So, here he stood at midnight on a dark pinnacle inside Neon Nightmare, timing the first of many risky plunges to the abyss below. In the morning’s wee hours, he’d be moonlighting at the New Millennium, planning a daring art heist.
And sometime in between, he should be making a few personal appearances before an audience of one. Temple. He’d been forced to neglect her, and them. She was feeling it and saying so.
He remembered the overpowering plunge of falling for her more than two years earlier when they’d met in Minneapolis. He’d lured her to follow him to Vegas where they’d settled like newlyweds into a co-owned condo at the Circle Ritz. That was when he’d first started to investigate the possibility of slipping out of his undercover counterterrorist role that had been forced on him as a teenager. He could retire at the ripe age of thirty-four and become a magician, pure and simple.
It hadn’t worked out that way. Someone had tumbled to him. Someone hounded him out of Las Vegas and into hiding for a year.
He’d come back to find that Temple, smart and spirited and cute as a kitten, had stood her ground like a tiger when the police came sniffing around about his past and present whereabouts.
He’d known female assassins who were stone killers, but Temple had her own brand of toughness all the more lovable for being so unexpected in such a petite package.
Now he couldn’t even manage regular appearances in her bedroom, and his promises of finally breaking free of his past had become as empty as an old-time magician’s top hat.
He had so many roles to play, public and hidden, professional and personal, that even an expert juggler like himself couldn’t keep them all up in the air.
Max had become the man in the mirror, the middle, the mirage. He was the magician, the mechanic, the pawn, and the power player . . . depending on whose casting card you read.
For the first time, this position seemed untenable. Undoable. Doomed. He had split himself into too many personas. Some would not, could not, survive. That was the curse of the double agent. He had acted that role for many years. Now, all aspects of his various personas dueled each other. He wore the three faces of . . . not Eve, but Eventual destruction.
He had the sinking feeling that he stood on the Eve of Destruction.
He swung off his high, invisible perch into the darkness eighty feet below, into the laser lights and neon, losing his misgivings in the sudden enthralling swoop of risk and danger.
Flying, falling, flying while people below gasped and cheered and some few hoped, in the darkest corner of their too human hearts, that he would fall for real and truly thrill them.
Swept Off Her Feet
Temple Barr woke up at 10:30 A.M. in her own bed, which was hardly unusual, and supposed that there wasn’t a woman in America who didn’t ache for one of those Scarlett O’Hara moments.
Maybe it was Scarlett swearing to heaven that she’d never have to choke down another raw turnip (or broccoli or cauliflower floret . . . or diet book) again.
Maybe it was the spunky freshman Scarlett, telling that blind-stupid Ashley Wilkes right out that he ought to be dating her instead of some wimpy prom queen from the next plantation down along the Sewanee.
Maybe it was Scarlett cornered on the stairs of Tara shooting an attacking Yankee soldier dead.
Or Scarlett in any of the dazzling fashion-show gowns in which she schemed, fought, and flounced her way through the Civil War and its aftermath . . . especially the gutsy gown made from green velvet drapes she wore to convince a jailed Rhett Butler that she wasn’t down and out when she was.
But the most perfect Scarlett moment of all involved the crimson velvet dressing gown she wore as Rhett carried her upstairs when he’d had it with her fickle, bewitching, bitching Scarlett ways.
Feminists long removed from the 1930s debut of Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind choked on their turnips over that scene, which to modern sensibilities plays like date rape—or, in that case, wife rape.
But no matter how a woman might land on the swept-upstairs-scene issue, she couldn’t fault the famous morning-after scene.
What a wake-up call! That was when Vivien Leigh’s Scarlett awoke in a cat-contented camera close-up. When her eyes recalled the-night-before-the-morning-after with the devilish satisfaction of a distinctly un-downtrodden Southern belle indeed. . . .
Temple awoke this day to one of those classic dawning moments. It made her world take an unexpected lurch toward a totally different axis than it had previously been twirling around like a ballerina in a well-known routine.
