She shook her head at him. “Doughboy, you haven’t stuffed your pie hole this way in ages.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I mean you have powdered donut residue all over your T-shirt. And that grease around your fingernails has Utz potato chips written all over it.”
“That’ll teach me to fall for a trained investigator.”
“What is this?” she demanded. “Are you getting antsy about me meeting your folks?”
“Not at all. They’ll adore you. How could they not?”
“I just hope my father won’t be a total drag.”
“Don’t even worry about it. My dad can get anyone to lighten up. He’s amazing that way.” Mitch went in the kitchen and started poking around. “I have a loaf of day-old ciabbata and some stinky Hooligan cheese. What would you say to a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich with slices of my late-season tomatoes? There’s also a half-bottle of that amusing Cote-du-Rhone. Deal?”
“Deal,” she agreed. “For our starter course grab the wine and two glasses and I’ll meet you up in the sleeping loft. We can do some scientific research on whether we recognize each other in the dark. If you have any trouble I’ll be the one who’s naked under the covers.”
“Be right there,” he said eagerly, fetching two glasses from the cupboard.
For the record, Mitch had no trouble recognizing her in the dark.
Later on, his growling stomach insisted on being fed. Des was dozing contentedly next to him. It was the most relaxed she’d been since the Deacon moved in. Mitch slipped out of bed quietly and tiptoed down to the kitchen, where he heated up his Lodge cast iron skillet and laid some thick slices of bacon in it to cook.
When his phone rang he grabbed it on the first ring, hoping it didn’t wake her.
“Oh, Mitch, thank God you’re there!” It was Lila Joshua, the more fluttery of the two sisters. “I have been trying to call you for nearly thirty minutes but an automated recording kept telling me they could not complete my call as dialed. An operator finally got through for me.”
“Did you remember to use the area code, Lila?” The phone company now required Dorseteers to dial the 860 area code even for local calls. It wasn’t an easy habit to get into, especially for older, wiftier residents.
“I-I may have forgotten,” she confessed. “It so happens I’m just a bit-”
“Here, give that to me…” Now he heard a more assertive voice on the other end of the line. “Is that you, Mitch?”
“What can I do for you, Luanne?”
“It’s Winston. He’s taken off again. I turned my back for one second and he was out the door and gone. I tried to go after him but you would not believe how fast he can scoot. And it’s terribly dark out.”
Now Mitch heard Des’s cell phone ring up in the sleeping loft. She answered it right away.
“Luanne, do you have any idea where Winston was heading?” he asked.
“That’s the part that has us a bit alarmed. Just before he darted out of the door he, well, he said he really wanted to go ‘bite some colored ass.’”
“Uh-oh…”
CHAPTER 5
When her cell rang she snatched it off the nightstand and said, “This is Resident Trooper Mitry.” It was nearly ten-thirty, according to her watch.
“Young lady, you need to get over here right now,” a familiar male voice thundered at her.
“What seems to be the problem, Mr. Bond?”
“He has an out-of-control dance party or rave or whatever they call it going on over there. Hundreds of them are swarming the neighborhood…” Them. “They’re screaming like banshees and-and playing their thug music so loud it’s shaking my whole house. I demand that you do something.”
“I’ll be right over.”
Des had just swung her size twelve-and-half AA bare feet to the floor when her cell rang again. This time it was the 911 dispatcher. A call had just come in from Mr. Rondell Grantham requesting an ambulance to treat the victim of an “incident” at the Grantham residence. Little brother hadn’t asked for state police assistance but it was automatic for Des to be called. She hurried down the stairs for her uniform and discovered Mitch throwing on a T-shirt and shorts. “You going somewhere, boyfriend?”
“Winston has wandered off again. The Joshua sisters are afraid he may have headed over to Tyrone Grantham’s.” He watched her jump into her uniform. “And you?”
“They’re having a party. And there’s been an incident of some kind.”
Mitch frowned at her. “Des, you don’t suppose?…”
“I don’t suppose anything yet.” She was fully dressed in less than two minutes. Her West Point training. “But you’ll never get in the gate on your own. I’m flooring it there. Can you keep up with me?”
“You betcha. Mind you, if I had a brand new Silverado with the 360-horsepower Vortec-”
“Mitch, you don’t need a new a truck.”
“Be right behind you, Master Sergeant.”
She went outside to her cruiser, jumped in and pushed it across the rickety causeway. Mitch stayed right behind her on the dirt road that twisted through the Nature Preserve, but once she made it onto the smooth pavement of Old Shore Road and floored it, he fell back a bit, his vintage sepia-toned headlights growing weaker in her rearview mirror. When she turned onto Turkey Neck and ran into the hot mess there, he caught up with her again.
Dozens and dozens of parked cars were crowded onto shoulders of the narrow road. Des spotted plenty of New York license plates, not to mention New Jersey and Rhode Island. Partiers were coming and going on foot right down the middle of the street. Boisterous groups of young guys, joshing and laughing. Couples walking hand in hand. All of them black. Them. She had to hit her siren to get through, Mitch snug on her tail. The media mob, when she managed to get near the Grantham place, seemed even bigger than before. The bright lights of the news cameras lit up the driveway out front like a red carpet movie premiere. People were lined up at the gate trying to get in. Big, impassive Trooper Olsen was turning them away.
“Hey, Des,” he said when she pulled up at the gate. “The Jewett girls got here two seconds ago.” Marge and Mary Jewett ran Dorset’s volunteer ambulance service.
“What happened, Oly?”
“Fist fight between a couple of partiers, I hear. I was just on my way back to check it out.”
“You can stay here. I’m on it.”
“It was supposed to be a small party, Des. Clarence had a very short guest list. He left the father-in-law, Calvin, up here to make sure no one else slipped in. Because I told him flat out-I’m a state trooper, not your doorman. Well, you know how it goes with parties. Word gets out and everyone just starts showing up. Good old Calvin let in pretty much anyone who had a pretty girl with him. I’ve got it on lockdown now.”
Des looked around at the media crowd. “Any sign of Plotka?”
“Him I haven’t seen, thank God.”
She jerked a thumb back in Mitch’s direction. “He’s with me.”
She eased down the gravel driveway with Mitch on her tail and pulled up behind the Dorset volunteer ambulance van, hearing the music loud and clear. Jay-Z and Alicia Keys were singing “Empire State of Mind.” Not exactly her idea of “thug” music but what did she know? Mitch pulled up behind her and got out.
“If Winston’s here, you hustle him home and don’t look back,” she said briskly as they started around the house toward the pool. “Just clear out, got it?”
“Got it.”
At least a hundred partiers were enjoying the warm night air, the swimming pool and each other. They were dancing to the music. Splashing around in the water in their bathing suits. Shrieking, laughing, having a great time. And why not? They were kicking it at the mansion of an NFL superstar. There was a long table loaded with food, an open bar and more than a trace of reefer smoke in the air. A DJ was working the music. Lights were on inside the house, upstairs and down, but the party seemed to be confined to the outdoors.