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  Praise for the New York Times bestselling Sunny & Shadow Mysteries

  “Small-town Maine hasn’t been this dangerous since Jessica Fletcher started finding dead bodies in Cabot Cove! In this debut, Sunny Coolidge, with the able assistance of a ‘big kitty’ named Shadow, proves she has the skills to make a successful amateur sleuth.”

  —Miranda James, New York Times bestselling author of the Cat in the Stacks Mysteries

  “Deftly combines heartwarming humor and nail-biting suspense for a fun read that leaves you looking forward to Sunny and Shadow’s next adventure.”

  —Ali Brandon, New York Times bestselling author of Plot Boiler, a Black Cat Bookshop Mystery

  “A purrfect debut. Four paws up and a tip of the tail.”

  —Carolyn Hart, New York Times bestselling author of What the Cat Saw

  “A charming, witty, exciting new entry in the genre, featuring the best-realized and most personable fictional character on four legs. You’ll love Shadow. And Sunny’s fun, too.”

  —Parnell Hall, author of NYPD Puzzle

  “With a dandy plot and comic relief provided by Shadow, Last Licks continues a pleasing series packed with suspense and amiable characters.”

  —Richmond Times-Dispatch

  “A must-read for all ailurophiles.”

  —Melissa’s Mochas, Mysteries & More

  Berkley Prime Crime titles by Claire Donally

  THE BIG KITTY

  CAT NAP

  LAST LICKS

  HISS AND TELL

  CATCH AS CAT CAN

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  CATCH AS CAT CAN

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with Tekno Books

  Copyright © 2016 by Tekno Books.

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME design are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  For more information, visit penguin.com.

  eBook ISBN: 9780698167100

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / May 2016

  Cover illustration by Mary Ann Lasher.

  Cover design by Colleen Reinhart.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  For Mom, who always liked dogs, and Belle, who always loved Jack.

  Also, many thanks to Larry Segriff of Tekno Books for staying the course in difficult times and to Michelle Vega, who inherited me.

  And finally, many, many thanks and a loud purr to all the people who read these stories and enjoyed them.

  Contents

  Praise for the New York Times bestselling Sunny & Shadow Mysteries

  Berkley Prime Crime titles by Claire Donally

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  1

  The wind off the water was frigid enough to cut through the thickest coat. He shivered, hunching his shoulders as his eyes flicked around, searching for someplace warm. Bright winter sunshine was giving way to darkness now. He’d spent the day wandering around town, mooching a bit here and there, keeping out of the cold, and watching . . . always watching.

  Somehow, though, he kept winding up back here, unable to make up his mind. Side by side stood the office and the store. Looking through one large window, he could see her, all bundled up against the chill, her eyes on a computer screen.

  Maybe that was just as well. If she spotted him, there’d be trouble. She’d let him know pretty clearly that she didn’t want him around there. But he didn’t care. She could say what she liked, he knew he could walk in there and do as he pleased. He almost decided to tap on the glass, but there was the other window, the store. He’d spent a lot of time working on the owner and it had paid off—he’d been generous. But there was generous, and there was more. And he wanted more, even if he had to steal it.

  How to do that? He could wait till a customer entered and the owner was distracted. Or . . . he could just do it under the owner’s nose and dare him to do anything. Again, he was pretty sure he could get away with it. A quick peek showed that the store looked completely empty right now. If he managed to find a way in, he could take whatever he wanted, no problem.

  So—love, or greed?

  He never got a chance to make up his mind. The choice was yanked away from him as a hand descended, caught him by the scruff of the neck, and raised him high in the air.

  His breath came out in a furious hiss as he dangled helplessly, his tail lashing in frustration. He tried to twist round, but he couldn’t bring his teeth or claws to bear on this stranger. All he caught was a glimpse of a hairy face, a smoky stink . . .

  And then a new voice started angrily shouting.

  *

  Sunny Coolidge scowled at the computer screen, sighing. The shopping cart software on the website still wasn’t working. And since online commerce was the lifeblood of the Maine Adventure X-perience—MAX for short—failure of the payment system meant big trouble. The upgrade for the shopping cart was supposed to fit in seamlessly, but now it wasn’t talking with the rest of the site.

  Just like one of those girls in middle school suddenly bullying kids she’s known since first grade, Sunny thought. And with about as much reason.

  She kept poking at the source code, but she couldn’t find the problem string. If she didn’t make any progress soon, she’d have to roll the whole site back to its previous configuration and hope that didn’t leave any exploitable security flaws.

  Good thing it’s a slow day, she thought. Tuesdays didn’t see a lot of tourist action in the dead of winter. Things would pick up a bit later in the week, with people booking romantic weekends in the local bed-and-breakfast scene. That’s why she’d taken the opportunity to install the new shopping cart and had spent the whole day trying to get it to play nicely with the rest of the site software—or at least notice it.

