Кэрол Дуглас - Cat In A Topaz Tango

“The usual death threats so far.”

“Yes, that is quite usual these days. Well, Mr. Midnight—”

“I do not stand on formalities. Call me Louie.”

“Very well, Louie. I am working right now and must be on my appointed rounds.”

“‘Appointed rounds’? Surely you are not delivering mail?”

Her laugh is an entrancing burst of soft purrs. “No, no. Nothing so mundane. I am to cover the floor and show myself.”

“You are not being put on parade like a showgirl!”

“I am a showgirl, Louie,” she responds, patting my cheek with velvet paw. “I appear nightly at the Sandbox Lounge in the hotel, with the house magician.”

I stiffen. (Not that way!) The evil Hyacinth, the late Shangri-La’s feline assistant, had hitched her star to the only Asian female magician in Vegas.

“My main job,” she goes on, “is to stroll around with my necklace of amber-colored jewels. I am a walking special offer. The hotel’s guests can earn free chips, a dinner, a lodgings discount or other prizes by spotting me on my rounds and unfastening a pendant jewel from my collar.”

I would like to unfasten her collar! “So your work is promotional?”

“Purely.”

“I see your mistress is clever indeed and that I must not detain you longer, no matter how much I might wish to, as your job is to be mobile.”

“You are so . . . intuitive, Louie. I do like a sensitive male. I hope our paths cross again.”

“I am sure they will. And if a feline chap were to snag one of your valuable dangles—?”

“He would return it. For, alas, only humans can redeem the pendants for rewards.”

“Oh, I think there would rewards aplenty for an enterprising feline PI.”

“Just between you and I—”

I lean inward, not about to correct the grammar wafting from that honeyed breath.

“One of the faux pendants they place on my collar each morning is not just crystal, but a precious jewel. And the reward for finding that is major.”

I think for a moment, which is a considerable challenge, under the circumstances, as you may imagine.

“‘A precious jewel.’ Perhaps a jewel as precious as your name?”

“And what would that be, Louie?”

I am about to display my precious deductive gift.

“It is a gemstone,” I say, watching the flash of an appreciative gleam in her glorious golden eyes, “often having others substituted for itself: plain citrine, even lowly smoky quartz. But the true stone is worth a thousand times the lesser stones’ value, and ranges through a divine rainbow of warm gilt colors, from faintest dawn gold to the warm, ruddy sherry of sunset, and it is called ‘precious topaz,’ as are you.

“It has been a pleasure to meet you, Miss Topaz. I trust it will not be the last occasion.”

I am rewarded by the sight of her almost invisible airy black eyebrow vibrissae lilting high in shock and pleasure at my correct prediction of her name. I bow and back away.

Midnight Louie knows when to leave them laughing, and, more important, when to leave them swooning.

Brothers, Where

Art Thou?

It nearly killed Temple to wake up early the next morning. This was Sunday, the day of the first live evening show but she doubted Matt would miss mass.

She ached to trail the cop side of the undercover team, but she knew Zoe Chloe Ozone needed to hang with her “peeps,” the four teen girls dancing with the barely older singing sensations, Los Hermanos Brothers.

The boy band’s name was redundant, hermanos being the Spanish word for brothers, but Temple supposed record and TV moguls liked the spin of a bilingual name.

The brothers themselves, ranging from twelve to sixteen, were reassuring both to their adoring fans and their mothers, and even to Temple.

Early showbiz exposure and training had made them smooth and creamy tween idols. They all had the cheeky, choirboy innocence of the young Bobby Dylan, not that it meant that they were. Nowadays, though, looks were everything.

Each girl had her soundproof mini-rehearsal “room.” Ekaterina was unique in having her own “manager,” Mariah.

Temple imagined Mama Molina was as thrilled as she was that Mariah and EK were joined at the hip for this competition. Official nerves were as tight-strung as the high E-string on a guitar about the junior competition members’ safety with reports of the Barbie Doll Killer elsewhere as well as the usual Cloaked Conjuror worries.

Los Hermanos Brothers made millions and the girl contestants were invaluable as the ordinary members of the community who were getting a gazillion-dollar chance to turn pro. Anything bad happening in this neighborhood was a disaster.

Temple donned Zoe Chloe makeup and clothes, which took an hour over a room service tray, and headed for the theater area. Things were getting serious. Maybe that’s why Midnight Louie had donned his best ears-perked attitude and came along like a lamb in his tote-bag transport.

He even proudly wore the silver collar trailing a bib of rainbow-colored heart-shaped beads Temple had made from an overdone ankle bracelet she found at the nearest dollar store. Well, he wore it without bucking out from under it and scratching it with the massive scimitars of his hind claws once Temple had explained that they all had to suffer through abominable articles of clothing to make this undercover operation work.

Louie’s aloof green eyes had then surveyed Molina’s Woodstock tie-dyed headband, Rafi’s leather vest and Navajo shirt, Temple’s Goth fingerless spiderweb gloves, navy-blue-painted finger and toe-nails, and skunk-striped pantyhose, then leaped for cover in the depths of her zebra tote bag, his collar strands clicking like mini-castanets or Chihuahua toenails on a kitchen floor.

All four girl contestants were in EK’s and Mariah’s “rehearsal room,” sitting on the wooden portable dancing floor in frog posture with their ankles together and their knees splayed flat as if they didn’t have a joint or sinew or protesting muscle in their bodies.

Louie jumped down to join them, getting copious oohs and aahs and pettings.

Zoe Chloe elected to perch pixielike on a nearby ladder, so as not to overstress her knees. Jumping down would be so much more graceful than jumping up from the cold, hard floor.

“That José Juarez is hot!” the black girl named Patrisha opined.

“So is Captain Jack!” a blond girl breathed.

It took Temple a millisecond to realize they were referencing the metrosexual Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean . She blinked at the advanced level of sophistication of young girls today. She’d never dreamed she’d be behind the curve ball at thirty.

For a moment, she ardently sympathized with Molina, who must be at least seven years older than she, and only a decade away from being able to sit on the floor. At all.

Watching the four competitors sink bonelessly to the floor and let their hair down was amazing. They chattered away, ignoring her now that Zoe Chloe was just another semi-adult supervisor.

EK’s doe-eyed, sallow look made her seem as wary as a starving alley cat. Skateboarder Patrisha’s elongated ebony frame was pertly elegant. She seemed a likelier candidate for a supermodel contest than this gig. Meg-Ann was a soccer star, big-boned, strong, and determined. Her long brown ponytail and sunshine-spawned freckles gave her tomboy appeal. And, of course, there was the perfect, cool, spoiled blond girl wearing the latest fads and destined to be prom queen, if nothing else: Sou-Sou Smith.

“What we really need to decide,” Sou-Sou said with a toss of her highlighted hair, “is who has the hottest Hermanos brother. I vote for my partner, Dustin. His sideburns just radiate sex.”