That Christmas Feeling Page 3

  She moistened her lips, her eyes fastened to him. “Rob, I—”

  “And now you’re telling me you don’t want to take care of your aunt? You won’t look after an elderly mentally ill woman with no family but you? What happened to you, Claire? Where’s the girl I knew in high school?”

  She pushed her purse strap up onto her shoulder. “This isn’t high school, Rob. People do change. And besides, you have no idea what I’ve been through. You don’t know anything about me.”

  “Yes, I do. I know you’re still smart, you’re about a hundred times prettier and you’re mean.”

  “I am not mean!”

  “Excuse me, but I have to turn out the lights and lock up.” He stepped around her.

  “I am not mean!” she repeated, following him to the door and up the stairs to the main level. “I’ve worked very hard to recover from my own issues, I’ll have you know.”

  “Issues.” He flipped off a main switch, instantly casting them into darkness.

  “Yes, issues. My fiancé left me for another woman, I had to quit the job I’d trained for and loved, and now I’m back in this little podunk town trying to start over. I have a tiny house, but it’s mine. It’s my home, and I’m not letting some ornery old woman who never cared about me or any of my family move in!”

  They stepped out of the courthouse into the night. “Like I said, Clarence. You’re mean.”

  As he walked away, she called after him. “My name is Claire!”

  “Rence,” he shouted back.

  “Claire!”

  “Rence!” He got into his squad car and backed out into the street. How about that, he thought as he drove off to look for meth dealers. Claire Ross had had those curls all along.

  Chapter Two

  Just as Claire pulled her car to a stop in front of Ross Mansion, a cascade of light, fluffy snowflakes began. Like goose down from a torn pillow, the white clumps gathered on the windshield and danced across the car’s hood. She paused, soaking in the heater’s comforting warmth before finally switching off the engine. For a moment she dropped her forehead onto her gloved hands that still clutched the steering wheel.

  “Not what I want to do,” she murmured through clenched teeth. “Are you hearing me, God? This is not what I want to do today! I don’t like Aunt Flossie. I don’t want to help her. And I’m furious with Rob West for shaming me into this! But I’m here, Lord, bad attitude and all. You promised to work things out for the good of people who love You and are called according to Your purpose. I do love You, and I know You want me to be kind to my great-aunt. So, please…even though I realize I’m doing this badly…please help me.”

  Letting out a long sigh, Claire opened the car door and stepped into the snowy morning. Bitter Missouri wind instantly penetrated her heavy winter jacket to the very marrow of her bones. Her cheeks ached. Her fingers went numb. Her eyes watered. Even her teeth hurt.

  Shivering, she trotted across the yard, her boots crunching on the frozen crabgrass that no doubt would bloom with a sea of golden dandelions in the spring. Good grief, what was wrong with Florence Ross that she couldn’t at least have a decent yard?

  After living near the ocean with its difficult climate and soil, Claire had come to appreciate that in Missouri, people tended their perfect postage-stamp lots with the loving care a mother gave a newborn child. They fertilized, weeded and reseeded until thick green grass covered every inch of ground. They sodded, dethatched and aerated. They planted flowers and bushes and trees, and they spread decorative mulch around everything that rose more than an inch above the smooth plane of their lawns. If all that wasn’t enough to satisfy, Missourians liked to add trellises, fountains, birdbaths, gazebos and collections of concrete statues—gnomes and cherubs and fairies. Early in the morning elderly ladies could be spotted with their dandelion forks, rooting out the pestilent weed with the passion of zealots. And nothing made a Missouri man prouder than to circle his yard several times a week atop his riding lawn mower.

  Florence Ross, on the other hand, seemed determined to cultivate the perfect breeding ground for every dandelion seed, crabgrass root and burr that made its way into her neighbors’ yards. Claire knocked on her aunt’s door a second time. No doubt those three cats huddled up against the outside of the brick chimney joined their feline companions in spreading fleas, chiggers and ticks everywhere they roamed. Not to mention dragging scraps of garbage from the trash cans into one yard or another.

  “Aunt Flossie!” she shouted. “Open up! I’m freezing out here.”

