Carole Douglas - Cat in a Red Hot Rage

“Do not let MissTemple hear that idea. She would take you off at the tail."

“Tut. I know how to handle these human females, unlike most human males. A little purr and rub here, a little manly huff and puff there, and they are all eating out of the palm of my paw."

“Especially Miss Detective Su." She is being sarcastic, and I forbear to reply to that comment.

“That is why we are going over ground. Once we reach the vent into the Lalique Suite, we will hear and see all while remaining not seen and not heard."

“Like very lucky human children."

“Hush! We are almost, hah! There.”

We hunker down, side to side and face to face, all the better to see and hear through the grille.

“I am jest an innocent bystander," that heroic lonesome cowboy, Elmore Lark, is whining to the two detectives. "I jest came down from Reno to check on my little fillies.”

Even a good ole boy like me can see that the phrase "little fillies" is not going over with Miss Detective Su. Even Mr. Detective Alch winces at that one.

“Look, Elmore," Su says. "I can call you 'Elmore,' can I not?”

“Sure, lady. Uh, Lieutenant.”

Alch chuckles.

“Detective will do," Su tells him. "Are you saying that you never divorced Electra, wife number one?"

“No, not exactly."

“Divorce is a very exact thing, like murder, Elmore. Which is it?"

“The papers were not quite right."

“And you did this because–"

“Oleta was a hot potato." He glanced at Alch for backup, but Alch was too savvy to do more than look as stony as a new president on Mount Rushmore.

Elmore shrugged. "Fun, but ... touchy. I figured I could always get Electra back–”

Su put a trouser leg up on the chair next to Elmore. It was a fancy Italian leather chair, but she had no shame at resting her mall shoe-shop ersatz leather boot on top of it. (I have learneda few things from my MissTemple and her extensive shoe col- lection.)

“You are a dirty dog, Elmore. I bet there are a lot of women who would like to see you swing for murder.”

“Ah, they do not hang people anymore.”

“You know what I mean."

“Ye-ah."

“And the worst part of your cheesy operation is you set one woman against another and then slip away all innocentlike. You are not innocent, are you?"

“Of murder, yes."

“So who do you think offed Oleta? Between us." Su's boot swiveled like it was about to crush out a cigarette. Elmore's gentleman's area was directly across from it on the next chair. I swallowed in fellow sympathy. Even the sinister Hyacinth had never touched claw to my, er, play balls.

“She has got him on the run," Louise chortled next to me. "Or having the runs," she adds with that peculiarly feminine zest for certain forms of violence against men who done them wrong. "I do not know what has gotten into the China Doll of the LVMPD," I say, truly amazed.

And that is when my man, Detective Morrie Alch, rises to the occasion.

“We will need to see your marriage and divorce papers," he tells Elmore Lark. "To both women, and any others you may have promised to love and obey for all time."

“I am not the greatest housekeeper," Lark says. As if one could not tell that from the wrinkles in his checked shirt. "Aren't there records you people can check in the blink of a computer cursor?”

Su leans closer, all glare. "Sure. But we want to see what you are flashing around, claiming to be genuine."

“And where were you yesterday morning?" Alch asks.

“At home in Reno. I drove right down when I heard about Oleta on the nightly news."

“We had not released her name to the press yet." Su is re- lentless. "Not enough information about next of kin. If you were on any lists in that regard, you sure did not show up."

“We divorced too. A few years ago."

“So why are you really in town?" Alch slipped that in with such an easygoing tone that Lark was answering before he thought about it.

“Some old business with Electra."

“She knew you were coming?"

“Nah. I did not even know all these red-and-purple ladies would be in town."

“Then how did you end up at the Crystal Phoenix?" Su pounced.

Elmore Lark winced and fingered his cowboy hat on the tabletop. Sometimes even your props will let you down. "Oleta e-mailed me to come. Said she knew something of interest to me. About Electra. And I had other interests in town.”

Su and Alch sat back in their chairs as one.

It looked like the long-ago romantic triangle was still plenty alive and kicking ... until someone had throttled Oleta.

At least there is another suspect on the scene besides Miss Electra Lark.

I hiss as much to Louise.

Below us, the humans are leaving the room.

“Why do you always refer to your human lady friends as Miss when some of them are actually Mrs.?" Louise asks in that annoyed tone females and relatives get when they have nothing better to do than pick on some innocent nearby dude.

“It is a courtesy title, Louise. I even use it with you, at times, though Bast knows you have given me little courtesy. All human females were 'Misses' at one time and I honor their eternally youthful origins by using that honorific. And, as you have seen and heard, these 'Mrs.' titles come and go nowadays."

“Do you think that your MissTemple, now that she is about to become Mr. Matt's MissTemple and maybe his Mrs., will soon be a 'Miss' again?"

“One never knows in this town," I answer grimly. If my MissTemple does decide to reside in a state of holy matrimony, I would hope it would be permanent. I do not like to move from pillar to post office. "And you have made my point, Louise. Aman is always a 'Mr.; no matter his marital status. Ergo, I do not see why a woman should not always remain a 'Miss:”

“I get that, but who is this 'Ergo'?"

“Merely an expression referring to some Latin lover type, no doubt. Speaking of which, it might behoove us to look up Mr. Aldo Fontana and his doings with MissTemple's aunt. They are on the case too, and those Fontana brothers are very well–"

“Built?"

“Connected, I was going to suggest.”

But I admit I am disappointed that even the fiercely independent Miss Midnight Louise can fall prey to a tall, dark guy with a world-class tailor.

Chapter 22

Midnight Madness

Matt Devine sat behind the mike at WCOO-AM, listening to other people's problems.

His own sounded miniature by comparison: a newfound long-lost father in his hometown of Chicago. A mother who wanted to run from a past too traumatic to remember, including an abusive ex-husband, except that Matt's real father had been the only good thing in it. And now that Matt had found that man by happenstance and whatever saint presided over happy endings, she wanted to run from him.

Parents. Way overrated once you were past twenty-one.

But he was only four years past thirty, and way too many of those years had been spent as a dedicated Catholic priest. He didn't regret those years, not even the celibacy. He'd donesome good. But time had made clear that he'd run to the priesthood in search of a more perfect father than his abusive stepfather, Cliff Effinger, even if he had to become that "Father" himself.

He'd come to Las Vegas to track down and confront Effinger, but the man he found was too small to fear or hate, and was dead now, anyway. Meanwhile, Matt had stumbled from hotline counseling into a radio shrink job that made "Mr. Midnight" a hot syndicated property.

He'd also met an empathetic, energetic fireball named Temple Barr who'd made him glad he'd waited seventeen years for her . . . and her heroic significant other, charismatic ex-magician Max Kinsella. Now the men's roles had changed.