Cat Nap полностью

“I just think it’s a problem with these parkas,” Sunny said. “You wind up with a kind of tunnel vision when you pull the hood up.”

“I’ll try to be more careful,” Mrs. Martinson promised. They said good night, and Sunny went out to her car. She frowned as she got behind the wheel. The snow may have stopped now, but the wind had picked up, sending showers of newly fallen flakes whipping around. It felt as if the temperature had dropped, too. Sunny had to concentrate on getting home along much more slippery roads.

When she arrived, she found that Mike had made a simple supper—soup and grilled cheese. He growled about the need for more salt—not on his food, but on the roads and sidewalks around town. After skidding her way home, even in the Wrangler, Sunny wasn’t about to argue with him.

They finished and did the dishes. Mike headed for the living room and the television. “There’s a good game on tonight.”

Sunny begged off. “I want to do a little research,” she said, going up the stairs. Once in her room, she fired up her laptop and got on the Internet.

I asked Mrs. M. to get some personal information on Dawn Featherstone, Sunny thought. Maybe I should have gotten some public info first.

All through dinner, she kept remembering Ken Howell’s comment. “You do crazy stuff for something you love.” But Sunny also knew that people did crazy things for people they loved.

She’d had a theory that Dawn tried to pin the blame on Jane for a simple reason: Dawn had committed the crime and was looking for a patsy. But what if Dawn was afraid that someone else had objected to her relationship with Martin Rigsdale and had taken him out? A father, a brother, an old boyfriend? Dawn might have been trying to cast suspicion on Jane—and even Sunny—to protect somebody close to her.

Using tricks she’d learned in her first weeks as a reporter, Sunny dug up the basics on Dawn—make that Dora—Featherstone. Here was a birth certificate from the right time frame. Not too many babies named Dora these days. That gave Sunny the names for both parents. She also learned that Dawn was an only child.

Looking for the Featherstone name in local newspapers brought sad news. Both of Dawn’s parents had perished in a house fire while Dawn was away at college.

Some things you’d rather not know, Sunny thought, leaning back from the keyboard. Well, that’s a perfectly good hypothesis shot to hell. Dawn doesn’t have a family to protect her.

She closed out her search window but then paused for a moment. There could be a boyfriend, though.

Unfortunately, she was unlikely to find anything like that online, unless things had gotten as far as an official engagement. So Sunny got her phone instead and punched in Helena Martinson’s number.

“I just wanted to check in and hear how you were doing,” Sunny said.

Mrs. Martinson laughed. “You should coordinate better with your father,” she said. “I just got off the phone with him a couple of minutes ago.”

“I was upstairs doing some work,” Sunny explained. “I haven’t gotten a report from him. So, how are you?”

“I’m fine,” Helena told her. “I rested a bit in my chair, had something to eat, and will probably go to bed a little early tonight. Tomorrow I may be a little stiff, and my knee will be a bit sore. As I told Mike, nothing life-threatening.”

Busily concentrating on the question she wanted to ask, Sunny stumbled a bit. “I’m glad.” She grimaced. “I mean, I’m glad that you’re fine, not that you’re going to be sore.”

“It could have been worse,” Mrs. Martinson agreed. “So what’s on your mind, Sunny? You usually don’t flub things up.”

“It’s just a question that came up, and you might have heard the answer already. When you were asking about Dawn Featherstone, did anyone mention her having a boyfriend?”

On the other end of the line, Mrs. Martinson paused for a moment. “Most of the people I spoke with were in Martin’s social circle, not Dawn’s,” she said slowly. “But there was mention of a serious boyfriend who went into the military—the Army, if I remember correctly. They sent him off to Iraq or Afghanistan, and he hasn’t been back since. Someone mentioned that he’d gotten married and either settled down south somewhere, or he’s on a base down south somewhere.”

Another possibility scratched off, Sunny thought. “Well, thanks, Helena,” she said. “It’s just a question that popped up.”

“Yes.” Mrs. M.’s voice was dry. “I wondered if there might be someone who’d object to Dawn carrying on with Martin Rigsdale. This fellow, Joey Something-or-other, was the closest possibility, but since he was out of the picture, I didn’t mention it.”

“But there you were with the answer,” Sunny said. “Thanks. Look, if you need anything—”