He let out a derisive snort. "Hank played the tuba."

"Meaning what, he flunked your coolness test?"

"We lived in the same house-period."

"You also worked together, didn't you?"

"We didn't work together. I'm only there on Saturdays or if somebody's sick or on vacation."

"Are you hoping to become a full-time carrier?"

"I'm hoping you'll go back upstairs and leave me the hell alone."

"Suit yourself. Nice talking to you. Actually, I lied. No, it wasn't." Mitch started back toward the stairs.

"Wait a sec," Casey said, allowing a tiny trace of hopefulness to creep into his voice. "Did Josie give you a message for me?"

"No, she didn't. But I haven't spoken to her today."

"Yeah, you have."

"So now you're calling me a liar?"

"I'm betting a million bucks she asked you to tell me something. And that's why you came down here."

"Don't ever bet with real money, Casey. You suck as a gambler."

"Tell me something I don't already know." He peered at Mitch with those nonpenetrating eyes of his. "Are you two getting it on?"

"Josie and I are nothing more than friends. I told you that yesterday."

"I didn't believe you yesterday. Still don't."

"That's fine. I won't bother to set you straight. There's no point, since you've already got life all figured out. Hell, you're sitting here in your mom's basement watching TV in your jammies and you're, what, twenty-six?"

"Twenty-eight."

"When I was twenty-eight I was freelancing for two different magazines, teaching a class at NYU and finishing up my first movie encyclopedia."

"Goodie for you, asshole."

"I'm not bragging. I'm just saying that there was so much I wanted to do every single hour of every single day. Isn't there anything you'd like to do?"

"Yeah, there is. I'd like to sit here without you hassling me. Jesus, you're as bad as Hank. He was always on me about how I should be applying myself. Like I'd take advice from that clown."

"You take advice from Josie, don't you? What does she tell you to do?"

Casey reached for a pack of Marlboros and found it empty. Crumpled it and tossed it aside. "She doesn't tell me to do anything. She encourages me."

"To do what?"

He shrugged. "Be more assertive."

"Is that why you gave her a black eye?"

"That was an accident. And I can't believe she told you about it."

"She didn't."

"Who did?"

"You did," Mitch replied. "Just now."

For a second, Casey looked as if he wanted to tear Mitch's head off. But he'd already tried that yesterday and ended up with his face frozen to the causeway. So instead he stuck out his chin and said, "I guess you think you're pretty smart. Trust me, you don't know shit."

"I know that you're in love with Josie."

"I don't want to talk about Josie!"

"Then why did you ask me about her?"

Casey said nothing to that. Just sat there in petulant silence.

Mitch glanced back down at the pile of NFL stats next to his chair. "Are you into the Patriots or the Giants?" Since Dorset was situated halfway between Boston and New York, its residents' team loyalties were divided right down the middle.

"Patriots," Casey grunted. "The Giants play down to the level of their competition. Hardly ever cover the spread."

"It sounds like you're in an office betting pool. Am I right?"

Casey had had enough. He got up out of the sagging chair and took off his robe. He wore an ancient Metallica T-shirt and long johns under it. He dug a Patriots hoodie and a pair of sweatpants out of a rumpled pile of clothing on the floor and put them on. Then he made his way upstairs to the TV room, where Paulette and Rut sat talking quietly. Mitch followed him.

"I'm going out for a while, Mom."

Paulette frowned at him. "Where to?"

"Got some errands to run. I'm out of smokes, for one thing."

"Okay, son. Would you mind getting me two packs of Merits?"

"Are you going to give me some money?"

Paulette fetched her wallet from the kitchen table and removed a twenty-dollar bill from it. "Just do me one small favor, will you?"

He rolled his eyes. "What is it?"

"Don't spend the whole afternoon at the Rustic. I need you here, okay?"

"Whatever." He snatched the money from her and stormed out of the house.

Paulette sat back down, a distraught expression on her face as she listened to Casey start up his pickup and go roaring off.

Rut reached over from the recliner next to hers and patted her hand. "Hank was a real fine fellow. Try to remember the good times you two had together."

She glanced at him curiously. "I always thought you didn't approve of Hank."

"That's not true at all. Hank was okay. I was just jealous. I'd be jealous of any man who's lucky enough to wake up and see your shining face right there next to him every morning."

"You're a silly old man, Rutherford."

Rut smiled faintly, his eighty-two-year-old heart overflowing with the hopeless, unrequited love that he'd kept to himself for all of these years. Briefly, Mitch thought he might tell Paulette how he genuinely felt. But Rut didn't, couldn't. Just nodded his tufty white head and said, "That's me, all right-silly."

CHAPTER 13.

THE WORLD-CLASS PISSING CONTEST-more commonly known as a team meeting-was held in the auxiliary conference room of Dorset's Town Hall, a stately white-columned edifice that smelled all year round of mothballs, musty carpeting and Ben-Gay. Everyone was there at nine o'clock sharp with the noticeable exception of the agent from the FBI, who Des had no doubt would start throwing his weight around as soon as he walked in. The bureau was incredibly dependable that way.

Four members of the Connecticut State Police were in attendance: Des, Yolie, Toni and Capt. Joey Amalfitano, a rumpled old-timer who was with the Narcotics Task Force. Des had worked a drug case with Amalfitano on Sour Cherry Lane last spring. Everyone called him The Aardvark due to his huge, down-turned snout of a nose. Des thought of him more as a weasel.

