Unknown - Cat_In_A_Hot_Pink_Pursuit

She laughed, and looked beyond him to the fancy car a bit ruefully. Maybe Sister Seraphina was right.

“This is a no-diet zone tonight,” she warned as she led him into the modest one-story house.

“You diet?” He was surprised. She was a strong five-ten, at least. Neither heavy nor thin. Sculptural, like a pillar, especially in those long, lean vintage velvet gowns from the forties she wore when singing at the Blue Dahlia.

Few knew that Carmen the occasional chanteuse was C. R. Molina, the 24/7 Vegas homicide cop. Those who did found the contrast perplexing.

“I thought you’d call this off,” he commented as they entered the homey living room, complete with two cats. What was it about cats and the Our Lady of Guadalupe neighborhood?

She turned to fix him with a Lieutenant Molina interrogatory stare. Her vivid blue eyes were her best feature, and against this Ole Mexico getup they made her electrically exotic.

“Why?” she asked. “Oh. The murder. There are always murders in Las Vegas, my friend.”

“I just thought you’d need to be on the job.”

“What makes you think I’m not?” she asked with some irritation.

“I don’t see myself as part of your job.”

“No. No, you’re not. Sorry. Sit down, get some cat hair on those khakis. I’m glad you could come.”

She clattered and rustled in the kitchen until the microwave tinged and then she brought out several small vivid pottery dishes of various salsas and a big platter of nacho chips wearing a mantle of cheese and sliced fresh jalapenos.

Matt grabbed a big blue linen napkin and dug in. “This is better than Friday’s,” he said.

“Yeah. A lotta Velveeta, a little Rotel, some fresh peppers to tart the whole thing up. Sorta like tonight.” Matt stopped scarfing and got wary. “Oh?”

“I got you out here on false pretenses,” she admitted. “Fast food?”

“Fast talking. I need your advice.”

“Oh. Well, that comes with the territory. ‘Will advise for food.”’

“I’m not good at plying my … acquaintances for free advice.”

“Well, then break out the Dos Equis. That’ll get me talking. You do have some?”

“Oh, my God! I forgot the beer.”

Matt smiled as her bare feet slapped kitchen tile and the refrigerator door shot a sliver of light into the dim living room.

The cats yawned and stretched, as if used to slapdash improvisation in feeding at Casa Molina.

Matt hated to admit it, but the nachos with bottled salsa sauce were superb: hot, greasy, and crispy.

A condensation-dewed long neck of Dos Equis landed on a cork coaster on the coffee table in front of him. By now the jalapenos had hit pay dirt on his tongue and he downed several swallows.

“Milk would be better,” she observed.

“Not manly,” Matt said, still choking a little. “Okay. What’s it all about, AlfieT’ he looked around, suddenly aware. “Is Mariah off with her friends?”

“Yes, and no. And, yes, we are alone here. I arranged it that way.”

“Really? Is this entrapment? This is very low-alcoholcontent beer.”

“Only entrapment for your professional opinion.”

“You didn’t have to ply me with dinner for that.”

She sat back on her tailbone in her chair, balancing her beer bottle on her stomach. This was no Molina he’d ever imagined.

“Mariah is away from home for a couple of weeks.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that my naive, gutsy daughter got herself accepted by some stupid, exploitative reality TV show, and Mama couldn’t say no without being cursed for life. So…”

“Wait a minute! Is that the Teen Queen thing?”

“And ‘Tween Queen,” she corrected with loathing. “Mariah thinks she wants to be a singing star and win a date with the latest Boy Toy nonsinger around. What’s a mother to do? I could take any casino boss in town in for questioning, but I can’t put a leash on my only daughter.”

Matt chewed some nachos while he thought about it. “No, you’re right. You can’t. She got accepted? On her own?”

“Yeah. Every kid has access to a video recorder nowadays.”

“Mariah? She’s just a baby.”

“Are you out of it! This is not what I want your advice on. Here. Watch her homemade video. The one that got her on the show.”

Molina got up, skirts swaying, to pop in the offending video.

Matt began to understand her mixture of panic and pride. Mariah had shot up. Those chubby baby features and limbs were starting to look coltish and graceful. Her eyes were as dark as her mother’s were light, making Matt wonder about the father again. Likely Hispanic.

Molina was half and half, although what the other half was he couldn’t guess.

Mariah’s voice was a contralto that blared like a boom box on occasion. She was a belter, unlike her crooner mother, and suited the pop music mode of her own day. But she had a voice. Too.

Molina got up to eject the tape and dropped it atop the TV.

Matt decided it was time to gently probe at the maternal wounds. “So the problem is … Mariah is unrealistic about a performing career?”

“Who isn’t unrealistic about a performing career? Everybody dreams. Maybe a tenth of one percent lives the dream. No, the kid can try it. She might break the odds. I think this freaking show is foolishness, but that’s not the problem. It’s possible that a killer is stalking the contestants.”

“My God.”

“I’ve got people on the stalker thing. That’s not the big problem.”

“What on earth could be, then?”

Molina leaned back, drained a bottle of Dos Equis, eyed the pathetic level in his own bottle, and got up.

“We’re out of beer, and the chili on the stove is about to desiccate. Come, sit down and eat.”

Chapter 14

Bad Daddy

The chili was red, full of beans and beef, and hot enough to fry the soles off a pair of Dr. Scholl’s sandals. Matt tucked in.

He and Molina sat at a small round table in a tiny bay window off the kitchen. He sensed this nook was hardly ever used for dining. Instead, quick bites were taken at the elbow-height eating bar between the kitchen and the living room.

Molina had poured their beers into thick glass mugs chilled in the refrigerator. Correction: Carmen had done that.

“So the problem—” Matt began when the first edge of his hunger had been soothed.

She had only picked at her chili—the plump bean here, the chunk of ground beef there. An occasional ring of soft-cooked jalapeno. She leaned back in her chair, suddenly Madame Interrogator again.

“You know what it’s like to be a bastard.”

Professional interrogator. Always went for shock value.

“Yeah. It means your mother is called names for the sin of being trusting and honest. Is there a woman in the world who gets caught in such a situation who anticipated it, or wanted it?”

“Maybe only the Virgin Mary.”

“She got a warning from an angel.”

“So. I know you resented, even hated, your stepfather. Have you also resented your real father?”

“This business of ‘real’ parents is interesting. There are genetic parents, and spiritual parents, and stepparents. Any and all of them can be horrible, or great.”

“I don’t need generalizations.”

“That’s mostly what’s out there, like it or not.”

“I like it not.” She took a swallow from the beer mug. “Mariah’s father is in town.”

“The guy … from Los Angeles? Your—?”

“Yeah. My ‘question mark.’ I tried to divert him by setting Kinsella on his trail but then I ended up with two snakes on mine.”

“How does Max come into this?”

“Max! Even that’s a damn anagram, not a given name. Michael Aloysius Xavier Kinsella. The man’s a puzzle from the most elementary fact.”