t sure how to describe. But the minute Jessica opened the door into the back of the shelter, the smell of a multitude of animals hit Hester hard in the face. She didn’t have allergies and liked animals but…this was a lot. A faint ammonia smell mixed with cleaning agent and pet shampoo, some musky animal dander, and, weirdly to Hester, woodchips.

“We’re pretty full right now,” Jessica said as she let everyone into the narrow hall. “We have an adoption fair coming up and we’re hoping to get some of the rescues into permanent homes. We’ve managed to foster out a lot of the dogs, but we’re a bit overflowing with cats and rabbits and hamsters at the moment.” She sighed. “People really should consider the responsibility of owning a pet before deciding to buy one for their kids for Christmas.”

The hallway on the other side of the reception area was narrow and tight for all seven of them, but brightly lit, the white walls lined with pictures of animals and some drawings obviously made by little kids of cats and dogs and one picture of a dolphin.

“You don’t…get dolphins in here, right?” Hester asked.

Jessica chuckled. “Not our specialty no. We’re a small animal shelter.”

Nari snort laughed.

“That was done by one of the staff’s kids,” Jessica clarified. “And he has an obsession with all things dolphin.”

“Sounds like a budding marine biologist,” Zelda said, her gaze scanning the hallway, looking, as always, unperturbed by her surroundings.

The closer they got to a door at the end of the hall, the clearer the sounds of animals got. There were some doors along the narrow corridor that Jessica said were either offices or examination rooms. But the door at the far end led to the kennels. The sound of barking and some mewing reached even through the door. And the scent of collected animals got stronger.

“It might be a little loud back here when we walk in,” Jessica said. “They get excited when they hear new people walking in.”

“Not sure I’ve ever been around so many animals,” Donna said, hanging back a little with Nari.

“Are you afraid of any of them?” Nari asked kindly, setting a hand to Donna’s arm.

“Not badly,” Donna said, still frowning at the closed door with all the barking behind it. “But dogs are a little…aggressive for me sometimes.”

“It’s okay,” Jessica said. “We’ll stick to the cat kennel. We don’t have to go in with the dogs.”

“If it’s not too difficult,” Heady said, “where was your friend attacked?”

Jessica, hand on the door to the back, said, “Near the drop-off door at the rear of the facility. There’s a buzzer that people dropping off animals can use to alert staff of the drop off. People use it day and night, but mostly at night when the reception area is closed. Since the attack, we aren’t allowed to open that door without the security guard. And they’ve installed a camera with a monitor that the security guard watches from his desk.”

Jessica seemed to visibly steel herself to open the door, then turned the knob.

The sound of animals got loud enough to make Hester wince. The door opened onto what looked like a staging area. Empty kennels and steel tables and a lot of shelves stacked, at intervals, with things like food and snacks on the middle and upper shelves, cleaning supplies and kitty litter on lower shelves. On one shelf to the side, behind a glass covered door, boxes and bottles that Hester thought might be medicine and bandages and the like. There was even a large refrigerator to one side, and a wrack of leashes and collars hanging from hooks on the wall next to the refrigerator.

Three doors led off from the staging area. One near the fridge, one that bisected the shelves, and one opposite the fridge, near a shelf full of bagged cat and dog food. The smell of animals and ammonia was stronger in here. Also the scent of the food, which was again something Hester wasn’t sure how to describe. It was a sort of dry, meaty smell without being meat? She didn’t remember the smell of dog food from their one dog growing up, so it was a strange sort of scent to her.

Heady sniffed but didn’t cover her nose, which surprised Hester. Her twin could be pretty fussy, so it always shocked her when Heady wasn’t.

Maya, bouncing on her toes, gestured at the two doors. “Which leads to the cats?”

“The one closest to the fridge,” Jessica said.

“And where’s the back drop-off door?” Heady asked.

“That one,” Jessica gestured to the door across from the fridge. “There’s a hallway with an exam room and some bathing facilities for the animals, and then the back door. It opens onto a small alley that runs the entire length of the facility. We have a small open area back there too where we can take the animals to move around freely and get some fresh air, but that’s accessed through the kennels. No way to get into it from the alley.”

Heady was frowning slightly, considering the hall toward the drop-off door, making Hester wonder what she was thinking. But before she could ask, someone came out of the door that bisected the shelves, the door that Hester presumed led to the dog area since it wasn’t the cat door.

“Jessica!” A young woman wearing tan cargo pants and a dark blue polo shirt grinned at Jessica, then frowned at all the other women. “What are you doing here this time of night?”

“Hey, Rami.” Jessica gave the woman a quick hug and introduced everyone. “We’ve just come to give the cats a little attention. Our book club mostly focuses on bat books, but we like cats a lot too.”

“They’re like dragons,” Maya said, shaking Rami’s hand enthusiastically enough to made the other woman’s eyes widen.

“And dragons count as a kind of bat,” Nari said.

“So it works for a bat book club,” Donna added. Then shrugged. “When you look at it just right and with your eyes squinted.”

Rami laughed. “Well help yourself. Jessica knows the animals and who will tolerate and welcome some cuddles.” To Jessica, she said, “You just missed Junichi. He went out for his dinner break. But he should be back before you all leave.”

“How’s everything been tonight?” Jessica asked.

“About normal. They’re all still a little more agitated than usual, but most of them have calmed down. Except Ms. Kitty. She’s still hiding at the back of her kennel. If you all can coax her out for some snuggles, I think that would help reassure and calm her a lot. But she’s been hissy and swatty since Victoria…”

Rami swallowed hard and shrugged.

“I told them,” Jessica said quietly. “We’ll see if we can get Ms. Kitty to accept some reassurance pets.”

Rami gave them a friendly wave before heading toward the front of the center on some errand or another.

