Cat in a Sapphire Slipper Read online

  “You know who these women are?” Aldo asks the madam.

  “We do not usually entertain women.”

  “You recognize any of them?”

  There is a rustle of taffeta and tulle. My nails itch for a good rip, but I hold back.

  A girl done up like the Blue Angel speaks hesitantly. “I recognized one voice.”

  “Yes?” the madam encourages the damsel in question.

  “I think she called a couple days ago, inquiring about our . . . hours.”

  The madam barks out a laugh. “Pretty much twenty-four seven, like the rest of Las Vegas. What did she think?”

  “She asked if we . . . handled . . . groups.”

  “And—?” The madam was frowning now.

  “I said we can do groups up to twenty, and she booked us for tonight for a twenty-four-hour exclusive.”

  “Shii . . . take mushrooms,” Aldo explodes, suddenly mindful of the female company. A Fontana boy is always the soul of courtesy. “That means no one else is going to show up here until tomorrow night. Why’d the gang need that much time?”

  “Scary,” Emilio says mournfully. “I do not even slot in my best girlfriend for a full twenty-four exclusive.”

  “Have you had such a booking before?” Rico asks the madam.

  She shakes her lavender-blue tinted head.

  “I thought it was a corporate inquiry,” the angel-baby in blue woman says in defense. “The woman who called sounded like an executive assistant. I thought it was one of the big hotels going all out for a celebrity high roller and his posse.”

  “She was an executive thief,” Emilio grumbles. “They have got a hundred thou in our Rolexes alone. Rolexi?”

  “You never were any good in Latin class in high school,” Rico says.

  “Who needs more Latin than ’veni, vidi, vici’?”

  The madam, who must have had high school Latin too and learned Caesar’s boast: “I came, I saw, I conquered,” laughs again.

  “Not tonight, boys. Besides, surely the Fontana brothers can disarm an army of men in tights.”

  That is just it. The madam has not had a close look at our captors. These are not men in tights, but girls in guns, an even uglier thought. Those delicate ladyfingers are not used to packing trigger-sensitive iron. They could break a nail and spray the room with bullets without even meaning to.

  “It sounds,” says the madam, “like we all will be here for a while. We should introduce ourselves. I am Miss Kitty.”

  Satin and I exchange a glance. It is sad how often our kind’s various nicknames are borrowed for ladies of the night and shady activities. The ancient Egyptians stuck to a simple “Meow” when naming us.

  The ladies give their first names in turn. There is an Angela, Babette, Crystal, Deedee, Fifi, Gigi, Heather, Inez, Jazz, Kiki, Lili, Niki, and Zazu.

  Satin hisses into my ear. “Only thirteen are working tonight, a bad sign. The reservation was for that number.”

  Meanwhile, I am doing some math of my own. There are the ten Fontana brothers, Mr. Matt, and Uncle Mario, the big kahuna, who has been detained, bound, in the archway to the barroom. That is twelve. “Who is the thirteenth of these ladies for?” I wonder.

  “The limo driver,” Satin hisses back.

  But the limo driver was replaced, so why order the full house? And where is the limo driver, anyway? Obviously, someone else took over for him and drove the whole crew here to this unexpected destination.

  Was he bribed, led astray, or waylaid? I can only hope they knocked him out back at Gangsters’ and he is now raising the alarm in Vegas.

  Except who is he going to call when the whole clan Fontana is under lock and key and gun sites here at the Sapphire Slipper? And he would not know where to send anyone, anyway.

  Who you gonna call? Crimebusters!

  I turn to Satin. “I am going to, uh, deputize you for the duration. Midnight Inc. Investigations needs a little beefing up at the moment.” I notice the airy vibrissae over her eyes waft. “Nothing personal. Just an expression we use in the private cop trade.”

  “I will be your undercovers partner, Louie,” she says, rubbing the side seams on my slinky black satin coat the right way.

  I swallow. “Undercover partner, Satin. That is the expression we use in the private cop trade.”

  I must admit, though, that the atmosphere here puts a wild hair up my nose. And it is black satin.

