“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
“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
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
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 …
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?
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
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.
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.
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.
Someone had conked him on the head outside of the Rustic and then … what? Then he’d been stuffed in the trunk of that car, right? And now he was freezing his ass off on this beach. He looked around, thinking that he knew this place.
Breezy Point.
Sure, he’d come here for bike rides with Des. Breezy Point was one of the nicest places to be on a summer afternoon. In the winter? In the winter it was known as the windchill capital of the Connecticut shoreline. They didn’t call it Breezy Point for nothing. The beach was deserted this time of year. Absolutely no one came here. It was also remote. Had to be a three-mile hike to Route One from here. Darkness was approaching fast. And Mitch was naked and all alone.
Except for his friend, that is. The fellow who was lying in the snow next to him with that shower curtain around him. Casey Zander. It was Casey.
The sudden realization sent Mitch scrambling to his feet to get away from Casey’s body. He promptly fell right back down into the deep snow, his bare feet so frozen that they wouldn’t support his weight. He felt dizzy, too. So dizzy he almost passed out again. He managed not to. Couldn’t, mustn’t pass out. Had to stay awake and get the hell out of here before it got dark. Because if he didn’t, he would freeze to death awfully damned fast.
