Cat In An Alien X-Ray

“A multiple murderer,” Temple corrected. “All his victims could have revealed his plans. He was the mastermind for the Synth’s mounting the most astounding magical illusion ever staged in Vegas as cover for a huge heist and making off with the hidden IRA funds too.”

“So the theory,” Max said, “is that the Synth was on a recruiting jag for their illusion of a lifetime, treasure hunt, and heist in the making?”

“Yes,” Temple said, for Matt’s benefit. He was new to this scenario. “And the three surviving founders of the Synth and Neon Nightmare realized that Cosimo Sparks had the motive to recruit other professional magic workers. What if he panicked when they turned him down and thought they’d, er, squeal on him and the plan? The Synth founders even believed Sparks tried to recruit Gandolph, Max’s mentor in magic.”

“Ridiculous,” Max said. “Once ‘Gandolph the Great’ retired, Garry Randolph was on his own crusade against phony mediums.”

“He even faked his own death,” Temple told Matt, “so he’d be available to help Max when the angry IRA guys from the past came after him.”

“So.” Matt pinned his finger on a row of the table in turn. “You think Gandolph’s former onstage assistant, Gloria Fuentes, was also approached to be recruited, along with the Cloaked Conjuror’s assistant, Barry, and Prof. Mangel at the state university. When they all backed off, Sparks killed them one by one to shut them up. Sounds like that board game, Clue.”

Temple nodded.

“It’s important we remember,” Max said, “that the Synth members considered themselves the high priests and priestesses of magic, which had lost out on the Vegas Strip to artsy acrobatic productions by Cirque du Soleil and actual magic trick revealers, like the Cloaked Conjuror.”

“And,” Temple said, “they weren’t primarily after the hidden stockpile IRA loot and guns Kathleen O’Connor and her allies had amassed, now up for grabs. They wanted to provide the massive illusion that would astound the Strip and distract from the hoard being claimed. Maybe they were being used by the mob, and maybe by O’Connor. And who was using whom more, Kathleen O’Connor or the mob, I don’t know.”

“That’s impressive,” Matt said.

“My theory?” she asked.

“No, I don’t know where the heck that’s coming from. But you did use the proper usage of ‘who’ and ‘whom’ in your last sentence.”

She had to laugh. “Comic relief. Always welcome.”

“Especially,” Max said, “when you’re unraveling a cosmic tangle.”

“Cosimo Sparks,” Matt said, “is now a murder victim himself, any murders he might have committed are just speculation.”

“So,” Max noted, “is the Table of Crime Elements before us, but Temple’s adjustment makes sense. There was a mini-attempt by the remaining Synth members and their followers to heist the million-dollar treasure chest at the Oasis last week.”

Max glanced ruefully at Temple from under quizzical brows. “Now that you’ve cleared away the underbrush, we stand a better chance of finding out where—and why—Kathleen O’Connor was lurking during the past two years of unsolved Las Vegas crime scenes.”

“Kathleen O’Connor.” Matt picked up the sheet of paper, then tossed it back down as if wanting to wash his hands of it. And her. “She’s become a myth, an invincible antagonist at the edges of all our everyday lives. If you believe,” he told Temple, “that the Synth guy, Cosimo Sparks, accounts for several deaths, that doesn’t leave much to blame on this … implacable banshee from Kinsella’s Northern Ireland past. How and why did you get so cozy with the Synth that they told you all about these murders and then just faded away?”

“They may not have completely faded,” Max said. “The IRA didn’t either.” His pause left a silence Temple had to fill.

“Surely, Temple, you didn’t go back alone to that hellish nightclub?” That’s what Matt really wanted to know. “It was bad enough you were snooping around it enough to crash one of the Synth’s meetings a bit back.”

This was awkward. She indeed had gone back there, and Max had been on scene as well. She didn’t want to lie to Matt.…

“I wasn’t alone,” she said.

She could feel the rising tension in Matt from two feet away. Max and she had not only once been live-in lovers heading toward marriage, but he’d also been the professional backup on her amateur investigations from the very beginning. Before Matt moved into the Circle Ritz.

“Midnight Louie and some of his feral cronies were there,” she said, quite truthfully.

The cat took a bow by rising and thumping down to the tabletop. He cocked a head at the paper under discussion, then yawned and thumped down to the floor. And Midnight Louie, all twenty pounds of him, did thump. Yet not a thing on the table had moved during his ponderous passage.

He lofted up to the couch arm right behind Temple, a bodyguard settling into position.