  No wonder the townspeople reviled the elderly spinster. Claire felt sure that everyone up and down this street would be thrilled if the police chief condemned Ross Mansion and kicked Flossie out. But the very thought of the foul-tempered woman ever setting foot inside Claire’s clean, quiet house sent prickles of horror down her spine. It also had motivated her to hurry over this Saturday morning and start rounding up Aunt Flossie’s feral felines.

  “Hey!” she hollered, hammering with her fist on the solid oak door. “Aunt Flossie, you’d better come down here and—”

  “Get offa my property!” The door opened an inch, and the barrel of a .22 rifle slid through the gap. “And I mean business!”

  Claire stepped back and swallowed a gulp of surprise. Okay, this was another gun. Yes, indeed. And most certainly it would be loaded.

  “Aunt Flossie?” she croaked out. “Uh, it’s me. Your niece, Claire Ross.”

  “I know who y’are. I told you not to come back here!”

  “But you also told me—”

  “Then get off my porch!” The door opened wider, and Flossie glared as she brandished the rifle. “I don’t want you here!”

  “And I don’t want to be here,” Claire snapped back. She grabbed the rifle barrel as she had seen Rob do, and stepped to one side. “You promised to get rid of the cats and clean up this place, Aunt Flossie. You promised!”

  “I don’t give a bucket of spit what I said! Let go of my gun and—”

  “You let go! I’m here to round up cats. I’ve brought a net and a pet carrier, and every last one of them—”

  The gun went off with a deafening boom, jerking out of Claire’s hand and blowing a hole through the porch roof. Claire jumped backward as though she herself had been shot. Flossie wobbled for a moment, then toppled to her knees. The .22 clattered onto the icy porch.

  “Get out!” Flossie screeched, her fingers gripping the filthy marble threshold. “Get off my land!”

  “You nearly hit me, you crazy coot!” Claire smacked open the door with her hand. “You could have killed me! Now, get up off that floor, Aunt Flossie. And don’t even think about going for the rifle.”

  As the woman reached out for the gun, Claire kicked it across the porch. It spun on the slick wood, sliding in circles until it dropped off the steps and into the yard. Vaguely aware of an approaching siren, Claire stepped over her aunt and into the reeking foyer of the aging mansion.

  “Get up, Aunt Flossie!” she commanded. “You’re not going to shoot me. I am going to round up your cats—and you’re going to help me.”

  Her aunt was still on the floor, crouching on hands and knees. “Get away from me,” she huffed. “Go on. Get outta here.”

  “Aunt Flossie, you have no choice in this.” Claire glanced out across the yard at the squad car pulling to a stop. “Now you’ve brought the police again. Oh, great, it’s Rob West. Well, this is just perfect. He’ll probably throw you out right this minute, and I’ll have to… Aunt Flossie?”

  Needles of alarm shot through Claire as she knelt beside the woman still huddled in the doorway. Unmoving, Flossie breathed heavily, her wispy hair drifting in the chill wind that sucked around the corner of the old house. Claire laid her hand on her aunt’s back. A knobby ridge defined her spine, and her shoulder blades stood out beneath the ragged pink bathrobe.

  “Aunt Flossie, are you all right?” Claire asked softly.

  A gnarled hand shot out and clapped he
r on the shoulder. “Back off before I have to coldcock ya! Look what you did—busted both my knees. Elbones, too, probably.”

  “I never touched you. You fell when you shot off that—” Claire bit off her retort. “Oh, never mind. Just let me help you up before we both freeze.”

  As she reached around her aunt’s scarecrow frame, a pair of boots thudded toward them across the porch floor. “Good morning, ladies,” Rob said. “Would one of you care to explain—”

  “She fell,” Claire cut in. “What does it look like?”

  “She pushed me,” Flossie spat out, her breath fogging the marble threshold. “Knocked me down and broke both my knees!”

  “I did not—”

  “Just be quiet, both of you.” Muttering in disgust, Rob scooped Flossie into his arms and headed through the front door. “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree is all I can say.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?” Claire demanded, following him into the foyer and slamming the door shut behind them. Rob made for a room from which came the only evidence of warmth in the mansion. “Because I’ll tell you one thing,” Claire went on. “I am nothing like—”

  “Aw, shut up!” Flossie squawked. “And put me down, you big galoot! Who do you think you are, hauling me around like a sack of potatoes?”

