Cat in a Sapphire Slipper

by Carole Nelson Douglas

  Cat in a

  Sapphire Slipper

  By Carole Nelson Douglas from Tom Doherty Associates

  MYSTERY

  MIDNIGHT LOUIE MYSTERIES

  Catnap

  Pussyfoot

  Cat on a Blue Monday

  Cat in a Crimson Haze

  Cat in a Diamond Dazzle

  Cat with an Emerald Eye

  Cat in a Flamingo Fedora

  Cat in a Golden Garland

  Cat on a Hyacinth Hunt

  Cat in an Indigo Mood

  Cat in a Jeweled Jumpsuit

  Cat in a Kiwi Con

  Cat in a Leopard Spot

  Cat in a Midnight Choir

  Cat in a Neon Nightmare

  Cat in an Orange Twist

  Cat in a Hot Pink Pursuit

  Cat in a Quicksilver Caper

  Cat in a Red Hot Rage

  Cat in a Sapphire Slipper

  Midnight Louie’s Pet Detectives

  (anthology)

  IRENE ADLER ADVENTURES

  Good Night, Mr. Holmes

  The Adventuress* (Good Morning, Irene)

  A Soul of Steel* (Irene at Large)

  Another Scandal in Bohemia* (Irene’s Last Waltz)

  Chapel Noir

  Castle Rouge

  Femme Fatale

  Spider Dance

  Marilyn: Shades of Blonde (anthology)

  HISTORICAL

  ROMANCE

  Amberleigh†

  Lady Rogue†

  Fair Wind, Fiery Star

  SCIENCE

  FICTION

  Probe†

  Counterprobe†

  FANTASY

  TALISWOMAN

  Cup of Clay

  Seed upon the Wind

  SWORD AND CIRCLET

  Six of Swords

  Exiles of the Rynth

  Keepers of Edanvant

  Heir of Rengarth

  Seven of Swords

  * These are the reissued editions.

  † Also mystery

  Cat in a

  Sapphire Slipper

  A MIDNIGHT LOUIE MYSTERY

  Carole Nelson Douglas

  The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied so that you can enjoy reading it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices.

  Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  CAT IN A SAPPHIRE SLIPPER: A MIDNIGHT LOUIE MYSTERY

  Copyright © 2008 by Carole Nelson Douglas

  All rights reserved.

  A Forge Book

  Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC

  175 Fifth Avenue

  New York, NY 10010

  www.tor-forge.com

  Forge® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Douglas, Carole Nelson.

  Cat in a sapphire slipper : a Midnight Louie mystery / Carole Nelson Douglas.—1st hardcover ed.

  p. cm.

  “A Tom Doherty Associates book.”

  ISBN-13: 978-0-7653-1861-9

  ISBN-10: 0-7653-1861-X

  1. Midnight Louie (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Barr, Temple (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 3. Public relations consultants—Fiction. 4. Las Vegas (Nev.)—Fiction. 5. Women cat owners—Fiction. 6. Cats—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3554.O8237 C27697 2008

  813’.54—dc22

  2008028538

  First Edition: September 2008

  Printed in the United States of America

  0 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For all the dedicated animal lovers who help feral cats lead better lives

  through Trap, Neuter, and Release programs across the country,

  and particularly for Alley Cat Allies and Feral Friends,

  which helped advise me on our first feral rescue.

  Contents

  Previously in Midnight Louie’s Lives and Times . . .

  Chapter 1:

  A Surprising Scenario

  Chapter 2:

  Shallow Wound, Deep End

  Chapter 3:

  A Deeper Shade of Black

  Chapter 4:

  A Winning Pair of Diamonds

  Chapter 5:

  Cleanup Detail

  Chapter 6:

  Here Comes the Ride

  Chapter 7:

  Girls’ Night In

  Chapter 8:

  High Anxiety

  Chapter 9:

  From Here to Urbanity

  Chapter 10:

  Perennial Partner

  Chapter 11:

  Deja Vu

  Chapter 12:

  Cell in Solitary

  Chapter 13:

  Courtesans on Parade

  Chapter 14:

  Name Day

  Chapter 15:

  Bridesmaids Revisited

  Chapter 16:

  Champagne Suite

  Chapter 17:

  Garden of Lies and Spies

  Chapter 18:

  Boys Just Want to Have Fun

  Chapter 19:

  Peep Show at the Chicken Ranch

  Chapter 20:

  Dirty Laundry

  Chapter 21:

  Hen Party

  Chapter 22:

  Dead Spot

  Chapter 23:

  Rescue Party

  Chapter 24:

  Hitchhikers

  Chapter 25:

  Taking Back the Night

  Chapter 26:

  Eight Berettas for Eight Brothers

  Chapter 27:

  Mental Clime

  Chapter 28:

  Slippery Slope

  Chapter 29:

  Feline Fatales

  Chapter 30:

  Compromising Positions

  Chapter 31:

  Wildest Schemes

  Chapter 32:

  Terrorizing Trio

  Chapter 33:

  Posthomicidal Nerves

  Chapter 34:

  Highly Suggestive

  Chapter 35:

  Crime Scene

  Chapter 36:

  Mama Molina!

