to get a hold of yourself at once, are you comprehending me?”
Tito didn’t respond. Esme and Chrissie immediately surrounded him, Chrissie murmuring soothing words at him while Esme hugged him and kissed him.
“Please step back, everyone,” Des told the crowd. “Please stepback now. And I want these damned cameras out of my face!” she roared angrily.
Miraculously, the paparazzi beat a hasty retreat. Des had explained this phenomenon to Mitch once: no one, not even the lowest tabloid whore, wants to be around a sister when she’s armed and pissed.
Esme and Chrissie seemed to be calming Tito down now. He stood there nodding his head obediently as he listened to them, his shoulders slumped, eyes fastened on the floor.
“How are you feeling, Mr. Molina?” Des asked him.
“I’m cool,” he said quietly, running a hand through his long, shiny hair. “Everything’s cool. No big.”
Now Chrissie hurried over to Mitch and said, “God, Mr. Berger, I am so sorry about this. If there’s anything I can do to make it right, just name it.”
Mitch sat there in the cold puddle of tea, fingering his jaw. “I’m fine.”
The commotion had brought Jeff Wachtell out of his store. “Mitch, I saw the whole thing if you need a witness.”
“I’m fine,” Mitch repeated.
“Can you walk?” Des asked him.
“I can try,” he said, struggling unsteadily to his feet.
“Okay, good, my ride’s outside,” Des said. “We’ll sort this out at the Westbrook Barracks together.”
“Whatever you say,” Tito said with weary resignation. “You’re the man.”
“Wait, what’s to sort out?” Mitch asked.
Des raised an eyebrow at him, clearly wondering if he was punch-drunk. “The paperwork, Mitch. You have to swear out a formal complaint before we can file criminal assault charges.”
“No way,” Mitch said hastily. “That’s absolutely not happening.”
Tito gazed at Mitch, stunned.
He wasn’t the only one. Des moved over closer to him, hands on her hips, and said, “What do you mean? That man just had his hands wrapped around your throat.”
“He was only trying to make a point.”
“Yes, that’s he’s a homicidal lunatic. Guess what? He succeeded.”
“Des, we had a simple professional disagreement. He sucker punched me and I slipped on an ice cube. It was really no big deal.”
“Mitch, he tried to kill you! You can’t let him off the hook just because he’s famous.”
“I’m not.”
She shook her head at him. “Okay, then I don’t understand.”
“This is already going to be bad enough, media-wise. Do you have any what idea what’ll happen to me if it actually heads to court? I’ll become a tabloid freak. I’ll never be taken seriously as a critic again. My reputation will be ruined. My life will be ruined. This is my worst nightmare, Des. Just forget about it, please.”
“I can’t,” she said stubbornly. “I’m not satisfied.”
“Fine, then tell me how to satisfy you,” he shot back.
“Yes, please, Des,” Esme said pleadingly as the tabloid cameramen quietly, inevitably, rolled back in like the tide, the shoppers crowding in behind them.
Des stood there in judicious silence for a moment, chin resting on her fist. “Okay, I want you two men to smack meat.”
“You want us to what?” Tito asked incredulously.
“Shake hands, or I’m running you both in.”
“You’re kidding, right?” Mitch said to her.
“I said it and I meant it. I don’t tolerate fighting in my town. This is Dorset, not Dodge City.”
“True enough,” Mitch said. “But we’re not in the Cub Scouts anymore, Des. We’re a pair of grown men and-”
“Smack meat!” Des snapped. “Or we’re going for a ride.”
Mitch shrugged his shoulders and stuck a hand out. Tito Molina shook it, his own hand smaller and softer than Mitch was expecting. The media horde duly recorded it for posterity.
“What do you have to say, Mitch?” one cameraman asked him.
“Not a thing,” Mitch answered curtly. “I spoke my piece, Tito spoke his.”
“Sure you don’t want to take a poke at him?”
“What do you say, Tito?” another paparazzi called out.
“Get your own damned life,” Tito snarled, instantly tensing all over again. “Stop living off of mine, hunh?”
“All right, let’s go!” Des said, herding them away.
The scene was over. The cameramen headed for the doors, anxious to run with what they had. The shoppers dispersed.
“Hey, Chrissie!” Jeff called out to the publicist, who was fending off the autograph seekers in Esme’s face. “Can I have a quick word with you?”
Chrissie shot an impatient glance his way, then a slower double take. “Wait, I know you…”
“I’m Jeff Wachtell, better known as Mr. Abby Kaminsky.”
Chrissie smirked at him faintly. “Oh, sure, and I should be standing here talking to you because…?”
“I was just wondering if you could convince Abby to swing by for a signing at the Book Schnook,” Jeff said, sucking his cheeks in and out. “She’ll be coming right past Dorset on her way to and from Boston, and it sure would help me out a lot. What do you say, will you ask her?”
Chrissie raised her jutting jaw at him. “This is like a joke, right?”
“No, I’m perfectly serious.”
“Jeffrey, let me see if I can draw you a picture. My client wishes to see you stripped naked, hung by your thumbs-actually, not your thumbs but a much, much tinier part of your anatomy-and slowly pecked to death by hungry birds.”
“Does that mean no?”
“It means,” Chrissie replied, “that she thinks you are the lowest, most contemptible creature on the face of the earth. If I so much as mention to her that I bumped into you today she’ll need a cold compress and a Valium. You ruined her life. She detests you. Am I getting through to you now?” And with that she turned on her heel and ushered Esme toward the door.
“Maybe this is a bad time,” Jeff hollered after her in vain. “Could we talk about it later?”
Tito made a point of hanging back, sidling his way over towardMitch with the predatory stealth of Jack Palance in Shane. Des was about to intercede but Mitch held up his hand, stopping her. He did not want her fighting his battles for him.
“Just one more thing, critic guy,” Tito said to him, his voice low and murderous, blue eyes boring in on Mitch’s. “I don’t want to see you in here again. If I do, I’ll mess you up for real. And I don’t care if your bitch is around to protect you or not, understand?”
It had been a long time since Mitch had been in this position. But as he stood there in The Works, nose to nose with Tito Molina, Mitch was right back in Stuyvesant Town all over again, a porky twelve-year-old going jaw to jaw with Bruce Cooperman, the playground bully who wouldn’t let him pass through the gate to the basketball court. Mitch had known what he had to do then and he knew what he had to do now. He stared right back at him and said, “This town is where I live, and you don’t tell me where I can or cannot go. If you want to fight, we’ll fight. But we won’t do it in front of the cameras. We’ll do it somewhere quiet. You’ll probably win, since you’re such a tough guy, but I do outweigh you and I promise you that I’ll put every pound I possess into messing up your precious face. By the time we’re through people won’t know you from Hermione Gingold, understand?”
Tito glowered at him in lethal silence for a long moment-until he broke into sudden, side-splitting laughter. Uncontrollable hysterics. “God, that was so cool,” he finally managed to say, gasping. “Thanks for that moment, man. I’ll have to use it in a scene someday.”
“It’s all yours,” Mitch said, wondering just how much of Tito’s erratic behavior was for real and how much