  Name Day

  “Mike, my lad!” The greeting boomed from the doorway with theatrical gusto.

  There’d been no name on the chart dangling from the foot of his bed. He’d checked after the psychiatrist had left. There had been no chart left. Strange.

  The late-middle-aged man beaming at him from the doorway looked nice enough. A civilian in rumpled suit and tie; good quality but rode hard and put up wet, like a saddle horse. A little overstuffed he was, but with a sharp, shrewd nose and chin. He was clean-shaven, but the graying hair was longish in back. Sharp hazel eyes were packed in weary pouches. Looked a little like a brilliant conductor focused on so much the rest of us—we the audience—didn’t see, that he appeared a bit scattered.

  “Glad to see you sitting up.” The fellow bustled over to sit on the bed’s foot and dig in the net grocery bag he carried.

  “Chocolate, some English-language newspapers.”

  He studied the chocolate wrappers handed to him. “Swiss. I thought so.”

  “Of course, my bright boy. Only the best for your recuperation.”

  “And just how am I ‘your boy’?”

  The man froze, then leaned in to whisper, so he was forced to wheel closer to hear.

  “I know we need to be discreet,” the man said, “but I doubt this room is bugged.”

  “I don’t.” Suddenly his feeling of unease made sense.

  “Ma . . . Mike?” The furrowed brow was a washboard of worry lines now, the man’s eyes darting around the room. “When I last saw you, you were out cold, but—”

  “When did you last see me? After I fell off a mountain?”

  “No. Here. After you were flown in.”

  “From Nepal.”

  The man ducked his head in vague agreement. “Mike, don’t you remember the accident?”

  “No. I don’t remember Mike either. Or you.”

  “I’m Garry Randolph.”

  “A relation, then?”

  “More of choice than of blood.”

  “Then why the bloody hell did you give me your surname when you checked me in? Don’t I have any relatives, family?”

  “You’ve been estranged from them for almost two decades.”

  “Why? What did I do to estrange my entire family?”

  “It was more something that was done to you.”

  “You’re talking in riddles,” he said sharply. “What would lose a man his whole family?”

  “A boy. You were just seventeen then. I’ve been your family ever since. It was . . . your choice. The situation was dreadful, but you chose another path than falling back into the old life and trying to forget.”

  “What path did I choose?”

  “Justice.”

  The word made him draw back. It was a weighty responsibility he wasn’t quite ready for. “And justice involved my climbing mountains?”

  “You really don’t remember . . . anything?”

  “Oh, I know where Switzerland is, and that it’s famous for chocolate.” He tossed the thick bar onto the thin white bedspread, even though it looked good to his medication-dry mouth. “I know what mountains are, and pain. I know I need to be careful. But with who, old man? And why?”

  “Not with me. Trust me on that. I’ve been your friend for a long time.”

  “Not ‘Michael’ Randolph’s friend?”

  “No. You’re right. That’s my last name. You’ve been almost a son to me, this old bachelor.”

  He saw the man’s eyes fighting moisture at not being recognized. At having to state their relationship, give it a contex
t. This man wasn’t a psychiatrist. He wasn’t wearing an expensive French suit.

  He, “Mad Mike,” may not know who he was, but he recognized genuine emotion.

  He clasped the man’s hand, hard. “I’m better than they think,” he whispered. “Physically, if not mentally. We’ve gotten out of tight corners before?”

  Garry Randolph nodded, once.

  “We’ll do it again.”

  The old man embraced him. Whispered something for his ears only.

  “We will, Max. But you didn’t hear that name from me.” Max.

  It was strong, that name. Short for what? Maximilian? Germanic. Teutonic. A European name. Not quite . . . right. But he had a name and this man knew it. This man trusted him with it.

  No one else could know this. Tight corners. But a real name was something he’d needed to know. It felt right. Max. He was Max. In time, he would remember all that Max had been. And known. Including what kind of justice he had fallen off a mountain hunting.

  Bridesmaids Revisited

  By now the parlor scene has settled down.