Heady had barely looked away from the hall that led toward the drop-off door. “After we visit with the cats and check on Ms. Kitty’s collar, I think we should look around near the drop off door. Just to get a better idea of the…setting.”

“Any clues that were there have been either found by the police or contaminated by now,” Jessica said. She swallowed hard. “The area had to be scrubbed and cleaned once the police said it was okay because the smell of blood was bothering the animals.”

Maya covered her mouth on a small, distressed sound that Hester felt in her soul.

Jessica wrapped an arm around Maya’s shoulder. “That was my reaction too.”

“Okay,” Hester said, rallying her determination. “Ms. Kitty first. Let’s look out our poor girl’s necklace.”

Nari chuckled at the description, then slapped a hand over her mouth. “Sorry. This isn’t really a laughing situation.”

“It’s okay,” Jessica said. “The collar does look like a fancy necklace.”

“Even if the diamonds are fakes,” Heady said.

***

They followed Jessica through the door that led into the cat section, which wasn’t quite as noisy as the dogs—she could still hear some of them barking from their side of the facility—but there were still a few hisses and a lot of mewing. The floors were spotless, but the smell of ammonia and cat was still quite strong past the door. Hester wondered how long it had taken Jessica to get used to all the animal smells because she didn’t seem to notice. Donna covered her nose for a moment, looked around, and then removed her hand, but her nose twitched.

Once Hester adjusted to the sharp cat scent, though, it wasn’t so bad. The room was clean and the cats were being well taken care of. There were just…a lot. Metal kennels with clear plastic doors with lots of holes in them lined both walls, bracketing a wide walkway. Three kennels high and probably fifteen columns across on each side. Room for a good number of cats. Hester had to guess the dog kennel would have a different layout. Although maybe some of the smaller dogs could go in raised kennels?

The lights were dimmed but not off and Jessica told them they’d shut the lights off in about an hour so the cats knew what time of day it was. There were windows on one wall, high up over the top of the kennels, but they were covered with shades.

Information cards had been slid into plastic holders on each door, giving the name of the cat and specifics about personality and diet. There were also leashes hanging on the far wall with names handwritten on white mailing labels over the top of each leash.

“Some of the cats are good with being walked on leashes and some aren’t trained to it and hate it,” Jessica said. “We try to get them all used to leashes and harnesses here so it’s easier to take them out back.” She gestured to the door beside the leads. “That goes into the exercise yard. Besides the other door in the dog kennel, there’s no other access.”

“Exercise yard?” Donna said. “That makes it sound like a prison.”

Jessica winced. “I know. But I swear we try to treat our animals like guests more than prisoners.”

Donna patted her arm. “I get you. It’s fine. What else would you call it? Right?”

Jessica led them about halfway down the row of kennels and gestured to one at the top of the column. “Ms. Kitty. She likes to be in the highest kennel so she can survey her territory.” Jessica smiled, but it looked forced.

Hester stepped close to read the card. It had Ms. Kitty’s name, breed, fur and eye color. “Why fur and eye color?” Hester asked.

“So we don’t accidentally put a cat in the wrong kennel. Some of them have allergies or medicines they need, and we don’t want to mix that up.”

“Fair point,” Zelda commented, though she was looking into a kennel next to Ms. Kitty’s. She started making “spp spp spp” noises and stuck her finger through one of the holes in the plastic kennel door. From inside the kennel, a sweet little mewing sound turned into a purr.

Maya leaned into Hester and whispered, “I think Zelda isn’t leaving here without a cat.”

“At least a plan to come back for one,” Hester agreed. Zelda already had two cats at home. And a fish tank. A combination that struck Hester as a little dangerous. But so far the fish and cats seemed to have come to a truce and got along well enough that the fish were still there.

Heady rose up on her toes to look into Ms. Kitty’s kennel, then glanced around. “I don’t suppose you have a… Ah, there we go.” A small, plastic step stool near the leashes, just a single step, but it was enough to get Heady on eye level with the interior of the kennel.

Hester and Heady were identical twins, technically, but Hester got an inch on Heady, while Heady was exactly a minute holder than Hester. Hester used both against her twin when Heady was getting fussy and irritating.

Heady looked into the case and a hiss answered her. “Yes, well, I understand,” she said to the cat as if speaking to another member of the book club. “It’s all very annoying I imagine and also quite distressing. Losing your human like that and then ending up here.” She waved her hand and the gold bangles on her wrist tinkled. “But we’re just here to make sure nothing bad happens to you. And your friend Victoria should be back soon. Now. May I have a look at your collar?”

Jessica reached up and touched Heady’s shoulder. “Cats don’t tend to—”

She cut herself off when a little white paw reached through one of the small holes and batted at Heady. Heady gave the little paw a brief squeeze. And rather than the paw quickly retracting or any more hisses, Ms. Kitty issued a small mew and batted at Heady again. Heady gave the little white paw a few strokes.

“What pretty fur you have, Ms. Kitty,” Heady murmured. “You are a very beautiful girl.”

Another mewing sound.

Heady, still stroking the cat’s little paw, leaned in close to the plastic door and peaked through, frowning. “Your blue collar is lovely, too,” she murmured. “But I suspect not the one you’re used to wearing.”

She reached through the holes in the kennel and, to Hester’s surprise, Ms. Kitty pressed up tight to the plastic, her white fur poking through in places. Heady gave her a little scratch with one hand and used the other to rub one of the diamond-looking gems on the collar.

“This is definitely paste,” she said with a sharp nod. “Not real diamonds.” She glanced around. “Did anything else come in with Ms. Kitty? Any other personal possessions?”

“Just her bed.” Jessica gestured to the back of the kennel. “And a small bag of toys the executor said were supposed to be Ms. Kitty’s favorites. But she hasn’t touched any of them since arriving. We’ve tried to draw her out with them, but she ignores them. Even did with Victoria.” Jessica was frowning at the cat leaning against the cage as Heady absently scratched her through the air holes. “She hasn’t done that—” she gestured at Ms. Kitty, “—with anyone but Victoria either.”

