“I can’t see his balcony through those overachiever palm trees growing from your patio,” Phoebe explained.
“And what makes you think Mr. Madison will come out on his balcony this particular morning?”
“’Cause the weather’s nice?” Phoebe sagged a bit. “All right, so it’s not a great plan. Got a better one?”
“Hmm.” Frannie distributed the cat food among her herd of felines, her brow furrowed in thought. Then she smiled. “Ah, I know. This will be great.”
Phoebe watched, curious, as Frannie selected among her pets one half-grown Siamese kitten. She picked it up and cuddled it, though it protested at being taken away from the food. “Igor loves to climb trees, don’t you, baby?” She grabbed a can of cat treats from the top of the refrigerator and headed toward the back of her apartment. “Follow me.”
Phoebe couldn’t wait to see what her resourceful neighbor had planned. Frannie made it a point to know everything about everybody who lived in Mesa Blue, their condo complex. But Wyatt Madison, who was house-sitting while his grandparents were away on a month-long cruise, had proved quite a challenge. No one had seen him. All they knew about him was that he’d moved recently from Chicago to Phoenix to produce a nationally syndicated talk show, “Heads Up,” and that his grandparents thought he walked on water.
“You’ll be sweet to Wyatt, won’t you?” 80-year-old Helen Madison had asked, as Phoebe helped her with the last-minute packing for her European cruise, the vacation she and her husband Rolland had planned for years. “He’s such a dear, but he needs some, er, female guidance, if you know what I mean.”
Precisely the reason Phoebe was so curious about the man.
“You know,” Frannie said as she led the way through the living room and to her large patio, where a couple more cats lazed in the sun, “I don’t blame you for trying to meet Wyatt before any of the other girls in this building get their hooks in him. It’s about time you took an interest in romance.”
Phoebe laughed. “I’m not interested in romance with Wyatt Madison. Please!” She’d sworn off men for the foreseeable future.
“Don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it,” Frannie said, batting her eyelashes. “Nothing makes a woman feel young and gorgeous like an attentive man. Of course, I guess that doesn’t apply to you. You’re already young and gorgeous.”
“It’s the burden I live with,” Phoebe quipped, though she was half serious.
“Anyway, if you’re not out to jump his bones—”
“I’m just curious, Frannie,” Phoebe said with a laugh. Actually, she was interested in Wyatt’s romantic potential. But not for herself. One of her best friends, Daisy Redford, who lived on the second floor, had a ticking biological clock. Phoebe and her other best friend, Elise Foster, had pledged to help Daisy find her man. They were leaving no stone unturned—even if it meant going along with some wacky scheme of Frannie’s.
Frannie stood at the back of the patio, set the cat down, opened the can of cat treats, and let Igor have a sniff. “Yummy, yummy,” she said. Then she took a morsel from the can and lobbed it up toward the third floor—toward Wyatt’s balcony.
“You aren’t serious!” Phoebe said, laughing. “This won’t work!”
“Just watch.”
It took her a few tries, but Frannie had an admirable hook shot. Eventually a piece of the treat actually landed on Wyatt’s balcony. And the cat, watching carefully, saw it.
Frannie held the cat next to the trunk of a palm tree that grew straight up from her patio to the third floor. Igor immediately got the idea. He sank his claws into the tree and, with his goal firmly in mind, started to climb.
“How did you know he would do that?” Phoebe asked.
“Like I said, Igor loves climbing trees. He also always gets stuck. Now we have a perfect excuse to knock on the mysterious Mr. Madison’s door.”
Phoebe and Frannie watched long enough to feel certain the sure-footed feline would complete his mission, then scurried up to the third floor themselves, though they chose to use the stairs.
Phoebe’s heart thumped as they approached Wyatt’s door. “This is kind of dishonest, don’t you think?”
“Of course not. The cat is stuck, or he will be shortly. How else would I get him down?” Frannie stopped before the door and knocked smartly.
“Who is it?” a deep, oddly muffled-sounding voice asked from the other side.
“It’s your neighbors, Frannie and Phoebe,” Frannie said brightly.
“Come on in,” the voice beckoned. “Door’s unlocked.”
Frannie didn’t hesitate. Phoebe followed her inside, and both of them looked around for the source of the voice.
“Mr. Madison?” Frannie called.
“In the kitchen.”
The women followed the sound of the voice into the kitchen, and Phoebe stifled a gasp as she laid eyes on the most delightful set of male buns she’d ever seen. It quickly became apparent why Wyatt’s voice had been muffled. He had his head and shoulders buried under the kitchen sink.
“I’m right in the middle of something,” he said, pleasantly enough. “If I let go, I’ll flood the whole kitchen. Can I help you?”
Frannie, her gaze riveted on that wonderful butt covered with snug, faded denim, couldn’t seem to articulate an answer. Phoebe jumped in.
“We’re really sorry to bother you, but Frannie’s cat seems to have climbed up a tree by your balcony, and now he’s stuck. We thought you could get him down for us.”
“I, um, can’t right now.” Wyatt seemed to be wrestling with a stubborn pipe or something. His muscles bulged as he applied pressure to a wrench. The wrench slipped. “Ouch. Damn it! Um, ’scuse me.”
“How long do you think you’ll be?”
“At the rate I’m going? Hours. Why don’t you go on back to my balcony and see if you can get the cat yourself?”
That wasn’t the plan! Phoebe looked at Frannie, who shrugged helplessly. “I guess we can try,” Phoebe said. With luck, the cat would be too high or too low for them to reach.
Phoebe tried to take everything in, searching for clues to Wyatt’s personality as she and Frannie headed for the French doors that led out to the balcony. But the apartment looked almost identical to the way it had before the elder Madisons had left—tastefully decorated, accented with a few souvenirs from their travels around the world. Wyatt hadn’t put much of a stamp on the place.
When they stepped outside, a veritable jungle of plants greeted them. Helen had quite the green thumb, and she nurtured everything from ferns to cacti on her roomy terrace. They all looked happy and healthy, as if Wyatt was taking good care of them. He probably was, too, knowing how unhappy Helen would be if any of her darlings expired during her vacation.
Phoebe noticed a couple of new additions, two huge potted cactus plants. Then she spotted Igor perched in the top of a palm tree—at shoulder level, perfectly within reach of either woman. Rats. He mewed pitifully, and Frannie plucked him out of the tree and cuddled him. “Oh, poor baby. Mama played a mean trick on you, didn’t she, pushing you up that tree when she knew you’d get stuck. Let’s go home and get a treat.”
“I guess we can’t linger out here without arousing suspicion,” Phoebe agreed.
They stopped in the kitchen on the way out. Wyatt was still busily engaged with his plumbing. Well, at least they’d discovered he had a nice rear and a pleasant voice.
“Did