Oh, they couldn't want her} Why would they want her? They'd been happy to be rid of her.

But Charlie was telling how she'd freed the big tomcat from the trap, and when Charlie described him, Kit felt cold and scared. "That was Stone Eye," Kit whispered. "That big gray-and-brown tom with eyes the color of rust. He runs everything. He bosses everyone. He always slashed and bit me. He did worse to the older female kittens." Thinking about Stone Eye, Kit wanted to crawl under the pillows into the dark where nothing would find her, but of course that was silly. That was how she felt, though. She wished Charlie had left him in that cage.

But Charlie would never do that. And when Charlie said she thought maybe other cats had been trapped and taken away prisoner, Kit remembered something scary, and she hunched down deeper next to Dulcie.

"What, Kit?" Dulcie and Lucinda said together. Lucinda rose and came to sit on the window seat beside her and to stroke her. "What is it?" the thin old lady said. "What did you remember?" Lucinda always knew how she felt.

"There was a man," Kit said. "In one town, when I was little, watching us when we were eating garbage in an alley. He watched us from the back door of a shoe shop and he had canned baked beans maybe for his lunches and every day he put out some beans for us and the hungriest of us sneaked up after dark and ate but always the man was there behind the screen watching and watching us. Stone Eye told us not to go there, and drove us away. He said we had to go away from that city but we went back anyway one more time the next day and there were other men there too and they put out those big traps for us with food in, humane traps they're called but we knew what they were and we left those streets. We stayed in the ravine and didn't ever go back there again."

Kit sighed. "There were three ordinary cats that traveled with us that couldn't talk but felt safe in the big clowder and they went back, they went in the traps every day and ate the food. Stone Eye didn't drive them away. When they got caught, he said what did it matter? When those men took the bungies off and the ordinary cats got caught, Stone Eye laughed and said they were just stupid beasts, but some of us…"

She paused to peer through the window toward the main road, where a car had turned into the drive, moving way too fast toward the house. Charlie rose angrily and hurried to the door, and ran out to tell the driver to slow down. Pedric got up and stood at the kitchen window, looking out.

"A black Alpha Romeo," he said crossly. "Damn fool." They watched the car skid to a stop right in Charlie's face, and the driver's door opened.

Kit could hear Charlie through the closed window, but Pedric slid the glass open so he could hear. "You don't drive like that on my property!" Charlie snapped. "What do you want?"

The driver was dark-haired and handsome. He stepped boldly out of the car. "Your property? I thought this was Chief Harper's property."

"I am Mrs. Harper. What do you want?"

He looked past her to the stable roof, where Ryan had paused in her work, kneeling on the roof. "It's really none of your business. I came to see Ryan."

"Everything on my property is my business." Charlie looked at his license plate. "Go on over there if you have business with Ms. Flannery. When you leave you will drive slowly." Kit and Dulcie smiled. Everyone said redheads had a temper. The man looked amused. Charlie's eyes flashed as he turned away. In the kitchen, Pedric glared as if he wanted to barge out and protect Charlie. Kit thought that wasn't smart at his eighty-plus frail years. Dulcie's ears were back and her tail lashed. Kit was fascinated, her nose pressed to the glass, watching.

The man was tall and indeed very handsome, with a smooth, angled face and short, well-styled black hair that, Lucinda would say, had been artfully blow-dried. He wore a pale tan shirt, powder blue tie, and a beautiful cream-colored suit. His sleek loafers looked like the handmade Italian shoes that Pedric liked to admire in the most elegant village shops. Beautiful shoes that were dulled now with dust from the yard. He approached the stables, smiling up at Ryan, but stopped abruptly when Rock burst out of the shadows growling, moving toward him stiff-legged.

Beyond the Weimaraner at the pasture fence the Harpers' two big dogs stood with ears flattened and lips drawn back in twin snarls. Ryan shouted at Rock from the roof, and swung on to the ladder; the silver hound backed off a step, his head lowered, teeth still bared.

Charlie had returned to the kitchen; she came to the window seat where she could watch, and she had her cell phone open. Kit thought, from the bulge in her pocket, that she might have additional protection, too.

Ryan came down the ladder, scowling. "What do you want, Roman?" Rock approached the man stiff-legged, snarling-but then the dog paused, sniffing. He glanced up at his mistress uncertainly, sniffed again at the man, and his short, docked tail began to wag.

The stranger smiled wryly, and knelt in the dust, knelt right down, facing Rock, and began talking to him, making little lovey sounds, kissy-baby sounds to the big Weimaraner. Kit and Dulcie watched Rock, amazed. The big dog had gone totally mushy, smiling and wagging and pushing right up to the man. Dulcie was so irritated she was shifting from paw to paw, growling-as if she'd like to race out there and tackle the man herself-and give Rock a whack on the nose. Pedric and the three women watched the scene, unbelieving.

Ryan took in the scene without expression and commanded Rock to heel. The cats knew she would deal with Rock later, in a little training session. Her voice was cold and clipped.

"What do you want, Roman?"

"It's Sunday, Ryan. I'm amazed to see you working on Sunday."

"Why would you come here? I didn't ask you here."

"I came by to see if you'd have dinner with me. For old times' sake?"

"There are no old times. I told you in the city I don't have the time or patience for you. Nor the inclination. I am involved, Roman. Do you understand that? Do I need to spell that out?"

In the kitchen, the little party glanced at each other. Too bad Ryan's lovely big bodyguard had suckered up to the man. No one could understand what was wrong with Rock; this was not his way, Rock was fierce as tigers when it came to Ryan. Dulcie and Kit looked at each other wishing, not for the first time, that the big, beautiful, intelligent hound could speak, that Rock could tell them what was going through that incomprehensible doggy mind.

Clyde liked to fix a big Sunday breakfast for himself and Joe and the household animals, preparing special, vet-approved treats for Rube and the three cats, who could not eat the exotic foods on which Joe Grey thrived. This morning he cooked, but his heart wasn't in it. Rube was not in his usual place on the throw rug before the kitchen sink, drooling as he waited; he would never be there again.

Sitting on the breakfast table in the middle of the Sunday paper, Joe looked sadly at Rube's empty place on the rug, which the cats had left between them. Despite Clyde's presence at the stove and the good smell of scrambled eggs and bacon and sauteed chicken livers, everything in the kitchen seemed flat and off-key. Joe felt so low that he hadn't even clawed the funnies and front page to enliven Clyde's morning.

He looked at Clyde hopefully. "Will Ryan be coming for breakfast?" Ryan could always cheer them up.

"You can see I only set two plates," Clyde snapped. "She's working up at Harper's, getting the barn roof ready to lift." Joe looked at Clyde and shrugged. He looked at the nicely prepared breakfast plate that Clyde set before him, the bacon artfully arranged between the scrambled eggs and the golden chicken livers. Clyde had even grated cheese on his eggs, a nice morning start with plenty of comforting cholesterol.