by Ace Atkins
I took a breath, stood, and walked to the bay window. I looked down to the sidewalk along Berkeley Street and then back to Greebel. “Only three stories,” I said. “You might even make it.”
“Can you imagine the trauma and horror Poppy has gone through,” he said. “She’s been abused for years by Steiner and then has to witness his murder and decapitation. It will take a lot of money and therapy to deal with everything.”
“Those girls suffered much more,” I said. “No kid should go through that.”
Greebel shrugged and was about to climb out of the client chair when Mattie Sullivan entered the room. Mattie had been running errands for Rita that morning and was dressed in a green skirt with a long-sleeved black top. I believe this was the first time I’d seen Mattie in a skirt.
She looked over at Greebel and then over at me.
“What the hell’s this?”
“Apparently your clients have been offered a settlement from the great beyond by Poppy Palmer, via this dirtbag.”
“Hey,” Greebel said.
I shushed him and waited for Mattie.
“How much?” Mattie said.
I told her.
“That’s less than a quarter of what’s in the suit.”
“I know.”
“You tell this guy to go fuck himself?”
I smiled and leaned against the sill of the bay window. “You know,” I said. “I was just getting to that.”
“You’ll never find her,” Greebel said. “Poppy can go anywhere. And has the money to live as she’s grown accustomed.”
Greebel’s good-natured grin had melted. He stood up, buttoned his coat, and turned to Mattie Sullivan. “Hope the goddamn backpack was worth the mess.”
I looked to Mattie and winked.
“Front door it is,” I said.
I walked up to Matthew Greebel as he winced and covered his face. I reached under his suit jacket and grabbed hold of his belt, lifting him up off the floor and marching him through my office and anteroom, where I unceremoniously dumped him into the hallway. Pearl was behind me, barking through my legs.
I pretended to dust off my hands.
I closed the door and walked back inside.
“I’ve already found more girls,” Mattie said.
“I heard.”
“And Rita knows people who can find Steiner’s stash,” she said. “She said they’ll find Poppy Palmer and stick a microscope up her ass.”
“That sounds like Rita.”
Mattie smoothed down the wrinkles in her long green skirt and smiled. She looked self-conscious and a bit awkward in her new clothes.
“I think you look very nice.”
“But where will I carry the gun?” she said.
“In a nice and fancy handbag?”
“Screw that.”
“Talk to Captain Glass,” I said. “Maybe she can give you some fashion tips.”
“Already have,” Mattie said. “Can I buy you lunch and tell you about it?”
“How about we walk over to Davio’s, sit at the bar, and I buy you lunch?”
“That works.”
I slipped into a lightweight khaki blazer. “You put in an application for the police academy,” I said.
Mattie smiled. “Ah.”
“Quirk told me.”
“Hope you’re not disappointed,” Mattie said.
“On you not following in the footsteps of your sleuthing mentor?”
“Yep.”
“Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”
“Pretty good advice,” Mattie said. “You make that up just now?”
“Absolutely,” I said.
Mattie sat down by Pearl and rubbed her ears and neck. Pearl found a nice bone to keep her occupied while we had lunch.
“Susan loves her,” Mattie said. “But she made me promise not to tell you.”
“I know.”
“She wasn’t even mad about the fancy shoes Pearl ate.”
“Did she say anything at all about me?” I said.
Mattie shrugged. “She thinks you’re pretty okay for a Boston thug.”
“I knew it.”
“But Susan ain’t easy to live with.”
“I’m no cakewalk myself,” I said. “Glad we both celebrate being individuals who often like being alone.”
We walked down the office steps and out onto Berkeley Street, turning left toward Davio’s. People rushed past us, without notice, as we took our own sweet time. I enjoyed not being in a hurry.
“Susan says my mom would be proud of me,” Mattie said. “That I don’t have to push so hard all the time. I can just be.”
“You know Susan did go to Harvard?”
“Which makes her smart?” Mattie said, pronouncing smart in the proper Boston fashion.
“As a whip.”
About the Authors
Robert B. Parker was the author of seventy books, including the legendary Spenser detective series, the novels featuring Police Chief Jesse Stone, and the acclaimed Virgil Cole-Everett Hitch Westerns, as well as the Sunny Randall novels. Winner of the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award and long considered the undisputed dean of American crime fiction, he died in January 2010. Ace Atkins is the New York Times bestselling author of twenty-seven books, including ten books in his Quinn Colson series. Handpicked by the Robert B. Parker Estate nearly a decade ago to continue the Spenser series, he's written nine novels about the iconic private eye. He lives and works in Oxford, Mississippi.
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