Free Death Runs in the Family by Heather Haven

Frank stiffen.
    Frank had been Dad’s best friend since they met in the late seventies. Actually, more than that, they’d been heart brothers. When Dad married Lila, Frank and she had to contend with one other. Even after Dad’s death, as godfather to both Richard and me, Frank will always be family. I love Mom and Frank to pieces, but they just don’t ‘get’ one another.
    Tío, the family peacemaker, jumped in. “Now, we all know Liana, upon the occasion, she leaps in with the heart before she thinks with the head. But we would not have her any other way, ¿ verdad? . Still, what is done, we cannot undo. We must try to recti-recti—”
    “Rectify, Tío,” I said. “Rectify the situation, if that’s what you’re trying to say.” He nodded his head to me with a smile.
    I saw warmth spread over Frank’s face. He opened his arms and stepped forward.
    “This has been a helluva day for you already, hasn’t it, pumpkin?”
    I nodded and stepped into his embrace, and for one shining moment, I was comforted by his very being. For one shining moment, I felt closer to the father I’d lost too soon, too fast.
    “Okay,” I said, swiping at my hot eyes. “Enough of this feeling sorry for myself. It’s getting us nowhere. Let’s sit down and talk.”
    I reached back for Mom, while still holding onto Frank with one arm and embraced her with my other. I felt her relax somewhat. The three of us walked over to the seating area arm in arm, followed by Tío.
    “Frank,” I said, guiding him to the leather easy chair before sitting down next to Mom on the sofa, “I’m beginning to think Kelli told me a lot of half-truths. If that’s the case, unless she rented a car and somehow maneuvered both cars where she wanted them to be for the disappearance, I think she had an accomplice, maybe one who drove her Mercedes here while she had the Land Rover. I’d like you to put out an APB for a late model, yellow Mercedes, probably Nevada license plates. With a little luck, she’s in that car.”
    “Where do you think it’s heading?”
    “Gut instinct. Back to Las Vegas. In her search for Nick Papadopoulos.”

 
    Chapter Six
    The Trail Leads to Vegas
     
     
    There is nothing pleasant about flying these days. Forget the friendly skies. Now it’s the pissed-off, you’re-being-stripped-searched-back-to-last-week’s-laundry skies. Bring on the long lines, pulling things out of carry-on, putting things back in carry-on, taking coats, jackets, hats, shoes, and belts off, putting them back on while you and your luggage bump to the end of the conveyor belt, throwing away your bottled water, cold cream, and anything else that’s liquid and weighs over four ounces. By the time you get to your gate, you’re usually a mere shell of your former self. If you still have everything you came to the airport with, it’s a miracle. I personally, am still missing a bra. I have yet to figure that one out.
    This time, though, worrying about Tugger and Baba’s fate made the above travesties excruciating. Frank hadn’t any good news yet regarding the yellow Mercedes, and I found myself sending up a few prayers to St. Francis, the patron saint of animals. Anything I could do to help the cats, I was going to do.
    Mom had left for Phoenix a few minutes earlier. I was booked on the five-thirty p.m. flight to Vegas. While waiting, I must have paced six years of pile off the terminal carpet. Right before I boarded, the cellphone rang, and it was Richard, so excited he didn’t even let me finish saying hello.
    “Lee! Tío just told me Kelli took the cats in the cat carrier. Why didn’t you tell me?”
    “I don’t see—”
    “Don’t you remember a couple of months ago when I came up with this idea about making those identity chips they insert into an animal’s neck where you could not only identify the pet but track their whereabouts?”
    “Richard, what are you droning on about? What you so laughingly call a chip was about the size of CD