  The Fontana brothers and Uncle Mario have been stripped of all the heavy metal on their persons, which I see includes a few switchblades. These weapons and primo examples of the watchmaker’s art are piled on the big round table with a fringed cloth. They are guarded by a single sylph in black spandex bearing a single Uzi.

  A whole lot of tall, rangy Fontana brothers are hunched unhappily on the various blue velvet Victorian settees intended to be draped by skimpily-clad ladies of the night. And day, here in Las Vegas.

  Macho Mario Fontana is established in a low-slung Victorian chair, attended by the madam herself.

  The resident “girls” are arrayed along the walls, eyeing the Uzis at the archways to the bar and the foyer with edgy respect.

  Only us felines are cool. Like the kidnappers. Wait! How can you “kidnap” a roster of fully adult brothers? An interesting question.

  I send Satin to the kitchen to eavesdrop on the other distaff kidnappers and remain to see how the men of the party are reacting.

  “This is ridiculous,” Macho Mario blusters. “We have a lot of outside firepower to call on.”

  “If you could call,” a guard in masked spandex purrs, pointing to the pile of RAZR cell phones on the table. “Take a gun, a watch, and a cell phone from a tough Las Vegas wiseguy, and he is limp linguini.”

  Yup. This dame purrs. Like the lead femme fatale on a soap opera.

  A lot of Fontana fingers twitch at that taunt. They not only are not trigger fingers, or itchy cell phone fingers, but well-buffed champagne bottle fingers. I must admit it makes the hair on my hackles rise to see so many dudes cowed by a bunch of distaff desperados. Desperadas.

  Then out from the kitchens via the empty barroom strides the full posse again: I count seven altogether. They are all either anorexic muscle boys, or women.

  I notice the Fontanas notice the same thing, and breathe out mutual sighs of relief.

  Premature.

  “We can cuff you if you need it,” a woman’s voice says. “There are plenty of cuffs around here.”

  “Even gentle baby blue-dyed, rabbit fur-lined cuffs,” another lady desperado lisps, flaunting a few pair. “We like live rabbits.”

  A few Uzis focus rather unnervingly on both the Fontana boys and the brothel girls.

  “Faux fur!” the madam shouts, like a team coach crying “Foul.” “No rabbits were injured in constructing our erotic handcuffs! I have a paper that guarantees that.”

  “What about the girls in those handcuffs?” one black-clad figure asks, twirling the silly artifact in question.

  I will never understand the human notion of naughtiness. If they had ever had to wear a collar for real, or get their ears clipped or rear branded for identification purposes, they would see that S&M is really just Sad and Mean. But maybe these toys are for B&D. My canine cousins know about Bondage and Discipline all too well. Luckily, we felines are usually the S part of S&M.

  However, the whip hand, so to speak, is held by the little ladies with the captured Berettas and switchblades and even metal nail files, oh my.

  Well, Satin is hissing along with the commando girls now, and we dudes—the Fontanas and myself—are seriously outnumbered.

  Aldo takes the lead and answers. “We were bound for a harmless little bachelor party at a harmless little bar. Not here. Not for a brothel, however well staffed and really well decorated and, er, manned by such lovely ladies. If you want to condemn anybody, condemn yourselves. You picked this place.”

  There is a long sentence.

  Then one clear soprano answers, “But you didn’t pick us!”

  The nasty black spandex masks peel off.

  I gaze upon beauty bare, an octet of lovely ladies in the prime of their twenties and thirties. Their expressions are intense.

  “Why are we always the bridesmaids and never the brides?” another demands.

  “Aldo may be tying the knot—the only real man among you!—but you younger brothers are still playing the field. And we, the field, don’t like it,” says another.

  Silence prevails.

  The Fontana brothers eye the women they chose to play bridesmaids to their groomsmen in the imminent wedding.

  “Hey!” shouts Macho Mario. “I’m not even in the wedding party. I am an innocent victim. Take my nephews. They are philandering dogs! But I am innocent. I should be sprung.”

  “He is ‘sprung’ all right,” one woman says, sashaying over to cluck Macho Mario under the chin with the business end of a confiscated Beretta.

