Carole douglas - Cat in an Indigo Mood

You would think these were still the Reagan years.

Max rearranged himself facing away from the TV to do some leg lifts. After the first couple of lifts, he paused to add an extra twenty pounds of weight.

"Another death overnight . . ." the male anchor was droning. ". . . the dead stripper--"

Max turned so fast to face the TV that he felt the sudden burn of a neck spasm. Wouldn't you know he would get a sports injury watching television---

". . . has been identified as Cher Smith. She was making her first appearance at Baby Doll's last night when she" was killed."

The screen flashed the color photo from Cher's driver's license.

Max stared at the TV long after the cheerful female anchor's impeccably made-up face had replaced the pathetic assembly-line photo of a face he had first seen only thirty-six hours ago.

He knew his hand was absently massaging his twisted neck, but he couldn't feel anything, pain or relief, only numbing disbelief.

And then anger.

He got up so fast the suspended weights crashed to ground zero like a freight train hitting a metal wall.

Even the harsh sound couldn't penetrate his almost self- hypnotic state.

Furious, and thinking furiously, he only knew he needed more information--fast. He had always needed more information, he realized with the sick certainty of hindsight, and Molina, damn her, had not seen fit to give it to him.

"She would now. Whether she saw fit or not.

Chapter 49

Three for the Railroaded

"Temple. I must see you. Right away."

"Max! Well, sure, but--"

"I'm sorry, l can': explain over the phone. It's a matter of life and death. Don't worry." he added bitterly. "It's all over. Both the life and the death. You've got to help me."

"Max, l will. Your place or--?"

"Yours. Getting myself there will distract me. Twenty minutes."

He hung up, and Temple stared at the receiver.

Something terrible had happened.

She glanced at her watch. Getting there might distract Max, but what could she do to make the minutes fly? She went over to the tape machine and rewound it. She'd started recording Matt's show, having missed the really important one, his debut. Nothing like recording the horse's hooves after it had tap-danced out of the barn.

But now was as good a time as any to see--nay, hear--what Mr. Midnight was all about.

Temple sat cross-legged on the floor by the machine, still in the living room where Matt had played the fateful first tape from Ambrosia only a week ago, and listened.

Listening to talk-radio counseling was like eavesdropping, she five minutes into the tape.

That illicit act was doubly enthralling for being able to hear Matt's counseling technique.

Knowing him, she didn't quite know him as radio shrink, but he sounded good, and his advice seemed sound, and, from the number of female callers he got, Ambrosia had been right that she had needed to provide something for the girls.

No life and death fireworks animated last night's tape. Temple's concentration broke. Life and death. Whose life and death were "all over," and why was Max so upset?

She clenched her hands and sneaked a peak at her watch, which she had resolved to ignore.

Ten minutes gone; ten more to endure. Just close her eyes and listen to Matt. . . . Max would Be here when he said he would. He knew the road time between her place and his the way a good magician knew his illusions down to the split second.

One knock. Imperative. On the dot. Twenty minutes.

Temple unwound herself--ouch; her left leg had gone to sleep... hobbled to the door.

Max sprang in when she opened it like a jack-in-the-box desperately seeking release.

"I could strangle Molina," he confessed, starting to pace in her hallway and continuing into the living room. "You've got to explain that dame to me. I thought I was playing a genteel game of chess with her, and now she's made me into a murderer."

"Max, for God's sake! Calm down. Sit down." Temple hustled to keep pace with seven-league strides back and forth in the living room.

"What's the matter with you?" He stared at her leg as if it were a prime-suspect. "Are you hurt? Is there something you're hiding from me? You weren't attacked too?"

"Only by pins and needles."

"And what have you got on the air?"

"A tape. Of Matt's show."

Max finally stopped still to stare at her, as if she were mad.

"Matt Devine."

"I know his last name."

"He's on the radio."

"Well, then turn him off. We need to talk."

Temple hastened to do exactly that. "About Molina?" she asked while on the run . . .or limp, rather.

Max was striding hack and forth again, running nervous fingers through his hair. His hair.

"Max, what on earth did you do to your hair?"

He stared at her as if "hair" were a foreign word, then his agitation collapsed into despair.

He sank onto the sofa, driving his face into the palms of his hands as if they were very welcome blinders.

Temple sat, gingerly, beside him. "Max." Her voice was barely a whisper. "What's happened?"

"My hair. A tale that hangs on a hair." He turned hollow eyes on Temple. She had never seen him so haunted, not even when he had discussed his Irish past. "I let Molina use me, thinking I was using her, and now somebody's dead."

"Who?"

"Did you hear or see the news this morning?"

"No, but I've got a morning Review-Journal I haven't looked at yet."

"It may have happened too late to make the newspaper. Probably well after midnight. I'd bet she was waylaid in the parking lot, like the other victims."

"Other? You're not talking about . . . Strawberry Lady and Church Parking Lot Lady!" Now Max gazed at Temple as if she were mad in her own turn.

"You know about those murders?"

She nodded, slowly. "Yes, but how do you?"

"Molina." He might have been saying the word hemlock, it came off his lips with such a bitter twist. "She recruited me to do a little discreet snooping. I figured if l did her a favor, I could get some favors from her in the future. She said he was a fringe suspect. Out of LA. An ex-cop gone had. I confirmed all that, and then l tracked him here to Las Vegas."

"So that's what you were doing when you were gone and said you couldn't tell me why!

Working for Molina?"

Max nodded glumly.

Temple studied his downcast head. His hair wasn't so had if you were willing to accept Max in that semi-punk look, which she wasn't. But after the bullet had restyled his ponytail, she could see why he'd had it cut.

"Did that Strip shooting have anything to do with this guy you were trailing for Molina?"

"Could have. Could be something else. Anything else. You know my fabled ability to make friends and influence people."

"Max." She curled her hand over his knee, shook it slightly.

"Don't be so hard on yourself. Just tell me how you ended up working for Molina, of all people!"

He flashed her a rueful glance, with some of the usual bite. "I didn't tell you because that was the terms of working for Molina, and . . . l didn't want to admit I'd gone over to the enemy, even just a little. I know how hard-nosed she's been with you, but she's a necessary evil, Temple, and she knows enough about some of the stuff going on in this town to be useful. I thought."

"So, What went wrong?"

"I'm glad you can stick to a rational exposition of the subject.

Okay. This guy seems to be everything Molina said: a low-profile trouble-maker, but not a major player. I tracked him to a strip club, where he worked as a bouncer."

She nodded, not wanting to disrupt his story. But she was thinking: Bouncer? Strip club?

Max?

Max was wringing his hands, wound up with tension, washing his hands like Pontius Pilate.