cheese.”
“Do you get along okay with Bonita?”
“I guess. She’s not really my kind of person. She’s a total taker. She broke up Justy’s marriage to June’s mom, you know.”
“Justy had a little something to do with that.”
“June thinks Bonita took advantage of him. Justy tries to come across as all take-charge but he’s really just a horny, clueless trog who drinks too much. Bonita sized him up right away and moved in for the kill. Or so June thinks. He doesn’t like her very much.”
“You say Justy owes you money. What’s up with that?”
“I think he’s having cash flow problems. People aren’t buying cars like they used to. There was nobody around the place last time I was there.”
“Do you think that’s why June is suddenly so anxious to leave-because Bond’s Auto Mall is circling the drain?”
“Mitch, I really wish I knew. But I don’t.” Callie sighed woefully. “Are you going to eat that last donut?”
CHAPTER 3
“I may not be a football star but I have rights, too,” proclaimed Stewart Plotka, who was holding an impromptu news conference on the shoulder of the road just outside Tyrone Grantham’s driveway. The camera crews practically engulfed him. “I’m here for some justice. And I’m staying here until I get it.”
Plotka was short, tubby and on the whiny side. As photo-op proof of how grievously he’d been injured by Da Beast he wore a highly theatrical black eye patch over his left eye and a splint around his right hand. Picture the world’s shlumpiest pirate and that was Stewart Plotka. The man looked about as dashing as a baked apple standing out there in the hot sun in his sweat-stained knit shirt and rumpled Dockers. His slickly tailored power lawyer, Andrea Halperin, towered over him in her stiletto heels.
Des stood there watching them, fuming. She was pissed at herself for letting Bob Paffin move her around. Not that the old weasel had left her a way out. He knew how to get ugly when he needed to. And, with a rich resident like Justy Bond climbing up his ass, he needed to.
“I have a right to be here,” Plotka went on. The news crews were pretty much blocking the entire road now. The trooper on traffic detail-a big, empty uniform-had lost control of the situation. “And I’m staying here until Tyrone Grantham owns up to what he did to Katie O’Brien.”
Des strolled on over and said, “I hope you don’t mean here here, Mr. Plotka. Because you’re impeding the flow of traffic.”
“Mr. Plotka has a legal right to speak,” asserted Andrea Halperin, who had sleek auburn hair and an intensely self-important air about her. “We’re on public property.”
“And I work for the public. I’m Resident Trooper Desiree Mitry and I’m informing you that you are creating a safety hazard. Please move along.”
“My client is not going anywhere. He has taken up residence at the Saybrook Point Inn and he intends to show up here each and every day until Mr. Tyrone Grantham owns up to what he’s done.”
“I said please move along.” Des kept her voice calm for the cameras. If she wasn’t careful it could bottom out on her and she could come across like Barry White on a bad hair day. “Move along.”
Andrea Halperin knew how to get her client on TV. She also knew when to cut and run. She steered Plotka toward a black Mercedes that was double-parked on the shoulder of the road. They climbed in and sped away, Andrea behind the wheel. The media throng promptly began shouting questions at Des. She ignored them as she strode toward the front gate. A tall, impassive blond trooper stood guard there.
“Hey, Oly,” Des said, smiling at him. Trooper Olsen was a pro who didn’t get all weird around her because she was a she. “What are you supposed to be doing?”
“Nothing,” he replied.
“Nothing?”
“Orders straight from the top.”
“I’m going in.”
“Are they expecting you?”
“They are if they’re watching CNN.”
He pushed a button on the inside of the gatepost. The gate swung open and Des started her way up the long, winding gravel driveway toward the house. The Grantham place had been built during the boom years of the nineties. It resembled a cluster of giant glass Kleenex boxes, some laid out lengthwise, others standing on end. A pair of Cadillac Escalades-one black, one white-was parked out front, along with a silver Range Rover, a blue Porsche 911 Carrera convertible and a tan Lexus SC 430 two-seater. Also a Dodge minivan and a beat-up old Ford pickup. All of the vehicles had New York plates except for the pickup, which had Texas plates.
Des rang the bell.
The door was opened by a lanky, way long young black man in a loose-fitting T-shirt and swim trunks. He was long enough to be a baller-six-feet-eight or nine, easy-and sported a retro-eighties high-top fade, a hairstyle she hadn’t known was staging a comeback. “Yo, lookie here, we got us Resident Trooper Des-aye-ray Mitry!” he exclaimed, flashing her a playful grin. “Ain’t nobody messes with you, sister. When you say move along you mean move along. I’m Big Tee’s cousin Clarence. Clarence Bellows. But since you and me’s about to fall in love just call me Cee, awright?”
It was bright and sunny inside the glass house. From the entry hall Des could see floor-to-ceiling river views. Hear a television blaring. Also hear someone playing jazz chords on a piano. Someone who could really play.
Clarence stood there with his hands on his hips, admiring her from head to toe. “Aren’t you the cutest thing with your big hat? Girl, you have got to come back when you’re not packing heat.”
“That will be quite enough, Cee.” A much smaller black man wearing gold-framed glasses appeared next to Clarence in the entry hall. “Resident Trooper Mitry did not come here to lip with you. Pleased to meet you, Trooper. I’m Rondell Grantham. Tyrone is my brother. Half-brother, to be precise. We share the same mother. Neither of us ever knew who our father was. Nor did she. I’m three years younger than Tyrone.”
“ And a midget,” Clarence pointed out.
Not a midget, but Rondell Grantham stood no more than five-feet-eight and was so compactly built Des doubted he weighed more than a buck-forty. He wore a white oxford cloth dress shirt, tan gabardine slacks and polished brown Ferragamo loafers. His hair was trimmed high and tight. “I was informed that Dorset’s resident trooper was a highly competent young woman of color,” he said to her. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you. We all have.”
Now a broad shadow fell across the entry hall and the famous Tyrone Grantham stood before her in a tank top and gym shorts, his heavy lidded eyes watchful and curious. The warrior athlete wasn’t nearly as tall as his cousin Clarence. He stood a mere six-feet-three. But he was as wide across as three grown men and it was all muscle. His gleaming shaved head didn’t sit atop his bulging neck so much as it receded into it. His biceps were the size of boulders. His thighs were as big around as an average man’s torso. Tattoos of snarling lions, tigers and attack dogs covered practically every inch of skin that Des could see. So did the battle scars of his brutal profession. His broad, flat nose had been broken countless times. His face scratched and gouged. Jagged surgical scars adorned both knees and both shoulders. His huge knuckles were battered and the index finger of his left hand stuck out at an odd angle.
Tyrone Grantham was an utterly savage-looking man. Yet he seemed totally relaxed and at ease. “Glad to know you, Trooper,” he said, a boyish smile creasing his face. “Did you meet my little brother, Rondell? I’ll bet he didn’t tell you he has a graduate degree in business from Wharton. He isn’t one to brag. I can’t tell you how proud I am of him. When we were coming up I looked out for him. Now he looks out for me. Right, little man?”
Rondell gazed up at his brother worshipfully. “That’s right, big man.”
“Damned right. Little brother manages my investments and various ventures. I’m presently expanding into the music business. We’ve installed a recording studio right here in the house. Cee’s a sound engineer with skills. We got us some big plans. Hey, what are we standing out here for? Come on in.”
