Unknown - 22_Cat_In_An_Ultramarine_Scheme

Scowling and handcuffed, a silent Santiago remained bracketed by the Fontana family while the car rushed past the effects he’d created.

Temple, upright again, with four cats for seatmates, leaned across to whisper into Macho Mario Fontana’s ear.

“I’m surprised you’d let a girl go along for the action and danger.”

“Ah, Nicky told me you’d get more violent if we didn’t than if we did,” Macho Mario whispered back. “The detective did whisk Van and her long-stemmed girlfriend out of harm’s way.”

“Santiago could have been armed,” she admitted, leaning back to her side of the car.

“Only by his massive ego,” Nicky put in. “He thought he was home free, and also free to hunt a second vault’s cache to his heart’s content.”

“And, besides,” Macho Mario said, reaching inside his jacket, which made the haughty Santiago flinch, “I have a little something—”

Temple pulled her feet in tight as the black boa gathered close to her and emitted a ganglike growl.

“Not to worry, little lady and little kitty cats.” Macho Mario extended a long cream envelope to Temple. “Here’s a gift certificate for a big little shopping spree at Gangsters Moll Mall for any damage our ride here might have done to your rolled-down hose.”

He managed to sneak in a pat on her bare knee as she took the envelope. His thick, still-jet-black eyebrows rose. Macho Mario hadn’t realized hose was passé for modern, comfort-driven women.

“Uh, sorry for ruffling your … fur, Miss Barr,” he said, hastily reclaiming his hand before any of the four cats could snap it off, and sending Nicky an apologetic look.

Macho Mario Fontana might be old mob, but he had no idea who possessed the important fur not to ruffle in this gangster car, Temple thought, looking down and smiling on a constellation of green, and one set of gold, cats’-eyes.

That would be Midnight Louie and the latest hot new gang in town, the Cat Pack.

On Thin Ice

After uniformed officers had hauled away the urbane and protesting Santiago, who claimed he had lawyers on three continents and would use them to sue everyone in Vegas involved in this travesty, Detective Ferraro asked “the principals” to remain behind, while the Glory Hole Gang and the Fontana brothers—the elegant Revienne escorted in their midst—took the trio of Chunnel elevators up to the exit on the Crystal Phoenix’s landscaped grounds.

Nicky and Van and Temple and Uncle Mario had no such luck losing their accompanying four cats, who ignored police wishes and stuck around, sometimes quite literally. Midnight Louie and Louise shadowed Temple and Van, while Three O’Clock glued himself to Nicky’s pant leg. Uncle Mario had somehow ended up with Ma Barker at his feet, favoring him with frequent upward but off-eyed glances that were either admiring or murderous.

“I hope you enjoyed your Columbo moment, Mr. Fontana,” Ferraro began.

“Of course,” Macho Mario beamed. “It was a pleasure to nail that phony.”

“I meant Mr. Nick Fontana,” Ferraro said. “That was a risky stunt, but it was worth shaking that cool customer up for interrogation. I had no idea Miss Barr would be on board for it.”

“She pushed her way into the car. What could I do?” Nicky asked innocently.

“You couldn’t overpower her?”

“You don’t know women, detective. The smaller they are, the more tenacious. They don’t call those stiletto heels for nothing.”

The detective eyed Temple’s spike heels. “I guess those are oddly fitting today.”

She immediately got the allusion. “Because Cosimo Sparks was murdered with a very thin dagger, like a stiletto?”

“And how do you know that?”

“Just … guessing from the context.” She’d never squeal on Coroner Bahr. She wasn’t a dirty rat.

“Pretty clever,” Ferraro said, turning to Nicky. “You got the evidence?”

Nicky reached into his breast coat pocket and pulled out a tiny tape recorder, not a firearm. “He didn’t actually confess, but he was pretty rattled by the dead man’s rerun appearance in his own media show. Broke the car window.”

“Glad the blood on his hands is his own doing,” Ferraro noted, pocketing the tape.

“Well said,” Nicky answered. “I’m just glad the Glory Hole Gang is cleared.”

“What?” Temple demanded. “Have I been totally out of this loop? They were suspects?”

“You should be ‘out of the loop,’ ” Ferraro said, his lean face stern. “I’ve heard a bit about your civilian snooping. Not to be encouraged. Yeah,” he finally admitted, “they were mixed up with Jersey Joe Jackson and his stolen silver dollars and rumored hidden stashes of other assets through the years since the late forties. We couldn’t come up with a motive for Sparks’s murder other than attempted robbery.”

“Not Sparks’s attempted robbery?”

“Could be, and Santiago could have come on him cracking the safe while inspecting the tunnel before the vault was opened, but why would a rich guy—and he is—kill someone for an empty vault? It looked more like money from the past was involved, with those few silver dollars found in the vault. When we searched the old boys’ suite …”

Temple’s jaw dropped and she stared at Nicky.

He nodded confirmation. “The police asked, so we got them all out of there on a pretext.”

“How could anyone think the Glory Hole guys … ? They’re in their eighties.”

“Greed never dies, Miss Barr, you should know that.” Ferraro’s lip quirk could have been the start of a smile. “Anyway, we found an ice pick among their test-kitchen supplies. It looked as clean as a whistle and new as a store-bought razor blade, but forensics found Santiago’s DNA on it, which was easily obtained from all over the media wizard’s Fontana Suite.”

“Why would Santiago kill Sparks?” Temple asked. “Greed is a pretty broad category.”

“For some reason, Santiago could have been looking for Jersey Joe’s treasure, now that he was in the vicinity.”

That just lay there, as linguistically lame as it was as a motive for murder.

“What about the hesitation marks on Cosimo’s body?” Temple asked.

Ferraro frowned at her as fiercely as he had at Midnight Louie. “You have some inside access to the forensics report, Miss Barr? I thought Lieutenant Molina had enough of your fringe investigations.”

“I was a reporter, Detective Ferraro. I hear things.”

Midnight Louie chose that moment to take a long stretch up the detective’s pant leg. His full-length reach was awesome, almost crotch-high.

Ferraro stiffened like a frozen haddock, winced, and gazed down into Louie’s big green eyes. Louie’s big black claws had probably pricked through his lightweight slacks fabric into his skin, but very delicately.

“I hate cats,” Ferraro said, “almost as bad as amateur dicks. Get this one off me, and I’ll overlook your possession of police information,” he told Temple, never breaking Louie’s stare.

“Louie! Down!” Temple ordered, as if he were a dog. She wasn’t sure how he’d react to that indignity.

Louie held his pose and Ferraro’s gaze for a long, deep moment of mutual standoff, then dropped back on all fours.

“We won’t keep you, Detective,” Nicky said. “We’ll, uh, read all about it in the Review-Journal.”

Ferraro turned to go.

Temple spoke. “What if those ‘hesitation marks’ on the body were prod marks?”

Ferraro turned back, looked at her, at Louie, and then nodded. He knew a bit about prod marks personally now.

“Good point. Sparks failed to find the loot, and once Santiago saw the empty safe, he thought he’d been deliberately led astray and tried to ‘prick’ Sparks to give out the ‘real’ location of the Jackson treasure. For some reason, Sparks couldn’t, or wouldn’t, then Santiago lost it, like he did in your car,” Ferraro said, nodding at Nicky.