Meow is for Murder Read Online Free Page B

sure what I’d do.

    But I’d think of something. Who was I to pop a pin into Rachel’s big, beautiful balloon of anticipation? Besides, our arrangements with her as my assistant were always based on her availability, allowing her to follow her acting dream.

    And if I’d any actual ideas of turning Amanda’s cats over to Rachel, even just for tomorrow, they’d long since slunk away.

    “Break a leg, Rachel,” I said with a genuine smile, which felt good after all the false ones I’d flung at Amanda earlier.

    “What, not all the bones in my body, like you told me before?”

    “I never said all of them. But however many it takes.”

    “Thanks, Kendra. You’re the best. And if I land the role—”

    “ When you land it,” I interjected insistently.

    “ When I land it,” she amended, her grinning face glowing, “I promise to find someone to help with Widget and the rest.”

    “Of course, but we’ll worry about it then.” Of course, I’d worry about it now.

    Fretting was half of my function.

    And I was already doing a damned fine job of it.

     
    LATER, AT JEFF’S, I’d showered and was just settling Lexie, Odin, and me into bed—the dogs’ on the floor, mine a comfy mattress—when the owner of the house himself made his nightly call.

    “Hi, Kendra,” Jeff Hubbard said in his sexy masculine voice. “You in bed yet?”

    “Getting there,” I replied, smiling seductively despite how I sat stretching my legs with only his long-distance presence to turn me on. “You?”

    “Yeah. Just got under the covers in my hotel room, which immediately made me think of you. It’s chilly here in Chicago, and I forgot my pajamas.”

    “You’re nude?” I shivered at the fire that flamed through me at the picture that flashed into my mind. That beautiful hard body of Jeff Hubbard in the flesh.

    A situation I’d appreciatively encountered numerous times before. And hoped to in innumerable episodes ahead.

    Except—the conflagration inside me suddenly shifted to ice as my mind reeled in an alternate direction. My earlier whereabouts that day with Amanda.

    Hearing my own tone change to somewhere between remote and rancid, I said, “I visited with Amanda today. She’s leaving town tomorrow and wanted to hire me to care for her cats.” I waited for Jeff’s reaction.

    He stayed silent as I counted the seconds. Five. Six. Seven . . . “I assume you told her no,” he finally said.

    “No, I agreed to do it. Otherwise, her cats could starve. She signed my contract. Promised to pay lots more than my standard kitty rate. I just have to check on them, change their litter boxes, make sure they have water and food . . .” Okay, so I babbled a bit. I needed for him to break in and say . . . well, something to make me feel a whole bunch better about the entire uncomfortable situation.

    “Where is she going?” he asked.

    “Up north, I think.” Although my image of her goal as San Francisco resulted from her offhand mention of a bay during our negotiation. Or some other body of water. The woman was obsessed with seascapes, so maybe it was an ocean. “Since I have her cell phone number, I’ll always be able to reach her,” I said.

    “Well, it’s your pet-sitting business.” His flat tone failed to improve my state of mind.

    “Sure is,” I continued icily. “Her cats didn’t make a good first impression, but I didn’t want anything bad to happen to them. And if I left Amanda in the lurch, she might think I was still concerned something’s going on between you and her.”

    “You know there’s nothing between us. Not now.”

    “Poor thing seems really scared about her stalker, Jeff.” Or she put on a perfect act. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she contacts you again soon, since she didn’t feel she could rely on the P.I. you recommended.” Okay, I was fishing. Would he snap up the bait and admit enough sympathy for his ex that I’d know our relationship was doomed? Or had he been