Politics Makes Strange Deadfellows Ebook by Jane DiLucchio

Author:Jane DiLucchio [DiLucchio, Jane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

When I returned to my car, I checked my emails and found a reply from Carlotti as well as Highland Medical. I texted Carlotti that I’d meet her in ten minutes. I emailed Highland and set the appointment for an hour and a half from now. I hoped that would give me both time for travel and time to wheedle information from Carlotti.

Carlotti’s dark eyes glared at me from across her desk. When my first questions concerned her connection with Dr. Sloan and the members of Animals First, she growled at me. “There’s no way I’m giving you our membership list. The police needed to get a court order before I gave it to them. You’ll have to do the same. And good luck with that. And why are you asking all this? Are you related to Sloan or something? I thought you were here about the ground squirrels. If not, the door is behind you.”

I handed over the draft of my proposal. While she read through it, I stood and wandered around the small office. Several framed Santa Barbara News Press articles hung on the wall. One proclaimed the founding of Animals First and displayed a picture of homeless kittens rather than one of the board of directors or the founder. I found that to be in character for the antisocial Carlotti. Another one showed a protest march at Shoreline Park that Animals First organized. A few local dignitaries marched along with the protesters. A color photo drew me to the next article. It detailed the organization’s successful rescue of a mountain lion orphaned by the wildfires that consumed the hills above Santa Barbara four years before. The photo was of a group of volunteers gathered around a trap from which the recovered cat was being released back into the wild. A tall blonde stood in the back row. I squinted, trying to make out her features, but all the people were looking down at the fleeing cougar.

“Do you have the original of this photograph?” I asked Carlotti, jolting her out of her perusal of my proposal.

She glared at me. “Why would I? The newspaper guy took it, not me. Why are you interested, anyway?”

I tapped my finger on the photo. “This looks like my sister-in-law.”

“Don’t touch that,” she snapped. She limped her way over to the picture. Her eyes followed my finger to the back row of people, then she glanced at me. “What’s her name?”

“Michelle. Michelle Mazer.”

“Not her.”

“She sometimes goes by Shelly. She’s missing and we’re trying to find any leads we can about her.”

“Still not her.” Carlotti reached across the desk and hefted the papers I’d given her. “You did a pretty decent job with the proposal. Not exactly the methods I would have chosen, but I guess you’d lose your job if you suggested everyone on the Mesa move out of their homes and close the cliffs to the public.” She handed me the proposal. “Good luck finding your sister-in-law. It’s a dangerous world for women.

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