“Including their house?” Jesse said. “Their house must be worth three million.”
“Almost none of it equity,” Healy said. “There’s two mortgages on it.”
“They are supposed to be one of the wealthiest families in town,” Jesse said.
“I remembered you telling me that,” Healy said. “So I told the accountant to poke around a little. According to what he got from the IRS and God knows where else, the accountant says that ten years ago they had a net worth in the area of fifty million.”
“What happened to it?”
“Don’t know,” Healy said. “Don’t know if they hid it, or spent it, or lost it. What I know is what the accountant told me. They got a net worth lower than mine.”
“Low,” Jesse said.
Healy nodded.
“How you doing with your crime wave,” Healy said.
“Badly.”
“Any other help you want from the Massachusetts State Police?”
“I’m doing so badly,” Jesse said, “I don’t even know what help to ask for.”
“Your man Crow involved in any of this?” Healy said.
“When did he become my man?” Jesse said.
“He’s not mine,” Healy said.
“Lucky you,” Jesse said. “Sure he’s involved. But I can’t prove it…yet.”
“Where do the Fiedlers come in?” Healy said.
“I don’t know,” Jesse said.
“But you wanted to know their finances,” Healy said.
“Mrs. Fiedler seems so committed to stalling that school project,” Jesse said. “I kind of wondered why.”
“And her finances tell you?”
“Her maiden name was Crowne,” Jesse said. “The property belonged to her father. He left it to charity, but if the charity doesn’t use it, it goes to her.”
“And it’s worth a lot of money,” Healy said.
“Ten million,” Jesse said.
Healy nodded.
“If you got fifty million, another ten is nice but not crucial,” Healy said. “However, if you’re down to your last three hundred thousand…”
“And you have two mortgages on your house,” Jesse said, “ten million could save your ass.”
“Nice to know it’s not simple bigotry,” Healy said.
58.
The man was wearing very good clothes when he walked into Jesse’s office. White suit, black-and-white striped shirt, white tie. Everything fit him exactly. His black shoes gleamed with polish. He had a neat goatee and, disconcertingly amid all the grooming, a lot of long, black hair.
“My name is Louis Francisco,” he said.
“Jesse Stone.”
“I’m looking for my daughter.”
Jesse nodded.
“Do you know where she is?” Francisco said.
“I do.”
“Where?” Francisco said.
“I won’t say.”
“With you?” Francisco said.
“No.”
“She is a fourteen-year-old girl,” Francisco said.
Jesse could hear no accent of any kind in Francisco’s speech, neither ethnic nor regional. It was as if he’d been taught to speak by a radio announcer.
“She is safe,” Jesse said. “There’s a female police officer with her.”
“You’ve been kind to take her in,” Francisco said. “But I am her father.”
Jesse didn’t say anything.
“I’ve come to take her home,” Francisco said.
“She doesn’t want to go with you,” Jesse said.
“Many children defy their parents. It doesn’t mean they should be allowed to run wild.”
“You can’t have her,” Jesse said.
“You do not, I believe, have any legal authority to prevent me,” Francisco said.
Jesse nodded.
“Bring suit,” Jesse said. “We’ll run it through the courts.”
Francisco smiled pleasantly.
“Perhaps I will,” he said. “Do you happen to know a man named Wilson Cromartie?”
“I do,” Jesse said.
“Do you happen to know his whereabouts?”
“I don’t,” Jesse said.
“Or a young man named Esteban Carty?” Francisco said.
“We’ve never met,” Jesse said.
“Too bad,” Francisco said. “I can’t say you’ve been terribly helpful.”
“Gee,” Jesse said.
“Still, I believe we can manage without your help.”
“Is that the royal we?” Jesse said.
“I have a number of employees with me,” Francisco said.
“If you attempt to retrieve your daughter, I will arrest you,” Jesse said.
“My employees may protest,” Francisco said.
“If necessary,” Jesse said, “I’ll arrest them.”
“There are many ways to skin a cat,” Francisco said.
He stood up and stared at Jesse. Something changed in his eyes. It was like gazing suddenly into the soul of a snake.
“And,” Francisco said, “to skin you, motherfucker.”
His voice rasped when he said it. They looked at each other for a still moment.
Then Jesse said, “Ah, there you are.”
59.
As soon as Francisco left the office, Jesse called Molly.
“Kid’s father just left here,” he said. “Suit out front?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll call him,” Jesse said.
“Does the father know she’s here?”
“Not yet.”
“But you think he’ll find out.”
“Sooner or later,” Jesse said.
“Is he alone?”
“I doubt if he’s ever alone,” Jesse said.
“Should we move her?”
“Where will she be safer?” Jesse said.
“I don’t know.”
“Okay, so stay with her,” Jesse said. “Keep Suit awake. Call me if anything looks funny.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You wouldn’t know where Crow is,” Jesse said.
