Cat in a Hot Pink Pursuit (38 page)

“
Shooting?" The Divine Yvette bats her black mas
caraed lashes as a prelude to a swoon. "You think there will be shooting?"

“
I meant cameras." But of course shooting is not im
possible with a murderer among us.

And I recall Miss Temple telling her Aunt Kit about a
notorious shooting death in this very house many
years ago. I have not led Miss Louise astray. Eaves
dropping is the low-key operative's biggest asset, and
you cannot get a lower operative than me.

I glance back to where I left the young sourpuss, my
partner. The spot is vacant. I cannot understand why
she did not wait around like a good girl for me to return and make my report, but frankly, I am glad not to have
her cramping my style with the sisters Ashleigh, now
that I have them to myself.

She might blow my cover and refer to me by some
demeaning nickname like "Snooze" or "Geezer" or,
heaven forbid, "Daddy-O.”

Chapter 41

Wolfram and Heart

Matt wore a Carl Sandburg T-shirt, baggy khakis, loafers without socks, and a Chicago Cubs cap on backwards.

He'd arrived at eight
A.M.
and spent the day lurking in the halls and emergency stairwells of the building that
housed Brandon, Oakes, and McCall. Just an ordinary
guy, staking out who came and went through the doors of the prestigious law office.

He'd wanted to look like a guy who'd gotten lost in the lobby and was still trying to find his way out. Nobody questioned him.

Around two P.M., after he'd watched the noontime exo
dus return to the law firm, he bought lunch at the lobby coffee shop and pumped the waitress.

Even in his instant scruffies, his looks won smiles and chitchat and information. The coffee shop provided latte, yeah, they had a machine for every variety of espresso.

Lots of very big people went up there. So what was he do
ing here?

Waiting to connect with a contact. He was in the record
business.

Realllly! Her cousin Stevie had a fab basement band. Radical but not too, you know? Ready for a big-time commercial break. He didn't look like a DJ. They were
usually such losers in the looks department. He should be
on MTV.

Yeah.

Matt finished the dregs of his caramel–whipped cream latte, just a dozen calorie counts shy of a hot fudge sundae, and went back up to the forty-fifth floor.

To lurk.

Krys, who had okayed his outfit this morning, would
be amazed to know how dull subterfuge was. He was amazed to know how dull it was. He thought about Carmen Molina, back in Vegas. Had she ever done this detail? Maybe. Maybe not.

What were the chances? The law office staff seemed to
recognize him. So how likely was it that some relative of his lost father would breeze up in the elevator and into Brandon, Oakes, and McCall? Today or any other day.

Infinitesimal. Matt bet that DJs didn't often use that word.

Ex-priests did, though, having been conditioned to
think in terms of infinity.

In terms of infinity, what were the chances that he
would find any trace or trail that led to the man who'd fathered him?

Almost zero. He didn't care. He'd learned long ago not
to care. He'd tried to tell his mother that. Trouble was,
she did.

What had been the high point in her life had been the nadir in his.

Nadir. Speak of the Devil. Rafi Nadir. Another un
wanted father. Carmen Molina had made it clear that Nadir hadn't deserved to know he was the father of a
child she would bear and rear without him.

The usual rap was men were unreliable. Men skated
out from under fatherhood and its obligations. They were
louts. Rats. Immature. They seduced and abandoned.
They made Matt sorry he was one.

Except . . .

He didn't believe it. He'd seen it during the Sacrament of Reconciliation, formerly known as Confession. Men were scared. They thought they had to be the whole enchilada, 24/7: strong, sole supporting, macho men. It was too much.

He considered his mother at nineteen—her critical
condition. Pregnant, with him. Catholic. Young. Damned.
Despised. No support of any kind. Hard not to hate the
guy who put her there. Except that she hadn't. And he'd
gone off to a foreign war and died. No chance to prove
his mettle on the domestic front.

The elevator made all the grunts and groans of being about to open again. Matt peeked through the stairway door like a kid playing hide and seek.

Another "briefcase" walking into Brandon, Oakes, and McCall.

Except . . . this guy didn't carry a briefcase. He wore
an expensively pale suit. His ash-blond hair was silver at the temples. Same height, same build, thickened a little around the middle.

Matt gaped, as if he'd seen a ghost walking through a wall, as the form vanished into the dark wood door of Brandon, Oaks, and McCall.

The proof of the pudding was what this man would
look like from the front, when he walked out.

Matt stuck the toe of his new sports tennies against the
heavy metal door. This he had to see, no matter how long
it took.

It took forty-eight minutes by his stainless-steel watch.

Several people came and went. Matt began to worry about a discreet exit door farther down the hall . . . but,
still, the elevator had to be taken, unless someone
wanted to walk down forty-some flights. And then that
someone would come face-to-face with Matt lurking in
the hidden echoing concrete spine that ran up the length of every skyscraper.

