Cat in an Alien X_Ray

by Carole Nelson Douglas

  “I think she’s safely out of your private life, Molina, but not your professional one. I once loved her, then hated her, and now I hunt her. As she hunts me and mine … and even my ‘frenemies’ … is that the word for us now?”

  Molina nodded solemnly.

  “I need your help, Carmen Regina, Lieutenant, sir.” He mustered a crooked smile. “And we none of us will sleep well until she’s cornered and confined.”

  Chapter 25

  Romance on the Rocks

  “I need drinks and a dinner,” Temple briskly instructed the person on the other end of her home phone at 11 A.M. the next day.

  “Ah, isn’t it usually dinner and drinks?” Matt sounded a bit fuzzy. “And are we still talking, much less dining and drinking?”

  Temple knew he was just waking up after a long work night, poor guy, but she couldn’t wait a moment longer. “The message you left was suitably desperate. I am mollified. Matt, I know the insane pressure you’ve been under with your mother being threatened and then getting married and the job thing and us having to work with Max and knowing that Kitty the Cutter is out there somewhere. It’s completely normal you might feel a little jealous. You’ve never been in this position before.”

  “You’re way more generous than I deserve.”

  “Just keep that in mind.” Temple couldn’t contain something else a moment longer. Her indignation. “Just remember, this outing is drinks first, food later. A special occasion. I just fired a would-be client.”

  “I thought the firee was the one who went out and solaced herself with good liquor and bad food.”

  Temple sighed loud enough to be heard in the back row of a community theater building. “I’ve never had to give up on a project before, but this was the last indignity. Silas T. Farnum is a deceptive, screwy, irresponsible nutcase, even if he has the most mind-blowing venue in Las Vegas, and I have flacked my last flack on his behalf. Details at six o’clock.”

  “Okay, okay. I see this calls for an emergency evening out. What would soothe the savaged soul? The Four Seasons, Palazzo? Or something down-home like the Bellagio?”

  “Maybe,” Temple conceded.

  “Maybe … which one?”

  “Surprise me.”

  “What? So it’s not the right one and you can fire me?”

  “No such luck. I’m done firing people. I don’t want to talk about this until we’re sitting someplace wonderful and I’ve had at least three sips of something very high proof. I’ll see you at my door at seven thirty.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  She was smiling as she hung up. She’d seen the strain on Matt’s face lately and should have held back and given him some space. Now she was getting the romantic time out they both deserved, and needed.

  It was high time to cut Silas T. afloat and concentrate on her chaotic personal life. Temple was not liking the fact that no further word had been heard from the Chicago network execs. They’d been so interested in Matt’s talk show future during the recent trip to the Windy City. She knew media plans could fall flatter than a French crepe, faster than a three-minute egg, but … Gee, listen to her think. Crepes and eggs. She must really be hungry.

  Tonight while Matt was properly attentive and consoling her on public relations bloopers, she could pump him on major career matters.

  * * *

  The Bellagio it was. The Circo restaurant was surrounded by gleaming vaulted traditional woodwork with sophisticated big top touches and offered Tuscan delights from octopus appetizers to gourmet pizza.

  Temple let herself soak in the setting as if she were sinking into a buoyant, bubbling hot spa. Matt was watching her relax with eyes as warming as brandy. Temple sighed.

  “Matt, this is exactly what I needed after spending days, it seems, on an unshaded dusty, grimy construction site. And this restaurant overlooks the Bellagio’s Lago di Como. Lake Como, where Kit and Aldo went on their honeymoon. Did you know—?”

  He just grinned, an expression Temple was surprised to realize she’d not seen for a while. “And did you buy that dress during your lightning shopping session with my mother?” Matt asked. He’d already learned to ask, not assume.

  “No, that was totally for the bride-to-be. I saw something during that raid on the Venice shops and realized I had an ’80s lookalike version among the vintage stuff in my closet.”

  “Lavender is definitely your color,” he said as the waiter brought them something wickedly scarlet in martini glasses. “Your high-powered drink, madam,” Matt said. “The Web site says the Bellagio pours twenty-five thousand cocktails every twenty-four hours, but the hotel pioneered upping the quality on mixed drinks in Las Vegas in recent years.”