Heady waved her free hand, the bangles clanking, and said, “Cats love me.”

“Since when?” Hester asked. They’d never had a cat growing up. And as far as Hester knew, her sister had never owned any cats either.”

“I started cat sitting for one of the neighbors several years ago,” Heady said with a little sniff. “And Delila’s clowder is quite fond of me.”

Huh. And here Hester thought she knew everything about her sister.

“She likes your bangles,” Zelda said absently, still smiling at the cat in a completely different kennel. “I suspect her wealthy human was a jewelry person, right?” Zelda looked up and around at the group. “She’d hardly bejewel her cat and not herself. So she probably wore sparkly, clanky jewelry too.” Zelda nodded at the gold bangles on Heady’s wrist. “Those are sparkling in the dim light.”

“And to be fair,” Donna said, “you do have a sort of snooty, rich person tone sometimes, Heady.”

Heady gave Donna a look, her mouth pursed.

But Donna just said, “You going to deny it?”

Mouth flattened into a straight line, Heady looked away, but she didn’t deny Donna’s opinion of her tone.

“Now you say it, Zelda,” Jessica said, “Victoria wore small diamond earrings. Nothing large or flashy, but they sparkled. Maybe that’s the trick. Ms. Kitty likes humans who like jewels as much as she does.”

“Perhaps,” Heady said. She cooed at Ms. Kitty. Then said, “We should look at the favorite toys.”

“Why?” Nari asked. “I know Victoria was Ms. Kitty’s favorite and all, but there’s no reason to think Victoria’s attack has anything to do with Ms. Kitty, right? Not really.”

“Just a hunch,” Heady said.

“What kind of hunch?” Hester asked as Heady stepped off the stool.

Ms. Kitty gave a sad little mew when she left and batted her paw through one of the air holes.

“I’ll be right back,” Heady told Ms. Kitty, giving her paw a little squeeze.

They followed Jessica to the small lockers beneath the hanging leashes.

“Ms. VanHoven, Ms. Kitty’s human, was wealthy,” Heady said. “And Ms. Kitty was obviously beloved or she wouldn’t have had a collar with real diamonds on it. Yet Ms. VanHoven left no provision for Ms. Kitty’s care in her will? Unthinkable. Either Ms. VanHoven didn’t expect to die any time soon and so hadn’t updated her will. Or something is hinky with the whole situation. My money is on the son or cousins who inherited.” She gave a sharp little nod, as if that explained everything.

“You’re jumping to conclusions,” Jessica said, always very logical, even when she was upset.

“Right,” Donna said. “There’s the executor who brought in Ms. Kitty. Maybe they’re responsible.”

“For what,” Nari said, frowning, “exactly?”

“For Victoria’s attack,” Donna said. “The reason we’re here.”

“But…why would he attack Victoria?” Nari asked.

“My theory,” Heady said as they all waited for Jessical to pull out the plastic bag full of Ms. Kitty’s toys, “is that something left the estate with Ms. Kitty that wasn’t supposed to leave the estate. A treasure or some jewels perhaps. They stripped Ms. Kitty of her diamond collar before dropping her at a shelter. Obviously, they’re greedy people.”

“Still doesn’t explain why Victoria got attacked,” Nari said.

“Obviously, she was saving Ms. Kitty,” Maya said, and Heady gave her an approving nod.

“You all realize this is just speculation, right?” Nari said.

“It’s weird you being the logical skeptic right now,” Donna said. “That’s usually Jessica’s job.”

“She’s too close to the subject,” Nari said. “Someone had to fill in.”

“Thanks for that.” Jessica gave Nari a head hug to her shoulder which Nari returned. Then Jessica held up the bag of Ms. Kitty’s belongings. “It’s something to check. Doing something is better than nothing.”

Heady took the bag from Jessica, looked around, and said, “We need a table, so we can really check things.”

“If we go back out into the staging room, there’s tables, but Rami or Junichi when he returns might ask questions.” Jessica started that direction anyway.

“Do you trust them?” Hester asked, trailing Heady, very curious now what was in that bag.

“They’re as devastated as I am about Victoria. So, yeah, I don’t think either has anything to do with this. If that’s what you’re asking.”

“Then they won’t mind us just…checking things,” Hester said.

As they passed Ms. Kitty’s kennel, a little white paw stuck so far out of the airhole, she nearly swiped Hester’s head. The mewing had turned into an angry yowl.

“She sounds pissed now,” Donna commented. “Not sad. Pissed.”

“Wonder why?” Heady moved to the kennel. “Are you mad we’re taking your toys to examine? I promise to bring them back.”

When Heady spoke, Ms. Kitty’s angry hiss turned into a soft mew like a kitten, and she did a little frantic wave of her paw.

“Do you understand what she’s doing?” Maya asked Jessica.

“No. But then I’m not as close to Ms. Kitty as Victoria was. She understood all her moods in a way that the rest of us haven’t been able to.”

“If we take her out of the kennel, will we be breaking some sort of rule?” Heady asked, reaching up to tug at Ms. Kitty’s paw gently, letting her know she was there.

“Well, no. That was our excuse for being here, petting the cats, but Ms. Kitty hasn’t been out of her kennel voluntarily since Victoria. I’m not sure she’ll let us take her out without a fight. We’ve had to be real careful when we do take her out for exams and cleaning the kennel.”

“We can try,” Heady said. “If she rejects us, we can leave her be.”

Hester gave Heady side eye. There was something in Heady’s voice that Hester wasn’t sure how to interpret.

“Can I snuggle this baby?” Zelda asked of the cat whose cage she’d never left.

