Cat in a hot pink Pursuit

Mariah had suddenly become a huge consumer of Seventeen magazine and a whole new slew of its ilk.
    Shaking her head, Carmen went in, blinking in the dimness of her living room, automatically snatching the letter opener and slitting through the taped flyers for new air conditioning units et cetera, even through the flap on the envelope addressed to Mariah.
    The pitch letter was two-color: pink and black. Carmen shook her head. What would her so very “now” daughter think if she knew that color combo was even older than her mother. “It Came From the Fifties”... Carmen chuckled.
    And then she read the letter. And sat down. And read the letter again. She looked at the return address. The headlining “sell” graphics.
    She took a very deep breath. She wondered who she could call.
    No one.
    She wondered what she would do.
    Whatever it was, it would be disastrous.
    Lose-lose.
    Oh, hell.



Undercover Chick

    Temple was hammering out a new proposal on her computer, trying to forget about Awful Crawford and reality TV shows and all their satanic ilk, when her doorbell did its vintage doo-wap on her ears.
    Matt? Something more to say before he left? Hmmm. Max wouldn’t ring, and Matt usually knocked, so maybe Electra, the landlady....
    Optimistic, as usual, she swung the door wide open, and found a figure as high, wide, and unwelcome as she could remember filling the doorway.
    “Lieutenant.”
    “Miss Barr. May I come in?”
    “You have a warrant?”
    “You have nothing to fear. This is a personal consultation.”
    Temple stepped aside to admit a woman who was almost a foot taller than she into her humble domain. Thank goodness Temple had resident “muscle” on the premises.
    Molina stopped cold in the archway to the living room.
    “Him.”
    “Louie lives here,” Temple said. “No doubt he’s thinking ‘her’ at this very moment.”
    “Actually, I like cats.” Molina crossed the invisible barrier between entry and living area to loom over Louie. “What a handsome fellow.”
    Louie was buying none of it. He fanned his long, curved nails and licked dismissively between his spread toes.
    “What can I do for you?” Temple asked, making small talk.
    Molina’s laser-blue eyes fixed on her insincere face. “A great deal. Can we talk where you have seating units not claimed by alley cats?”
    “My office?”
    “Better than mine.”
    So Temple led her into the spare bedroom-cum-office, wondering madly what this was about. She heard Louie thump assertively down to the floor as he followed them.
    Temple indicated the casual wicker chair opposite her computer desk and sank into the comfortable sling mesh of her teal Aereon size A chair.
    Louie leaped up on the computer desk and sat there like a silent partner, switching his long black tail over the side.
    “I didn’t expect a familiar,” Molina said.
    ‘Think of Louie as Paul Drake, and of me as Perry Mason.”
    Not possible.” Molina’s lips suddenly quirked.
    “What?”
    “I could buy Nora Charles and Asta.”
    Oh. I could do The Thin Man! I do so love vintage Lothes and vintage quips.”
    Louie growled.
    “Louie, however,” Temple added airily, “does not do dogs.”
    Molina spread her hands, dismissing the parallels. “Perhaps Bucky Beaver, then. I need to hire your services.”
    “A PR person could do a lot for your department.”
    “Forme.”
    “For you?”
    “And not PR.”
    “What for then?”
    “You’ve shown some... zany aptitude for undercover work.”
    “Me?”
    “Tess the Thong Girl ring a bell?”
    “Well, that was just—”
    “I know. You were just Little Red Riding Hood with a basketful of thongs trying to save the Big Bad Wolf from the Evil Huntsman.”
    “Max isn’t a Big Bad Wolf! Although you’re an excellent candidate for the Evil Huntsman. You probably went after Snow White for the Evil Queen too.”
    “Let’s set personal issues aside, Miss Barr.”
    Temple saw those laser eyes shift, eyeing the room and conceding to Temple’s domain for the first time.
    “You really do want to hire me?”
    “Yes.”
    “For what?”
    “I want you to enter the Teen Queen reality TV show competition.”
    “What!” Temple leaped up from her chair. “I’m too old!”
    “That leap says not. The upper age limit is nineteen. You can pass.”
    “But—”
    “You can pass. You think I don’t know who can go undercover and how well? You’re a shoo-in.”
    “Get Su! She’s small for her age.”
    “I would, but