  “You researched my druthers! That is so sweet, Matt.”

  “I hope this candy apple red drink isn’t.” He sipped and offered a considering expression.

  Temple said, “You realize I can’t be a ‘madam’ until I’m married.”

  “Not a problem.” He watched her sample the cocktail.

  “Wow. Like a Cosmopolitan made from White Lightning. I like.” She sighed. “I need. My shoulder muscles have been in lockdown since I first heard the name Silas T. Farnum.”

  “So what did Silas T. Farnum do to earn your wrath and swift execution?”

  “Farnum,” she snarled. “The surname alone should have alerted me. He’s the P. T. Barnum of modern hucksterism.” She lifted her glass. “A toast to toasted hucksters.” She sipped again before reluctantly lowering her glass. “Although his building concept was pretty awesome.”

  “We’re not talking about his personal presence here, I hope. A Web site maybe—”

  “No. He’s invested in the unlovely area on the Paradise Road bend, the beastly backside of the Strip’s beauty parade. His project is so high-tech, it takes futuristic to the moon and back. But how do you sell a building people can’t see?”

  “Ran out of construction money, huh?” Matt shook his head. “A lot of people with big dreams and even bigger bankrolls did when the Great Recession hit them.”

  “Don’t cry for Silas T. Farnum. He’s got the site lot, he’s got the dough. He’s got a sure-thing prize for the ‘Most Unusual Vegas Design.’ If people could only see it.”

  “Maybe he’ll attract more customers than you think.”

  “Don’t keep looking on the bright side! How do you sell … nothing?”

  Matt was looking lost. And that made him look weary, with new fine lines around his eyes.

  “Forget about my troubles,” Temple said. “What’s up with you? Or, rather, what’s keeping you up past your two A.M. quitting time? I don’t understand why you need to work up new show ideas with Ambrosia when you’re on the brink of leaving The Midnight Hour.”

  “I’m not.” He took another slug of Red Ruin.

  “Not working up new ideas? I can understand how you hate to leave her and WCOO in the lurch—”

  “I’m not leaving The Midnight Hour.”

  “Matt!”

  At that instant, her cell phone yodeled for attention. Temple had to dig in her crowded envelope purse to pull out a smartphone with a loud ringtone of Leonard Cohen singing “Hallelujah” and set it back to sleep.

  This was definitely not a “hallelujah” moment for either of them.

  “Sorry,” she told Matt, hating the interruption at such a crucial time.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Matt looking relieved. He didn’t really want to continue this conversation. And she really did need a good long talk with him.… As she watched her phone screen, she heard Silas T.’s voice: “Look at this.”

  She lifted the dang phone, ready to hurl it to the floor.

  Sound and motion filled her screen. A YouTube dip showed a Spielberg-like hovering spaceship as a hysterical voice-over did the “color” coverage.

  “Holy flying cow! It’s not a bird! It’s not a plane! It’s a super spaceship, and I’m filming it on my camcorder from my Riviera Hotel room window. I’m watc
hing this thing descend—hell, land!—in a vacant lot off the Vegas Strip. The aliens are heeeere and they couldn’t have picked a better place to colonize.”

  Matt had risen at hearing the hysterical voice and came around the table to watch the tiny screen over her shoulder. “Is that your ex-client’s freaky new attraction? Looks like a winner to me.”

  “That’s just the thing. It’s not an attraction. It’s invisible.”

  “Coulda fooled me. Temple, you need to tell me what’s going on.”

  She looked up into his worried but true-blue brown eyes. “I think I could say the same.”

  * * *

  Matt was right, but first Temple needed to consult with … ditch … her not-client. She excused herself to head for the ladies’ room. This was Vegas, so it was a mini-nightclub all on its own. Dark and glossy with furtive reflections and pink fluorescent lights framing the over-sink mirrors so every woman looked like a movie star.

  “What is going on?” she demanded when Farnum answered her call.