“Sure,” Jessica said, smiling faintly. They all knew Zelda was about to adopt a new cat and just hadn’t said so aloud yet.

Zelda’s likely new kitten crawled right into her arms the moment the kennel was open and began purring so loudly Hester could hear it above the other cat starting to meow in earnest. Yeah. Zelda wasn’t going home alone tonight.

Ms. Kitty was another issue. When Jessica opened her kennel, the fluffy white cat launched herself at the back of the enclosure and hissed. “I was afraid of that,” Jessica said.

“Let me try to coax her out,” Heady said. “If I fail, we’ll abide her wishes and leave her in her kennel.”

“She did stick her paw out for Heady when she was passing,” Nari pointed out.

“She was probably just looking for one of her toys,” Donna said.

Maya bounced on her toes, trying to better see into Ms. Kitty’s kennel around Jessica. “Could be she didn’t want us to leave.”

“Or could be she wanted Heady,” Hester murmured as Heady stepped close to the kennel and Ms. Kitty stopped hissing.

“Well now. That’s better,” Heady said primly. “Would you like to come investigate with us, or stay here? We’ll be looking at your toys. There might be something there of interest. To the case or to you.”

From her vantage, Hester couldn’t see into the kennel. But the hissing had turned to a soft mew. And after a moment, that little white paw appeared again. This time, without the kennel’s plastic door in the way, Ms. Kitty waved her paw at Heady without having to reach through an air hole.

“If I pick you up,” Heady said, “you are not allowed to gouge me with your claws. This sweater is one of my favorites and I don’t want snags in it.” Heady’s golden bangles jangled as she reached up for Ms. Kitty.

She needn’t have worried about scratches and her sweater. Ms. Kitty slid out into her arms easily, like water falling into a cup. She wrapped her little front paws around Heady’s neck and snuggled in close to her, her little brown eyes wide as she searched the kennel area.

“There there.” Heady patted and petted Ms. Kitty’s back.

She was a beautiful cat, her long white fur a little matted but otherwise clean and shiny. The blue collar with its paste diamonds glistened under the overhead florescent lights. Her little mews and meows sounded distressed, but she didn’t try to launch herself out of Heady’s arms or back into her kennel. She clung to Heady the way a small child might.

Hester hadn’t personally been interested in having kids, but Heady had. And unfortunately, it hadn’t worked out for her. Which had always been a sore spot. She and Trevor were very happy together. But the one thing they’d missed was having children. Hester had been a bit sad about not being an aunt too. She would have been the cool aunt who allowed cursing in her house.

She’d never considered what kind of pet aunt she might be.

***

While still petting and murmuring quietly to Ms. Kitty, Heady walked out of the kennels and into the staging area. Jessica shook her head. “I’m not sure whether to consider this a miracle or just weird,” she said quietly.

“It has to be the bangles,” Nari said. “Like Zelda pointed out. They must remind Ms. Kitty of her human.”

“Did Victoria wear bangles?” Donna asked.

“No. Just the sparkly earrings.” Jessica looked at them all. “I guess the staff here needs to start wearing sparkly jewelry if we want to earn Ms. Kitty’s trust.”

“Not a bad idea,” Zelda said absently. The small kitten she was probably going home with was an adorably small orange that barely overflowed Zelda’s hand and had already curled up tight in her arms and fallen asleep, purring.

“Let’s go through this bag of toys,” Donna said. “Before anyone else decides to adopt.”

Nari chuckled as they followed Jessica out into the staging area. Heady was already there, holding Ms. Kitty, but her attention was on the door that led to the hallway that led to the backdoor again. Ms. Kitty wasn’t looking in that direction. She was looking at them over Heady’s shoulder as they walked out with her bag full of toys from her old home.

Jessica opened the bag and spread the items out onto the tall, long metal desk above a rack of food bowls. There were a number of squeaky toys and fluffy, mouse like things. A long feather, like a peacock’s, and some plastic spheres with triangle cuts in them. Hester nudged one of the spheres. A piece of kibble fell out of one of the holes.

“Designed to make getting treats an adventure,” Jessica said.

With the others leaning over her shoulder, Hester moved the toys around. She glanced occasionally at Ms. Kitty to see if she was showing any interest. Ms. Kitty was staring at them with her wide eyes, but she wasn’t looking at the toys, even when Hester shook the one with kibble still in it.

Carefully, she turned the two kibble toys around, looking for where they opened. Some kibble fell out of the one, clinking onto the steel work table. Ms. Kitty had no response to the food. When Hester found the little section that snapped open, she dumped the rest of the kibble onto the table and shuffled it around with her finger. Nothing there but hard little bites of cat foot that smelled a little meaty and dry. The other two treat toys were empty, though Hester did run her fingers around inside just to make sure nothing had gotten stuck inside the spheres. There were two more collars for Ms. Kitty but they were ordinary nylon, one yellow, one blue, with no fancy stones or even pretend jewels.

In all the pushing and jiggling, Ms. Kitty didn’t respond once to any of the toys or the noises they made. She didn’t react to the little pile of dried kibble on the table. She didn’t react to the nose of dogs barking from their kennels. Ms. Kitty just looked over Heady’s shoulder, staring at them all with wide brown eyes, like she was waiting for something.

“Poor baby,” Heady cooed, her hand stroking down the length of Ms. Kitty’s back. “She’s trembling,” Heady added in a normal voice. “But she’s not clawing me or struggling to get away. She’s not struggling to return to her kennel.”

“The poor thing,” Maya murmured. She stood by Zelda and was petty the sleeping orange kitten in Zelda’s arms absently.

“There doesn’t seem to be anything significant in the toys,” Hester said. “I hate to say it, but we might be on the wrong path here and Victoria’s attack has nothing to do with Ms. Kitty.”