  “Sack of feathers, more like it. What have you been eating anyhow, Miss Ross? Cat food?”

  Rob tromped into what must have been the parlor at one time. Claire gaped at the appalling sight. An ornate marble fireplace belched gray smoke upward to the soot-blackened ceiling twelve feet overhead. Stacks of newspapers, magazines and advertising circulars lay moldering on the faded carpet. Antique settees and chairs that once might have been lovely leaned like old haystacks, covered with papers, clothing and cats. Everywhere—cats. Skinny and yellow eyed, they stared at Claire from atop ornate valances, an old upright piano, curvy-legged tables and mantel shelves. They peered out from under cushions and from behind Oriental pots whose foliage was long gone.

  And the smell! Claire raced for a window as Rob kneed a pile of newspapers from one of the old settees and placed Flossie on it. Throwing back a velvet curtain that turned to dust in her hand, Claire reached for the sash. A cat that had been basking in the pale winter sunshine leaped to its feet, arching and hissing at her. With a gasp of surprise, she swatted the cat off the sill and jerked upward until the old window slid open a crack. Chill air rushed into the room as Claire headed for another window.

  “What’re you doing, girl? Trying to freeze me out of house and home?” Flossie squirmed as Rob attempted to wrap a moth-eaten afghan around her. “Hey, you’re the no-good devil who stole my shotgun! And she knocked my .22 off the porch. Thieves! Robbers! Help! Somebody help me! I’m being attacked!”

  “Hush now, Miss Ross,” Rob ordered. He spoke over her high-pitched cries into the radio on his shoulder. “Dispatcher, this is Chief West. Send Bill Gaines over here to Ross Mansion, would you? And tell him not to turn on the bells and whistles, please. Ten-four.”

  “Who’s Bill Gaines?” Claire asked, stepping around a heap of unwashed pots and pans on the floor.

  “Paramedic. He’s with the fire department. We’ll let him check Miss Ross over and see if she needs to be transported to a hospital. Meanwhile, you and I can start rounding up these cats.”

  “No sirree, you don’t!” Flossie rolled off the settee and staggered to her feet. “Nobody touches my cats! And I’m not going to a hospital, either. Where’s my pistol? I’ll show you, Buster Brown. Just you wait and see what I can—”

  “Get back on that couch, Miss Ross,” Rob commanded, depositing her on the settee a second time. “Now, stay there, and I mean it.”

  “What’re you planning to do? Handcuff me?”

  “If I have to, I sure will.” He heaved out a deep breath as he turned to Claire. “What do you suggest we put the cats in?”

  “I borrowed a pet carrier from my neighbor.”

  “One pet carrier?”

  “Well, I didn’t expect to have any help, you know. I thought I’d catch a cat or two and take them over to the shelter. Then I’d come back here and—”

  “Did you call the Buffalo shelter to ask how many stray cats they can manage?”

  “I didn’t…think…”

  “Clarence? You didn’t think?” He grinned for the first time that day, his blue eyes twinkling despite the smoky pall that darkened the room. “Obviously this is a situation that calls for brainpower. Leave it to me.”

  With a wink, he headed for the parlor door. As he talked into his radio again, Claire heard the fire engine pull up in front of Ross Mansion. Flossie was already back on her feet and fairly spitting nails. Blocking out the sound of her great-aunt’s verbal venom, Claire greeted the paramedic and the two volunteer firemen who stepped into the room. Looking as though they had entered a genuine haunted house, the three men paused, their eyes wide and their Adam’s apples working to control the gag reflex.

  “Uh, seems like Miss Ross has a blocked chimney over there, Bill,” one of the firemen spoke up. “How about we take a look at that?” After a glance for confirmation, the two crossed the room to inspect the smoking fire. Bill picked his way toward the tiny creature who was dancing around like an imp from the bowels of Hades.

  “All of you better get gone!” Flossie ranted, shaking her fists. “And leave my fire alone. Why, I’ll have you know it takes me a good hour to start it every morning, and I’m not—”

  “Aunt Flossie, the paramedic is here to look at your knees,” Claire cut in. “You said they were broken.”