  “We’ve an accidental reveal. Those fleeting seconds I showed you Area 54’s bells and whistles were captured by dozens of amateur videographers from hotel room windows all around. Talk about stunt PR. This is premature but sweet.”

  “This is a huge pain in the alien patootie. It will have Unforeseen Consequences. Trust me. Meanwhile, I’m off having a private life, if you don’t mind.”

  When she came out of the bathroom, totally unprimped, she eyed Matt sitting at their table, swirling a swizzle stick around in his virtually untouched drink, frowning.

  Something invisible was going on here too, and she doubted it would ever be accidentally revealed. She needed to find out why the Chicago deal had gone cold and why he didn’t want to talk to her about it.

  Temple sighed, turned off her cell phone, and headed for her fiancé with a feeling of dread.

  Chapter 26

  Going, Going, Going, Gone … Viral

  Temple jerked upright in bed, in the dark, her heart pounding. She’d finally fallen asleep after an awkward dinner with Matt. He gave reason after reason for not taking the job in Chicago: his relocation, her relocation, Louie’s relocation. Loyalty to WCOO and Leticia Brown and her “Ambrosia” syndication. Too many relatives in Chicago, including his clingy cousin Krys, his mother who needed a stable family atmosphere to start out her new marriage.

  It was all absolutely true and reasonable and Temple didn’t buy a bit of it. You can’t snow a professional snower, a spin expert. The only thing that rang true was the deep, troubled look in Matt’s eyes.

  What was going on?

  They’d parted when he had to leave for work, both of them miserable, the would-be festive evening out a debacle, thanks to her crazy day job and his late-night job and everything being knocked out of its orbit by some hidden planet Matt would not reveal to her to save his soul.

  She’d sobbed her way through War Horse on the DVD and finally was exhausted enough to sleep. She was a fixer, she decided, and she would fix this if it killed her.

  Now her cell phone was trumpeting “Hallelujah,” and from the condo’s large living room her landline was chiming in, very much muffled.

  She’d shut the bedroom door to keep the dawn’s early light from flooding through the row of glass-paned French doors to the patio. So she didn’t know what time it was until her cell phone face told her—6:10 A.M. An ungodly hour in Las Vegas, when all bad gamblers kissed their assets good-bye and bedded down for the night at 5 A.M.

  Jeez, was that unreliable Silas T. Farnum pestering her again? She fumbled for the bedside lamp switch, being careful not to kick her feet as she rolled over to sit up. Didn’t want to give Midnight Louie a punch in the paunch.

  The distant phone rang on as she answered the cell.

  “Silas T.—”

  “This is Temple Barr?” The female voice was brisk and urgent and not Molina’s.

  “Yes.”

  “This is Madison Wiswallson.”

  Madison, Wisconsin? Something to do with Max?

  “KXTP-TV news, L.A.”

  Alphabet soup. Temple was still disoriented.

  The voice continued. “You’re representing Deja View Associates, it says in this release. A Mr. Farnum directed me to you about the UFO scare infecting Las Vegas.”

  “UFO? Oh. He’s not officially my client.” No legal agreements had been signed. “I do know he released some helium balloons on his own. I have nothing to do with them, uh, him.”

  “Well, he plastered the Internet and media e-mails with a strangely vague release and you’re listed as the contact. And I beg your pardon. We’re not talking ‘helium balloons.’ Do a YouTube search for “Vee Is for Vegas Visitors” and, oh, let’s see … “Alien Intervention” … “UFOs Unleashed” … “Elvis’s Asteroid Belt Lands on Strip” … “Flying Saucer Convention” … “Little Men in Green”…”

  Temple had done as instructed and was following a string of tiny films of Farnum’s supposedly quick-peek at the UFO design. Oh, my unmentionables! She quashed any expletives that occurred to her and would be better directed at Silas T. Farnum.

  “I know nothing about this, Miss Wisconsin. I mean, Miss Wishywallson. I have no comment. Mr. Farnum is not a client.” And he won’t be quotable the minute I can reach the sneaky old scam artist and shut him up.

