“Nasty little buggers. They piss behind sofas, you know.”

Red ran a hand through his hair and turned away from the window. “If you say so. Look, it’s just until we find the owners. Woman from 1D grabbed the thing out of a tree, so she’s not about to chuck it over to the RSPCA.”

“Hm, 1D,” Vik mused. Red shouldn’t have mentioned specifics. Vik was too clever for his own good and had a fantastic memory. “Ain’t that the one you’re always moaning about?”

Red glared at thin air. “Always?”

“Always.”

“Nope.”

“Alisha!” Vik bellowed. “Red’s on about the rich bird from 1D again.”

In the distance, he heard Vik’s wife holler back, “Oh, he isn’t. Tell him to bloody shut up about her.”

“See?”

“Fuck off.”

Vik sighed dramatically. “There’s no shame in having a type, mate. The posh ones never did it for me, but—”

“Vik.”

“—your tastes leave a lot to be desired.”

“Vik.”

“One month, and the cat’s got to go,” Vikram said, smoothly changing the subject. Thank Christ. “And don’t let it out of the flat. If anyone sees it, there’ll be hell on earth.”

“That’s what I told her. I’m dropping some litter off in a bit.”

“Oh yeah? She can’t get it herself?”

Well, no, she probably couldn’t. “I’m the superintendent.”

“Right,” Vik snorted. “That’s exactly why.”

“Yep.”

“Not like you’re soft on her.”

Not bloody likely. “You know me. I’m soft on everyone.”

“True enough, mate. True enough.”

Red put the phone down. He spent the rest of the day avoiding his window.

CHAPTER FIVE

Chloe’s youngest sister played five different instruments, but her greatest asset was her voice. Eve Brown had, as Gigi would say with great significance, lungs. So when she burst into Chloe’s flat belting out “Defying Gravity” like Idina Menzel on Broadway, the cat reacted as if an earthquake had hit.

Chloe watched her placid companion fly into a state of major feline alarm. She’d learned since rescuing it a couple of days ago that this particular cat was not like most others; it lacked all grace and spatial awareness, as evidenced by its current path of evacuation. Streaking off in the direction of the bedroom, it managed to hit the sofa, the base of a standing lamp, and the door frame before making good its escape. Chloe had decided that this nervous clumsiness marked the two of them as a fated pair. She had also, in moments of exhaustion or panic, been known to bump into a door several times on her way through.

Eve bounded into the now cat-less living room and trilled, “We come bearing snacks!” Then, seeing Chloe’s wince, she removed one of her ever-present AirPods and stage-whispered, “Oh, sorry. Do you have a headache?”

“No.”

“She’s lying,” Dani said, appearing in the doorway with far too many shopping bags. She wore a fluffy gray hat to protect her shaved head from the cold. “I always know when you’re lying, Chlo. I’ve no idea why you bother. Tea?”

Chloe rolled her eyes and snuggled deep into the nest she’d made on the sofa. “Is it tea? Or is it one of your bush concoctions?”

Dani waggled her eyebrows menacingly and raised the shopping bags. “Don’t worry, darling. Evie baked devil’s food cake to make the medicine go down.”

Ten minutes later Chloe was indeed armed with a steaming mug of mysterious, spicy liquid and a fat slice of gooey chocolate cake. She shoved the latter into her mouth with shameless enthusiasm and let her eyes roll back, headache be damned. “This is divine.”

“I made it just for you,” Eve said, and patted Chloe’s knee like a concerned mother. It had been three days since the Grand Climb, and Chloe had been on the sofa throughout because her body was throwing a tantrum. Her sisters, being painfully nosy, had finally caught wind, and had therefore descended upon her to treat her like a baby. It was mildly irritating and simultaneously endearing, because it involved both pats and heavenly chocolate cake.

“Thank you. You’re a very good baker.”

“I’ll put that in the window of my cake shop one day,” Eve said brightly. “I am a good baker. My sister says so.”

Chloe raised her brows. “Cake shop?”

“That’s the latest plan,” Dani called from the hallway. “But don’t ask her about it, or she’ll start whining about the tyranny of skeptical parents who refuse their daughters business loans, and you know I can’t stand her spoiled-brat routine.” Ignoring their youngest sister’s outraged gasp, Dani marched back into the room with a hissing cat in her grip. “Now,” she said, holding up the squirming bundle of fur. “Is this the creature you rescued?”

“No,” Chloe murmured. “That’s one of the countless other cats I acquired two days ago.”

“Shut up.” Dani squinted into a pair of narrowed, feline eyes, her expression stern, her jaw set. She had a habit of grinding her teeth when she was concentrating especially hard. Finally, she ended the interspecies staring contest and announced, “I judge this cat to be … a boy.”

“Excellent,” Chloe said, quite satisfied. “We’ll name him Smudge.”

“Oh, Chloe,” Evie tutted. “You ought to name him Cat, like Holly Golightly.”

The nerve of little sisters. Bossy boots, the lot of them. With a withering glare, Chloe said, “Don’t tell me how to raise my children. His name is Smudge. The end.”

“Wonderful.” Dani set Smudge down and he ran off in a blur of smoke. After a minor collision with a table leg, he was gone. Dani snorted and slipped into their old Nana’s patois. “Him ’fraid like puss.”

“Of everything,” Chloe admitted. “I think that’s why he was stuck in the tree, actually: he could’ve gotten down, but he was too scared.”

The air in the room changed, excited grins blooming like flowers, all eyes turning to Chloe. “Ohhh, yes,” Eve sang, leaning back against the cushions. “The tree. That you climbed. Like a badass! Care to share?”

Ah. Chloe smiled coyly. “It was rather impressive,” she murmured, feigning modesty.

“Do tell,” Dani drawled from her position sprawled out on the floor. Honestly, the woman was allergic to chairs. She was also good at ferreting out lies. But would she notice a minor (read: huge and ginger) omission? Hopefully not, because Chloe had no intention of bringing up Red’s role in the palaver.

“I saw the cat, I got the cat. It was all very athletic. I climbed that tree like … like Lara Croft!”

“With sweaty cleavage and frequent, strangely sexual grunts?” Dani mused.

“With effortless expertise,” Chloe corrected. Inaccurately.

“I’m sure you were quite Byronic,” Eve said.

There was a short pause before Chloe deciphered that one. “Darling, do you mean heroic?”