  Chapter 37:

  Three Cat Night

  Chapter 38:

  Devised to Disguise

  Chapter 39:

  Mass Matrimony

  Chapter 40:

  Memories of the Fall

  Chapter 41:

  Ladies-in-Waiting

  Chapter 42:

  Happy Hooker?

  Chapter 43:

  Command Post

  Chapter 44:

  Dead of Night

  Chapter 45:

  A Fine Kettle of Fish

  Chapter 46:

  Wheel of Misfortune

  Chapter 47:

  Loving Dangerously

  Chapter 48:

  Break Dancing

  Chapter 49:

  Louie’s Imps

  Chapter 50:

  Missing Max

  Chapter 51:

  Gossip Girls

  Chapter 52:

  Just Kidnapping

  Chapter 53:

  Babes to Boots

  Chapter 54:

>   Meeting Mr. Wrong

  Chapter 55:

  Ex Marks the Spot

  Chapter 56:

  A Real Pickle

  Chapter 57:

  Peace of Paper

  Chapter 58:

  Not So Safe

  Chapter 59:

  Mincemeat

  Chapter 60:

  Monkey Business

  Chapter 61:

  Louie Puts Up a Red Flag

  Chapter 62:

  Leading Questions

  Chapter 63:

  Radio Silence

  Chapter 64:

  Peace in the Valley

  Chapter 65:

  Come Into My Parlor

  Chapter 66:

  Farewell, My Lovely

  Chapter 67:

  Traveling Music

  Chapter 68:

  Sanctuary

  Chapter 69:

  Endurance Vile

  Chapter 70:

  Family Circle

  Chapter 71:

  Nuptial Nuances

  Chapter 72:

  Resurrection

  Chapter 73:

  Au Revoir, Max

  Tailpiece:

  Midnight Louie Has Issues

  Carole Nelson Douglas and Nitpickers

  Cat in a

  Sapphire Slipper

  Midnight Louie’s

  Lives and Times . . .

  There are lots of fat cats in Las Vegas.

  These glitzy media-blitzed streets host almost forty million tourists each year and a ton of camera crews. If lights, action, and camera are not recording background shots for CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, they are taping any of thousands of personal videos. People think they know this town—from film if not firsthand experience—know it from the flashy hotels to the seamy side of the Strip.

  And a good number of them know one particular Las Vegas institution.

  That would be me.

  Every last neon bulb and grain of sand in Greater Las Vegas is my personal territory. Oh, I keep a low profile. You do not hear about me on the nightly news. That is the way I like it. That is the way any primo PI would like it. The name is Louie, Midnight Louie. I like my nightlife shaken, not stirred.

  Nowadays, though, I am in an unprecedented position. I am torn between two assignments. Usually I am torn between two Persian showgirls, so this is a new predicament for me.

  On the one mitt, I am worried about the once-significant other of my roommate, Miss Temple Barr. Mr. Max Kinsella was last seen performing incognito as a masked magician and hitting the Neon Nightmare nightclub wall at fifty miles an hour on a bungee cord. Not even an ace illusionist could survive an impact like that. He has not been seen since and is presumed dead by all and sundry who might know about his masquerade as the Phantom Mage. That includes only me and my business partner-cum-purported daughter, Miss Midnight Louise.

  That this tragedy coincides with my ever-lovin’ roommate going over to the Light Side (our handsome blond neighbor and former priest, Mr. Matt Devine) in her romantic life only adds to the confusion. I believe there is a film of recent vintage called Two Funerals and a Wedding. In my estimation, the current situation is One Funeral and Two Weddings.

  Because here I am, Vegas’s most macho gumpad (and, boy, do I step in a lot of that stuff) and I am overhearing talk about nothing but upcoming nuptials.

  Well, you will soon have to suffer from all that drippy sentimental stuff yourself. I will console myself by summing up the much more dudely and dastardly events that have happened to me and mine previously.

  I am a noir kind of guy, inside and out, the town’s top feline PI.

  I am not your usual gumshoe, in that my feet do not wear shoes of any stripe, but shivs. Being short, dark, and handsome . . . really short . . . gets me overlooked and underestimated, which is what the savvy operative wants anyway. I am your perfect undercover guy. I also like to hunker down under the covers with my little doll. My adventures would fill a book, and in fact I have several out. My life is one ongoing TV series in which I as hero extract my hapless human friends from fixes of their own making and literally nail crooks.

  That is why my Miss Temple and I are perfect roomies. She tolerates my wandering ways. I make myself useful looking after her without letting her know about it. Call me Muscle in Midnight Black. In our time we have cracked a few cases too tough for the local fuzz of the human persuasion, law enforcement division.

