Cat In A Sapphire Slipper

“Isolated. Iffy cell phone. Temple. Take the . . . Rover. Kidnapped! By whom? Murder?”

While Temple and Kit stared at each other in utter shock, Electra disappeared.

“Nicky,” Van was shouting. “I’m losing you! The connection. Nicky!!!”

Cool, cool Van von Rhine was shaking when she reluctantly snapped the cell phone shut. Her hands were smoothing her mussed French twist.

“Nicky swears it will soon all be under control,” she said, “but he says we have to get out there ASAP.”

“We?” Temple asked. “Not the police?”

“He says the bachelor party—him, Aldo, their brothers, Uncle Mario, and Matt—” Van glanced sympathetically at Temple. “They’ve all been kidnapped. Even Midnight Louie is there!”

“My cat? Who’d kidnap a cat?”

“He must have been along for the ride. They were hijacked to a different location than the expected bachelor party in town. This . . . notorious brothel in the desert. Somebody look up the address—”

Electra bustled in. “I’ve got the coffee on and found the telephone book. Just give me a minute. Van, you need to get online and get a map to this Sapphire Slipper place. They’re sure to have a Web site.”

“Of course. Online.” She stood up. “Nicky said—”

“What did he say?” Temple demanded, jumping up.

“He said they need you out there to solve a murder. They need a cool head and an outside eye. He said that Matt discovered the body, and Nicky discovered Matt with the body, and they’re the most likely suspects. We get a jump on the police, or they . . . jump on them. It was a prank. Just a prank. The bridesmaids went berserk. It was supposed to have been funny. Now maybe one of them is dead. Murdered.”

“Who can drive?” Kit asked.

“Me,” said Electra. “I was planning on ‘cycling home, so went light on the champagne. Plus, I’ve got the extra poundage to metabolize it. Sometimes fat girls do have less fun. Van, you get the map and order the Rover from the valet captain. If cell phones don’t work out there—”

“There’s a satellite phone in the Rover,” Van said, racing for her home office and the computer.

Temple sat down. Everybody seemed to have it together.

All anyone needed from her was on-scene detective work.

All?

Matt? A suspect. Matt at the Sapphire Slipper brothel? Oh, my. Oh, Matt.

She was starting to shake like Van had at first. Nicky vulnerable, too.

Something soft intruded on her crazed, anxious mental soliloquy.

Midnight Louise was rubbing against her calf, looking up through serious, round, gold eyes.

And Midnight Louie out there too!

Midnight Louise spoke. One meow. Loud and strong.

“We’ll get them all out of it in the twitch of a cat’s whisker,” Temple said, stroking the little cat.

She didn’t believe one word of what she said.

Hitchhikers

Sorry, Miss Temple, I do not need a pat on the head, I need wheels and some armed and dangerous backup.

The women are still a bit shocked and shaky despite their brave talk, but it is no surprise at all to me that a midnight phone call reveals that the old man is ruff deep in a hotbed of shady women, dangerous men, and murder most sleazy.

I am surprised, though, that Mr. Matt Devine, who provided my first temporary shelter after I showed up as a stray at the Crystal Phoenix, would be in any danger of a murder rap.

No way, Bombay! That is not going to happen with Midnight Louise around.

I let the women-behind-the-men on the hot seat out in the desert run around and mount what passes for a rescue party.

I take careful note of their urgent shouts and consultations.

My sharp ears (both in their external appearance and aural effectiveness) twitch this way and that to take it all in. This Sapphire Slipper is tucked away on the backside of any reasonable distance, but where there is a will, there is a way.

“Won’t we need, uh, weapons?” Miss Kit Carlson asks, sounding as fierce as her frontier gunslinger namesake.

“No. Nicky said not.” Miss Van von Rhine is her sharp, efficient self again, her hair slicked down and smoothed for a rumble. “The brothers were traveling fully loaded, and the mock-kidnapping has turned into a hysterical hen party, he says. The boys will soon be in charge again.”

“When were they ever not?” Miss Temple Barr asks.

Miss Van von Rhine lifts an almost-invisible eyebrow. These pale human show cats have barely any vibrissae over their eyes, unlike my lush black spidery lashes.

“Apparently for a few hours tonight they have been disarmed, bound, and held utterly helpless.”

Miss Temple gives a disbelieving cry.

I agree. No wonder murder was afoot if the Fontana brothers were tied hand and foot. Who would be so stupid as to take the only decent muscle in Las Vegas out of action?

“I do not care what you say,” Miss Electra says. “We can stop at the Circle Ritz on the way for a couple useful switchblades I got from my motorcycle club guys. Forearmed is forewarned.”

Now we are rockin’! My switchblades are built-in, and I do not go anywhere without them. They are my American Excess card.