PRUSSIAN IN PERIL

A PEPPER AND OSIRIS MYSERY

BOOK 2

DAPHNE HUNT

CONTENTS

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

About the Author

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

Copyright © 2022 by Lauren Smith

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ISBN: 978-1-956227-12-3 (e-book edition)

ISBN: 978-1-956227-13-0 (trade paperback edition)

PROLOGUE

Grand-Hôtel du Cap Ferrat – France

Osiris

There is something about the sun and the French Riviera. It hits one’s fur differently than the sun in England. No matter how bright the light is, it doesn’t seem to burn, nor is it too cold and pale so that it fails to warm you. The sunlight here was a cat’s dream.

And I was fortunate enough to enjoy it from my perch on the railing overlooking the sea at the Grand-Hôtel du Cap Ferrat. I couldn’t resist letting out a satisfied purr as I closed my eyes halfway, embracing the utter perfection of the sunlight and the sound of the waves. As much as cats don’t like to be in water, we do like to be near it.

Behind me, the low conversational murmurs of my two humans carried across the terrace.

Lucas Havers, my male human, had brought me along on his courtship of his human female, Pepper Park, who I fondly referred to as the American. My Lucas is a Brit. And me? I’m a purebred Egyptian Mau, straight from the pyramids of Giza. Lucas’s father brought me to England when I was a kitten, so I’m a Brit too in some ways, I suppose.

But you don’t want to hear about all that. No, what you’re looking for is a tale of kidnapping, deception, and murder most foul, one which destroyed the tranquility of our vacation.

On this particular day while I was enjoying the sunshine, I heard a strange sort of gurgling sound, like the sound the small koi make in my pond back home whenever they come too close to the surface and I give them a good wallop. It’s a fishy sound, but somehow in this place, it makes my fur stand on end because there are no fish nearby, no fish at all. I had checked when I first arrived.

Unable to deny my curiosity, I am a cat after all, I leaped down from the railing and slipped through the marble spindles of the balcony to jump down to the gardens below.

“Osiris!” Lucas called my name in alarm, but I was too focused to reassure him I would return. I followed the gurgling sound until I reached a private pool that abutted one of the hotel’s first floor suites.

The sound stopped, and I soon realized why. A body, a human one, was floating in the water, face down. Beside the edge of the pool was a lavender ribbon, torn with bits of short blue gray fur tangled in it. It was fur I recognized by sight, but as I crept closer, I also recognized by scent.

Sophie. My darling Sophie. The beautiful Russian Blue, so endearingly called “The Prussian” by the humans. The sweet scent of my lovely Sophie clung to the ribbon. What was Sophie’s ribbon doing here?

I studied the body floating in the pool again. It seemed death had found me here in this beautiful, sunny place.

A moment later, a sharp cry sounded from behind. Pepper had followed me. She was always worried I would wander off and get lost. What foolishness. Cats don’t get lost, we simply get distracted by adventures and occasionally forget to come home.

“Osiris!” Pepper scooped me up in her arms and I purred loudly, attempting to reassure the poor girl. She was still a little jumpy about cats in general, but since I’d adopted her, I was determined to get rid of that fear. She suddenly realized there was a body in the pool and shrieked. “Oh God! Help! Lucas! Someone, help!”

The poor woman’s screams drilled into my brain and I struggled to get free of her. She could be reassured after she chose to calm down.

“What’s the matter?” Lucas rushed across the pool deck then skidded to a stop as he saw the body before him.

“Not again,” he muttered, eyes wide.

My nose twitched and my whiskers quivered as I sniffed the air, seeking undercurrents beyond the growing stench of death. It seemed I had another job to do, another murder to solve, if I was ever going to enjoy my French Riviera sunbathing.

Whoever dared to mess with my vacation would find themselves as shredded as the library curtains when I had a fussy afternoon. Oh yes, this murderer, whoever they were, would rue the day. I’m descended from pharaoh cats you see… and nothing gets by me, the descendent of an ancient cat kings and queens. I would find the murderer. But I am getting ahead of myself. So much happened before this…

1

One Week Earlier…

Pepper

I can hardly believe it’s been four months since I met Lucas Havers and Osiris, the Egyptian Mau which had once belonged to Lucas’s father. I had come all the way to England to stay at an airbnb for a much needed break from my work as a foreclosure attorney in Oklahoma. The next thing I know, I was knee-deep in solving the murder of Lucas’s father.

I may have gotten Lucas arrested… by accident, but thankfully I also proved him innocent. Then we shared an amazing kiss and made a promise to stay in touch, which we did. Now I am here in the French Riviera with him, and Osiris, of course.

I’m getting better about cats. I’m not what you’d call a cat person, but Osiris is definitely growing on me. It doesn’t hurt that his owner is absolutely gorgeous. Lucas is thirty, with blond hair and light brown eyes, and he’s wonderfully tall. He has that delightful British bad boy swagger mixed with a quiet, almost boyish charm that makes me such a sucker for him.