“Why are you asking me?” Molly said.
“Because you’re the one I’m talking to on the phone,” Jesse said.
“Why do you want to know?” Molly said.
“Because I’m trying to keep track of as many loose cannons as I can. Any idea where he is?”
“No,” Molly said. “Of course not.”
“Okay,” Jesse said. “Where’s the kid?”
“She doesn’t get up until afternoon,” Molly said.
“Jenn left for work yet?”
“She’s in the shower,” Molly said.
“Stay close,” Jesse said.
When Jesse hung up, Molly looked at the phone.
Well, wasn’t I jumpy! Maybe I’m not cut out for adultery.
Jenn came from the bedroom wearing a white terry-cloth robe. Her hair was still wet, and she wore no makeup.
God, she looks like a schoolgirl.
“Your hair’s wet,” Molly said.
“I just took a shower,” Jenn said.
“Naturally curly hair?” Molly said.
“Yes. God was kind.”
“If mine gets wet it goes floop,” Molly said.
“God was kind to you in other ways,” Jenn said. “Is that coffee?”
“It is.”
Jenn poured some coffee into a thick white mug, put in a sugar substitute, and sat at the kitchen table opposite Molly.
“Amber’s father has arrived,” Molly said. “Jesse won’t give her up.”
“Does the father know she’s here?” Jenn said.
“Not so far,” Molly said.
“You think Jesse has a legal leg to stand on, keeping the girl from her father?” Jenn said.
“I don’t think Jesse expects it to go through the legal system,” Molly said.
“Because the father is a gangster?”
“Yes.”
“That’s kind of sc
ary,” Jenn said.
“Yes, it is,” Molly said.
“Does it scare you?”
“I have a lot of training, and some experience, and I have great respect for Jesse Stone.”
Jenn nodded.
“But does it scare you?’
“Some,” Molly said.
“Me, too,” Jenn said.
“But you’ll stick?”
“I am not going to get to the big leagues,” Jenn said, “if I run away from a developing story because I’m scared.”
“Any other reason?” Molly said.
Jenn smiled. It wasn’t exactly a happy smile, Molly thought.
“I, too, have great respect for Jesse Stone,” Jenn said.
“And he thinks he’s such a mess,” Molly said.
“He is,” Jenn said. “In many ways. And I have helped him to be a mess. But he’s a good cop. And he won’t quit on us. And at the very center of himself, he’s a very decent man.”
“Why can’t you be together?” Molly said.
Jenn shook her head.
“I don’t know, really,” she said. “We work on it all the time.”
“When you were married did you ever cheat on him?” Molly said.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To get ahead. I thought I was an actress.”
“And you slept with a producer?” Molly said.
“Yes.”
“How’d you feel about it?”
“Lousy,” Jenn said.
“Because you’d cheated?”
Jenn sipped her coffee, holding the mug in both hands, her elbows resting on the table, the light reflecting off the harbor brightening the room.
“Not exactly,” Jenn said. “I guess I felt lousy because the sex was a means to an end.”
“The end being your career?”
“I guess.”
“The career was important, though,” Molly said.
“I know,” Jenn said. “Jesse seemed so complete, except for drinking too much.”
“Even then?”
“Yes. And I felt so incomplete….” She shrugged and made a small half-laugh. “Still do.”
“And guilty?”
Jenn nodded.
“That, too,” she said.
Molly poured them both more coffee. Jenn added the sugar substitute and stirred slowly.
“How come you’re so interested?” Jenn said.
Molly colored a bit. Jenn squinted at her as if the room had suddenly become too bright.
“Molly?” Jenn said.
Molly was looking at the dark surface of the coffee in her cup. Jenn waited.
“I don’t feel guilty,” Molly said.
“You had an affair,” Jenn said.
Molly half-shrugged.
“Last night my husband was out of town. My mother had the kids, and I had sex with a man.”
Jenn smiled.
“Anyone I know,” she said.
“Crow.”
“Jesus Christ,” Jenn said.
“Have you ever met Crow?” Molly said.
“No, but I’ve heard.”
“And I don’t feel guilty,” Molly said.
“Except that you feel guilty,” Jenn said, “about not feeling guilty.”
Molly nodded slowly.
“I guess so,” she said.
“So why’d you sleep with him?” Jenn said.
“I wanted to.”
“Any trouble at home?”
“No,” Molly said. “I am happy with my husband. I love him. I love my kids. I love being married…. Hell, I love being a cop.”
“Lot of protect and serve there,” Jenn said.
“Maybe. But mostly it feels like I just wanted to. He is a very, very exciting man. He seems completely contained. There was no crap about love or anything. Just he wanted to have sex with me, I was a little flattered I suppose, and I wanted to have sex with him.”
