Pumpkin Blend (A Paramour Bay Cozy Paranormal Mystery Book 14) Read online

  I just want to go on the record that I get double the amount of blueberry-filled edibles tomorrow. Bodyguard duty isn’t usually on my list, but I’m the type of feline that can be bought for the right amount of catnip treats. Oh, I forgot to mention that the park didn’t have a single pumpkin on the property.

  “See?” I couldn’t help but close my eyes as Heidi drove us home. I couldn’t wait to go to sleep. “The missing pumpkins have nothing to do with the squirrelpocalypse.”

  I wouldn’t say that, Raven. It finally dawned on me why I needed to find you in the pumpkin patch tonight…well, besides me not wanting to go blind from the pepper spray.

  Once again, I popped my eyes open for the second time this evening to prepare myself for Leo’s epic epiphany about to escape his lips.

  His memory blips could be impressive, and I had a feeling that this one was going to rank right up there with the time he forgot to tell me that werewolves existed.

  Nothing that dramatic, Raven. Stop being such a pessimist. I merely wanted to tell you that while I didn’t find any pumpkins, I did spot some rather large pumpkin seeds on my way into the park. And by some, I’d say quite an abundance. Anyway, my theory is that Skippy and his band of ninja squirrels ate what they could of the stolen pumpkins and then squirreled away the rest in their stash. I’ll have to go back tomorrow to follow the trail of seeds. Who’s with me?

  Chapter Eight

  The morning alarm on my phone had gone off at exactly seven o’clock in the morning, though I had managed to hit the snooze button at least a half dozen times. Maybe more, but I was still suffering from my morning brain fog. The only thing that would make it go away was that blissful, first cup of java.

  I savored the rich, delicious sanity-saver as I leaned against the kitchen counter with my eyes closed. There would be no sleeping in today, no enjoying the warmth of my heavy comforter, and no lingering hot shower.

  According to Leo, there was a trail of pumpkin seeds to follow.

  Not anymore.

  “Leo!” I exclaimed in irritation as my hot coffee sloshed in my cup and spilled onto both of my hands. “You’re supposed to be over at Heidi’s place.”

  I didn’t have to look far to find him. He was currently sitting on the kitchen island still wearing his pirate costume, judging me with his right eye.

  My on-again, off-again soulmate has terrible habits. We’re off right now, because who in their right mind files their nails with a metal emery board? She’s clearly a sadist! I have sensitive ears, you know. Anyway, I decided it was best to get a head start on the day. Don’t think that I didn’t try swiping the file out of her hands a couple of times, but all she kept doing was patting me on the head like I was some slobbering pooch. We’re in the off-again stage, in case you weren’t listening.

  “You know that Heidi’s heart belongs to Jack,” I chided, setting the mug on the counter so that I could run my hands under cold water. I was lucky that the scalding coffee hadn’t done damage to my skin. “What do you mean there aren’t any more pumpkin seeds?”

  Um, how much of that coffee were you able to drink before I came home?

  “Not enough,” I mumbled underneath my breath. “Not anymore—that’s what you said a few minutes ago. What did you mean by that?”

  I reached for the dishtowel to dry my hands, wincing when my skin was a bit tender on the sides of my index fingers and thumbs. They’d gotten the brunt of the spilled coffee.

  There. Are. No. More. Seeds.

  I just arched my eyebrow in hopes that he could see that I had zero patience this morning for his stalling tactics.

  What? I’m just trying to help spell it out for you. I’ll start over. Ready? I left my on-again, off-again soulmate to finish her grooming so that I could get a head start on the day. Remember, I’m a battle plan expert when it comes to the squirrelpocalypse. Imagine my surprise when Satan’s feathered mini-dragon was making a game out of dive-bombing out of the sky and picking up each and every pumpkin seed.

  “Oh, no,” I murmured in dismay, grabbing my coffee cup and making my way over to the island. I pulled out the stool on the end and climbed on up to hear the rest of the story. “Mr. C ate all the pumpkin seeds?”

  You haven’t noticed that Satan’s feathered mini-dragon is starting to look like an overstuffed egg?