  She clicked on the bedroom TV, set to a local channel’s morning news show. A huge photo of the revealed UFO top of Farnum’s stealth building occupied the entire screen. It looked as impressive as a movie still from Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

  It was replaced by a live shot of the parking lot, the real building invisible to the TV videographers, thank God. A male reporter was doing a stand-up job of a stand-up, gazing soberly into the camera. Oh, no! It was sleazy promoter Crawford Buchanan, with a soul patch and a pea-sized diamond earring. Gross. When did he get a real TV job? His deep, mellow, and oily radio voice oozed into the room.

  “Hundreds of people have gathered overnight on this deserted Las Vegas construction site on news that an unidentified flying object was captured in mid-descent by dozens of cell phones and camcorders.”

  The camera panned across the milling mob before returning to the reporter.

  “Complicating matters,” he went on, “is the fact that part of the area was a recent crime scene when an unidentified body was discovered here three days ago. Many of those gathering now include some who claim they had signed up for a ‘UFO convention’ at this location—an empty lot, as everyone can see.”

  Another camera pan of the towering buildings hundreds of feet away on the Strip and the unimpressive shrouded pseudo-building made the point.

  “So who invited all these true believers to an empty lot? Did the people just arriving miss the main attraction? A real UFO landing? Or is it all a come-on for a new magic act on the Strip? Maybe the New Millennium Hotel’s Cloaked Conjuror can pay Paradise Road a visit and pull away the curtain.”

  How right the annoying twerp was. Temple knew she had to get there to do damage control, whether she was representing Farnum or not.

  “This is Crawford Buchanan, the KSOS-TV Night Crawler, up bright and early to see what the cat dragged into Vegas now.”

  Temple remembered the small four-legged silhouette streaking away from the temporarily revealed spotlight the saucer’s neon green pillar of light made. Oh, no! Where was Louie? Not here safe in bed.

  All she needed was Molina on the warpath and her cat caught fleeing the scene on film.

  Chapter 27

  We Are Not Alone

  I knew there was something fishy about that high-rise parking garage the old guy in the seersucker suit was wanting my Miss Temple to see the other night. So I went along undercover (of darkness) to view the sneak peek.

  Manx! Those UFO lights nearly sizzled my unmentionables.

  I rocketed out of there, but when the waft of something fishy undulates past the area between my whiskers and chin, I leave no ston
e unturned or nook and cranny unexplored.

  What are these nooks and crannies, anyway? More of those insanely popular e-readers? I am sure that it goes back all the way to middling English, which is no skin off my sniffer, as I do not deign to speak anything other than key phrases of cat.

  Humans would be a lot better off if they restricted themselves to only a few choice words of absolute necessity, such as “This sunlight spot is mine” or “You are sleeping on my tail.” Instructions to lesser beings, that kind of thing. In that line, I will broadcast a mental command to Miss Temple: “More shrimp risotto sauce on that former rabbit food that is served to me in the guise of army brown Free-to-Be-Feline health kibble. Pellets in and pellets out, if you know what I mean, and the ants will play pinochle on your snout before I munch a bit of it. It does not fill my nook or cranny.

  Anyway, I am again on the same site, and it is almost unrecognizable, mostly for the crowd of gawkers it has attracted.

  I wander now among the gathered weirdos, fans, and true believers of all things UFO and alien. If any murderer was going to return to the scene of this crime, the discovery of an unlabeled corpse, he or she would have an instant cover.

  I recall when my gang of three—Miss Temple, Mr. Matt Devine, and a younger and more amenable Mariah Molina—attended TitaniCon, the world’s largest (and most disastrous) science fiction convention at the New Millennium hotel. That was when Star Trek: The Experience was in full bloom, and all sorts of alien beings got to parade around as waiters and guides wearing assorted alien heads … Klingons and Ferengi and such.

  Did you ever notice that most aliens always have something weird about the head and face? Whether they wear rubber masks for a TV show or are drawn by purported victims of alien abduction, there is always some new wrinkle in the unfortunate human skin condition called … well, skin.

  You will also realize how much more attractive media aliens are when they wear fur, such as the charming Chewbacca of the Star Wars franchise or, my personal favorite, those delicious little Star Trek morsels called Tribbles. Born to be snacks, and so prolific.