Cat In An Ultramarine Scheme

“You are,” he pointed out. “Am I glad I ran into that ex-priests’ group when I was helping you investigate one of those murders you feel compelled to help solve. They made me see the spirit of the canon law is more important than the letter of it.”

“I keep forgetting I’m a … ‘near occasion of sin’—isn’t that the terminology?”

Matt frowned, sounding stern. “You didn’t get that from me. Who told you that?”

“The Unitarian Universalist minister I consulted,” Temple admitted.

“You saw a minister, about me?”

“No, about me. I needed to know what my being modern about putting the honeymoon before the wedding would do to your conscience. So I’m very happy you’ll be seeing the old folks at home next week and preparing them. You didn’t have to keep that from me, Matt. I’ll understand if they want to reject me.”

“No one who knows you would want to reject you.”

There was a silence. Apparently, Temple thought, Max Kinsella had, or had at least vanished on her for the second time in their mysteriously interrupted three-year love affair.

“Not willingly,” Matt added.

“Remarkably generous concession,” Temple said.

He shrugged, which did great things for his swimmer’s-strength upper torso, upon which Temple snuggled again.

“Okay. You’re out of town for a week,” she concluded. “Fans of The Midnight Hour will be besieging the station phone lines begging for the voice of their favorite radio late-night shrink. Louie will be hogging the entire other half of my condo bed. You’ll be wrestling your large Polish family and pinning them down to offer you independence and support. We’ll cope.”

“I’m sure you will. I’ll also be doing a week of The Amanda Show live.”

“A whole week gig? Not just the occasional hour like you’ve been doing? And you leave your major-media promotion break to an afterthought? The Amanda Show is second only to Oprah.”

“Oprah has a huge lead … on everything. My relatives do get a huge kick out of me being on TV in their own backyards. I figure that will help them adjust to a soon-to-be married ex-priest in the family.”

“Good,” said Temple. “I’ll try not to solve any murders without you.”

Matt checked his watch. “I hate to kick my fiancée out of a warm bed, but the movie’s over and I have to get ready for heading over to the radio station.”

Temple yawned. “Do what you have to. I’m starting to feel like a lovesick teenager with a curfew,” she grumbled. “Home by eleven. Yes, folks.”

“I’m sure your parents would be very proud,” Matt said as he bent to kiss her good night again, and vanished into the bathroom.

Temple retrieved her clothes and shoes from the bedside and gave a fond farewell look at the fifty-two-inch flat-screen television. She only had a thirty-seven-inch in her condo.

Of course, she also had Midnight Louie, when he deigned to sleep in nights, and he was an extra-large model cat.

Fifteen minutes later she was snuggled down in her own bed, Midnight Louie blissfully on his back on the other side, all four feet splayed in ludicrous disarray. Temple was sure he only unfurled his long, furry, soft underbelly here at home.

The Circle Ritz, like all fifties-vintage construction, was cramped by modern room-size standards, especially in the tiny, tile-lined bathrooms, only a bathtub wide, both of them. Still, Temple loved her petite living quarters. It was like living in a luxurious dollhouse surviving past its time. The thought of forsaking it for another place, for a freestanding house, made her a little sad.

But then, Max had rolled around alone in a big house when he returned to Vegas from his first disappearing act. Maybe it was more grown-up to live in a house rather than an apartment or condominium.

Maybe Temple was finally growing up, not just getting older and wiser.

She scratched Louie’s tummy until he yawned to display his vast pink maw lined with white teeth and started purring like a Volkswagen motor.

Nobody who knew her would reject her.

Apparently Max had, despite himself, twice. Somehow Max was still showing up unexpectedly at the most awkward moments. In her mind.

Her heart told her she’d loved Max, but it had always been “despite” circumstances that never stopped keeping them apart. Her heart told her she’d remained faithful to their passionate past for so long, she’d almost missed falling in love with a uniquely wonderful guy who loved her to death. Or rather, until death did them part, and meant it.

That same heart told her that Max would have let her know if he was alive, somehow, if he was alive.

And, if not, he was a master magician. You’d think even then he’d have the chops and decency to let her know for sure that he was dead.

How Green Was My Valley

“Smog?” Max asked, staring out the Cessna’s porthole window as the small twin-engine prop airplane approached Dublin.

“Ireland has smog now? Is that what the Celtic Tiger is thrashing its technological tail about? Is pollution what Ireland’s acclaimed economic revival achieved?”