She hated to say it because they had no other leads or things to check. Nothing that the police hadn’t already picked up or was cleaned when the facility was able to clean their hallways. If Heady’s instincts were wrong about the Ms. Kitty connection, they had nothing else really to go on because there’d been nothing very obvious in the files.

“One more thing,” Heady said, not sounding deterred by the lack of evidence anywhere among the toys. She went to the door that led to the back corridor and the back exit. Since the door wasn’t locked, Heady turned the knob and started down the hallway beyond. It was well lit and clean, like the rest of the center. Only the smell of cleaners and bleach were stronger back here.

Ms. Kitty made a small mewing sound, and clung tightly to Heady as she walked slowly along the hallway to the back door, but the cat didn’t try to scramble over her shoulder and escape.

Hester followed her sister and the others fell in behind her. Hester glanced back at Jessica, who lingered at the back of the group. “You don’t have to come this way if it upsets you.”

“It’s okay.” Jessica spoke quietly but gave a firm nod. Nari wrapped an arm around her shoulder and walked with her.

The back door was ordinary enough. A steel door with a push handle and an extra panel with locks. There was a small camera screen next to the door that showed a view outside just at the door. And above it, a little light.

When she pointed at it and frowned, Jessica explained. “The light and a buzzer let us know someone is at the back door. The ring camera was just installed after Victoria’s attack.”

“You didn’t have a camera before that?” Donna asked, sounding appalled. “There’s no window in that door. How could you see out?”

“We couldn’t,” Jessica said. “But this drop off spot is usually for people who don’t want to talk to staff. Or are dropping off animals after hours. Most of the time, no one hangs around to make sure someone answers to door after they’ve rang the bell. It’s never been a problem.” She waved at the camera. “I suppose we should have had that before. And the camera that the security guard can see. But cameras can be expensive and we try to be careful that the money here all goes to caring for the animals, paying the staff… Spending money on expensive security measures never came up before.”

“No one’s ever even tried to rob the place?” Donna shook her head. “That’s amazing.”

“What would anyone steal?” Nari asked. “Leashes and kibble?”

“There were a lot of medicines in the staging room,” Hester pointed out. “Someone might look to steal the drugs for…reasons.”

“Was anything stolen when Victoria was attacked?” Maya asked.

Jessica shook her head. “Not that we could see. Nothing in the back was tossed. The vets haven’t mentioned any missing medicines.”

Heady was still stroking Ms. Kitty, looking at the back door and frowning. She glanced at the floor, at the camera, at the lock. Then she locked eyes with Hester as she asked Jessica, “Do you know if Victoria was holding Ms. Kitty when she answered the bell? Would she have brought one of the animals with her? Since she wasn’t expecting a person to be there, just another animal?”

“Not likely,” Jessica said. “She couldn’t be sure what sort of state, or even what kind of animal, was being dropped off. Could have been a box of blind kittens or a snake in a cage or a miserable, snappy dog with its leash tied to the bar outside. She’d have needed both hands to deal with whatever was waiting on the other side of the door.”

“And she’d have put Ms. Kitty back in her kennel and closed the door before coming here to answer the bell,” Heady said.

“If she’d had her out of the kennel? Probably.” Jessica frowned.

“What?” Hester asked.

“Well, the procedure would be to put any animals we had out back in their kennels before going to the door. For every animal’s safety. So they wouldn’t try to run away, or anything like that. But…”

“But?” Maya asked, her gaze jumping to the ring camera and back to Jessica.

“Ms. Kitty only ever came out of her kennel for Victoria, and she wasn’t the kind of animal to bolt through the door. She’s a bit fussy and doesn’t actually like being outside.”

“Who does?” Heady cooed at the cat.

“So if maybe someone was pounding on the door, making it sound urgent,” Hester said slowly, “and Victoria had Ms. Kitty out already, she might have risked leaving her out to run to the back door?”

“It’s…possible,” Jessica said. “Urgent moment, an animal not going to bolt because they hate outside… I could see Victoria just leaving Ms. Kitty in the staging room while she rushed to answer the back door.”

“And since you never get robbers trying to break in,” Donna said, “that wasn’t the first thing Victoria would have thought about.”

“Probably not. I wouldn’t have.” Jessica glanced at the door. “If someone was knocking urgently after hours, I’d assume they’d found an animal in really rough shape and wanted to make sure that animal got inside and was seen by someone who knew what to do. That would be my first assumption.”

“Probably Victoria’s too,” Hester said. She glanced at Heady. “Hold Ms. Kitty tight. We’re going to open the door. But if she bolts back to the staging area, let her go. I’ve got a hunch.”

Heady nodded. “Same.”

Hester nodded to Jessica and Jessica pressed a button on the side of the door near the ring camera, then shoved the bar and opened the metal door. Night air rushed in, cool and fresh. Hester only realized the hallway was a little hot when that colder air hit her. Or maybe the corridor was too crowded with people—it wasn’t a large space. Or maybe she was just having a hot flash. Whatever it was, the cold air and fresher outside scents washed away the warmth and the smell of animal and animal food and bleach that filled the corridor.

Ms. Kitty hissed almost immediately. Heady tightened her hold and took a step away from the door, and Maya and Nari moved so that they were half blocking the door in case Ms. Kitty did try to bolt that way. But the cat showed no interest in the outside.

She did, however, show a great deal of interest in getting away from the door.

More hissing and then she was clawing her way over Heady’s shoulder, back toward the inside of the center. Heady cursed—a rarity—and let Ms. Kitty go. The fluff of white streaked toward the staging room, through the still open hallway door.

“Follow her,” Hester urged. “Maya, stay here. We need to leave this door open, but I don’t want anyone else bolting.”

“I’ll stay,” Zelda said. “My kitten seems to like the air.”

“We’ll stay together,” Maya said. “Hurry.”

