I closed the lid, resolving to scrub out the toilet later, before I used it myself.

“Let me straighten this up quickly,” I told John, “and then we can settle Emma in here for a while.”

While John stood holding the carrier, Liddy quickly put dirty laundry into the hamper and replaced the clean towels on shelves. I folded the spilled litter into the dirty towel where it had been dumped and refilled Emma’s box with fresh crystals from an unopened box beneath the sink. Finally, I refilled Emma’s water dish and spread a fresh towel out on the floor and took the carrier from John.

I unzipped it and coaxed her out. She was tentative. I know how upsetting it is to an animal when their familiar territory is changed in some way. It’s hard on human beings, too. I stroked her and said, “Don’t worry, sweetheart. You’ll be comfortable here until I can let you back into the rest of the house.”

Emma crept over to examine her litter box, and I backed out of the bathroom and closed the door.

Eileen’s bedroom and bathroom were an ugly mirror image of mine. Total disarray.

“We’ll have this put back together before she sees it,” I told John.

Jaws clamped, John nodded. I guessed that he didn’t trust himself to speak at that moment.

As bad as the living room and the bedrooms had been, the worst pain whacked me in the heart as soon as I came to the kitchen.

Liddy groaned, and John muttered a string of expletives I’d never before heard him use.

All of my dishes and cooking utensils had been taken out of their cabinets and left on the counters, the table, and the floor. All of my cleaning products had been removed from the area beneath the sink and my brooms and mops and vacuum cleaner cleared from the utility closet. My large crockery jars of dried pastas, sugar, and flour had been emptied onto paper towels and obviously pawed through. Rendered unusable by hands I was sure were dirty, those supplies would have to be thrown away.

They hadn’t opened Tuffy’s and Emma’s sealed bags of Natural Balance dry food, but they’d emptied the already opened bags onto newspapers. I’d have to discard that, too.

With growing dread, I opened the refrigerator. Hatch and his team had taken everything out, but at least they’d put back the items that needed to stay cold, although not in the logical arrangement in which I kept my supplies.

Last came the freezer. This news was semibad. The frozen items in sealed supermarket packaging had been left alone, but everything that I’d wrapped in foil or freezer bags had been opened and not resealed. I’d have to get rid of that food, too, because I didn’t know what contamination had occurred and I wasn’t going to risk my health, or anyone else’s.

John’s expression was grim, but-perhaps trying to sound a positive note-he said, “For anything that they’ve destroyed, you can be reimbursed. There are forms. Want me to pick one up for you?”

“No, but thanks. Figuring out the cost of the ruined food will take more time than it’s worth.”

As I stared at the disaster that was my kitchen, heartsick and virtually paralyzed, Liddy stooped down, picked up a stack of dinner plates, and put them onto the cabinet shelf where they belonged.

“It’s a start,” she said.

My best friend’s simple act-and her encouraging smile-were just what I needed to snap myself out of the emotional morass I’d sunk into.

I indicated the lone pile of plates that Liddy had put back on the otherwise empty cabinet shelf. “One thing done. Only a thousand more to go.”

Filling a bowl of fresh Natural Balance for Dogs, I said, “I’ll take this to Tuffy.”

It was a relief to go out into the fresh, cool air. I hadn’t realized it until that moment, but the search party had managed to raise dust that I didn’t know I had. I resolved to be more thorough when I vacuumed.

Seeing me at the back door, Tuffy trotted over from where he’d been playing with a rope toy I’d hung from the limb of my one orange tree. I put the bowl of Natural Balance on the bottom step.

Ignoring the food, Tuffy nuzzled me, and I hugged him. His warm body and soft fur in my arms was a comfort.

“I’ll let you inside soon, Tuff. In the meantime, you’ve got food and water and shade and toys.”

He looked at me with his dark, intelligent eyes and I felt he understood. In any case, having Tuffy and Emma reminded me that it didn’t really matter how big a mess Hatch and company had made of our home. Whatever was ruined were only things, and things could be replaced.

Back in the kitchen, John was closing his cell phone.

“I gotta go. There’s a double homicide in the Hollywood Hills.” He looked around at the chaos. “I hate to leave you girls with all this.”

“We’ll be fine,” I said. “Liddy knows where everything goes as well as I do.”

Liddy blew him a kiss. “Go solve the crime, Big John. We’ll work faster without having to tell you what to do.”

As soon as we heard the front door close, Liddy tugged at my sleeve. “We’re alone now. So tell me why the Sicilian isn’t here.”

“He thinks I was sleeping with Keith Ingram.”

Liddy huffed. “Men! We can’t do without them and it’s illegal to kill them. Where’s the justice in that?”

It took us two hours to put the kitchen and my bedroom back together. While we worked, I filled Liddy in on what had happened at the coffee shop.

“I love his novels,” Liddy said, “but he’s not exactly a darling of the New York Review of Books. Maybe it was one of those snobby critics who shot at him.”

I smiled. “When he’s well enough, I’ll tell him your theory.”

I’d opened the bathroom door and was enticing Emma into the bedroom, when I heard the doorbell ring.

“I’ll go,” Liddy said.

“Thanks.”

I lifted Emma up and put her on top of my freshly made bed. After giving her a few gentle strokes, I closed my bedroom door to keep her inside until we put the rest of the house right.

My bedroom was finished. Now it was time to begin restoring Eileen’s room and bath. I’d started down the hallway when I heard Liddy’s voice from the front door.

“I don’t know if I should let you in,” she said. “Is your medical insurance paid up?”

27

I met Liddy and Nicholas in the archway that led to the living room. He carried a large bag from Junior’s Restaurant and Deli on the corner of Westwood and Pico Boulevards. He knew it was my favorite place for sandwiches. I could smell the wonderful scent of Junior’s pastrami from twenty feet away.

Nicholas held the bag out in front of him like a shield. “I come in peace.”

“I’m so hungry if you won’t forgive him, I will,” Liddy said.

Nicholas kept his eyes on me and waved the Junior’s bag so as to waft more enticing aromas in my direction.

“Extra lean pastrami on fresh-cut rye,” he said.

I took a few steps forward, but kept ten feet between us. “What’s on the sandwich?”

“Russian dressing on one side of the rye, mustard and coleslaw on the other. No pickle. I got you your favorite extra lean corned beef, Liddy. And sides of potato salad, and three slices of New York cheesecake for dessert.”

“I forgive you,” I said.

“Thank God.” Liddy took the bag. “I’ll set us up in the kitchen. You two need a few minutes alone.” She winked at me as she left the room.

“I was a total jerk,” he said.

“Agreed. But what made you come to that conclusion?”

“When I cooled off, I thought about the kind of person you are and figured out that you must be taking heat for Eileen. I’m guessing Ingram made a video of her. That’s why O’Hara decked him and why you broke into the bastard’s house.”