Purrfect Heat Read online

  Purrfect Heat

  The Mysteries of Max 4

  Nic Saint

  Puss in Print Publications

  Contents

  Purrfect Heat

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Epilogue

  Excerpt from A Tale of Two Harrys (Ghosts of London 4)

  About Nic

  Also by Nic Saint

  Purrfect Heat

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  The peace and calm of Hampton Cove is brutally disturbed when celebrity chef Niklaus Skad, famous for his show Kitchen Disasters, is found cooked in his own oven. The chef wasn’t a well-liked man, and there are plenty of suspects to go around. Odelia Poole, Hampton Cove Gazette reporter and civilian consultant to the police department, teams up with Detective Chase Kingsley to catch the killer, but soon finds this proves a lot harder than she thought.

  Max, Odelia’s blorange tabby, would love to help out, but is faced with a cat emergency when Odelia takes in a new stray. Diego soon proves to be a handful, and when he sets his sights on Harriet, it’s war in the cat menagerie. With Dooley fearing he’s contracted a wasting disease, and Brutus in a funk because Diego stole his girlfriend, Max has his hands full. Good thing he still has time to ferret out clues and chase suspects, or Odelia would never be able to crack the case.

  Will Diego become a permanent fixture in the Poole household? Will the celebrity chef’s killer ever be found? And what’s going on with Gran’s crush on the mysterious Leo? Find out in Purrfect Heat, the new installment in the funny cozy cat mystery series The Mysteries of Max.

  Prologue

  Erin Coka arrived bright and early for work. It was her day to open Fry Me for an Oyster and she didn’t want to be late. As a newish employee of the restaurant, she had everything to prove and everything to lose. Not that her employers, Brainard and Isabella Stowe, were terrible people or anything. They just ran a tight ship, and expected all members of their staff, from the dishwashers to the chef, to do the work and show up on time.

  Lately, things had been even more hectic than usual, with the famous celebrity chef Niklaus Skad in town, subjecting Fry Me for an Oyster to his usual grueling treatment. He’d been all over the place, a camera crew in tow, criticizing the menus, the seating, the decorations, the presentation and even the way the staff dressed and behaved. It seemed nothing was good enough for the Great Niklaus, and Brainard and Isabella had been on edge all week. Kitchen Disasters could make or break their business, though by the looks of things, Niklaus was leaning more toward destroying them.

  Erin opened the door and stepped inside. The air was stale and musty—redolent with cooking scents. She stuck her nose in the air and sniffed. Yuck. Something smelled awful. Had Hendrik been working on one of his notorious creations again? Cooking up something special for Niklaus? Going for a last-ditch attempt to save his career and the restaurant?

  She walked through to the kitchen. “Chef? Chef, are you in here?”

  Sometimes, when the mood struck him, Hendrik Serarols liked to come in at the crack of dawn to try out a few new recipes he’d dreamed up. She walked past the bar and through the swinging doors into the large kitchen at the back. Here Hendrik created his masterpieces, which had put Fry Me for an Oyster on the map in Hampton Cove and far beyond.

  “Yuck,” she muttered, as her eyes scanned the squeaky clean kitchen.

  All gleaming countertops and scrubbed pots dangling over the stoves. Everything perfectly clean, as it should be. Niklaus Skad was big on hygiene, his pet peeve. The stench seemed to be coming from one of the ovens, the biggest one, where they baked pizza and other large dishes. Hendrik had once joked you could fit a man in there, even one as big as him.

  She walked over to the oven and saw that it was switched on. “Chef?” she repeated. “Are you cooking something in here?” No reply.

  She peered in through the oven window. Whatever it was, it had been cooking for so long that smoke was curling out through the vents. Had Chef put something in last night and forgotten to turn off the oven? He had so much on his mind lately he was starting to get a little frazzled. And who could blame him? With Niklaus on his case all the time, even yelling and screaming, and the camera crew in his face while he tried to keep it together and run the kitchen, a lesser man would have fallen to pieces.

  She flicked on the oven light, and that’s when she saw it. Her lips parted on a silent scream. There was a man in there, baked to a crisp!

  Chapter 1

  I was luxuriating in my all-time favorite spot: at the foot of Odelia’s bed. I’m blessed with a smallish human, which means I’ve got the foot of the bed all to myself. I’ve heard horror stories of other cats, whose owners stretch out all the way to the edge of the bed, and then wriggle around all night, making it absolutely impossible for any cat to get any sleep.

  In that sense, Odelia is the perfect human. Well, not just because she’s short, but also because she’s super nice and sweet. She always makes sure I’m well fed and well taken care of, never stingy on the cuddles and the strokes, and she keeps my blorange fur looking nice and shiny by giving me a vigorous grooming every week without fail. She’s even installed a pet door so I can come and go as I please. A nice, big door, as I’m big-boned.

  Odelia is a reporter for the Hampton Cove Gazette, and if there’s one thing that sets her aside from most humans, it’s that she speaks feline. Yep, she and I have a perfect understanding—literally. She takes care of me, and in return I collect gossip from all over town and give it her hot off the griddle. All the news that’s fit to print, straight from the cat’s mouth.

