Unknown - Cat_In_A_Hot_Pink_Pursuit

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Either way, I do not like my recent dance in the dark with an ambulatory Elvis one little bit. The moment my vibrissae sense a stir of fresh air, I take a sharp running right in that direction … and fall three feet down onto a hard surface.

That does not give even a ninja a lot of time to do a double axel and land on his feet, spraying wood shavings like Tara Lipinski sprays ice splinters. Float like a butterfly, land like a lummox.

I barely manage to turn myself upright before I must dig my shivs into a wooden roof.

Which then plummets below at a speed fast enough to give my ears a Bing Crosby pin-back.

Landing is the bone-crunching shock I had anticipated.

I cripple my way over the edge and flip upside down again, hanging by a half-torn nail sheath.

Even upside down I can see Miss Midnight Louise in the night-lit glow of the kitchen where she is one with the black marble floor except for the cynical gleam of her old-gold eyes.

“Could not resist a midnight raid on the icebox, eh, Dad? Do not bother apologizing. There is some very nice kipper a passing guest was kind enough to dig out of the Sub-Zero for me. And did I manage to dig up some dirt on the murder vic. Lose the death grip on the silent butler, come on down, and we will chew the fat. Yours, I hope.”

What can I say? Nothing. So I do not.

And thus I learn what my Miss Temple and her roommate Mariah were up to in the Teen Queen Castle while I was communing with Elvis in the attic.

Chapter 47

Filing Their Nails

Temple and Mariah had played possum until the blondes’ lightning raid on their bathroom was well over. Temple quickly found the added can of purported hairspray and tried it on a hand towel, which immediately turned as shiny and shellacked as a decoupage project.

“Liquid plastic spray,” Temple diagnosed. “Those witches wanted my new blonde hair turned into an impossible mess. Too bad we have serious work to do tonight, or X. C. would sneak in and adhere a few sleepy blonde heads to their pillowcases. They’re all feather-heads anyway. But I have something else in mind tonight.”

They darted like dragonflies down the stairs to the first-floor hall, knowing where the cameras were positioned and trying to dodge them like bullets.

Mariah had insisted on coming along on this clue-fishing expedition and Temple, frankly, needed a lookout.

Now they stood outside the door to Marjory Klein’s former office and Mariah was facing the first challenge of her crime-solving life: crossing yellow crime scene tape.

You’d have thought she was Matt Devine being asked to commit a little mortal sin.

“I don’t know, Xoe. We’re not supposed to.”

“‘We’re not supposed to.’ Where would that have gotten Lewis and Clark? Lois and Clark for that matter. TV characters you’re probably too young to remember.”

“Am not. Reruns. They were almost hot.”

“Okay. ‘We’re not supposed to.’ Where would that have gotten—?”

“Ah … um … Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde?”

“Right. Well, I’m legally blonde now, and I say we crash this party.”

“Huh?”

Temple ducked under the tape and donned the thin latex gloves that came with her hair-dye product. The pros had ignored them to use their own professional-quality pairs, so Temple had appropriated them against a future need. She pushed against and opened an unlocked door.

Surprise! The cops were really lax. Or someone else had been here.

Mariah followed her inside, acting like Dorothy in the haunted wood: scared. As if she thought Mama Molina had some crystal-gazing globe that could follow her every move. Probably did.

Temple flicked on the mascara wand–size flashlight she always traveled with. A bright needle of light played over surfaces familiar to both her and Mariah.

“Too much to revisit?” Temple asked.

Mariah had insisted on accompanying her. Now the dark empty room made the reality of sudden death a more obvious deterrent than a thirteen-year-old might realize.

“No. And yeah. I guess. That poor lady! She just wanted me to do well.”

“We will do well. By her. She was the only consultant who imported her own file cabinets. I wondered why when I had my sessions with her. Let’s take a look.”

First Temple scanned the room for hidden cameras and mikes. She was getting good at spotting them. They’d stockpiled cloth napkins at meals and now distributed them around the room like demented waitresses. Over the lamps, the power outlets, lighting fixtures.

Besides, they kept the room’s lights off. Even if any cameras picked up intruders, they would be shadow puppets on a highly manipulated stage.

The file cabinets had always struck Temple because they were the Steel Case sort: heavy metal, with locks. This office’s decor was more wicker basket style. They were the two-drawer variety on wheels that’s easily overlooked as mobile work surfaces. There were three of them, all lockable.

That was the problem. Temple tried each one. Surprise. These drawers were locked.

“We need the keys,” she whispered to Mariah. “And they’ll probably be hidden.”

Twenty minutes later, Temple had explored every drawer and Mariah had finished her more imaginative search, usually up above or under something.

No keys.

“Why didn’t the police try the files?” Mariah wondered.

“Probably thought they came with the office and had nothing to do with Marjory. But we’ve seen all the other offices and no one else has these industrial-strength things.”

“Still, missing them is shabby police work.”

“Maybe the police checked them out and relocked them, then.”

“If my mom had been on the scene, they’d have been shaken upside down. Why hasn’t she shown up?”

“Probably to keep from ruining your big chance, remember? You made it pretty plain she wasn’t to interfere.”

“Yeah.”

This kept Mariah silent for a whole minute. “Mrs. Klein was a food freak,” she said suddenly. “Maybe it was for good and all but she was still freaked about it. She used to play with that fake fruit on her desk until I was ready to scream, or grab one and eat it. I bet—”

Mariah ambled to the basket of fruit on the desk and pulled out a plum (wax). From beneath it she pulled out a snake. “Hey, look!” A slim leather cord that ended with a trio of thin tiny keys.

“Brilliant thinking,” Temple said. “Where would a food freak hide something but under fake fruit.”

Temple grabbed the flimsy keys and tried them in sequence until all three file cabinets were unlocked. The open drawers revealed colored hanging file folders stuffed with a variety of colored file folders, each bearing a clear crystal tab indicating its contents.

“Reading rainbow,” Mariah commented.

“Seriously neat freak.”

Every food group, vitamin, study, and food additive had a file folder. So did every Teen Queen candidate.

Temple collapsed on the floor to read about her alter ego, Xoe Chloe, line by flashlit line. This wasn’t just a food plan (more fruit and fiber, less empty calories like soda pop), it was a psych sketch.

“Am I glad I’m not really me!” she told Mariah. “I show ‘clear antisocial tendencies magnified to chronic instability.’ Hey. I’m better at being bad than I thought.”

Mariah snatched the flashlight to study her file. “I’m the ‘typical only child’ who’s ‘hidden behind baby fat.’ I’m ‘desperately seeking a father figure!’ Coulda fooled me.”

“Listen, if Marjory Klein was so off about a fake personality like Xoe, she’s certainly off about a real personlike you. Makes you wonder how off she was about everybody.”

“She did have a beans and legumes fixation.”

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