The lawyers' office door didn't so much squeak as
rumble a little when it opened and shut.

It was opening now, spitting out the front view of the man Matt had glimpsed from behind. He managed to eel out of the stairway to meet the man at the bank of elevators.

To meet himself.

Related, no doubt.

How to mention it?

The guy did the usual big-city elevator shuffle: push
the DOWN button, stare at the computerized numbers of floors and cars above. Pace. Glance at his watch. Glance
askance at the guy who'd joined him in waiting, trying
not to stare at strangers, of course.

Matt's throat was so dry he couldn't have received Communion to save his soul.

Alex Haley'd had Kunta Kinte. Now Matt had his own
Roots.
Someone who looked like him. Someone he
looked like besides his mother. It didn't matter, he'd always said. It mattered.

The man slipped a look at him again. He seemed nervous.

Matt took off the stupid baseball cap, stuffing it in the
pocket of his baggy Dockers. He regretted the carefully casual clothes, regretted not looking like himself. Not looking like this impeccably dressed man three elevator doors down the hall.

The man, maybe—forty-five. A cousin? Not a brother,
his real father had been too young. Matt had to be an only
child. The mystery man cleared his throat. Looked away.

The elevator indicator tinged.

They both froze.

Watched the door open between them, neither wanting to meet the other as they rushed to claim it.

The man glanced at the EXIT sign over the stairwell where Matt had lived most of today.

He knew. Or suspected. He wanted to run.

The elevator doors opened. Closed. A couple inside watched them with puzzled, and finally contemptuous,
stares. Why call for an elevator if you weren't going to
take it. Why indeed?

And then they were gone.

Alone again.

“I think," Matt said, "that your last name might be the same as mine should be.”

The guy stared at him. His eyes were gray. So was his
skin color. Matt saw he was older than he'd looked at
first glance, and began to fear he might be having a heart attack.

He began to have one too. This guy was actually old enough . . . to be his father.

Chapter 42

Feline Shepherd

I am shocked. Shocked, I tell you!

With my own concealed ears, I hear my Miss Temple
consign young Miss Molina to the questionable over
sight of Mr. Rafi Nadir, who may be her unacknowl
edged sire.

Being an unacknowledged sire myself, I feel a deep
sense of obligation to keep an eye on this extremely
unlikely pairing.

If my Miss Temple has set the wolf to watch the
lamb, I will be the mountain lion set to watch the wolf.

And when it comes to major matches, felinus versus caninus always wins.

So, when Miss Savannah Ashleigh betakes herself
inside, I pad after Rafi who pads after her.

Once she is fully attired, if you can ever call the belly button–exposing, cleavage-baring clothing of MSA
that, we follow her to her office quarters for the day and
stand guard in the hall.

He is in the standard feet apart, hands crossed in
front posture of security guys since my forebears stood
guard duty in the palaces and temples of ancient Egypt.

I assume the deceptive stance of a sleeping feline. It
works every time.

Sure enough, along comes Miss Temple, escorting
Miss Mariah to her first appointment of the day.

“
Mariah, this is Mr. Nadir. He will help you if anything
goes wrong.”

Mariah is having none of it. "You mean if Savannah
Ashleigh is strangled in her own monokini by the time I
go in for my appointment?"

“
Hey," Mr. Rafi Nadir says in a cajoling tone. "Nobody
buys it on my watch. What say I accompany you on
your rounds and make sure?"

“
What about your client?" Mariah asks, savvy kid
that she is.

“
Oh, I suppose your friend Xoe Chloe will be respon
sible for her.”

Miss Mariah consults Miss Temple, who shrugs in
typical, deplorable Xoe Chloe fashion.

And so the deal is struck. My Miss Temple will watch
Miss Savannah Ashleigh, a personage we both wish
would be boiled in canola oil and put on the South Beach Diet until death did them part. And Mr. Rafi
Nadir, the bane of Miss Lieutenant C. R. Molina's life,
past and present, will be watching over his own daugh
ter, unawares. If Miss Savannah gets restive and calls
for male reinforcements, instead of Mr. Rafi, I myself
will rush to the scene to distract her and the Persian
babes. It is the least I can do, and I have been known
to drive Miss Savannah to distraction in the past.

It is amazing the things an observant feline can know, and not say.

I decide where to invest my time and energy, and de
cide it is the unlikely partnership of Nadir and Molina.

Miss Temple watches me ankle off down the hall af
ter them, looking worried.

So we all three end up waiting outside various offices
for Miss Mariah's daily consultations.

“You pull bodyguard duty often?" Mariah asks.

I am about to answer but Rafi Nadir beats me to it.
"Nah. Most people who hire bodyguards need the
publicity more than the muscle."