  Odelia stirred, and I pricked up my ears. I can tell when she’s about to wake up, which is my cue to snuggle up to her and bury my nose in her armpit for an extra cuddle. It’s our morning ritual, and the start of our day.

  This morning, however, things were going to prove different, and the first sign I got was when Dooley and Brutus came barging into the bedroom, looking excited, but not in a good way.

  Dooley is my best bud, a gray Raggamuffin who belongs to Odelia’s Gran. Brutus is a black cat and… not exactly my buddy. He belongs to Chase Kingsley, a cop and occasional kissmate of Odelia’s. Yes, I know kissmate isn’t a word, but how else can I describe Chase and Odelia’s relationship? They’re not a couple, they just… kiss… sometimes. And flirt a lot, I guess. I know, it’s disgusting, but what can you do? Humans are weird that way.

  “Max!” Dooley cried. “Terrible news! Terrible, terrible news!”

  I reluctantly heaved my head from the soft blanket. “What is it?” I murmured, then yawned cavernously. Dooley is one of those overexcited cats who get their tail in a twist just because their human got them a new brand of kibble or a new smell of cat litter.

  “A new cat,” Dooley said, still panting. “There’s a new cat in town.”

  I looked from Dooley
to Brutus, who was, at least in my eyes, still the new cat in town, even though by now he’d been here a couple of months.

  “No, not me,” Brutus grunted. “A new new cat.”

  I frowned. “So? New cats are born every day. What’s so special about this one?”

  “He’s not a kitten,” Dooley announced, looking highly perturbed.

  “He’s a full-grown cat,” said Brutus. “And he belongs to Chase.”

  “Your Chase?”

  “My Chase.”

  “That’s not possible. Your Chase doesn’t even like cats. He just took you in because his mother is living with her sister who’s allergic to cats.”

  It was a long story. Brutus had belonged to Chase’s mom, but when she couldn’t take care of him anymore, Chase had graciously agreed to give him a home. Though he spent most of his time either at Odelia’s or next door, at Odelia’s mom’s place, where Dooley lives with Gran.

  “Martha loves cats,” Brutus explained. “She just can’t help herself. So when she saw this rascal roaming the streets, she took him home with her, and immediately got into a huge argument with her sister.”

  “So Chase took him over? Again?” I asked, incredulous.

  Brutus nodded somberly. “And he’s something else, this one.”

  “He’s called Diego and he’s a real charmer. A regular ladies’ cat.”

  “Like Brutus, you mean,” I said, giving Brutus a level look.

  “I’m not a ladies’ cat,” Brutus protested. “Can I help it that the ladies all love me? It’s not as if I go out of my way to seduce them or anything. They just take one look at me and bingo. They go all gooey on me.”

  “That’s a ladies’ cat,” I said in measured tones. “That’s you.”

  “You got it all wrong as usual, Maxie, baby,” Brutus growled.

  “No, you got it all wrong. As usual,” I countered.

  “No, you got it all wrong!”

  “No, you got it—”

  “It doesn’t matter!” Dooley cried. “Diego is here and Harriet is going to take one look at him and she’s going to go weak at the knees and fall for him!”

  “Not my Harriet,” Brutus said, though he didn’t look convinced.

  “Your Harriet?” Dooley asked. “Harriet isn’t your Harriet.”

  “Oh, yes, she is. I know you’re devastated by the fact that she likes me more than you, but she is mine,” said Brutus with a smirk. “All mine.”

  “Harriet isn’t yours. Harriet is a free spirit. She belongs to no one.”

  “All mine,” he said in a sing-songy voice. “All the time.”

  “Where is Harriet, by the way?” I asked.

  Harriet belongs to Odelia’s mom and also lives next door. She’s a white Persian with green eyes. Even though she’s totally not my type I have to admit she’s very pretty. And she likes to hang out with Brutus, he wasn’t lying about that. Much to Dooley’s chagrin, cause he’s got a crush on Harriet himself.

  “I have no idea,” said Brutus. “When I woke up just now she wasn’t there.”

  I cut a glance at Dooley, and he nodded somberly. Brutus had taken to spending the night at the house, occupying the spot next to Harriet on the bed. When they weren’t traipsing all over town, that was.

  Odelia muttered something, and I wasn’t surprised. All this meowing and hissing had probably woken her up. “Now see what you’ve done,” I said. “You’ve gone and woken up my human.”

  “What do you care?” Brutus asked. “She needs to get up anyway.”

  “I like her to wake up gradually.”

  “Max likes to snuggle with Odelia,” said Dooley. “He’s a snuggler.”

  It’s a good thing us cats are covered with fur, otherwise Brutus would have noticed the blush that was now creeping up my cheeks.

  “I am not,” I said indignantly. “You take that back, Dooley.”

  “I’m not taking it back. You are a snuggler. You like to snuggle.”

