Unknown - 22_Cat_In_An_Ultramarine_Scheme

“Frankly, despite his DNA on the ice pick, the motive is all iffy and airy-fairy, and I doubt we’ll convict. Where did Santiago run into this slightly eccentric retired magician? Why would a sophisticate like him buy this bizarre Jersey Joe Jackson hidden-money rumor, and then kill over it? Right at the site of his brand-new toy about to debut. He would have had to have had a lot more visceral motive than a rich man’s unending greed to go through all that.”

“I don’t know,” Temple said, who thought she did, “but he was in and out of the Glory Hole Gang’s suite and test kitchen next door to his like a neighbor with a borrowing fetish. I saw that while I was visiting the old boys briefly.”

“At least,” Ferraro said, “your ultrasenior-citizen friends are in the clear. If I were you, I’d leave it at that and be happy.”

Temple nodded quickly. “You’re right, detective. All’s well that ends well.”

He actually grinned, but it looked forced. “We’re in agreement on that.”

She turned to Nicky when it was just her, him, Macho Mario, and Midnight Louie again.

“I can’t believe you engineered that stickler detective into letting you take Santiago for a ‘ride’ to his arrest.”

“It was a hard sell,” Nicky admitted.

“And you didn’t even tell me? I’m your PR person, Nicky. That was … cold.”

“I only told Uncle Mario, and I had to do it that way.”

“Well, letting Santiago luxuriate in his own setup and then slipping in a whole new scenario—how’d you do that, anyway?”

“Please. Vegas is teeming with special-effects people. You got the dough, they got the go. But the police demanded secrecy.”

“I get that, but why the big production?”

Nicky waggled his handsome head from side to side and shrugged with his hands in his pockets like a misbehaving twelve-year-old.

“The police came to me with their evidence and suspicions. It was all as thin as an ice pick, but I knew a high-profile arrest couldn’t go down at the Crystal Phoenix Hotel itself. People sleep there. You can’t have them thinking murderers are floating around. Van would kill me!”

Macho Mario nodded soberly. “Definitely.”

“So …,” Nicky said, “down here it fits. It’s all part of the ambience, right?”

“I suppose there’s a certain poetic justice to Santiago riding the rails to his own arrest.”

“You can work with that? I mean publicity-wise?”

“I can work with that. Publicity-wise,” Temple said. “You know, I’d just like to sit down here in the car seat and collect my thoughts.”

“Van wants all us Crystal Phoenix folks up in the Jersey Joe Jackson Ghost Suite for a cocktail calm-down in half an hour or so.”

“Just folks?”

Nicky glanced down at the four cats still swarming at Temple’s ankles.

“My brothers will bemoan the black cat hair on their usual pale and expensive Ermenegildo Zegna suits, but two of these four felines have lived at the Phoenix, and the quartet does seem to be the new Cat Pack in town. So sure, bring on the dander.”

On those not-feline-flattering words, Nicky grabbed his uncle’s arm and they headed for the elevators.

Temple sat, unsatisfied and uneasy.

Yes, it was good Santiago had been unmasked as someone criminal. Even now, he might not be fully unmasked. What if he’d been one of the foreigners in the Synth club room?

Whew. The Synth and its schemes remained a conundrum that could go any of a dozen ways. Whether the Synth’s extravagant mass casino heist scheme was a group delusion or they were being used by terrorists, it was best to keep them out of the limelight until some real evidence existed. The secret underground link between Gangsters and the Crystal Phoenix and Neon Nightmare needed to stay that way for a while too.

Temple was sure the new Cat Pack would be patrolling it for rats of any variety now.

Maybe stopping and arresting Santiago would end all the plotting. The Synth had lost their real leader, Cosimo Sparks, but had he been truly linked to a larger scheme, or playing some game of his own? The silver dollars and rat-snatched bearer bond proved the vault had once been full of filthy lucre. Had it been hoarded IRA money, though? And where had the guns and explosives gone, if so? Had Sparks gotten greedy or scared and decided to move the hoarded IRA money? Had he just found a Jersey Joe Jackson hoard and had he been trying to save the Synth’s Neon Nightmare investment? Or was he a true loyalist to the last-gasp alternate IRA cause, trying to protect its holdings from elements who’d raid it? Had he died rather than give Santiago the location of the moved treasure? Or had he simply known … nothing? And died because of that?

If Temple kept quiet about all these unsettling questions, maybe Max Kinsella’s name would never need to come into it. And he was the last thing she needed on her mind with a marriage to plan.

Besides, Detective Ferraro had been dubious a solid case could be made against Santiago. As long as all these questions remained unanswered, Max’s possible connections to all and any of it remained unknown to anybody but her.

Unfortunately, that put news of his fate in a similar limbo.

Might it be better for all concerned for the situation to stay that way?

Forever.

Beside her, Louie, surrounded by his triplets, meowed plaintively.

“Right,” she told him. “The old-time gangsters knew that sometimes ‘mum’s the word.’ That’s ‘meow’ to you.

“I’ll keep quiet about your street gang connections and we’ll all move forward. And you can be ring bearer again.”

Da Denouement, Dudes

I have been the life of the party before.

I have also been the death of the party, if the party in question deserved it.

All in the line of duty, defending my partner and her interests, whatsoever they may be.

I must say, she is sufficiently grateful. Although my not-inconsiderable contributions to subduing crime in Las Vegas and meting out punishment are often overlooked by officialdom (this was even a problem for Mr. Sherlock Holmes), my Miss Temple never fails to see that I get in on the celebratory party.

Hence, we are all gathered in the Jersey Joe Jackson Ghost Suite at the Crystal Phoenix, where a feast of gourmet appetizers is laid out for the guests of honor: yours truly, Pa Three O’Clock, Ma Barker, and the kit chit, Miss Midnight Louise.

A bunch of Fontanas also happen to be present, and the Glory Hole Gang. Actually, Miss Van von Rhine, being the hostess from whom all good things edible and drinkable flow at this affair, and my roomie are the only females present, the Midnight family femmes excepted.

Apparently, Miss Van von Rhine’s hot blonde foreign friend, Revienne, had a headache after all the Chunnel of Crime ride excitement and is dining quietly in her room. Fine. Leaves more for me and mine.

And what a spread the Glory Hole Gang helped lay out! The overgrown members of our party are nibbling from a long table with some foodstuffs the Cat Pack is being polite about and leaving for demolishment later.

Along a classy plastic runner on the vintage carpet are exquisite Asian dishes tricked out with exquisite tidbits of world cuisine, including anchovies à la orange, shrimp and liver with sautéed giblets, and catfish in a sauce of liver and milk.

Maybe not your menu, but right up my alley.

“The Jersey Joe Jackson Ghost Suite is filled up to the gills,” Miss Temple notes.

I do like her figure … and figures of speech. “Gills.” Aaah. I foresee a leisurely midnight dip at the koi pond.

So does Chef Song, who is presiding over the buffet table and knifes me a sharp warning look. I am reminded that the kitchen is among the most likely places for an “accident” in the house, and that a kitchen tool was the murder weapon in this case.