  “Do these knees look broken?” the older woman hissed. “Why, they could carry me to Kathmandu and back! You think I’m about to let some goggle-eyed greenhorn take a gander at my legs? Is that what you think?” Rising to her full height of just under five feet, Flossie stared at Claire. “Well, you’re wrong, girl!”

  “Sit down, Aunt Flossie!” Claire shouted, taking the woman by the shoulders and forcing her back onto the settee. “Sit down now! And if you so much as squeak, I’ll tell Rob to handcuff you.”

  With Flossie bawling like a calf at branding time and Claire doing her level best to restrain her, Bill managed to sneak in a quick examination of the elderly woman’s knees. As the paramedic retreated from the hail of verbal abuse, Rob returned to the parlor with Claire’s pet carrier, the fishing net she had brought and word that the local shelter could handle ten cats and the nearby town of Bolivar would take the rest. The head of Buffalo’s animal rescue was on her way with several humane traps and other equipment.

  “I’m afraid you’re going to have to cuff Miss Ross, Chief,” Bill said, eyeing Flossie. “I got a look at her knees, and I suspect they’re all right. But I’m telling you…I think we may have some other problems going on. I’d like to check her over. She may need to see a doctor.”

  “What’s wrong?” Claire asked. Flossie was headed for the door, murmuring that she was going to fetch her pistol. “Is my aunt sick?”

  “Hard to say, but I think for sure she’s got…well, fleas. Maybe other things, you know.”

  She grimaced. “Lice?”

  “Not sure. She definitely looks anemic to me. There are bruises all over her legs, but everybody knows the only place she ever goes is to the corner grocery to buy cat food and a few supplies. So I’m thinking she bumps into the furniture, maybe. Then there’s the matter of her teeth. Vitamin deficiency, low iron, you name it. Her general nutritional condition looks pretty bad….”

  His words drifted off at the sight of Rob West handcuffing Florence Ross to the arm of her carved mahogany settee. Her free fist pounding his broad shoulders, Flossie wailed and screeched and threatened the police chief with every manner of legal action and vengeance imaginable.

  Claire could only stare in dismay. How on earth had things gotten so out of control here? Exactly who was responsible for Florence Ross? Did the state of Missouri owe her help—the Division of Family Services, M
eals on Wheels, Social Services or whatever? Were Buffalo’s public servants—the police force and the city aldermen—liable for keeping an eye on their elderly and infirm residents? Should the Ross family have been looking in on their recalcitrant relative, a hermit who had unequivocally disowned all of them? Or was Aunt Flossie supposed to be capable of maintaining her own health and habitation?

  The sight of the elderly woman cuffed and snarling at everyone in sight sent a curl of flame through Claire’s chest. The truth of the matter was, Aunt Flossie had brought this on herself. She had alienated everyone to the point that no one wanted to go near her. For all they knew, she could have dropped dead weeks ago, and no one would have been the wiser.

  Angry at her aunt, her family, the police, the state government and even herself, Claire snatched up the fishing net and dropped it over the nearest cat. A gray-striped bag of skin and bones, the animal instantly sprang to life—yowling, hissing, turning circles inside the nylon net, tangling claws and teeth and tail in a mass of freaked-out feline hysteria.

  “Look at her! Look at what my niece is doing!” Flossie hollered. “She’s killing Oscar!”

  Oscar? This cat had a name? Struggling to keep the animal trapped, Claire reached for the pet carrier. As she tugged it toward the netted cat, a claw caught her hand and raked a line of torn flesh.

  “Ouch!” she cried, tumbling backward into one of the haystacks of clothing and newspapers. The cat escaped the net in a blur of gray fur. Ears flattened against his head, Oscar made for the open window and vanished with a flick of his long tail.

  “Nice try, Clarence,” Rob said, reaching out to help Claire to her feet. “But I believe this is a job for two.”

  “Fine, then.” She handed him the net. “See if you can do it.”

  But the cats were on to their game now. Warily eyeing the enemy, they crouched with skinny muscles coiled and sharp claws dug in, ready to bolt. The two firemen had managed to put out the fire, and Claire was forced to shut the windows in order to prevent more animals from escaping. Even with doors and windows closed, it was going to be no easy matter cornering the malnourished, flea-bitten cats.