Temple heard the deep bass boom-badda boom-badda boom boom throbbing in the background, vibrating the table surface under their folded arms. That primitive beat would never back the soulful wail of classic torch songs that Carmen belted out at the Blue Dahlia. Even that selfindulgence happened only on the odd nights when she felt like dumping Lt. C. R. Molina. Then Carmen came out of the dressing room in a black velvet ’40s evening gown and scatted like a contralto archangel.
Rafi stabbed a droplet of tabletop condensation with a pristine fingernail (Temple always found it creepy that, for such a
jerk, his nails were clean as a whistle). One of those fingerails drew the drop into a comet trail.
“I found out that she sang. On key. Had sung in school choir. Had soloed. I talked her into finding a no-name club and working it off-the despair and downers. I created Carmen.”
Well! Temple was well and truly blitzed. Rafi Nadir as impresiario? As Brian Eno, manager to the Beatles? Colonel Parker to Elvis Presley? Get outta here!
“It’s a fact.” He’d read and answered her skepticism in half a heartbeat. “I got her patronizing the vintage stores, buying into the ’30s and ’40s looks. She always thought she was too big to be attractive. She always thought being attractive was a sm. Christianity is one woman-hating, repressive religion.” Temple blinked.
“Yeah. I know. But I’m not Muslim. My family is Christian. It’s okay to dis your own race or religion.” Rafi laughed. He sipped his Sprite as slowly as if it were 100-proof vodka. “We dudes are all the same, under the foreskin.”
Gack! He had made a rather sophisticated, if crude, play on words, and cultures. Not to mention a self-enlightened one.
“Are you sure you’re the Great Satan Molina thinks you are?” she asked.
He laughed, not nicely. “Hell, yes. I am now. Then, I was as stupid as Carmen was. Only I got nailed by it, and she just sailed free of all that. Teflon Woman.”
He drained the harmless dregs of melted ice cubes. “I lost my career. Okay, it was partly my fault. When the cards are stacked against you, sometimes you make the deck turn faster, just to get it over with.
“What I don’t get, or forgive, is the way she dumped me. Maybe she saw that my career was sinking like a stainless-steel stone. Whatever, she just left. That was it. Not a word, not a note. Gone. She was gone. No explanations, no reasons, no apologies, no hysterics. Nothing left behind that I could blame. Except me. That was cold. And that’s why I’ll never forgive that
-”
Temple cut him off. “Is that when you decided that underachievement was your business, your only business?”
“You’re one of those annoying reformers, aren’t you? Always looking on the bright side. Let me tell you, there’s no bright side in the real world. You work law enforcement, you see the dark side. You don’t need no black helmet, no light saber. You see the dark side every day. There is no Good Ship Lollipop. No wonderful world of Oz. Trust me.”
“Maybe I should. Maybe you’re not really the rotten guy everyone thinks you are.”
“Maybe.” He leaned over the table. Very close. “Maybe you’re wrong. The world is full of wrong dead women. Born optimists. Maybe Carmen got it right. Cut and run. Maybe you should do that too. Now.”
Temple did not believe in turning tail.
On the other hand, maybe Rafi Nadir had a point. If he really was a redeemable guy, this was a warning. If he was not, this was a Warning.
Temple turned tail, and left.
Chapter 46
A Rubdown with a
Velvet Glove
Temple made the parking lot of the Circle Ritz, and counted herself lucky.
She turned off the ignition.
She then deplaned. Or, in the case of the chic little Miata, first she got her left foot out of the car. Then she got her right foot on the tarmac. Then she shimmy-shimmied like her non-sister Kate… .
And found Matt Devine waiting to help her to her feet. Ankles, do your duty!
“Matt! Hi.”
He pulled her up.
Whew. He pulled her up. Close.
“Hi.” Temple wasn’t used to repeating herself. “Am I your sister Kate?”
“Are we on the same planet?”
“Maybe not. What are you doing here?”
“Making sure you’re safe.”
“Why shouldn’t I be?““I don’t know. I was worried.” Temple was worried too. About her composure.
If Matt wanted to ensure she was safe, telling him she’d found a dead body would hardly ease his mind. Something held her back from mentioning Beth Blanchard’s death, maybe just shock.
“Where have you been?” he asked.
“Who wants to know?”
Matt stopped her. Stopped them. Stopped their progress into the Circle Ritz. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“I don’t know. Not at this time. It could be a deranged fan stalking Amelia Wong. Something rotten in the retail furniture business. Something criminal on the fringes.”
Matt’s hand on her arm stopped her. “Not that. Not that Maylords stuff. I meant, with you. What’s going on with you?”
“Oh. That. I I… bought a new car.”
He glanced at the Miata. “So did I. Notice something?”
“Huh?”
“Both of our new cars are built for two.”
“So?”
“So where does Max fit in all this?”
Temple stared at Matt. “You’ve never called him that before.”
“Called him what?”
“By his first name.” She resumed walking into the building. “You both always use last names, like you were, I don’t know,
grade-school teachers calling out the roll.”
“It’s a form of depersonalization, Temple. We use last names to distance ourselves from people we can’t deal with.” “Mr. Midnight. Mr. Late-Night Shrink. Is that true?”
He nodded as he pressed the elevator button for her floor. “Yup. The only thing Kinsella and I have ever had in common
has been our mutual distrust. Born of our rivalry for you.”
“Rivalry? I’m Max’s … significant other. Always have been.”
“Always?”
Oh, what a night. She had recently heard those words blasting off the oldie radio station in her car. In this case, what the song brought to mind hadn’t been a night. It had been an afternoon. And it hadn’t been Max with her. It had been Matt. Oh, what a
night … not!
“Well, not before Minnesota,” she admitted about Max and her, about when they had met. Matt followed her down the short hallway to her unit door. “But I thought, you know, with your special background, you have to get it all right the first time. Get married. Have sex. Have children. That’s way too intimidating for a modern girl. We believe in free samples.”
There! That ought to scare him back into his uncomplicating, unavailable self.
Instead, Matt leaned against the wall, smiling slightly.
“It sounds like you’ve become overly dependent on my hang-ups.”
Temple turned the key in her door and the wide mahogany expanse swung slightly ajar. It was like Alice’s rabbit hole. Should she fall down it and get away from the real world, or should she take somebody with her? Besides a kitten or a white rabbit.
“Is that a free drive-time assessment?” she asked, sounding a little brittle even to herself.
“My radio show isn’t on during drive-time. It’s on during middle-of-the-night wonder time. I wonder if you ever listen?’
“Sometimes.” What a liar. As often as she could manage it. On the air, he was good. He was very good. Don’t tell her that now applied to personal appearances. Not on her doorstep, anyway.
Matt kept smiling at her like a man who knew what she wanted. She wasn’t used to feeling nervous with him. The shoe should be on the other foot.
She backed up almost imperceptively, before she could stop herself.
He put out a hand to steady her, not that she was shaky externally. The back of his fingers smoothed down her cheek and then his hand curved around the nape of her neck and shivers ran down her spine, arms, legs, and anyplace else shivers had a hankering to take off for.