Rogue Island by Bruce DeSilva Read Free Book Online Page B

belonged somewhere else.
    â€œNo, no. I’m a reporter.”
    â€œYes? What do you want?”
    â€œIs Joseph home?”
    â€œHe reads the same paper I get. He don’t need his own paper.”
    I was standing on a crumbling concrete stoop, staring at a solid door with three dead bolts.
    â€œMrs. DeLucca, this might be easier if you would let me in.”
    â€œWhaddayou, nuts? How I know you are who you say you are and not somebody else, maybe somebody come to rape me, huh? How I supposed to know that? Open the door? Fuhgeddaboudit.”
    â€œMa? Who you talking to?”
    â€œNobody, Joseph. Go back to sleep.”
    Heavy footsteps.
    â€œNow you done it, you woke up Joseph. Hope you’re happy now.”
    The dead bolts clicked and the door swung open, revealing an ancient speck of a woman in a starched blue duster that matched her bouffant.
    Now I remembered. For about a month, Carmella DeLucca had been a waitress at the diner, snarling at customers and shuffling so slowly between the counter and the booths that even kindhearted Charlie finally couldn’t put up with it. When he let her go, nobody took her place.
    She stood in the doorway now on swollen feet stuffed into bunny rabbit slippers. If Dorcas could see me now, she’d accuse me of sleeping with her.
    Behind Mrs. DeLucca loomed her bouncing baby boy. At six foot three and about forty years of age, he looked a lot like me, if you overlooked the fifty extra pounds straining the elastic of yellowed boxers. I didn’t want to think about it. He had forgotten his shirt, although I suppose that mat of hair counted for something.
    â€œWhy you botherin’ Ma?”
    Be careful with this one, Mulligan, I thought. One of those extra pounds might be muscle.
    â€œI’m a reporter working on a story about the fires.”
    â€œWhat’s that got to do with Ma?”
    â€œActually, I wanted to talk to you.”
    â€œYou the guy been writin’ all them stories?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œDon’t you know that just encourages him, writin’ all them stories and puttin’ ’em in the paper like that? That’s just what he wants, see all that stuff in the paper. Bet he’s cuttin’ all those stories out, makin’ himself a fuckin’ scrapbook. Sorry, Ma.”
    â€œWho is?” I said.
    â€œWho is what?”
    â€œWho is making himself a scrapbook?”
    â€œHow the hell do I know? What, you some kinda smart-ass?”
    â€œYou happen to see any of the fires yourself?”
    â€œWhy you askin’ that for?”
    â€œI’m just talking to people who’ve seen some of the fires, asking about what they saw.”
    â€œYeah, I seen three of ’em. No, four. Last one was when the fireman got barbecued. Watched them pull his body out the house. Stunk somethin’ awful. It was really cool.”
    I flashed on Tony at his wedding reception, his arm around the girl everybody wanted. As my eyes slid over the landscape that was Joseph DeLucca, I managed to keep my clenched fist where it was. He probably couldn’t spell asshole, so maybe he couldn’t help being one.
    â€œHow did you happen to be there?” I asked.
    â€œI was watchin’ The Brady Bunch, just like every Friday afternoon since I ain’t been workin’. Marcia was complaining ’bout her new braces, and just then sirens started goin’ off. She thought the braces made her look ugly, so I told her, ‘Yeah, they do, you whiny little bitch.’ When my show ended, I walked over there, see what was up.”
    â€œI see. Mrs. DeLucca, is that how you remember it? The two of you were watching The Brady Bunch ?”
    â€œMa was at the Duds ’n’ Suds. Why you care where Ma was at?”
    â€œSo you were home alone, then?”
    â€œWhat the fuck you gettin’ at? Sorry, Ma. You accusin’ me of something? Get the fuck outta here, ’fore I shove my