Oh. Right. Yes. Oh. My. Oh. Dear. Oh!
Because all morning-afters have their down as well as their up sides, and Temple was starting to see that. It didn’t help that Midnight Louie, all fully furred twenty pounds of him, was sitting on her chest like a guilty conscience, staring at her with unblinking feline-green eyes.
His mesmerizing eyes and shiny black hair reminded her that she was betrothed (as much as you could be in a modern world) to raven-haired Max Kinsella, a magician on hiatus. Louie’s watchful presence also reminded her that Louie had been on patrol in the apartment early this morning when she’d returned from her supposedly bland dinner date with neighbor Matt Devine, during which certain overly neighborly things had occurred and mention had been made of the M-word: marriage.
Louie knew. Somehow.
And that gloriously green stare said that he understood every miserable nuance of her now hopelessly complicated love life. And that he did not approve.
Neither, she knew, would Max.
Louie Agonistes
What is a loyal bodyguard and bedmate to do? (And I am not asking you, Mr. Kevin Costner; I am no fan of anyone who dances with wolves.)
My charming roommate, Miss Temple Barr, is obviously undergoing a major life crisis. Now, were a serial killer breaking into our humble but homey unit at the Circle Ritz, I would not be at a loss for direction.
I would leap upon a pant leg, ratchet my way up to his chest and shoulder area—making three-inch tracks a quarter-inch deep—lash out with my built-in switchblades and take out his eyes, then execute a thorough bit of plastic surgery on his mug for a finishing touch.
All of the above before the average bear could say “Hannibal Lecter.”
But nerve and brain, my two greatest assets, will not work here. I am at a loss for once, waylaid by the tangled webs of human emotions when it comes to what are such simple matters to the rest of the animal world, i.e., what people call the Mating Game.
This is not a game, folks! It is the call of the jungle, the survival of the species, and the triumph of the Alpha Male. Of which I am, naturally, one. Although perhaps not so naturally anymore since I was relieved of the possibility of fatherhood by a villainous B-movie actress who had hoped to de-macho me. Whatever. Despite Miss Savannah Ashleigh doing her worst, I am still catnip for the dames and no back-alley offspring will ever come back to haunt me.
I am the 007 of the feline world, four on the floor and one in the backseat, with an unlimited license to thrill. Even the animal protection people cannot fault my condition and habits.
And I face no messy consequences who might want to slash a dude across the whiskers and call him a philandering absentee father. I am thinking here of Miss Midnight Louise, my erstwhile daughter from the old pre-chichi cut days. According to her.
Anyway, this stuff among my own species I have aced.
Humans are a different plate of Meow Mix entirely.
I pace back and forth in front of the French doors that lead to our triangular mini patio. By now my Miss Temple is out for the day, pretending that she is going about business as usual, but I saw her disarray the previous evening and am most . . . unsettled.
True, she lavished more than the usual affection on me, even clutching me to her breast (which is not such a great treat for a dude such as I, if you wish to know; we do not like forced confinement, even in comfy places). Please, let us come to you. It works out much better.
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Anyway, I put up with this mushy stuff because we go back a long way and have done some heads-up crime-solving together. A dude owes it to his partner, even when the going threatens to get slushy.
And it is not that I am such a big fan of Mr. Max Kinsella, who previously occupied pride of place here at this Circle Ritz unit, i.e., the bed. I mean, he is probably an okay magician and he does have undercover aims for the betterment of humankind—not that humankind much deserves it, from my observation—but there is only room for one black-haired, agile, and sexy Alpha Male in this unit, and it is I.
You will note that I am schooled in the nuances of human grammar as well as kung fu.
And I have nothing against Mr. Matt Devine, who once devoted himself to the service of humankind (boy, they do get a lot of devotion for such a sorry species) and, during his priesthood days, actually gave up using what I almost lost. Even Miss Midnight Louise has a soft spot for him and she is one hard mama, let me tell you, speaking as her delinquent supposed-daddy. So I do sympathize with a well-meaning dude who is trying to enter the Alpha Male sweepstakes so belatedly in life. Not everyone can have my advantage of being born to be bad.