  While he sputters his indignation, she eyes the ladies of the house arrayed along the walls.

  “Okay. Here’s the deal. This is between us and these handsome but sadly maritally backward guys. We can confine you in the house B&D room, or you can put these sweet baby blue and pink faux rabbit-fur cuffs on our hairy-wristed guests. It is up to you, ladies. Nine ought to do it, if we include Mr. Macho shaking on the lounge chair over there.”

  Fontana brothers pale in unison as the blue and pink fuzzy handcuffs are flourished.

  I sympathize, observing with a low growl to Satin, “These rogue bridesmaids are mean. Real guys do not wear pink. Especially in fetish wear!”

  “Really? I think the baby blue at least goes rather well with black hair.” She bats her eyelashes at me.

  Yes, we felines do have eyelashes outside of cartoon representations of our kind. Take a close look at yours sometime, if you can do so without a faceful of shivs.

  Me? Bound in baby blue? Pretty in pink? I do not think so!

  One thing I find consoling: Mr. Nicky Fontana is also missing. In a blitz of brothers I can understand how the berserk bridesmaids overlooked a married one they seldom saw. Those full-coverage masks and bug-eyed sunglasses do not permit much peripheral vision. And these little dolls are totally focused on the objects of their frustrated affections, not any spare and ineligible dude.

  “This is just a girls’ idea of a bachelor party they can control,” Miss Satin sniffs. “They have no criminal intent and are paying for the staff’s time.”

  “Fur-covered or not, those handcuffs are effective,” I say. “I do not like to see dudes of my gender, if not my species, lose their dignity, not to mention their hardware. What do these dames hope to gain by this?”

  “Have a little fun at the guys’ expense and remind them that the girls have been taken for granted. That is why many of our gentleman callers visit the Sapphire Slipper. They feel taken for granted.”

  Satin slips me another long-lashed look. I have a sick feeling that she is also referring to my amorous attentions back in the day when we were an item on and off the Strip.

  It is likely true that no real mayhem is intended here, except that Mrs. Nicky Fontana will be anxious if her wandering spouse is not home by the wee hours of the morning, and it sounds like this captivity is shaping up to be a twenty-four-hour deal.

  I would not want to b
e hanging around the penthouse suite at the Crystal Phoenix when Miss Van von Rhine discovers that Mr. Nicky is not only not coming home tonight, but the Gangsters’ limo is lost in space.

  Champagne Suite

  “What do you think the rascals are up to tonight?” Van von Rhine asked as she refilled her three guests’ champagne glasses. Electra had come when called, leaving the Circle Ritz on the Hesketh Vampire motorcycle. Her helmet sat at her feet, the words SPEED QUEEN printed on the front.

  Next to it sat the Crystal Phoenix’s house cat, a gold-eyed black stray named after Temple’s cat, Midnight Louie. Midnight Louise was smaller, had longer hair, and didn’t share Louie’s eye color, but she was as prone to push through open doors into other people’s parties as her namesake.

  She also had that same odd air about her of appearing to understand what people said. Or, at least, she listened intently, as if there was something to learn. This was odd, because Temple would swear that cats never condescended to learn anything from human beings.

  She bent down to pat Midnight Louise’s attentive black head. She wished Louie himself were here. She always felt more at ease in his formidable presence, and on more than one occasion he had attacked a human on her behalf. Hard.

  Of course, she wasn’t the one in peril tonight.

  Temple didn’t want to admit it aloud, but she was worried about Matt. He was venturing far from ex-priest territory tonight. She assumed a Fontana brothers bachelor party could be pretty wild, in a harmless sense. Surely, Aldo would look out for Matt. After all, they were soon to be pseudo brothers-in-law. Surely.

  Omigod! Would she have to call him Uncle Aldo?

  “I don’t have to guess,” Electra said smugly. “I know.”

  “Know what?” Temple had forgotten what the conversation was about.

  “Where the rascals are going for Aldo’s bachelor party.”

  “You do!” they all shouted at once.

  Every woman here had someone near and dear off in the desert night partying hearty, except Electra.

  Electra pleated the full floral folds of her muumuu.