Page 9 of Promise Keeper

"Wait! You're going to Florida next week?"

"Didn't Ben or Mia tell you?"

"No."

"Well, I wonder why?" She shrugged it off. "Anyway, we're going to stay in a time share we're thinking of buying. It's right on the water in St. Petersburg." She took a sip of her coffee. "We were hoping Fiona and Jim would buy in with us, but they're putting that pool in and it costs a fortune. I guess the good part about that is I'll have somewhere to swim and lay out."

"Don't you belong to a country club?"

"Yes... and?" She wasn't getting my point.

"Can't you swim and lay out there?"

"Not without tanning first. Heavens! Can you imagine? I'd be like a ghost out there."

"Right. Of course. I don't know what I was thinking."

"Speaking of the club, I'm getting Mia a membership. She needs to start playing tennis or golf. She's well beyond the age when she should be starting, but she's a talented girl, so I have faith she'll pick it up fast."

"Does she want to play tennis or golf?"

She waved a hand at me and laughed. "Do any of us, really?"

I honestly had no idea. I'd never done either, at least not for real. In college, a friend and I would go and hit tennis balls around with thrift store rackets at the park. We were terrible. Balls we hit over the fence ricocheted off cars in the parking lot and picnic tables. We were a pubic menace.

"If you can get her to play, more power to you," I said. It was no skin off my nose either way.

"Back to our trip next week," she said. "Can you care for Ellsworth while we're away? I'd leave him with Fiona, but she's been so busy with the train depot now that the winter is over, she's never home."

"Did you forget that we have five dogs?" I asked her, certain she'd lost her mind this time. "I don't think Ellsworth would be very happy at our house."

"Ellsworth happens to be very fond of dogs," she said. "Devon Rex's are much like dogs personality-wise."

Desperation, that was what this was. "I'll talk to Ben and see what he thinks."

"I already have. He said if it's okay with you, it's fine with him."

Of course he did. "Well, I guess it's settled then. We'll make sure he's happy and taken care of."

Somehow.

Like he'd been listening, Ellsworth wound around my legs, purring and looking up at me with his big eyes almost the same size as his giant bat ears. I had no idea how that combination was cute, but the cat was adorable.

I reached down and scratched his head. "We'll be just fine next week, won't we?"

Irene reached behind her and pulled a binder from the countertop. "Here are his instructions," she said, opening the front cover to reveal a table of contents.

"He's a cat," I said. "Don't you just feed them, scoop their litter box, and maybe brush them every now and then?"

She stared at me, wide-eyed. "No!"

"Okay, then. Hit me with the binder, I'm ready."

I slouched down in my chair and rested my chin in my hands. It shouldn't've surprised me that Irene had a high maintenance cat.

"First, he drinks distilled, room temperature water. Nothing from the tap. I'll send his food along marked so you know which he eats in the morning and which in the evening. There's wet and dry. You'll need to measure the amount so he doesn't get too much of one or the other. The portions are listed here. Are you paying attention?"

Honestly, I'd been thinking about the body in the trash, and shrunken heads. Who did those heads in Steve's collection once belong to? If they were even real that is. "Of course I'm paying attention. Food. You'll mark it."

---