But my first and foremost loyalty is to my Miss Temple. She is not only Recently Blond, she is recently tempted by the New Dude on the Block.
Well, I am the grayer head here by a single hair. I will not tell you where it is.
So, I sense that I will have to seek advice outside my usual, normal guy-type venues.
Ick!
However, for the good of my devoted roomie, no sacrifice is too extreme.
The Deal of the Art
The New Millennium Hotel’s vast, soaring, empty exhibition space rivaled the square footage and chambered nautilus design of the Guggenheim Museum West at the Venice Hotel and Casino up the Strip. Temple eyed its scope with a frisson of pride that this might be her next assignment.
The Guggenheim Museum in New York City and its Western branch at the Venice Hotel in Las Vegas made strange bedfellows, but Las Vegas was built on making strange bedfellows. Or making bedfellows of strangers.
Nowadays in the City That Never Sleeps, though, class is a more cherished commodity than wretched excess for its own gaudy sake. To this has Las Vegas ascended: the city now boasts a mini Guggenheim Museum as well as a mini Eiffel Tower. Pretty soon it may boast a mini me.
New York’s famous Frank Lloyd Wright–designed museum was created decades ago for its Manhattan setting. It is a top-heavy organic space, with galleries spiraling upward around a soaring central atrium.
The vaulted exhibition space at the New Millennium is less natural and more high-tech, an eight-story Star Trek holodeck now vacant but capable of running any exhibition “program” needed.
“You like, I see,” said Randall Wordsworth, the New Millennium’s chief PR honcho.
He was an affable, well-fed, graying guy who looked liked he had been born with the low blood pressure needed to navigate a major Las Vegas attraction through endless media hoopla.
“It’s a totally blank canvas in three-D,” Temple said, trying to get her focus right despite three cups of espresso. It was 12:30 P.M. and she still was not quite there yet. “There’s nothing you can’t do in this space.”
“Exactly. We plan to use it for three-dimensional multimedia, multicultural exhibitions. The opening art exhibition will be spectacular, but so will the elevated magic show occurring above it. A double bill of eye candy and live entertainment. You see our problem.”
“Two-dimensional artworks like paintings, no matter how rare and spectacular, are static.”
“Exactly.”
“But the more you jazz up the exhibition itself,” Temple went on, “the less respect you get from the major national media, and the higher risk you run of something invaluable being damaged, or even stolen. What to settle for? Glitz or guilt? Essentially, this new upscale trend has made the Las Vegas we know and love bipolar.”
Wordsworth laughed. “That last analogy earns you a free lunch at our Jupiter restaurant. And my dedicated admiration.”
Over a sumptuous lunch of Martian greens and Saturn scampi (the New Millennium boasted a relentless solar system theme), Temple and Randy Wordsworth discovered that they were both pros at public relations.
That wasn’t surprising. What was surprising was discovering that they both performed the same tightrope act of being meticulously honest with the press while keeping the interests of their billion-dollar-baby employers foremost.
Lying to one for the other never came out as well as it was supposed to.
“Truth will out,” Randy mused over the arugula and other less identifiable but no less trendy greens, “and show up on Access Hollywood.”
“Or Sixty Minutes, even worse.”
“So our jobs—” he began.
“—are to prevent anything bad from happening that might make the six P.M. news, et cetera.”
“I’m amazed some major hotel hasn’t snagged you for PR director,” he noted, sipping the white wine spritzer the canny PR person uses to imbibe socially without losing an ounce of keen observation.
Or weight, unfortunately, Temple thought.
“I’m happiest working with a variety of projects,” she explained. “And I’m the semiofficial permanent floating PR consultant for the Crystal Phoenix Hotel and Casino.”
