Sure, I was casting a wide net. It wasn’t exactly that I wanted Dan Franklin to be guilty, but all the signs were there. Because I still wanted to distract Tim from Dan Franklin’s banking activity, I filled him in on the blue Taurus as we went up the steps to the Monorail station.
“You’re wondering why he’d take the Monorail,” Tim said when I was done. No one could ever accuse him of not being with the program.
As he spoke, the sleek bullet-shaped Monorail slid along its track and came to a smooth stop at the station, which we were approaching. I didn’t see Dan Franklin anywhere up there, but we didn’t have the greatest view.
We had to buy tickets from a machine. Tim stuffed a ten-dollar bill into its slot, and it spit out a couple of tickets. He handed me one.
“Too bad there wasn’t a person here,” I said. “You could’ve just showed your badge.”
He ignored me, and we slipped the tickets into the turnstile. The doors flipped open, and we took the stairs two at a time.
At the top, the Monorail’s doors were closing, and as it started to move past us, going north toward the Sahara, I spotted Dan Franklin inside one of the cars, smiling and waving at us as the train picked up speed.
“We just wasted ten bucks,” I said. “Because even if we get on the next train, we don’t know where he’s getting off.”
Tim still hadn’t said anything. He stood with his hands on his hips, surveying the tracks.
“This only goes to the Convention Center, the Hilton, and the Sahara from here,” he mused. “The Convention Center doesn’t make any sense; it leaves you off in the middle of nowhere, not close to the Convention Center or to the Strip. And the Hilton-it’s too far off the main drag. No real reason to go there, either. The Sahara is the logical destination.”
“For what?” I asked.
Tim turned and stared at me. “What do you mean, for what?”
“Why would he go to the Sahara?”
He sighed. “Think about it, Brett. If you want to be some sort of Nancy Drew, I think you’ll have to do better than that.”
And then the lightbulb over my head went on.
The wedding chapel wasn’t far from the Sahara.
“You think he’s going to That’s Amore, don’t you?” I asked.
Tim grinned. “So you’re a little slow.”
I started for the escalator but heard Tim say, “Where are you going?”
I turned back to see him staring at the track, as if willing a train to come by.
“What? We’re going to take this?” I asked, walking back over to him.
“By the time we get the car, he could be long gone.”
“And by the time a train comes, he’ll be halfway to Mexico.”
“But not if he doesn’t have a car, like you suspect.”
Okay, so he had a point. “But won’t we need a car once we get there?”
“Maybe you can ask your friend Jeff Coleman to meet us.”
Had aliens come and taken my brother away? Was he one of those pod people from Invasion of the Body Snatchers?
And then I knew. He wanted to ask Jeff how he knew about the ten thousand dollars. I’d painted myself into a corner on that one.
“Call him, okay?” Tim said.
I had to try to turn it around a little. “Why don’t you call Flanigan instead?”
“Because if I tell him I’ve got a gut instinct based on your gut instinct, he’ll tell me to stay out of it.”
I grinned. “And that doesn’t appeal to you, does it?”
“Just call Coleman, okay?”
I didn’t see any way out of it. As I reached into my bag, I saw another Monorail approaching. That didn’t take too long.
I flipped my phone open and punched in Jeff’s number.
“Kavanaugh?”
“Hey there, what are you doing right now?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“I’m not kidding. Are you free now?”
“For what? Phone sex?”
I snorted. “No. Not phone sex.”
Tim shot me a look, and I waved him off as the Monorail came to a stop in front of us. The doors slid open, and we stepped inside. It was like the monorail in Disney World. Clean and bright. Except that no one else was in this car, and as I remembered, the monorail at Disney was usually full of screaming kids and at least one balloon.
Jeff was talking. “Okay, so no phone sex. Maybe next time.”
I ignored him. “Can you meet Tim and me over at That’s Amore? We need a ride.”
“Where’s your car?”
“It’s in the parking garage at the Venetian.”
“So how are you getting to the wedding chapel? Are you taking a cab?”
“We’re on the Monorail.”
“The what? Kavanaugh, you do know that no one but tourists use that thing.”
He was right. Although, looking around me, I didn’t think even the tourists were taking advantage of it.
“So can you meet us?”
“What do I get if I do?”
I closed my eyes and counted to ten before I spoke again. “You get the satisfaction of possibly catching a killer.”
“I told you I didn’t care if the cops ever caught the guy who killed Rosalie’s husband.”
“But what about Ray Lucci?”
He was quiet a second, then said, “That’s a little complicated right now.” His voice was unusually soft.
“Sylvia told you, didn’t she?” I asked.
I heard a short inhale, then, “Yeah. She told me you knew, too. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Not my place. Are you okay?”
“It’s not the kind of news I was expecting.”
I wanted to talk to him more about it, how he was handling knowing he had a half brother whom he’d never get to know, but sitting here on the Monorail with Tim watching me didn’t seem like the right time. Jeff was the first to change the subject, though.
“So why are you heading to the wedding chapel?”
“I think you were right when you said you thought Dan Franklin was the killer. I ran into him a little while ago, and he ended up taking off. We’re following him. We think he’s heading to the chapel.”
“You think?”
While the Monorail glided along its track, I managed to put the story in a nutshell by the time we reached the Convention Center station.
I was so immersed in my conversation that when Tim yanked me by the arm and pulled me up, I shrugged him off at first. But then I saw the look on his face and where he was looking. Outside the Monorail window.
Dan Franklin was striding across the parking lot at the Convention Center.