“Slick Rick, you mean?”
Tommy nodded. “He told me we’ll be toast if the feds start leaning on blubber boy. Casey would give us up in a heartbeat to save his own sorry ass. Slick Rick said to take care of it. I’d just sent Gigi to the Yankee Doodle with Casey to settle him down. Figured I’d follow them there. Except when I got outside there’s some dude crouched by the woodpile watching them drive away. Same dude who was just inside the Rustic asking Steve a bunch of questions. I figured he had to be the one.” He swallowed hard. “Put that thing away, will ya?”
Yolie held the knife even closer. “The one? What one?”
“The undercover cop. Slick Rick heard there might be a state narc hanging around. Word gets out.”
Des felt her stomach tighten. “What did you do about him?”
“Whacked him over the head with a snow shovel and tossed him in my trunk.”
“Why did you do that?”
“I couldn’t just leave him lying there. People would notice him.”
“No, dumb ass,” Yolie growled. “Why’d you whack him over the head?”
“Because I didn’t want him following me to the Yankee Doodle. I had business to take care of there. I had no personal beef with the guy but he intruded into my thing. So I did what I had to do.”
Yolie raised her chin at him. “Of course you did.”
“Then I drove to the Yankee Doodle, except Gigi had locked the bungalow door.”
“I always do,” she whimpered. “I told you I was sorry.”
“Just shut the hell up, will you? I had to pound on the freaking door. Attract all kinds of attention to myself. That’s real smart, isn’t it?”
“Not here to listen to you two bicker,” Yolie growled, poking at the tender flesh of Tommy’s scrotum with the tip of her knife.
Tommy held up his hands, shuddering. “Okay, okay. Just take it easy, will ya? When I went in, Casey was sitting on the bed taking his boots off. Still had his clothes on which, believe me, was a good thing.”
“I hated doing him,” Gigi said. “He was totally fat and he had these acne scars all over his back that were disgusting.”
“Yeah, like you’d know from disgusting,” Yolie said.
Gigi frowned at her. “Did you just insult me?”
“Then what happened?”
“I pulled a blade and he ran into the bathroom, squealing like a little girl.” Tommy’s voice was eerily flat and emotionless now. “I went in there after him and stuck him until he wasn’t squealing anymore.”
“What did you do with him?”
“Wrapped him in the shower curtain and threw him in my trunk.”
“With the other guy?”
“Yeah, with the other guy.”
“Was the other guy still unconscious?”
“Don’t know. I wasn’t paying much attention to him.”
Des’s gaze flicked over to the windows, then back at the bed. “Are they still out there in your trunk?”
“No way. You think I’m stupid?”
“You don’t actually want us to answer that, do you?” Yolie responded.
“What did you do after you left the Yankee Doodle?” Des asked him, struggling to maintain her calm.
“Dumped Casey’s body.”
“Where?”
“Breezy Point.”
Breezy Point was a state park ten miles east of Dorset’s Historic District. It had a nice stretch of beach and miles of bike paths and hiking trails that overlooked Long Island Sound. During the summer it was a popular destination. During the winter it was windy and desolate. Hardly anyone went there.
“Why Breezy Point?”
“It’s my favorite place in the whole world,” Gigi answered, brightening. “That’s where Tommy and me met. Right, baby? I was wearing that little pink T-shirt and you said, ‘Hey, I like pink.’ Which I thought was the lamest line ever. But you were so cute I started talking to you anyway and…” She trailed off, sniffling. “I thought it would be, you know, funny.”
“I don’t get the joke. Yolie, do you get the joke?”
“Afraid not.”
“So you drove out to Breezy Point, dumped Casey’s body and then?…”
“Picked up a pizza and came back here,” Tommy the Pinhead said. “That’s the whole story, I swear. Now put that knife away, okay?”
Yolie shook her head at him. “Not quite. The guy who you brained with the shovel…”
“What about him?”
“Did you gut him, too?”
“Nope. Didn’t have any cause to.”
Des walked around to his side of the bed and pressed the nose of her SIG against Tommy the Pinhead’s forehead. “What did you do with him?”
CHAPTER 16
The first time Mitch came to he was positive he had to be on a wild ride at Disney World. It was hurtling him along incredibly fast and was bone-jarringly bouncy and everything around him was pitch-black and really, really scary. Except Mitch had never been to Disney World, which meant he had to be dreaming. Except he wasn’t dreaming. His eyes were wide open.
Oh, God, I’m blind.
No, wait, he could see a crack of light down there by his feet. And hear the sound of tires on slushy pavement as the wild ride slowed down and came to a stop. Mitch took careful stock of himself. He seemed to be lying on his side in a fetal position. The back of his head hurt. He reached for it, fingering it. It felt sticky.… Okay, now he remembered. He’d been watching the parking lot of the Rustic when someone coldcocked him on the back of the head with a heavy object-like, say, a twelve-inch Lodge cast-iron skillet. Because he’d gotten his bell rung but good. Second time in less than a year, too. First time was that concussion he got at Astrid’s Castle when he and Des got stranded up there with that killer who kept …
Focus. Try to remember what happened.
The Rustic. He’d been standing there watching, um, watching Casey and Gigi take off in Casey’s Tacoma. Sure, that was it. And now?
Now I’m stuffed in the trunk of somebody’s car.
It was cold and super-cramped in there. Zero headroom. And it smelled like oil and burnt rubber. Had to be an old beater of a car. Its automatic transmission was bad. As they started to pick up speed again, Mitch could feel the tranny rev and rev and rev before it lurched into second gear. He smelled more burnt rubber. Smelled something else, too. An animal smell. A dead animal smell. He groped around in the darkness. His fingers found the smooth roundness of a spare tire. Then, behind him, a plastic bag. Really large one. Actually, more like a tarp than a bag. Something big and heavy was wrapped inside.
Or someone.
Mitch gulped as he fought back a strong, sudden wave of nausea. Then the car went over a bump and the back of his head smacked hard against the lid of the trunk and he was out again.
The second time Mitch came to it was with a sudden yelp, as if he were awakening from an awful nightmare. He was cold. Freezing cold. He had never been so cold in his life. Shivering and shaking, his teeth chattering so violently that he was afraid he was going to shatter them.
Where am I? Why am I so cold?
He glanced around, blinking, dazed. Well, hell, he was basking on his own beach in the late-day sun. It was a nice, breezy afternoon out on Big Sister, the surf lapping against the rocks. Must have drifted off for a few minutes as he lay there in the sand in his swim trunks. Sure, that was it. He looked around for the island’s familiar landmark, the old lighthouse, except it wasn’t there. Wait a second, he wasn’t home. This was a different beach. Someone else’s beach. And this wasn’t soft sand he was lying on. And he wasn’t wearing swim trunks. He wasn’t wearing anything at all.
I am lying stark naked in the snow.
He was still asleep. Had to be. This had to be a dream. Except it wasn’t. He was lying naked in the snow, shaking with cold. It was, what, thirty-five degrees out? That wind off of the water was howling. His fingers and toes ached, ears and nose stung.