He crawled past downed couples tangled like fallen mannequins in the vignettes, muttering into cell phones pulled from pockets and purses.
He glimpsed a glint of silver on the move as he neared the central area, low and erratic, but visible to him … and
therefore visible to the shooter.
Matt pushed up into a crouch and went zigzagging through the empty rooms, past prone bodies hopefully only playing
dead and dialing for their lives.
“The employee lounge,” someone bellowed. He recognized Janice’s voice, coming from far across the central space.
Lights. Employee lounge. At the back? He hadn’t seen it in the front, didn’t make sense in the front, and the bit of moving quicksilver had been heading deeper into the store… .
Matt dodged from ottoman to desk legs to bedskirt to decimated buffet table, aware of people lying everywhere.
He skittered like a beetle, edged like a roach.
The occasional gun report shattered something precious, and hopefully, not sentient.
The shots were interspersed with sobs and moans. Who knew how many had been hit?
He could have been still facedown like most of them. Waiting for the nightmare to end. Except … he saw a bigger nightmare. A flash of silver and red suddenly splashed like well-veined shrimp across the entrance atrium.
Matt heard something scream at his heel, and pushed forward. Chips of shattered travertine spit into his calves.
He dove under the looming orange body of the Murano, eyeing the undercarriage, then crawled past and through, working
back into the darker parts of the store. Into the interior shadows, where the light panel lay.
In the distance, he heard the wail of oncoming sirens, still far, far away.
A glimpse of ground-level silver fluttered like a startled dove past a Barcelona chair. Matt lunged after it, hearing a bullet
ping off the chair’s stainless-steel frame.
The bastard was aiming … aiming at movement. At Temple. He was outrunning the bullets, catching up, overtaking. Matt dove for the only moving element ahead of him. And … the lights went out.
Chapter 10
Shrimp Cocktail
Well, this was the night the lights were blazing in Georgia, but they sure went out in Maylords. Here is how it all went down from my point of view. My own personal lowdown, so to speak, which is as low down as you can get. Ankle level, in point of fact.
As soon as the blasts of gunfire turn Maylords into an exploding glass factory, Miss Midnight Louise and I swing into
action.
We streak from the anticipated chow line out back to the firing line up front.
Luckily, we operate well under the line of fire and are able to tiptoe through the broken glass and into the besieged home decor store. Only in America.
We still have to keep under the sofas, being careful to avoid being seen by carpet-hugging humans who are crawling around on our level for once. It is not a pretty sight. I find that I much prefer socializing with various brands of sniffy footwear than ineffective applications of underarm deodorant.
Although, to be fair, these humans are in a state of primal fear.
They are not used to being hunted on the streets of Las Vegas, as Louise and I have been, merely for the simple sin of being homeless.
Nowadays, of course, we have whole buildings to call home. Louise has bagged the elegant Crystal Phoenix Hotel and Casino, where she has taken over my old job as house detective. I hang my unused collar at the retro-funky Circle Ritz apartments and condominium, where I am in permanent residence with my live-in, Miss Temple Barr.
Still, our roles in law enforcement matters are not self-evident. When we boogie around the city on business we are in constant danger of being snagged by Animal Control and treated like disposable nobodies. Makes one almost succumb to wearing a collar, but give one inch and pretty soon Big Brother Vet will be imbedding eavesdropping chips in our brains.
Anyway, before we can thoroughly scout the place, another series of shots riddles the plate glass.
Immediately the downed humans start mewling and whimpering like whipped curs. Louise and I roll our eyes at each other.
With everybody face down, now we can paddy-foot where we please, as long as we avoid using a prone human as an area rug. (Which role reversal, actually, would be kind of fun, but I know what Miss Louise would think of such unprofessional behavior.) We soon make our way to the abandoned entrance area, where tender curls of fallen shrimp strew our path like rose petals carpeting the footsteps of conquering heroes.
Should we help ourselves? I do not mind if we do, for night troops travel on their stomachs. Or so I hear. Of course, we must chew our morsels well, as ground glass is not a seasoning for the weak stomached. However, both Louise and I grew up on Dumpster picnics. We are pretty savvy about avoiding slivers of glass and tin cans, not that anything from a can would be found in a Chef Song buffet.
A voice booms out in the darkness with such authority that for a fleeting moment I fear the world will be created again.
Miss Louise hunkers against me, not from fear but the better to whisper in my ear. “Who is on the loudspeaker?’
“That is no loudspeaker, dear girl, that is a theatrically trained voice projecting. Sometimes I envy these humans their immense, and immensely wasted, vocal range. In fact, I know the possessor of that stainless-steel foghorn”
“You always claim to know everyone in this town.”
“Mostly, they know me,” I retort modestly. “That happens to be the commanding voice of Danny Dove, the eminent choreographer. At least someone two-legged in the place has the sense to call for the lights to be put out.”
As we listen, we hear the answering scrabble of a few footsteps. Someone besides us is up and about now.
Louise and I dispose of the last shrimp within reach and duck under the floor-length tablecloth as a new burst of gunfire rakes across the china, making for a rainfall of chips that are useful at no casino in town.
In the fresh quiet after the storm, I hear at least two or three people in motion. Peeking my nose out from under the watersoaked linen, I spy a sight that would turn my whiskers whiter, were they not already so colored.
“What is it, Daddikins? You have stiffened like roadkill.”
“Roadkill. That is a good name for it. My roomie has lost her mind and is on the move in this shooting gallery:’ “How do you know?”
“I have glimpsed the fugitive sparkle of what can only be my Austrian crystalized Stuart Weitzman signature shoes. Miss
Temple must be looking for the light-control mechanism in answer to Danny Dove’s clarion call. I must go to her aid:’
“And what can you do?”
“I do not know, but I can be there in case. Stay here, under the tablecloth. And do not eat all the shrimp!”
Without a backward look, or a burp in mourning for the abandoned shrimp, I streak in the direction I last saw Miss Temple’s shoes crawling in four-four time. At least she has the sense to assume a four-limbed mode of locomotion. On the other hand, I hate to contemplate my namesake shoes scraping their delicate crystals on all this scattered glass … speaking of which, ouch! I might be better off with some protective booties myself.
Sure enough, the megawatt glimmer of those dazzling white Austrian crystals are as easy for a seasoned tracker like myself to follow as breadcrumbs for a bird.
Ker-plough ack-ack-ack. Whoever is shooting has a lot of ammo, not to mention nerve. I crouch down, hoping my Miss Temple has had the sense to do likewise. But someone else is moving despite the fresh shots.
Someone pale and sensibly low is following Miss Temple too.
I scramble right on those vanishing heels, which are dull brown leather and not nearly as simple to tail as synthetic diamonds.