As they rushed toward the staging area, Hester looked at Heady gently touching her shoulder. “Did she get you?”

“Just a little scratch. It’ll be fine.”

“I’ve got some ointment,” Jessica said. “To keep the scratch from getting infected.”

That Heady didn’t immediately start griping about the scratch, or about possible cat germ infections, or even the new snag in her sweater for that matter, made Hester raise her brows. But she didn’t comment. Heady was fussy and particular but she was also brave and kind and caring. She probably really didn’t notice or care about the pain or the drops of blood on her neck or the pulled threads in her sweater.

In the staging area, they all came to an abrupt halt. No sign of Ms. Kitty. Not crouch under the steel table, or by the fridge. The dogs were barking a lot again, so Ms. Kitty hardly went that way.

“She must have rushed back to her kennel,” Jessica said.

“Can she jump up that high to reach it?” Donna asked as the five of them headed toward the cat kennels.

“She never has before,” Jessica said, “but she’s a cat. It’s possible.”

“I’ll check the kennel,” Heady said, “since she only comes out for me. The rest of you check the staging area.”

The women spread out, Hester taking the area near the door leading into the cat kennels, searching around the bags of cat food stacked on shelves near the long steel table, then higher to see if she spotted Ms. Kitty on the upper shelves. But there were only boxes of cat treats and dewormer. She moved to the fridge, because she’d had a friend whose cat liked to jump up onto the fridge to ambush people walking past by jumping on their heads. The fridge at the center was shorter than Hester’s friend’s fridge, so it was obvious Ms. Kitty was on the top. But Hester still checked around the back and sides, and even opened the fridge to check inside because she didn’t want to miss a spot.

Heady came back from the cat kennels, a lot of meowing and hissing in her wake. “She’s not back there. Not in her kennel. No other kennel doors are open. And she doesn’t seem to be around the leashes and toy cubbies.”

“I’ll help you double check the other kennels,” Jessica said. “I know it sounds impossible, but I swear cats don’t have bones. Just in case she slipped into an enclosure we thought was closed.”

Heady nodded and the two women disappeared back into the kennels.

Nari jogged into the dog kennel side, the cacophony of barking that started made Hester want to cover her ears. Poor babies. She’d have gone through and petted them all and given them some attention if they weren’t here to solve a crime.

Donna was moving boxes and bags to check behind them. Nothing seemed to have fallen off the shelves, but Ms. Kitty could have slipped behind boxes without knocking things over, Hester supposed. She’d been in such a hurry, though, that seemed unlikely.

Hester searched around the base of the shelves, under the long steel staging table, looking for anything that might have fallen off the shelves, giving them a hint where to look. “Ms. Kitty. Here, Ms. Kitty. Here, kittykittykittykitty…” She paused, remembering the way Ms. Kitty reacted to Heady’s bangles jingling. She didn’t have any jewelry on to simulate that sound, so she hunted around for something that might work.

When she didn’t come up with anything, she rushed into the cat kennels and asked Heady to borrow two of her bangles.

Heady didn’t even have to ask why. Her eyes got wide, and then she nodded, removing two and giving them to Hester, then she started jingling her own remaining bracelets as she called Ms. Kitty’s name while Jessica continued looking into the closed kennels.

Hester went back out into the staging area and lightly knocked the two bangles together on her wrist as she called out to Ms. Kitty.

“Shhhh!” Donna called suddenly. “I hear something.”

They all listened intently. And there. A small, quiet mewing.

***

Hester kept jingling the bangles as she and Donna neared the mewing sounds. They came from a low shelf under the staging table, near the back, behind boxes that had been pushed out of order, but hadn’t looked particularly jostled until Hester really looked closely at them.

“We’ve got you, Ms. Kitty,” she said quietly, hoping her voice sounded a bit like Heady’s, at least enough to sooth the wide-eyed fluff of white. When they moved the boxes and spotted her fur, Ms. Kitty hissed loudly. She didn’t do the quiet mewing she did with Heady, but Hester tried anyway. She lowered her voice, tried to sound soothing and a little prissy. “Well. That’s very rude to hiss at me, but after what you’ve been through, I understand.”

A quiet mew.

“I realize I’m not the human you’re looking for, but it’s important you come out so we can make sure you’re okay.”

Ms. Kitty didn’t move.

Hester moved some more of the boxes and cans to better see the cat, who was so crammed back into the corner of the shelf, all she was was a circle of fluffy white and two glowing golden eyes. The shadows were deep in that part of the shelving. So dark, Hester had to squint.

“Here use this.” Nari tapped Hester’s shoulder and then handed her a cellphone with the flashlight on.

Hester hadn’t even realized Nari had come back out from the dog kennels. She turned the flashlight so that she could see better but so that it wasn’t pointed directly at Ms. Kitty. The area behind the boxes where Ms. Kitty had wedged herself was a little dusty, but not as dusty as Hester might have suspected.

She made calming noises and let the bangles on her wrist jingle as she tried to get close enough to grab Ms. Kitty. The cat’s position was awkwardly behind a leg of the steel table and against a side of the shelving and it required reaching around things to get to her. But Hester was afraid to move too suddenly or dislodge too much of Ms. Kitty’s cover for fear the cat might take off again.

Behind her, she heard Heady’s voice, and that got Ms. Kitty’s attention.

“Yes,” Hester said quietly, “you did scratch her a little. I think you should come out and apologize to her.”

Ms. Kitty meowed and stretched her head forward a little. Hester held out her hand, the bangles catching some of the flashlight light. Ms. Kitty meowed again and sniffed Hester’s fingers.

From behind her, Heady said, “Ms. Kitty. Please come out. We’d just want to make sure you’re okay.”

Which Hester thought was the sort of thing a cat wasn’t going to understand. But the sound of Heady’s voice was obviously enough for Ms. Kitty. She started to creep forward, very slowly.