  Sudden noise outside brought her eyes from the screen to the big plate glass window at the front of the office, just in time to see a furry gray streak taking cover under a parked car.

  What’s Shadow gotten into this time? Sunny wondered.

  Her dad had already called earlier in the day with a missing cat alert. That had become all too common lately, Shadow hitching rides into town with her. Since he’d adopted her more than a year ago, Sunny knew the big gray cat was a
wanderer. But the situation had gotten a lot worse since an attractive nuisance had opened next door to the MAX office.

  Among his many business enterprises, Sunny’s boss, Oliver Barnstable, owned a bit of real estate here in Kittery Harbor. Specifically, he rented out the row of shops around the MAX office—the New Stores, as the locals called them, although they’d been built back when Sunny’s dad was a kid. Names tended to stick in Kittery Harbor—the folks were on the conservative side.

  But the space next door to MAX was a symbol of hope and change. Hopeful entrepreneurs opened businesses, failed, and the premises changed hands yet again. It had happened so often since Sunny started working that she had a hard time keeping count.

  When Neil Garret opened Kittery Harbor Fish, she’d worried about the smell, but figured it wouldn’t last long. Actually, Neil had kept the place spotless and odorless, keeping his stock on fresh ice or in a state-of-the-art walk-in freezer.

  Shadow, however, had caught a whiff when Sunny began coming home with fresh fish as a healthy alternative for her dad’s suppers. The cat had stowed away to find the source, shamelessly playing up to Neil as the fish merchant’s new best friend. Now he often went visiting the fish market in hopes of snagging himself a snack.

  When Sunny’s father called to say that Shadow wasn’t around, Sunny figured he’d snuck aboard her Wrangler for a ride into town—probably while she’d left it to warm up. Well, he got skunked this time, Sunny thought. I haven’t seen Neil at all today.

  Kittery Harbor Fish had survived longer than other tenants in that jinxed location, but lately Sunny had been seeing the signs—late openings, early closings. Today, it looked as if the store hadn’t opened at all.

  It didn’t bode well for the business. And it means that if Shadow hopes to score the occasional piece of fish, he’ll have to use his charms on me—provided he survives his latest adventure.

  Even as she thought that, Sunny rushed through the door and outside into the chilly weather to find an upset Zach Judson standing on the sidewalk. “Whatever he did, I’m sorry,” she told the shop owner.

  Zach turned, a look of surprise on his blunt features. “Nah. Shadow is innocent—for once.”

  Sunny had to smile. Zach had actually known Shadow longer than she had. Before the cat had settled with Sunny, Shadow often used to turn up at Judson’s Market, and probably a lot of other places around town, in hopes of a handout.

  Zach shrugged his massive shoulders, the product of years spent unloading food deliveries. “At least I didn’t have a problem with him, but somebody else may have. I stepped out of the store and spotted some guy grabbing your friend here.”

  As Zach spoke, a familiar face appeared from under a salt-splashed Chevy parked at the curb. Shadow still looked skittery and wild-eyed, scanning for possible enemies. But he must have recognized Zach’s deep voice. Then Shadow spotted Sunny, and his eyes went wide. She could see the conflict on his furry face, whether to run toward her or stay under the relative safety of the car. Slowly, he edged up onto the sidewalk and slunk his way toward Sunny. About halfway to her feet, he suddenly stopped, swiping out with his paw and hissing.

  “Whatcha got there, Shadow?” Zach bent to retrieve whatever had upset the cat. It seemed to be a piece of string or twine.

  “Maybe he’s catching a whiff of whoever grabbed him from that,” Sunny suggested. But her voice faltered as the string dangling from Zach’s fingers fell straight, to reveal a loop tied at the end—a crude but effective noose.

  2

  Sunny realized she was staring when Shadow came up and butted his forehead against her knee. Almost automatically, she bent and picked up the cat to cuddle him in her arms. “You don’t think the guy you saw was going to use that on Shadow?”

  Zach Judson frowned, holding out the noose. “It’s really short if he intended to use it for a leash.”

  Shadow twisted in Sunny’s arms, snarling and trying to lay a claw on the twine. Usually his response to a bit of string was a lot more playful, a mock pounce rather than a serious attempt at attack.

  “I guess you are smelling something there,” Sunny said, then shook her head.

  It’s not as though Shadow is going to give us a brief rundown and description of the creep.

  She saw the same thought must have struck Zach. “I didn’t get a good look at the guy. All I saw was a raincoat—maybe he had a beard.” He dug out a cell phone from the pocket of his heavy coat. “Anyway, I’m calling the cops.”

  Sunny carried Shadow to her office door. “I’ve got a plastic bag to hold that noose.” She gulped a little on the last word.

