The Orange Cat and Other Cainsville Tales (Cainsville 3.5)

The cat looked at him.

"You don't need to wait."

The cat seemed to consider. Then it rose, stretched and trotted down the steps onto the sidewalk. It took one last look at the house, head tilted, as if committing it to memory, planning to return when the time came. Then it headed off down the street and disappeared.

#

"I would have made more if it had gone to trial," Gabriel said, with deep regr

et, as he took a bite of his cookie. "But I couldn't have won the case, and I decided my reputation was better served with a decent plea bargain."

"It is justice," Rose said. "For his wife . . . and for the cat."

"Hmm." That was, of course, the least of his concerns. He was simply glad he'd insisted Patton wire him the money before sealing the plea bargain. The man had not been otherwise inclined to pay his bill.

"Do you think the cat's gone for good, then?"

"I doubt it." He took the last cookie from the plate. "It's a very patient cat."

BAD PUBLICITY

October 2000

Patrick loved postal-box offices. He loved the people who used them. Some, of course, had legitimate reasons for not wanting mail sent to their home address. His fell into that category, and he was far from the only fae to conduct mundane business this way. But for humans, the reasons were so much more interesting. Today, there was the young man, furtively collecting his plain-paper-wrapped treasures, having apparently not realized he could find porn on the new marvel known as the Internet. Then there was the middle-aged woman, acting as if she'd come to collect her Tupperware order, yet her trembling hands suggesting the small box did not hold a new set of plastic tumblers.

The one who caught his attention, though, was a woman who couldn't be more than mid-twenties. Dressed in business attire, but a little too bright and perky to be taken seriously, smiling at every newcomer as if she were a greeter at Walmart. Her gaze landed on him.

"Patrick?" she said. "Patrick Rhys?"

He could play dumb. He was rather good at it. And the problem with being a bocan was his damnable curiosity. Add "fiction writer" to the mix and he was doomed.

"Yes?" he said.

She brightened an extra twenty watts. "I'm Lisa Grant. Your new publicist. You are a hard man to get hold of. Can we talk?"

"Is that a question? If so, the answer is no. Politely, no."

She giggled. "They said you were funny. Just like your books."

"My books aren't supposed to be funny."

She froze, eyes widening, her panic suggesting she hadn't actually read his novels. He let her dangle a moment before freeing her with, "There's a coffee shop down the road. Let me get my mail first."

#

On the way to the coffee shop, Lisa talked nonstop, every line punctuated by an interrobang, as if she were both uncertain and terribly excited at the same time.

"Do you know how hard it was to find you?!"

"I finally called the post office and they said you come in every other Friday?!"

"I had to wait in that office forever?!"

"And the people in there?! So sketchy?!"

He'd been planning to continue on to a funky little shop where he would write after collecting his mail, but that was two more blocks, and he'd never endure this conversation that long.

When he veered toward a diner instead, Lisa wrinkled her nose and said, "Are you sure this place is"--she lowered her voice--"sanitary?"