We decided to take this thing between us slow, and I like that, I just turned twenty-eight and I finally feel like I’m learning who I am and what I want out of life. And after I solved Nicholas’s Havers’s murder, I realized something. I liked solving the crime and putting the bad guy behind bars. It was a rush unlike anything I’d ever felt before.

So now I’m working at my District Attorney’s Office instead of at foreclosure firm. And I’m good at it. Really good. So good that my boss has given me some extra vacation time. That’s how I end up in the lobby of the most beautiful hotel in the French Riviera, with Lucas at my side.

“This place is perfect. Seriously perfect.”

Lucas grinned. “I’m glad you like it. I came here last year and fell in love with the place.” Lucas was wearing jeans and a white button-up shirt, which made him look so relaxed compared to the usual tailored suits that he wore. I was a little more casual with jean shorts and a nice blouse top. I felt a bit out of place, considering that most of the people that worked at the hotel were dressed in clothes that came right off the fashion runways of Milan.

“Let’s check in. You’ll love the seaside suite I booked. The view is incredible.”

I rolled my suitcase beside me as I followed Lucas to the front desk. Osiris gave a soft meow from the carrier Lucas had slung over his shoulder. The silver and black striped cat stared at me with golden eyes through the mesh side of his carrier.

“The hotel really lets you bring pets?” I asked in a whisper as we crossed the lobby.

Lucas chuckled. “When you pay over €6000 a night, they let you bring anything.”

I choked at the price. “Six—? Lucas, that’s too much—”

“Pepper, please let me do this for us. I want this week to be memorable. I never do anything fun with my money.” He winked at me and, just like that, I gave in. Yeah, I had a serious weakness when it came to Lucas.

I turned my focus to the lobby itself, wanting to immerse myself in every splendid detail. The walls and ceiling were bright white and the floor beneath was a pale marble so polished it was almost mirrorlike. A small circular glass table decorated with fresh-cut flowers surrounded by white cloth armchairs was in the center of the lobby. Above it was a tall glass cage chandelier that glittered with silver along the edges.

An older woman, perhaps in her late seventies, sat in one of the chairs, a fancy cane resting across her lap. Her gray hair was pulled up into a chignon. She stared off into space regally, her face devoid of any expression. I followed her gaze to see a young couple who had just entered the resort behind us.

The woman was perhaps a few years younger than me, maybe twenty-three or twenty-four years old. She was pretty in an ethereal sort of way with a delicate face, pale blonde hair and gray eyes. She hung on the arm of a dark-haired, dark-eyed man who was perhaps a year or two older than Lucas. They were a beautiful couple and their clothes were the height of fashion. It was clear that they came from money. The closer they got, the colder the old woman’s face became. I glanced between them, more than a little confused by her clear dislike of the couple.

Another man in his mid-twenties with sandy blonde hair and hazel eyes came up behind the old woman, his attention also fixed on the young couple. There was a longing in this man’s eyes as the woman passed by on the arm of the other man.

The woman then noticed him and suddenly smiled, pulling free of her dark-haired companion.

“Well, if it isn’t Archie Fordham!” The woman rushed over and hugged the man before she realized the older woman was there with him. “And Lady Fordham, how lovely to see you.”

“Genevieve dear, so nice to see you.” Lady Fordham said politely, but her eyes were hard as they flicked over to the dark-haired man who’d continued on toward the front desk where Lucas and I were standing, where the hotel manager greeted him.

“Ahh, Monsieur DeLuca.”

“Etienne, I’ll take my usual suite,” Mr. DeLuca said with a casual arrogance that rubbed me the wrong way. I came from a small town, and wasn’t from family money. I would never get used to people who seem to think they owned the world. Lucas was rich, seriously rich, but he didn’t act like he owned the world. Perhaps that was because he’d earned a lot of his money. It hadn’t all be an inheritance from his father.

“Oh, but I am so sorry, Monsieur. DeLuca. I did not know you are coming to stay with us. I am afraid that suite is booked.” The manager glanced at Lucas and I, clearly flustered. Lucas had already paid for our suite and was putting his credit card back in his wallet when DeLuca noticed.

“That is not acceptable Etienne,” DeLuca said. His Italian accent was charming, but there was an edge to it I didn’t like. Neither did the manager, it seemed. Etienne frowned at him, but kept his good manners.

“I’m afraid it’s gone, but I do have the poolside suite—”

“No. Give me the palace seaside suite.” DeLuca demanded, his voice raising an octave and drawing the focus of everyone in the lobby. Lucas seemed all too aware that we had the suite this man so clearly wanted.

“Pepper, I have our keys,” Lucas murmured to me. “Why don’t we go on up?”

DeLuca stepped directly in our path. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

Lucas raised one eyebrow and challenge. “I suppose it is us. Sorry old boy, better luck next time.”