  Zach came in, and Sunny bagged the evidence. “If anyone comes, you know where to find me.”

  Sunny nodded. From early morning until closing time, Zach was at his market down on the far corner. She said good-bye to Zach and returned to her seat in front of the computer screen. Shadow immediately squirmed his way free and dropped to the floor, stalking around Sunny’s desk and hissing the occasional cat curse to vent his offended feelings.

  “I know how you feel,” Sunny told him as she began rolling back the MAX site software. It was pretty evident that she wouldn’t get the peace and quiet to do anything else.

  I wonder who’ll end up getting this call—if they send anybody, Sunny thought as she worked at the keyboard. Kittery Harbor was a pretty quiet town. But she wasn’t sure the local police would leap into action over someone messing with a cat.

  Maybe Ben Semple will turn up if the traffic is quiet in outlet-land. Ben usually patrolled the miles of outlet malls to the north of town. And since he was a friend of Sunny’s, he might stop by.

  But Sunny got a very different visitor. Her eyebrows rose in surprise when Will Price came through the office door. “Is this pleasure, or business?” she asked, looking up into his face. Sunny and Will were comrades in arms, dealing with all sorts of mysterious business since she’d returned to Kittery Harbor. And more recently, they’d finally wound up in each others’ arms. She knew what Will looked like when he was being romantic and when he was busy being a cop.

  “I’m going to go with business, then,” she said. “Don’t you think it’s a bit of overkill, having the sheriff’s chief investigator coming out over a case of possible animal abuse?”

  “Chief and only investigator,” Will said, stepping around Sunny’s question. His laugh came a beat too late. “I had some spare time. How’s the little guy doing?”

  A gray-furred face appeared from under Sunny’s desk, staring warily up at Will. Shadow usually got off to a rocky start with the men in Sunny’s life. But he’d come to accept Will being around. Now, though, the cat advanced with hesitant steps and dubious looks. But Shadow’s basic nosiness soon won out over caution. He went over to Will’s boots to give them a good sniff. Will chuckled. “For a second, I thought he didn’t recognize me.”

  “Well, he’s more used to seeing you in uniform,” Sunny said, smiling. Will’s promotion to plainclothes hadn’t just given him a new look. It put a strain on his wardrobe. When he took off his parka, Sunny saw he was wearing what she called his big date sports coat—a tweed hacking jacket he usually wore when he was taking her someplace nice. Besides that, he had two courtroom jackets for when he was called to testify and a pair of wedding and funeral/interview suits. Even though the area was crammed with outlet malls, Will hadn’t blown his new raise on additional work clothes. Sunny approved of that. Whenever she made hurried purchases, she usually regretted them.

  Besides, a lot of the stuff available in the outlet stores featured so much shiny polyester, Sunny was amazed the items didn’t slide right off their hangers. Will only bought some heavy trousers and additional dress shirts there. She’d contributed a new tie that she’d given him as a Christmas present. She smiled as she noticed he was wearing it now—although the smile slipped a little when she found he had already gotten a mark
on it.

  Will sank into the visitor’s chair across the desk from Sunny, smiling when Shadow stretched up to put both paws on his knee. “So you know who I am now, huh, little buddy? What have you been up to that someone wants to string you up?”

  He dropped his grin when he saw the look on Sunny’s face. “Guess that wasn’t as funny as I thought it was.”

  “I think hearing it out loud finally made the idea sink in,” she admitted, reaching into her desk drawer and bringing out the bagged noose. “Here’s the evidence.”

  Inquisitive as ever, Shadow watched as Sunny passed the bag to Will. But he didn’t have any dramatic reaction to it. “He just about pitched a fit when we found it outside,” she said. “Maybe Shadow smelled his attacker on the string.”

  Will examined the loop. “No chance of getting fingerprints from this,” he said. “And I don’t think we can take Shadow around to give the sniff test to everyone in town. What can you tell me about the perpetrator?”

  Well, now he sounds as if he’s taking this seriously, Sunny thought. Too bad there’s nothing much I can tell him.

  “I was working on the MAX website. Ollie the Barnacle doesn’t pay me to stare out the window. Zach Judson was coming out of his store and noticed that Shadow was in trouble.”

  “They were in front of Judson’s Market?”

  “No,” Sunny replied. “The problem was next door, at the fish market.”

  That brought another off reaction from Will. He hadn’t been delighted to find an attractive older guy setting up shop next door to Sunny’s office. Not that Neil had done anything for Will to complain about. He’d been polite and pleasant, not flirtatious at all. But Sunny hadn’t mentioned that to Will. She figured possible competition would keep him on his toes. Instead, it seemed to make Will frown and think.

  “You don’t suppose that Zach and Neil are still mixing it up, do you?” she asked. “I mean, Zach did complain to Ollie when Neil opened his store, saying it was competition.”