  Mr. C was the resident chickadee who’d made a rather colorful nest on top of the lamppost near the local bakery. He’d gone to great lengths to steal some pink, red, green, and blue feathers from the hats of the older women in town. They’d been on a hat kick this summer, and Mr. C had taken advantage of the timely fad.

  I would have thought that he would have begun his journey south for the winter, but apparently chickadees didn’t really migrate.

  “Were you at least able to see where the trail of pumpkins seeds extended before they were snatched up by Mr. C?” At this point, anything would help in finding a new clue. “You said you caught sight of the trail last night near the park. What direction were they leading you?”

  In case you haven’t noticed, I only have one good eye. It was also dark out, and those lampposts at the park only give off so much—

  I reached over and snatched the eyepatch off Leo’s head.

  “You have two good eyes, and you’re just pretending otherwise to keep an evil spirit that probably doesn’t exist from taking over your body.” I held up the patch and looked at it a bit closer, wondering if maybe Leo hadn’t been mistaken. “Leo, there shouldn’t have been any seeds. The prized jack-o-lantern had already been carved, so there were no seeds inside of it. The other pumpkins that had been taken from the Stellhorn’s farmstead hadn’t even been carved.”

  Leo’s whiskers twitched as he thought over what I’d said, and then we both sat in silence while pondering if Leo had really seen a trail of pumpkin seeds leading him through the park.

  I may have short-term, medium-term, and long-term memory blips once in a while, but I know what I saw with my one eye and sniffed with this incredible sniffer of mine, Raven. Besides, I watched as that chickadee enjoyed a very nutritious breakfast of pumpkin seeds. Any trace evidence was eaten by Satan’s feathered mini-dragon.

  I went to work on putting the eyepatch back on Leo after asking him which eye he would prefer covered. Both were back to normal, and I told him that they’d stay that way if he avoided going over to see Aphrodite.

  I can’t do that, Raven. I know that black strand of fur belonged to my former perfect mate. Do you think that there may be a secret door hidden in the old geezer’s basement?

  I’d been in mid-sip when Leo had posed his inquiry, and that’s when it hit me that we’d been looking in all the wrong places.

  “You’re a genius, Leo!” I exclaimed, hopping off the stool and taking my coffee with me as I went to take my shower and get dressed for the day. “I have until eleven o’clock to open the shop, so we need to get a move on.”

  One, you haven’t given me my breakfast yet. Two, I already know that I’m a genius. There is no need to state the obvious. I might have taken a pitstop at the teashop last night for more of those blueberry-filled edibles. That reminds me—you need to break into the additional stash that my VVBFF left with you that is hidden in the backroom amongst the pestles and mortars. And third…what was the third point I was trying to make?

  I’d set my coffee cup on the bathroom sink and had been reaching for my toothbrush when something Leo said about his side trip to the teashop last night struck me as odd. I slowly pulled my toothbrush out of its holder as I mulled over his words.

  There was a third…

  “Leo, when did you pop into the teashop?” I asked as I put some toothpaste on the bristles of my brush. “Last night?”

  Don’t sidetrack me, Raven. The third point that I was trying to tell you is right on the tip of my tongue.

  I began brushing my teeth as I walked out of the bathroom and past the spiral staircase that led to the bedroom loft. Leo was still sitting on the k
itchen island, staring up at the ceiling as if it held the answers he sought.

  First…second…third…yes! And third, I still need my mid-morning nap. I checked on Skippy and his band of ninja squirrels already, and they are all having their breakfast. They won’t start hoarding their collections for the day until the afternoon, so I’ll need my rest if I’m going to keep up with their diversions. They have many of them, you know. All to throw me off their trail, which is how I know I’m close to locating their winter hibernation stockpile.

  “Leo, we’ve been looking everywhere for the pumpkins,” I pointed out, catching the small eyeroll at my obvious statement. My words were a bit muffled as I spoke around my toothbrush, but he got the gist. “I mean, everywhere visible. Liam drove around all the neighborhoods, we staked out the scene of the crime, and everyone has been keeping their eye out for the giant-sized prized jack-o-lantern that literally can’t be missed if it was set out for all to see.”

