The Mysteries of Max: Books 31-33 Nic Saint (kiss me liar novel english .TXT) 📖

“We want the whole enchilada,” said Gran, rubbing her hands. “And in fact I already have the perfect combination in mind, picked from your website.” And to prove she wasn’t lying, she took out her phone and showed them the design she’d picked.

“Ma!” said Marge. “I told you I want light colors. Light and modern!”

“This is a timeless design,” said Gran.

“It looks like something from the forties!”

“The forties are coming back,” said Gran. “In a big way.”

“I suggest we sleep on it,” said Tex.

“And I suggest we pull the trigger,” said Gran.

Tex’s eyes narrowed, and his index finger twitched. It was clear he was definitely ready to pull the trigger—and then bury his mother-in-law in a shallow grave.

“Why don’t I show you folks some of our more contemporary designs?” the salesman suggested, proving his mettle by focusing on the most important person here: Marge.

And so for a while we moved from one kitchen installation to the next, while the salesman explained the ins and outs of every installation in great detail. And just when I thought I couldn’t take any more, the door opened and Harriet and Brutus walked in on the heels of more customers.

“What’s the situation?” our Persian friend asked.

“Tex doesn’t want to buy a kitchen, Marge wants something light and modern, and Gran wants something old and timeless,” I summed things up in a single sentence.

“I think Tex is probably right,” said Brutus. “Why spend money on a new kitchen when the old one is perfectly fine?”

“It isn’t fine,” I told him. “The wood is chipped and the fridge is broken and the whole thing looks like it’s seen better days.”

The butch black cat shrugged. “Looks all right to me.”

Just then, Gran caught sight of our newly arrived friends and came trotting over. “I need your help,” she told Harriet, then without further ado picked her up and carried her over to where she was duking it out with Tex and Marge. “I’ve got an idea!” she cried.

“Oh, my God,” said Tex.

“What is it?” asked Marge a little uncertainly.

“We’ll let a neutral party decide,” said Gran, and held up Harriet as if this was a scene from the Lion King and she was introducing the new king to the world.

“You’re going to let a cat decide what kitchen we choose?” asked Tex with a touch of incredulity.

“She has to live there, too, right? And everybody knows that cats have great taste.”

The salesperson, whose smile had fallen off his face by now—no one can train those facial muscles to keep working so hard for that long, not even a seasoned kitchen-hawking pro—glanced at Harriet, and nodded his acquiescence. “Why not?” he said.

In other words: if you people are crazy enough to trust the word of a cat, I’m perfectly willing to indulge you. Or also: never argue with a crazy old cat lady.

“So what will it be, Harriet?” asked Gran as she showed Harriet some of the designs they’d put aside. “Just pick a number—one to twelve—for the one you like best.”

“Seven,” Harriet said immediately, and placed her paw down on its corresponding design.

“Not that one!” Tex said, looking as fed up with this whole kitchen-choosing process as we were.

“I told you!” said Gran triumphantly. “Good job, sweetheart.”

“I’m not sure,” said Marge, wavering.

“Why not? It’s light, it’s modern—”

“And timeless,” the salesman interjected.

“It’s also the most expensive one of the bunch,” Tex added, an objection immediately brushed aside by his wife and poo-poohed by his mother-in-law.

The salesman was fully on board with the decision, for he was beaming again, and said, “Shall I wrap it up or are you going to have it here?” And laughed heartily at his own joke.

Chapter 9

We’d just arrived home when we came upon Odelia giving us a look of determination.

“What is it?” I said immediately.

“I have an idea, Max.”

“You have?”

“An idea to catch this catnapper of yours.”

“Well, he’s not my catnapper, per se,” I countered.

“It’s a foolproof plan,” she assured me.

Even through our recent kitchen saga, the thought of a person catnapping cats and murdering homeless people hadn’t been far from my mind. It was a very strange tale.

“We need to stop this person,” Odelia announced. “And also, if this is the same person who’s killed and buried our John Doe, he needs to be stopped before he kills more people.”

“Do you really think he’ll kill more people?” asked Dooley.

“I don’t know, Dooley. As long as we don’t know why he did what he did, we have no way of knowing what his next move will be.”

“So weird,” I murmured. “A man who kidnaps cats and murders homeless people then buries them in the woods for some reason.”

“It is a very strange business,” Odelia agreed. “So I’m going to run my idea by you.”

“Shoot,” I said, perhaps a little injudiciously, considering our John Doe had been killed with a firearm.

“I was thinking: why don’t you let yourselves be taken by this person, and that way we’ll know exactly who’s doing this, and we can catch him in the act.”

Both Dooley and I stared at our human in visible dismay. “We have to allow ourselves to be taken?” I asked, wanting to make sure I’d heard her right.

“You’d wear a tracker, of course,” she said, “and Chase and I will be close by, so that when you’re taken, we’re right on that catnapper’s heels.”

“Um… sure,” I said, though I wasn’t entirely convinced of their scheme. Don’t let my robust appearance fool you, I’m not exactly the world’s most courageous cat. Still, it seemed like a good plan, so I decided to go along with it.

“So what exactly is it we’re supposed to do, Max?” asked Dooley.

“Odelia is going to put a tracker on us,” I explained, “and so when we’re taken by the catnapper she’ll know exactly where we are at all times.”

He nodded intelligently, then said, “What is a tracker, Max?”

“A tracker is exactly what the word says, Dooley: it is a small device that tracks our every movement. In fact the full