The U.S. Postal Service had sent Inspector Sam Questa from New York City. Questa was in his late forties and bore a startling resemblance to Fred Flintstone. His huge, blunt featured head was set directly atop a massive torso with almost a complete absence of anything resembling a neck. Seated there at the conference table, Questa gave the impression of being a large man. Yet Des doubted he stood much taller than five-feet-four. He had the stubbiest little arms and legs she'd ever seen. She could not imagine how the man found clothing to fit him. He wore a plain gray suit, white shirt and muted tie. Kept his gleaming black hair combed carefully in place, but didn't do nearly as good a job of keeping his emotions in check. He glanced repeatedly at his watch, growing more and more pissed as the minutes ticked by. The man didn't like to be kept waiting by the FBI. The man was feeling disrespected.

And, at precisely 9:17, the man decided he'd had enough. "What do you say we get started here?" he growled. "I got a full plate and I can't sit around all morning waiting for the goddamned bureau to grace us with its presence."

"Okay by me," said The Aardark, slurping loudly from his container of coffee.

Yolie nodded her head in agreement.

Questa glanced down at a yellow legal pad. "Fine, then let's get down to business here...."

That was when the conference room door burst open and in strutted a twenty-something testosterone jarhead wearing a pair of aviator shades and a snug-fitting red ski jacket. He whipped off his shades, then off came the jacket, too. Underneath it he had on a white merino wool turtleneck that was stretched so tight across his pumped-up muscles that Des swore she could make out his entire six-pack of abs as he stood there styling self-importantly for everyone's benefit, his granite jaw working on a piece of chewing gum.

"Lord help us, they've stuck us with Maverick again," Yolie groaned under her breath. "Did we piss somebody off?"

"Possibly in a previous life," Des murmured unhappily.

"You know him?" whispered Toni, who was positively goggle-eyed.

Yolie looked at her, aghast. "Don't tell me you want that," she whispered in response.

"Loo, I swear I've just laid eyes on the father of my children."

"Trust me, you won't feel that way once it opens its mouth."

Toni continued to gape at him. "Oh, it doesn't have to talk."

"Oh, yes it does. And every single word that comes out of its mouth rhymes with 'asshole.'"

"Sorry I'm late, people," he declared in a booming, authoritative voice. "They closed I-95 because of a jackknifed tractor trailor and I had to make it out here on Route 1. I've never seen so many muffler shops in my life. Seriously, how do folks out here afford to eat three meals a day if they're always buying so many mufflers? Am I right or am I right?" He went around the table and shook hands. First with Sam Questa. "Grisky, FBI, how are you? Then with Joey Amalfitano. "It's Grisky."

"We've already met, Agent Grisky," The Aardvark pointed out. "We worked the Sour Cherry Lane case last spring."

"Sure, we did." Grisky's eyes said he didn't remember The Aardvark at all.

But he did remember Des. "Hey there, girlfriend," he exclaimed, grinning at her wolfishly. "Sure never thought I'd find myself back in your sleepy little hamlet again."

"It's not sleepy and I'm still not your girlfriend," Des said. "You remember Yolie Snipes of the Major Crime Squad, don't you?"

"You kidding me? How could I forget a sweet-looking sister like Miss Yo-lan-da Snipes. How goes it, Sarge?"

"It's lieutenant now," Yolie informed him between gritted teeth.

"Moving on up, hunh? Good for you. And, whoa, look who they gave you for a sergeant-it's Snooki. Are we on MTV right now? Seriously, am I or am I not standing in the presence of Miss ... Nicole ... Polizzi?"

"Actually, my name's Toni Tedone," she simpered breathlessly. This qualified as a major departure for Toni the Tiger. The last time someone at the Headmaster's House dared to call her Snooki he got a knee in the cojones.

"Real glad to know you. And, hey, lovin' the patchouli," he said as he made his way to the other end of the conference table.

Toni gaped at him, awestruck. "I'm going to marry that man."

Des and Yolie exchanged a horrified look before Des said, "Toni, there are two very important words you need to know about a man like Grisky."

"What are they?"

"Premature and ejaculation."

Toni frowned at her. "You say that like there's some other kind."

Grisky parked himself in a chair and said, "I just heard that the DEA's jonesing to get in on this, too. That means they'll be crawling up our butts if we don't nail it in the next thirty-six hours-which I've assured my boss we will. We have to. I'm flying to Cancun late tomorrow night to hook up with my Quantico buds for a sacred ritual. We spend the week before Christmas down there every year and I cannot, will not, miss it. So let's hit this out of the park and I mean now. So far it looks to me like we've got ourselves quite a little shitstorm. Possible organized drug activity, theft of the U.S. Mail, a dead mailman..."

"Postal carrier," Questa grunted.

Grisky raised his chin at him. "Sorry?"

"They're known as postal carriers, Agent Grisky. I thought you'd like to know since you seem to think you're in charge of my investigation. What we've got here is a matter for the U.S. Postal Inspectors to deal with."

"Well, that's a big no," Grisky fired back cheerfully. "Otherwise, we wouldn't all be sitting here at this large table with you. We're all working together on this one, Inspector. And we need to share what we know. So how about you put your dick in a box and tell us what you've got, okay?"

Questa shifted around unhappily in his chair. "I've had two teams of investigators on the ground since approximately nine o'clock last evening," he said grudgingly. "One of my teams is presently up in Norwich working the supply chain. The other's at the Dorset Post Office conducting interviews. I personally interviewed Postmaster Zander at her home early this morning. The victim, Hank Merrill, was her live-in lover. She's grieving and extremely upset. I also spoke with her son, Casey, who's a part-time carrier. I found him to be reasonably cooperative, although I did think he gave me an attitude."

"It was nothing personal," Des said. "He gives that to everyone."

"At the present time," Questa continued, "there is no reason to suspect Postmaster Zander has been complicit in any wrongdoing. But, based on my experience, the odds are good that she knows more than she was willing to admit about what's been going on."

"Which is what?" Grisky asked.