  So when I hear that any major new attraction is coming to Las Vegas, I figure that one way or another my lively roommate, the petite and toothsome, will be spike heel–high in the planning and execution. She is, after all, a freelance public relations specialist, and Las Vegas is full of public relations of all stripes and legalities. In this case, though, I did not figure just how personally she would be involved in a bizarre murder far from the madding Strip.

  After the recent dramatic turn of events, most of my human associates are pretty shell-shocked. Not even an ace feline PI may be able to solve their various predicaments in the areas of crime and punishment . . . and PR, as in Personal Relationships.

  As a serial killer finder in a multivolume mystery series (not to mention an ace mouthpiece), it behooves me to update my readers old and new on past crimes and present tensions.

  None can deny that the Las Vegas crime scene is a pretty busy place, and I have been treading these mean neon streets for twenty books now. When I call myself an “alphacat,” some think I am merely asserting my natural male and feline dominance, but no. I merely reference the fact that since I debuted in Catnap and Pussyfoot, I then commenced to a title sequence that is as sweet and simple as B to Z.

  That is where I began my alphabet, with the B in Cat on a Blue Monday. From then on, the color word in the title is in alphabetical order up to the current volume, Cat in a Sapphire Slipper.

  Since I associate with a multifarious and nefarious crew of human beings, and since Las Vegas is littered with guidebooks as well as bodies, I wish to provide a rundown of the local landmarks on my particular map of the world. A cast of characters, so to speak:

  To wit, my lovely roommate and high-heel devotee, Miss Nancy Drew on killer spikes, freelance PR ace MISS TEMPLE BARR, who had reunited with her elusive love . . .

  . . . the once missing-in-action magician MR. MAX KINSELLA, who has good reason for invisibility. After his cousin Sean died in a bomb attack during a post–high school jaunt to Ireland, he went into undercover counterterrorism work with his mentor, GANDOLPH THE GREAT, whose unsolved murder while unmasking phony psychics at a Halloween séance is still on the books. . . .

  Meanwhile, Mr. Max is sought by another dame, Las Vegas homicide detective LIEUTENANT C. R. MOLINA, mother of teenage Mariah . . .

  . . . and the good friend of Miss Temple’s recent good friend, MR. MATT DEVINE, a radio talk-show shrink and former Roman Catholic priest who came to Las Vegas to track down his abusive stepfather, now dead and buried. By whose hand no one is quite sure.

  Speaking of unhappy pasts, MISS LIEUTENANT CARMEN REGINA Molina is not thrilled that her former flame, MR. RAFI NADIR, the unsuspecting father of Mariah, is in Las Vegas taking on shady muscle jobs after blowing his career at the LAPD. . . .

  In the meantime, Mr. Matt drew a stalker, the local lass that young Max and his cousin Sean boyishly competed for in that long-ago Ireland . . .

  . . . one MISS KATHLEEN O’CONNOR, deservedly christened Kitty the Cutter by Miss Temple. Finding Mr. Max impossible to trace, Kitty the C settled for harassing with tooth and claw the nearest innocent bystander, Mr. Matt Devine . . .

  . . . who tried to recover from the crush he developed on Miss Temple, his neighbor at the Circle Ritz condominiums, while Mr. Max was missing in action. He did that by not very boldly seeking new women, all of whom were in danger from said Kitty the Cutter.

  Now that Miss Kathleen O’Connor has self-destructed and is dead and buried, things are shaking up at the Circle Ritz. Mr. Max Kinsella is again apparently lost in ac
tion. Mr. Matt Devine had nosed him out on the run for the roses, anyway, the prize being the heart and hand of my lovely roommate, Miss Temple Barr.

  Her maternal aunt, MISS KIT CARLSON, ex-actress and current romance novelist, came to visit and stayed to hook up with ALDO, the oldest of the fabulous Fontana brothers, hitherto all bachelors save for the youngest, NICKY, who runs the Crystal Phoenix Hotel and Casino with his lovely wife, MISS VAN VON RHINE.

  You would think everything is lovely in Las Vegas from my last paragraphs.

  But there are almost forty million potential victims in this old town, if you include the constant come and go of tourists, and everything is always up for grabs in Las Vegas 24/7: guilt, innocence, money, power, love, loss, death, and significant others.

  All this human sex and violence makes me glad that I have a simpler social life, such as just trying to get along with my unacknowledged daughter . . .

  . . . MISS MIDNIGHT LOUISE, who insinuated herself into my cases until I was forced to set up shop with her as Midnight Inc. Investigations, and who has also nosed herself into my long-running duel with . . .

  . . . THE SYNTH, an ancient cabal of magicians that may deserve contemporary credit for the ambiguous death of Mr. Max’s mentor in magic, Gandolph the Great, not to mention Gandolph’s former onstage assistant as well as a professor of magic at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas.