Unknown - 16_Cat_In_An_Orange_Twist

back, in front of the central fountain. Let’s move, shall we?”

The splashing water of the central fountain would also muffle any imminent fireworks up front.

Temple shooed her tight knot of cardboard-check clutchers backward. Media cameras and mikes obligingly followed. It only took ninety seconds to get the group in motion en masse, but Temple’s ears were tuned to the action behind her.

For such dedicated antagonists, their reactions were in total harmony.

“You!” each spat like fighting alley cats. Temple backed up behind the videographers, nodding to encourage the check passer, then turned and sped back to the crime scene in progress.

Interesting. Temple detected no fear on Nadir’s side, but plenty of high anxiety on Molina’s.

Not that the Iron Maiden of the LVMPD broadcast anything but authoritarian steel. Still, Temple had spent … oh, hours … trying to figure the woman out. She noticed the classic Shakespearian giveaway in the lieutenant’s demeanor: mainly, way too much cold control. Methinks she doth repress too much.

“What are you doing here?”

The pair spoke in embarrassing concert again.

“Security,” Nadir said in answer.

Molina glanced over her shoulder at a puzzled Alch. “You have a file on this guy?”

“I do, Lieutenant,” Alch said.

Both Nadir and Molina jumped at the sound of her title.

Nadir’s surprise instantly iced over with resentment. Molina froze like a cat on a hot tin roof who had just been fingered by animal control. If her situation weren’t precarious enough already, they had to make TV news of it.

“Make sure you keep that file current,” she snapped, then turned to leave.

“Wait!” Nadir moved to stop her, maybe just follow her. “I need to talk to you.”

“Not my need at all,” she said. “Thank your unlucky stars for that. Stay out of my way. I don’t need to tell you to stay out of trouble either; that’s a waste of time. If you’re cleared on this, I do suggest you stay out of Las Vegas. Permanently.”

This time when she turned her back on Nadir she was unstoppable, leaving in her wake only the whip crack of her bootheels smashing into travertine.

Nadir instinctively started to follow, but Su, tiny flower of Asian womanhood, stepped forward to block his way. He assessed her, moved ahead.

Su grabbed one hand and did some twisty thing with his thumb that had Nadir’s knees buckling.

“The lieutenant doesn’t want to see you,” Su said. “Got it?” She released his thumb and stepped back in a martial arts

stance, hands up and spread to indicate she was willing to let him off if he didn’t push it.

Rafi shook his hand. “Tricks. You women are full of ‘em.”

It wasn’t what Temple would have said to diffuse the situation, but Su just grinned, complimented. Then she turned on her own low-heeled Mary Janes and exited, quiet as a crouching tiger.

That left … Detective Alch. And Temple.

He caught Temple’s eyes as she met his. They had seen each other on the fringes of several investigations under Molina’s supervision. Temple knew Alch was one of Molina’s top detectives. Alch knew Temple for a gifted amateur sleuth who was a perennial thorn in his boss’s hide. They both shrugged. An unspoken understanding had been reached.

Alch ambled off after the macho women on his team. Temple ankled over to macho man Rafi Nadir. “What did she do to your thumb? Is it okay?”

“Yeah. After the numbness wears off. Some tricky Chink stuff. They’re little people and they make up for it with all that marital arts hooey. Makes sense for them. I wasn’t ready for that, from her. Jesus. Carmen.”

Temple wasn’t ready to hear those last two words in tandem.

“What?” Nadir looked around, saw they were alone. At last. He figured out the source of Temple’s surprise, at least. “I’m Christian, for Christ’s sake. Lebanese-American, like Ralph Nader. I get to swear.” - Temple put up her hands, realizing too late she was mimicking Su’s hand’s-off stance. But from her it was a peace sign.

Nadir’s hand checked the back of his neck for tension. “What the hell was she doing here?” He eyed Temple. “You know her?”

“Urn, she knows me, and not in a necessarily friendly way. I imagine she wanted to view the Wong juggernaut in action. It must be tough investigating murder among the media icons.”

“A lieutenant. Sure, why not? Women and blacks and Latinos are the gender and color scheme of the decade in public service jobs. What do you know about her?”

“A little,” Temple said. “I bet you know a lot more. Maybe we should talk about it”

“I don’t get off for an hour.” He looked around. The fountain area was still ablaze with TV lights.

“I can wait,” Temple said. She had a little exercise in crowd control to finish first.

The check passing was over and recorded for six seconds on the nightly news. Videographers were on the floor in obeisance, packing their equipment in oblong black boxes that struck Temple as coffins for cameras.

“How did it go?” Temple asked Kenny and Amelia Wong after she’d thanked the MADD representatives and sent them on their way with the media.

“We did as you said:’ Kenny reported like a dutiful fourth-grader. “Anytime they asked about the death on site, I said I hadn’t been briefed by the police yet and to check with their spokesperson.”

“We kept some of the focus on MADD,” Amelia added, “as you suggested. It made them look crass to badger us about the death here with grieving mothers who had lost children looking on. Media are sheep.”

“Not always,” Temple cautioned. “They can bite like packs of wolves sometimes. But they do have hearts and if you can

find a way to stir their collective conscience, you are much better off than being the target of their relentless curiosity. If either of you are contacted for statements again, express your sincere sorrow at the death. That’s all. Over and over again, in different words if you have to. Let the police make the official statements.”

Having settled down her power players, Temple headed back to Rafi Nadir. He was staring out the front windows at the parking lot, and was startled when she came up to him.

“I thought you were hobnobbing with the big cheeses.”

This was it: her chance to pump Rafi for every shred of insight into Early Molina. He was obviously shocked out of his shoes. Max would love this.

Holding Rafi Nadir’s hand on the occasion of his unexpected meeting with Carmen Molina, Temple discovered, involved (sigh) a rendezvous at a strip club, the only place he would agree to go.

At least she had talked him into patronizing Les Girls after his shift was over. Les Girls was the only strip club in Vegas owned and operated by (gasp) women. Women strippers, retired … or not.

Temple was known there from a previous PR job, and, on the pretext of visiting the Maylords ladies’ room, an oddly inapt expression, called ahead on her cell phone. She reached the manager, Lindy Boggs. That assured a reserved table where Temple could hear what Nadir was saying over the cranked-up music.

Did she have pull in this town or what?

They went in separate cars. Nadir would never consent to playing passenger in her Miata. Ride shotgun in a pussy car? Hell, no: unshakable evidence of a wuss. And Temple wasn’t keen on sharing the shabby charms of the ‘89 Grand Prix that turned out to be his.

So out of the lot and over to Les Girls they drove in single file, Temple bringing up the rear and wondering how she could

dig up all the dirt she was dying to know about Molina’s lurid past. Hey, if it involved Rafi Nadir, it had to be lurid!

Chapter 43