  “Nothing to be ashamed about, Maxie,” said Brutus with a sly grin. “Some cats are snugglers and others aren’t. I for one would never want to be caught dead trying to stick my nose in Chase’s armpit, or sniff at his hair. Yuck. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like the guy, but that’s not how we roll.”

  “So how do you roll?” I asked, giving him my best scowl.

  He studied his claws. “You know, us catly cats just hang, you know. Like bros. Like buds. Chase, Chief Alec and I like to watch the ballgame, knocking back a few brewskis, swapping some off-color stories from our sordid pasts. It’s what real cats do. You wouldn’t understand.”

  “You don’t drink brewskis,” I said heatedly. “And you definitely don’t swap off-color stories about your sordid past because Chase doesn’t speak feline and neither does Uncle Alec. You’re making all that up.”

  He grinned. “Keep telling yourself that. Whatever makes you feel good, bro. Just keep on snuggling. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing at all.”

  “There is nothing wrong with that!” I cried.

  “That’s what I just said.”

  “No, but you said it in a way that makes it sound wrong!”

  “Hey, don’t you go getting all weird on me, Maxie. I said I’m fine with you being all feminine and girly so why don’t you just let me be all manly and butch, huh? To each his own is what I always say.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him, and I was itching to give him a piece of my mind—or my claws. Then again, Brutus is a formidable cat. Strong and athletic. I may be bigger, but I’m not afraid to admit it’s mostly blubber.

  “Easy there, big guy,” said Brutus, catching my glare and holding up his paws in a peaceable gesture. “You look like you’re about to blow a gasket. We’re all buds here, okay?”

  “Right,” I said dubiously.

  “Do you really drink beer, Brutus?” Dooley asked.

  “Of course. You’re not a real cat if you haven’t downed some suds.”

  “I haven’t downed some suds,” said Dooley. “You think I should try?”

  “First chance you get,” Brutus assured him. “But go easy, slugger. Not everyone can stomach the stuff.”

  “Let me guess,” I said. “Only real cats can, right?”

  “That’s right, Maxie. Though if you can’t keep it down, that’s fine, too.”

  He was playing with me, as usual, and I wondered if this new cat was going to be just like Brutus, for if he was, Dooley was right. This was bad.

  Just then, the doorbell rang, and I groaned. Now I was never going to get my morning cuddle. Brutus grinned at me. He’d read my mind.

  Odelia murmured something, smacked her lips, and sat upright in bed, blinking confusedly. When she saw us, she blinked some more. “Um, Max? Are there really three of you or am I seeing things?”

  “You’re not seeing things,” I said. “Dooley and Brutus came over.”

  “Oh, hi, Dooley—Brutus.”

  The doorbell rang again.

  “There it is,” she said. “I thought I’d heard something.”

  With her blond hair a mess, her green eyes trying hard to focus, and her nose wrinkling in confusion, my human looked cute as a button. She swung her feet to the Finding Nemo carpet by the bed, and I saw she was wearing her pink Betty Boop pajamas. She staggered from the bed, and shuffled to the door.

  “So what were you guys talking about?” she asked as she stumbled down the stairs, rubbing at her eyes with one hand while holding onto the banister with the other.

  “About the new cat,” Dooley said.

  “His name is Diego and he’s a real charmer,” I said. “At least according to Brutus.”

  “Well, he is,” Brutus said. “I only talked to him for all of five minutes and I could see he was one of those ladies’ cats.”

  “You mean like you,” Odelia said, not missing a beat.

  “I’m not a ladies’ cat!” Brutus cried. “Ladies just like me!”

  “That’s a ladies’ cat,” I said.

  “Diego
belongs to Chase,” Dooley said.

  Odelia halted on the bottom step and looked down at Dooley. “Chase has a new cat?”

  “Used to belong to his mother, just like Brutus,” I explained. I gave her a worried look. She nodded. She understood Dooley and I didn’t like Brutus. And if this new cat was anything like him, we were in for another nasty surprise.

  “I’m sure Diego will prove to be a perfectly nice cat,” she said.

  Odelia is always the picture of optimism. For her the glass is always half-full. You have to admire that about her, of course. Then again, sometimes the glass is half-empty. Or completely empty. Like in the case of Brutus.

  Odelia made her way to the door and peeked through the peephole.

  “Oh,” she said, surprised, and quickly turned and looked in the hallway mirror. “Ugh,” she said, and finger-combed her hair and checked her eyes for sleep gunk. Then she heaved a resigned sigh and opened the door. Odelia’s uncle Alec stood on the mat, along with Chase Kingsley, who was holding up a small orange cat.

  “That’s Diego!” hissed Brutus.

  “Surprise,” said Chase with a smile, and handed the cat to Odelia.

  Chapter 2

  Odelia took the cat from Chase. She was feeling a little awkward. If only she’d known they were coming over, she could have splashed some water on her face, sprayed some deodorant on her pits and dressed in something a little more appropriate than her Betty Boop pajamas.