“How is that?”
Des glanced at Yolie curiously. “How is what?”
Yolie raised an eyebrow at her. “The pink of things.”
“So far so good.”
“Myself, I’ve never road tested a nonbrother.”
“I thought you and Soave’s cousin Richie…”
“No, we’re just friends. He’d like to get with me, but I’m not playing that game right now. I’m just so damned tired of getting hurt. Word, are they any nicer?”
Des shrugged. “They’re still men.”
“Soave had him a major chubby for you, you know.”
“He told you that?”
“Didn’t have to. I can see it in his eyes whenever he talks about you. And he talks about you a lot.”
“Well, it never went anywhere, if that’s what you were wondering. Strictly his chocolate fantasy-you know how that goes.”
Yolie nodded her braided head. “I am, like, uh-hunh. They all want to find out what it’s like to get with Sheena, Queen of the Jungle. What do they think, that we hang from the chandelier by our ankles?”
“What, you mean you don’t?”
Yolie let out a hoot. “Girl, you’ve got you a bad self. We’re going to be okay.”
“Yolie, I never had any doubts.”
Des turned off Old Shore at the Peck’s Point Nature Preserve. The preserve was open from sunup till sundown. There were footpaths, bike paths, a green meadow that tumbled its way down to the tidal marshes, where the osprey nested. The moisture from the night’s rain shimmered on the tall meadow grass in the morning sunlight.
Yolie gazed out the window with her mouth open, overwhelmed by the serene beauty of the place.
Des had grown so accustomed to it that she forgot sometimes just how spectacular it was. She eased her way slowly along the dirt road, passing a couple of joggers who were out with their dogs. The road ended at the barricaded causeway out to Big Sister Island. Des had a key to raise the barricade. Slowly, she eased across the ricketywooden causeway, seeing Big Sister through Yolie’s eyes as Yolie took in the lighthouse, the historic mansions, the acres of woods and private beach.
“Shut up, girl! No wonder you dig him-man’s got his own private island.”
“It’s not all his.”
“Who is this man?”
“He’s just someone who happens to know everything there is to know about every single movie that’s ever been made in the history of the planet.”
“Sounds like a geek.”
“That he is-but he’s my geek.”
Des pulled up in the gravel driveway outside his cottage. Mitch was on his knees in his vegetable patch, weeding with furious intent. Quirt sat right by his side, keenly interested in every clump of fresh soil Mitch was turning over. The lean orange tabby came running to greet Des when he heard her get out. Rubbed up against her ankle, talking up a storm. She bent over and scratched his chin as Mitch got up off his knees, swiping at his sweaty brow, and ambled toward them.
He looked sad and confused and hurt. In fact, he looked exactly the way he had the very first time Des laid eyes on him, the day he’d found that man’s body buried in this very vegetable garden. The only thing different about him now was his red, swollen jaw.
“Hey, Master Sergeant,” he said to her, his jaw clenched tightly shut. It must have stiffened on him in the night.
“Hey, baby,” she said gently, putting her hand on his rather damp shoulder. What she wanted to do was hold him tight, make it all go away. “Say hello to Sergeant Yolie Snipes-she’s Rico’s new partner.”
“We came to ask you some questions about Tito Molina, Mr. Berger,” Yolie said to him solicitously. “Are you okay with that?”
Mitch was fine with it. “Let’s go inside and get a cold drink. Sorry I sound so funny, Sergeant. I feel just like Al Pacino in the first Godfather after he got punched by Sterling Hayden. Remember that scene in Brando’s study when Michael tells Sonny he’s going to be thetrigger man in the Italian restaurant? The camera moves in on him slooowly as he sits there, commanding the attention of all of the men in the room, and that’s when it dawns on you that he’s the new godfather. Man, that was great moviemaking.”
He shlumped inside the house ahead of them, Yolie pausing to whisper, “Girl, does he talk about movies all the time?”
“Only when he’s awake.”
“You didn’t tell me he was so cute. He squeak when you squeeze him?”
Des smiled at her. “That’s not all he does.”
That morning’s New York newspapers were stacked on Mitch’s desk, the Daily News and Post featuring identical page-one photographs of Tito astride Mitch with his hands around his throat. Already it was old news.
“Have you been getting a lot of calls from reporters?” Des asked him.
“I wouldn’t know. I unplugged the phone after I spoke to you.”
He washed his hands and face in the deep, scarred kitchen sink, then poured each of them a tall glass of iced tea with sprigs of mint from his garden. He handed them around, then flopped down in his one good chair as Des and Yolie took the loveseat. “Whew, it’s sticky as hell out there this morning,” he said, breathing heavily. “I apologize if I smell like a plow horse, but I’m learning that physical work helps me when I’m down.”
“I head straight for the weight room myself,” Yolie spoke up, her head swiveling as she took in the view of the Sound from three different directions. She was, Des observed, very uneasy here in Mitch’s cottage. Also very anxious to make a good impression on the Deacon’s daughter. So anxious she was slouching a tiny bit as she sat there beside Des, just enough so that her immense breasts were less of a temptation for Mitch to stare at. Des knew why-Yolie did not want Des thinking that she’d been waving them in her boyfriend’s face. This was an aware, careful girl. A girl who missed nothing.
“Mitch, we need to talk about that phone call you got from Tito,” Des said, shifting them into business gear.
“Yeah, okay,” he agreed, sipping his iced tea carefully. Some of it dribbled down his chin anyway. “I hadn’t been asleep very long. In fact, it seemed as if he’d just left.”
“Whoa, he was here last night? You didn’t tell me that part.”
“Yeah, he was sitting right here when I got home from the beach club.”
“How did he get out here?”
“He swam out, which should have told me something right away.”
“Why is that, Mr. Berger?” Yolie asked, gulping down some iced tea.
“Call me Mitch, would you? You’re scaring me with that mister stuff.”
She flashed a quick smile at him. “Done, Mitch.”
“The tide was coming in,” he explained. “It’s dangerous. Anyone who tries that can’t be thinking straight.”
“You couldn’t have known what he’d do,” Des told him. “Besides, it’s too soon to say what did happen. We don’t know yet.”
“I should have known,” he repeated stubbornly.
“Did you give him your Mets T-shirt to wear?”
“He sort of borrowed it. I’m never going to see that shirt again, am I?”
“You wouldn’t want it back, believe me.”
“Please tell us what happened when he was here,” said Yolie, politely taking over the inquiry, pad and pen in hand.
“Nothing,” Mitch replied, shrugging. “We talked.”
“It was a friendly talk? You were vibing?”
“We totally were,” Mitch said, his voice filling with regret. “He told me he wanted to make a movie about his
