Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In A White Tie And Tails

“Meanwhile,” she notes, “Mr. Max has been out on the town performing acts of derring-do that threaten to undo his precarious healing process. Can you say the same?”

“My acts of derring-do have threatened to undo other entities’ healing processes. It is the Chicago Outfit, zero; and Midnight Louie, two.”

I push closer, not to get cozy, mind you, but to exchange privileged information.

“I am happy to hear you have been sticking closer to Mr. Max than a coat of black graffiti spray paint while I have been transported across state lines to eavesdrop on some amateur episodes of The Old and the Restless. My Miss Temple and Mr. Matt are a done deal, whether you or I like it or not. What would occasion Mr. Max to greet the network-approved lovebirds on their return to the nest? He does not live here anymore.”

“He is lucky to be alive and not-living somewhere six feet under after last night.”

“Last night? There was some more hot homicidal action in town while I was gone? No!”

Miss Louise takes this moment to admonish a possibly verminous intruder on her back forty. Or she could be allergic to something, like me.

“Well?” I demand, gently tapping her shoulder.

She responds to my friendly overture by swatting my mitt to the pavement. “First tell me what went down in Chicago.”

“The usual. We prepare to fly. I am the VIP of airport security in Miss Temple’s admittedly sissy poodle portage bag.”

“‘Por tahge ’?”

“That is French for ‘transportation,’” I respond airily, waving my posterior plume de ma tante for emphasis. It always distracts Miss Midnight Louise when I talk à la the Divine Yvette, my Persian petite.

“I am the object of a kidnapping attempt at the moment of our arrival in O’Hare,” I say vehemently, nipping at the vermin that left her for higher-end pastures.

At this she hoots. Well, she rolls over on the ground exposing her soft underbelly with no fear, as if I were a bunny rabbit instead of Chicago muscle.

“They were obviously after your carrier,” she manages to mew between rude snorts.

“Actually, that is too true,” I admit. “Airport security suspected I was acting as a mule for smuggled celebrity fine jewelry. Unfortunately, the only fine jewelry my Miss Temple owns is the engagement ring on her finger and an MIA opal ring in her notorious scarf drawer. No, Louise,” I add. “They were after me as a means to information hidden by Mr. Matt’s louse of a late stepfather, Mr. Cliff Effinger, in goods held by his widow, Miss Matt Mama in Chicago.”

By now she is again upright and skeptical. “So these Chicago hoods believed someone would give up valuable info to save your hide?”

“Not ‘someone.’ My Miss Temple.”

“That I can believe. You have become a kept cat on her account, so I do not doubt some schmaltzy unnatural link holds you two together.”

I am not about to defend my personal life to one who scorns the human–feline bond while maintaining quite a crush, if you ask me, on Mr. Max Kinsella.

Meanwhile, Miss Midnight Louise is chewing on my revelations, suiting word to act by gnawing on a loose nail sheath, reminding me of my brilliant ruse with the rusted carpenter nails and the crooks.

“I am afraid,” she finally admits, lifting her head to spit out the sheath, “that Mr. Max has seen plain evidence this very weekend that Mr. Cliff Effinger’s bizarre death by drowning on the old Oasis Hotel pirate ship attraction is not a closed case, but one of interest to various sinister elements around town. I followed him on two expeditions to the Oasis to check on the Effinger drowning site and the last one was nearly fatal to him, if not Mr. Rafi and me.”

“Hmm,” I say judiciously. Acting judicious gives one time to think. “Are you saying that Midnight Investigations, Inc., might be forced to indulge in some wet work?”

“I am saying that our job wrangling the private and public part of our human associates’ lives will have to get messy before we can be sure the right people come out of this mess alive.”

Chapter 33

Temple’s Table of Crime Elements

“Nice place,” Max said, prowling around behind Matt’s red suede sofa. “Should I recognize it?”

“Not at all,” Temple said.

They’d “convened” at Matt’s apartment. Her suggestion. It held no unsettling memories for Max to unpackage. Matt would be on his own territory. She was the most adaptable person present.

Max finally settled his long frame on one of the upholstered side chairs, leaving Temple and Matt the sofa.

“How’d you end up at the Oasis pirate ship attraction?” Matt asked.

“Gandolph—” Max paused to eye Matt. “You know better than I remember that he was my former stage partner in Europe and mentor at counterterrorism work for half my life. I suppose he was my spiritual father.”

Max’s blue eyes had become soft-focus as he looked inward, a new habit for the Max Temple had known. “He’s the only person I still feel … felt a real personal link with.”

Temple couldn’t stop her eyes from flashing to meet Matt’s at the same moment. Max’s insight and declaration, if accurate, cleared away a ton of emotional sand traps looming between Temple’s former and current fiancées.

Max was still figuring out his reactions. “He’d been born Garry Randolph. I keep calling him by his stage name as a magician and his civilian name interchangeably. Maybe it’s because I’ve lost part of my mind.” He made a humorous grimace. “Or maybe it’s because I can’t separate what he meant to me.”

“He needs no further introduction here,” Matt said. “I get spiritual fathers. I also get very unspiritual faux fathers, like Cliff Effinger. You know, if that Oasis drowning case ceases being ‘cold,’ this new death there could make me a suspect again in Effinger’s death.”

Max shook his head. “Don’t worry. I’ve managed to bollix things up so much that right now Rafi Nadir is a likeliest suspect for the latest death at the Oasis. And Molina might be eager to buy that because it takes him out of the running for joint custody for her daughter. Fortunately, the probable victim vanished.”

“Why is Rafi involved?” Temple asked. “You’ve said he was a good guy. So any personal bones Molina had to pick with him are not relevant?”

“I say that because Gandolph secretly hired Nadir as our Vegas backup. Even I didn’t know about that. When I crashed, Rafi was on-site at the Neon Nightmare as a security man. He was really there to keep an eye on me. When I went down, he was in instant touch so Gandolph could have me spirited away by fake EMTs, which covered up the murder attempt and made my apparent death convincing.”

“Gandolph has been way more central to all this than we suspected,” Temple told Matt. “The Synth has been looking like some lame woo-woo group of delusional magicians pretending to be powerful occultists lately, but Gandolph’s ‘retirement’ years were spent unmasking fraudulent mediums. Apparently, he still took the Synth seriously.”

Max bestirred himself on the upholstered chair, a sign that his battered frame was revitalizing. “Parts of it. The Synth is not a united front.”

“How do you know?” Temple asked.