“Nicky and Van Fontana’s place! Class act. ‘Choice,’ as Spenser Tracy said when he met Katharine Hepburn. Sad that they’re both finally gone now.”
“You mean Tracy and Hepburn, not Nicky and Van, of course. Sad and a heck of a lot less interesting.”
“That’s exactly why I’m looking for outside assistance with the White Russian exhibit.”
“I can’t see why. You’re a total pro.”
“Thank you. I’d like to keep it that way.”
Temple nodded. “When what we do works, nobody notices.”
“With this exhibition, the New Millennium competes directly against the Bellagio and the Venice, which started the Art of Vegas trend. A lot is on the line, going upscale like this. Your reputation for, er, uncovering crime scenes is another reason we’d like you on board. An exhibition like this attracts the criminal elements. We have security, of course, but we’d like someone on staff who can blend a suspicious mind with publicity concerns.”
“You need a Nancy Drew with a communications degree.”
“Right. And since you’ve done PR in the past for purely cultural institutions, I could use you to handle special touchy corporate sponsor events and high-gloss artsy-fartsy print media. Glitz I get. With quiet snobby stuff, I gotta admit, I’m out of my element. If Art in America deigned to notice us, I’d swoon.”
“I can’t guarantee that, but I can give it the old art college try. What about the show’s basics, like security?”
“Absolutely the latest high-tech world-class museum paraphernalia. I can’t be specific—”
“Of course not. The fewer who know how and where, the safer the installation. But with all that archaic bling from days of empire, your prime audience will be women, and we’re generally a rule-abiding lot. Sometimes too much so.”
“Yes. Women will be dazzled by the paintings, the artifacts, the jewels, the gowns, the tragic death of the Romanovs, and the brutal end to empire.”
“And they’ll hopefully urge their honeys to dazzle them after a tour of the exhibition with the costly but less arty goodies in the exhibition gift shop and the hotel’s Milky Way shopping arcade.”
“You got it.” He frowned as he sipped the de rigueur watered-down wine. “Apparently, you don’t place all your faith in high-tech security.”
“I’ve . . . dated a magician. I think you’d do well to import some human bloodhounds to mingle with the patrons. Just in case the lasers and eyes-in-the-sky don’t work.”
“You have a security firm in mind?”
“No.”
Wordsworth lifted pale, caterpillar eyebrows.
“I have a discreet family business in mind, given that your patrons will be mostly middle-aged women.”
“Paying twenty bucks a head to eyeball the exhibition? Yes. And if they can’t drag hubby along, they’ll view it on their own. Diamonds and rubies and emeralds and sapphires and plique-à-jour enamels and Fabergé and all.”
“Exactly. The, uh, gentlemen I have in mind for the job are impeccably continental and most amenable to middle-aged ladies. To ladies of all ages, in fact.”
“I will get some references—?”
“Certainly. My aunt, the well-known novelist Sulah Savage, for one. And Nicky Fontana at the Crystal Phoenix, for another. They’re his brothers.”
“The Fontana boys?” Wordsworth sputtered a discreet swallow of wine spritzer into his napkin. “You do think outside the box.”
He sipped again to recover, then nodded, as if approving the wine’s vintage. It was something else he was approving. “They do discreetly straddle the line between legit and illegal.”
“To catch a thief . . .”
Randy nodded. “Perfect casting, now that you mention it. You have a theater background also, don’t you?”
Temple nodded. “Rather minor and very distant.”
“Still, with the Ocean’s Eleven and Twelve caper movies so popular, we wouldn’t want a nouveau Rat Pack trying a heist at the New Millennium.”
“I and six million women might, if George Clooney came along for the ride. After all, he and Brad Pitt are putting together a new Las Vegas hotel deal.”
“You know, that’s not a bad idea. Turn it around to focus on the star and not the deplorable use of robbery for entertainment. It’s like turning the Fontana Brothers out on security detail. I imagine they’d take extreme issue with anyone challenging their protective services.”
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