Hester held perfectly still, her hand out, waiting for Ms. Kitty to make the transition.

Instead of coming to Hester, Ms. Kitty bypast her and went to Heady, which Hester didn’t take offense to. She was just relieved they’d gotten Ms. Kitty back without it causing too much chaos. She swung the flashlight around, about to back out from under the table as she heard Heady greeting the cat and Ms. Kitty mewing in response. But the flashlight caught on something. Reaching around awkwardly, her fingers brushed cool metal. She picked up the small piece and scooted out from under the table.

Handing Nari’s phone back to her, she frowned at the thing she’d scooped out from Ms. Kitty’s hiding spot. It was a locket, probably about as big as her thumb, long rather than round, shaped like a bone of all things, made of etched silver.

“What’s that?” Heady asked, holding Ms. Kitty in her arms now. The cat was purring and had her face buried against Heady’s arm.

From the hallway, Zelda and Maya rejoined them.

Zelda was still holding her future kitten. “We’ve closed the back door,” she said as all the women gathered around Hester. “What did you find?”

“Not sure. It was where Ms. Kitty was hiding.” Hester held up the locket so light could catch it. All the women leaned in to look. There was a smooth oval on the long part of the bone and into that smooth oval was etched the name MS. KITTY.

“Oh. It must have been her name tag from one of her collars,” Jessica said.

“Do you remember it?” Hester asked, fingering the shape. There were tiny hinges so it obviously opened. She felt around for a button to press.

“No. But Victoria probably would have noticed it since she spent most of her time with Ms. Kitty.”

“I recognize it,” Heady said. “It was hanging on the red and diamond studded collar Ms. Kitty had on in the pictures that looked like studio shots. I didn’t see it on the blue collar in her pictures here, though.”

“Wait,” Donna said, “this locket was hanging from the expensive collar that is missing. Not the cheap paste collar she’s got on now.”

“I didn’t see it on this collar,” Heady said. “That doesn’t mean it wasn’t there and turned away from the camera. She is quite fluffy. That could have been hiding in her fur.”

“And come off back in the shelving when she went there to hide,” Hester said. She found the button on the locket and pressed. The silver bone popped open.

Revealing a key.

All the women were quiet for a long moment.

“That looks like a clue,” Donna said after a moment.

“It certainly does,” Zelda said. “And we’ve been touching it a lot.”

“Finger prints on a cat locket were never going to produce a suspect,” Heady said primly.

“But whatever this key leads to might,” Hester said, meeting Heady’s gaze.

“You think that’s what the attacker was after?” Maya asked. “A key to something…important?”

“Could just lead to more Ms. Kitty toys,” Donna cautioned. “Why hang a key that leads to something important around a cat’s neck?”

“Because it’s the last place someone looking for the key would look,” Heady suggested. “I think Ms. Kitty’s human was a very smart woman.”

“It’s something we can give the police,” Jessica said. “Maybe it’ll help.”

She sounded uncertain but more hopeful than she’d sounded earlier in the café. Hester knew they’d come here on a long shot that they’d find anything helpful. But this…this felt helpful to her. Heady gave a firm nod, as if she thought it was something too.

“Call the authorities, that detective looking after Victoria’s case,” Heady said. “I feel positive this key will lead to her attacker.”

The other women exchanged uncertain looks, but nodded in agreement. “It’s no smoking gun,” Donna said.

“But it’s not nothing,” Nari said.

“I’ll be right back,” Jessica said, going to call the cops.

Heady petted Ms. Kitty and cooed at her. “You did very good hiding that locket,” she said to the cat. “Even if it was likely on accident.”

***

They met at the café the next week rather than at their usual time because none of them wanted to wait too long for an update on Victoria’s case. They made a show of pretending they’d read a new Dracula novel, a retelling that emphasized a romance plot, but Hester knew they’d have to get to the book at a later meeting. She hadn’t even gotten a chance to read it yet anyway.

Everyone gathered at the cluster of couches and chairs at the back, their various drinks and snacks on the coffee table, Jessica at the side chair where Zelda usually sat so that everyone could see her well.

In the intervening week, the police detective in charge of Victoria’s case had taken the oddity of the key inside a locket for a cat collar more seriously than Hester feared she would. And, according to Jessica, it turned out that was because the detective was already investigating one of the cousins and the executor in the death of Ms. VanHoven. The attack on Victoria on top of some things the executor had said following Ms. VanHoven’s death had made the detective suspicious.

“I didn’t know the police were investigating Ms. VanHoven’s death,” Jessica said. “The center was told she died of natural causes, but it turned out she was murdered. The detective was already investigating that death when Victoria was attacked. She just didn’t deign to tell me of her suspicions because something about an ongoing investigation.” Jessica huffed.

Heady rolled her eyes, too. “So inconsiderate.”

Hester thought maybe the detective had a point, keeping all that information to herself, but she wasn’t about to say so in front of Heady.

“Anyway,” Jessica said, “the key led to a lockbox at a bank, and that lockbox had a new, updated will. One that left Ms. Kitty a safe home along with enough money to Ms. Kitty’s caretaker—an unrelated friend of Ms. VanHoven’s who looked after both Ms. Kitty and the older woman quite a lot—to set up the friend for life. It halved the inheritance the son got, and eliminated anything the cousin got. The executor of the original will was not the executor of her updated will and it states clearly in the will that he was to be given nothing. Apparently, there was some sort of falling out? Anyway, they’re still investigating, but the executor and the cousin are now ‘people of interest,’ in both the murder and Victoria’s attack. The DNA from Victoria’s attack is still being processed, but there’s a court order for DNA from the cousin and executor now.”

“That’ll all take months,” Zelda said, “but at least it’s more evidence.”