  It’s starting to sound like you want me to miss my mid-morning nap, Raven.

  “You can have thirty minutes,” I offered, taking my toothbrush out and trying to speak around the gob of foam that had now formed in my mouth. “But after that, be ready to head back to town.”

  It takes me twenty minutes to get comfortable, two minutes to dream about my victory in the squirrelpocalypse, and one minute to drift to sleep. You’re only leaving me seven minutes of restful sleep. That’s not nearly enough if you want me to be on the payroll today.

  I made my way back into the bathroom and rinsed my mouth out so that I could finish telling Leo what our plans were for the day. The minty fresh taste was invigorating, as was the fact that I now had a new plan.

  “You’re my familiar, Leo.” I rinsed out my toothbrush and slipped it back into the plastic holder. “Neither one of us are on the supernatural payroll.”

  What is this grand plan of yours, because I’ve seen you in action before, Raven. It’s not pretty.

  “I bet I can tell you where you first saw those pumpkin seeds,” I proposed, leaning over the tub to turn on the shower. I’d let the water warm up a bit before getting undressed, allowing me to finish up my conversation with Leo. “Well? Do we have a deal? If I win, you don’t complain for the rest of the day. If you win, you can have all the blueberry-filled treats that you want today.”

  No deal. You’re too confident, and you’re setting me up to walk right into a trap. See? You’re not good at constructing battle plans. Besides, I like complaining. It’s an outlet to relieve my stress from all of my responsibilities regarding the squirrelpocalypse. I will let you take a guess while I go and get comfortable, although I already noticed that my new cat bed hasn’t arrived yet. Can we sue the delivery people? They said this week, and they didn’t live up to their promise.

  “We’re not suing anyone,” I said wryly, wondering how he could fall asleep when he was talking a million miles per minute. “And here is my guess—you found the trail of pumpkin seeds when you were walking from the teashop to the park last night. You didn’t blip over there, because you were still licking the catnip off your whiskers and enjoying every last speck. You just so happened to walk past the new storefront that has yet to open, which is where the pumpkin seeds began. Am I right?”

  The fact that Leo had stopped midstride on his way over to the bay window told me everything that I needed to know about today’s scavenger hunt. I gave myself a fist pump of victory as I made my way back to the bathroom.

  While I admit that you may or may not be right about where I first spotted the trail of pumpkin seeds, I still don’t see what the new storefront has to do with anything.

  “It has everything to do with it, Leo!” I called out, shutting the door behind me.

  Every time I walked past the new shop, I would get a tingling sensation in the palm of my hand. While my skin hadn’t actually warmed like it did when danger was present, there was still something about the place that set me on edge.

  Today, I planned to find out why and what it could possibly have to do with the missing pumpkins.

  Chapter Nine

  “Tell Leo that I’ll buy some of those wooden emery boards,” Heidi said as she clung to her caramel macchiato that we’d gotten at the bakery. It was by far her favorite morning beverage, while I was veering off toward the pumpkin flavors this season. “They don’t work as well as the metal ones, but I can compromise for my favorite familiar. I was wondering why he disappeared in mid-conversation. I was literally in the middle of telling him about my cute costume for this year.”

  Why did I have to accompany you two on this nonsensical scavenger hunt? Those seven minutes of blissful sleep wasn’t nearly enough to brave this morning’s overcast, gloomy morning. You realize this is perfect weather for a catnap.

  “Because,” I said with determination as we came upon the entrance to the new shop. I motioned toward the darkened window that we’d come to stand in front of on the sidewalk. The new storefront owner had put up some type of solid black cardboard in the display window and the glass door to prevent onlookers from seeing inside. “You’re going to pop in there so that you can take a peek around.”

  I’m going to do what? I clearly misunderstood your ravings. I’m thinking the horrifying sound that my on-again, off-again soulmate made with the metal emery board has done some permanent damage to my ears.