“And the person who was supposed to inherit Ms. Kitty and a lot of the money has retained a lawyer. The son isn’t actually contesting the new will. Turns out he’d made a lot of money on his own, in film or something, and was more upset to lose his mother than that his inheritance had been split with a family friend. I got the impression from the detective that the son is actually a pretty good guy.”

“Why wasn’t he charged with looking after Ms. Kitty, then?” Heady asked. She sipped her tea, her gaze narrowed as she tried to hide her intense interest in the answer.

Hester saw right through that. Her twin had taken a fondness to Ms. Kitty and the outcome for the cat was almost as important as finding Victoria’s attacker now. Hester couldn’t blame her sister. Poor Ms. Kitty had found a place in Hester’s heart too.

“The son travels a lot for his work and doesn’t even have a regular house or apartment where Ms. Kitty could live,” Jessica said. “He rents temporary places and moves all the time, I guess? Anyway, he was happy to let the more stable family friend look after the cat and promised to ensure the friend was paid until the probate cleared and the inheritance money made its way to her.”

“Hmm. He does sound like a decent sort of guy,” Donna said, almost sounding reluctant to admit that. At Hester’s raised brows, Donna shrugged. “He was my prime suspect. I’m adapting to it being a cousin working with the executor.”

“I thought it was the son and the executor, too,” Maya said. “At least we got the executor right.”

“We aren’t actually detectives,” Zelda pointed out. “We were guessing. It could have been none of the above.”

“But it wasn’t.” Now Heady looked smug.

“Wasn’t about the diamond collar, though,” Nari said, wiping some foam from her cappuccino off her upper lip with her finger.

“Actually, it sort of was,” Jessica said. “Ms. VanHoven had the same locket on every collar that Ms. Kitty had, but she kept the key in the locket on the red collar, since that’s the one Ms. Kitty always wore. The son told the police that the cousin would have known this because he’d seen her put the key in the locket on the red collar while the son was around. The son didn’t know if the executor knew where the key normally was.”

“Of course he did if he was in cahoots with the cousin,” Heady said.

“At any rate, the executor either switched the collars before handing Ms. Kitty off to the rescue center, or Ms. VanHoven switched collars before she was murdered. The detective wasn’t sure and refused to make a guess.”

“They do have to be careful about making assumptions,” Nari said with a knowing nod.

“How would you know?” Donna asked.

“I watch crime shows.” Nari spoke so primly she sounded like Heady.

Which made Hester grin into her black coffee.

“No one knew that the key had been moved to the blue collar’s locket, apparently,” Jessica continued. “Even the son.”

“So the detective thinks whoever attacked Victoria was looking for Ms. Kitty’s collar and the locket,” Hester guessed.

“And probably thought Victoria was hiding it when it wasn’t hanging on the collar,” Heady said.

“Or when Victoria refused to let whoever was at the back door come in and look at Ms. Kitty’s collar,” Nari said. “Bet that’s why they attacked Victoria. Because she was protecting Ms. Kitty.”

“I’m sure that’s exactly what happened,” Heady said.

“That was a spot Ms. Kitty hid in one other time, before the attack,” Jessica said. “So it’s possible the locket just fell off there and not even Victoria noticed there’d been a locket on the collar.”

“Well, whatever turns out to be the case,” Heady said, “at least Victoria is on the mend.”

That was the first thing Jessica had told them. She was still in the hospital but due to be discharged in a few days. And Ms. Kitty’s new caretaker had already been in to visit Victoria. It sounded like they’d bonded over Ms. Kitty. Which was nice.

“And,” Heady continued, “our investigation led to a clue that will solve the crime.”

“That still doesn’t make us detectives,” Zelda said. She’d put in the paperwork to adopt the kitten she’d fallen for that night a week ago. And apparently, she’d been back to the rescue center every day since to make sure the kitten knew she’d be going to her forever home as soon as all the technicalities and medical things were sorted—the kitten still had some medical needs that had to be finalized before it could leave the shelter.

“I think we’re very good detectives,” Heady said. “This is the second crime we’ve solved.”

“Well, not solved,” Maya pointed out, her foot bouncing as she sipped her chamomile tea. “Just helped find some important evidence.”

“Which helped solve the crimes,” Heady said.

“We don’t know that for sure yet with this case,” Donna said. “We still don’t know for sure why Victoria was attacked. Or by who since she can’t remember the attacker.”

“It will be the key—no pun intended—piece of evidence,” Heady said. “Watch.”

“Suspect the DNA will do all the evidencing,” Nari said into her mug.

“But without the key and the updated will, they would have no real cause to demand DNA from either the executor or the cousin,” Heady said firmly. “We solved the case.”

Hester rolled her lips into her mouth so she didn’t start an argument with her twin. But she did have to admit, Heady might have a point. They now knew for sure the detectives were taking Victoria’s attack seriously and would, eventually, identify her attacker—who was likely also a murderer.

And at the very least, they had found the clue that allowed Ms. Kitty to go to her rightful new owner, someone Ms. Kitty already knew and trusted. That, all by itself, felt like a win.

And if their little book club happened to have solved another murder along the way, even without the help of a bat this time, well…

That felt like a win too.

***

Thanks for reading BAG BATS BI-MONTHLY MEETING AT THE CAFE. I hope you enjoyed it. If you’d like your own personal eBook copy of this story, you can find it for sale here. You can also peruse the previous Café stories that are individually available for sale here. 

You can also find the first visit of the Bag Bats to the Cafe in BAG BATS AT THE CAFE, available as a standalone eBook or as part of the STORIES FROM THE CAFE: VOLUME TWO collection!

 

Don’t forget to check back on August 1st for the next Free story from The Café!

 

BAG BATS BI-MONTHLY MEETING AT THE CAFE Copyright © 2026 Kat Simons

All Rights Reserved. No part of this story may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This story is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.