  “Your ears are just fine. Now in you go. Pop in.” I took a much-needed sip of my pumpkin macchiato, briefly debating if I should get one of those specialty machines for the teashop. It was one thing to bring in some specialty coffees, but it was quite another to turn the tea haven into a hardcore coffee port with a casual wave toward tea. I hastily dismissed the idea as quickly as it had popped into my head. “You’re going to go inside and see if there are any pumpkins laying around.”

  Have you lost what is left of the marbles rolling around in that head of yours, Raven? I am not going into a building where something evil is waiting to take over my body and claim my soul. Have you ever thought that the malevolent spirit might want access to my mental antioxidants?

  “Leo, it’s just a storefront,” I reassured him, leaning back just a smidge so that I could peek past Heidi and make sure that Eugene and Albert hadn’t walked out of the diner yet. They usually set up to play chess in front of Monty’s hardware store for the remainder of their Sunday morning. We were still in the clear, because they would no doubt wonder what Heidi and I were doing on this side of the street loitering outside the new shop that everyone was gossiping about. “Just blip in, and then blip out. Easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy.”

  I think it’s you who should be consuming my blueberry-filled edibles. On second thought, that would just be wasting premium organic catnip treats. Never mind.

  Like Heidi, I had wrapped both of my hands around the disposable cup. The heat was a welcome respite from the crisp morning air. Leo had been right about the gloomy description of the morning, though. Numerous clouds had gathered overhead with a looming threat of cold drizzle.

  Another careful scan of the area around us had me realizing that someone had taken the time to decorate the exterior of the empty shop in front of us. Had it been the new unidentified owner, or had one of the shops on either side taken up the initiative as a welcoming gesture?

  I mean, someone had placed a cornstalk next to the entrance with cute little ghosts taped to the glass door. There was also a string of lights hanging from the awning above, but they must be on a timer of some sort. They weren’t currently lit.

  “Would an evil spirit take time to decorate a storefront?” I asked, pointing out once again that Leo had nothing to fear by seeing what was inside the shop. All I needed was affirmation that the pumpkins were inside, and then I’d be able to tell Liam where to look. “Hurry up so that we can get back to the teashop where it’s nice and warm.”

  I’m not in any rush to have my soul snatched from my body, Raven. I happen to like my brilliant soul. We have no idea what number life I’m on, a
nd I’d rather not find out that it was my ninth.

  “You’re wearing your pirate costume.” I looked down toward the sidewalk where Leo was still stubbornly sitting back on his haunches. His eyepatch was secure over his left eye, his trifold hat was a bit crooked, and the adorable vest had been buttoned up before we’d left the cottage. “If you’re right about a malevolent spirit floating around in there, he or she won’t even recognize you as a possible vessel. You’ll be mistaken for an All Hallows’ Eve prop.”

  “While you two have been gabbing like two teenagers, I’ve been looking around,” Heidi said, motioning toward the sidewalk. “I don’t see any seeds. Are you sure that this is where the trail started?”

  I’m certain. Satan’s feathered mini-dragon had me hiding behind the cornstalk with one of his nosedives. I’m lucky that I was wearing this patch.

  “Leo is positive.” I leaned down to offer Leo another alternative. “We can always walk over to the cemetery to ask Ivan if you’re in his appointment book for this weekend. Would that ease your concern about going inside the new shop to have a look around?”

  We are not bringing the local grim reaper into this, Raven. He’ll bring it up at the poker table to throw me off my game, and then I’ll look like a scaredy-cat instead of a heroic familiar doing his best to stave off the squirrelpocalypse.

  “Heads up,” Heidi murmured, turning around so that she was facing the street. “Mindy is looking our way.”

  I quickly stood and gave the boutique owner a wave as I bumped shoulders with Heidi. Mindy was getting out of her car, looking at us a bit strangely for simply standing in front of the new shop.

  “I’ll be ready to shop at eleven,” Heidi called out, letting her voice travel across the street. “Wilma and Elsie mentioned the new scarf section, and I’m looking for a burnt orange one that I can’t seem to find anywhere.”