“How was it?” Jenn said.
“It was fine. He’s adroit. I’m okay. And, if you’ll pardon the pun, it was a one-shot deal.”
“No commitments,” Jenn said. “No promises.”
Molly nodded.
“No when can I see you again,” Molly said. “There was something sort of honest about it.”
“One time only?” Jenn said.
“Yes,” Molly said. “He wanted to. I wanted to. We did.”
Jenn drank some coffee. Usually she was trying to figure out her own situation. This was kind of fun.
“Well,” Jenn said. “Here’s what I think. I think you did something for yourself, because it felt good. You don’t feel guilty about it, so you won’t confess to your husband—thank God. You are right where you were before Crow. And nobody has gotten hurt.”
“So how come I felt the need to confess to you?” Molly said.
“I think you were bragging,” Jenn said.
Molly reddened slightly. She laughed.
“Maybe,” she said.
“And maybe looking for a little advice from an experienced adulteress,” Jenn said.
“Maybe,” Molly said. “What’s puzzling me is, I’m an Irish Catholic mother of four and I’m not sure I can find any sense of sin in here.”
“Don’t let it make you unhappy,” Jenn said. “That would be the sin.”
Molly smiled.
“I like your theology, Jenn. I’ve committed adultery, but if I’m happy about it, I can still avoid sin.”
“Ruining a happy marriage is the sin,” Jenn said.
Molly nodded.
“And I haven’t done that yet,” Molly said.
“Not yet.”
60.
Miriam Fiedler lived on Sea Street a mile and a tenth past the Crowne Estate School in a shingle-style house with a large veranda. Jesse sat with her on the veranda and told her what he knew of her and the Crowne estate.
She looked at him as if he were speaking another language as he talked. When he was through she said nothing.
“What I want to know is where the money went,” Jesse said. “You used to be rich.”
She still looked blankly at him. And then, almost as if she were merely the conveyance for someone else’s voice, she began to speak.
“That was before I married Alex,” she said.
There was no affect in her voice. It sounded like a recording.
“I was forty-one,” she said. “My first marriage…”
They were each sitting in a wicker rocking chair. Neither of them was rocking. Jesse waited. Miriam didn’t say anything. It was as if she had forgotten what she was saying.
“And Alex?” Jesse said.
“He was a year younger,” Miriam said, “forty. He, too, had never married. I soon realized why.”
Again silence. Again Jesse prompted her.
“Why?” Jesse said.
“Alex is homosexual,” she said.
“But he married you.”
“For my money,” Miriam said.
“Which he spent?” Jesse said.
“Generally on his boyfriends,” Miriam said.
They sat quietly in their rocking chairs. Motionless. Looking at the slow unspooling of her story.
“He travels,” Jesse said after a time.
“Yes.”
“But he doesn’t work,” Jesse said.
“No.”
“And you pay.”
“He tries not to embarrass me,” she said. “That’s worth something.”
“Why not divorce him?” Jesse said.
“Then he would embarrass me.”
Jesse frowned.
“Embarrass?” he said.
“I cannot stand to be thought a dupe,” Miriam said. “I cannot stand having it revealed that I have been married all these years to a man who would only have sex with young men.”
“And spent all your money in the process,” Jesse said.
“Yes,” Miriam said.
It was the first word with a hint of feeling in it.
“If I will give him one million dollars,” Miriam said, “he will go away and get a quiet divorce—Nevada, perhaps—and I will be free of him.”
“If you had one million dollars,” Jesse said.
“Yes.”
Jesse nodded and was quiet. The wind off the ocean brought with it the smell of salt and distance and infinite possibility.
“There is a developer,” Miriam said, “Austin assures me, who will pay ten million for the Crowne estate, in order to build a resort. Austin says the town will not prevent him.”
“Austin Blake,” Jesse said.
“Yes.”
“The zoning board might have a problem,” Jesse said.
“Austin assures me there will be no problem.”
“He’s your attorney?” Jesse said.
“Yes. Do I need him here now?”
“I have no plans to arrest you,” Jesse said.
“Will you keep my secret?” she said.
“If I can,” Jesse said. “You’ll need to lay off the kids at the estate, though.”
“I know,” she said.
“I’ll use whatever undue influence I have to keep Channel Three from using it.”
She nodded. Jesse thought it might have been a grateful nod.
“What am I to do?” she said.
Jesse took it as a rhetorical question. But she repeated it.
“What am I to do?” she said.
“What if you got the divorce, without selling the Crowne estate?” Jesse said. “And it was still done quietly?”
“I would at least be free to live my life.”
“What would that mean?” Jesse said.
“I…” She stopped, struggling to say what she was trying to say. “I have a relationship with Walter Carr.”
“Which you would be free to pursue?” Jesse said.
“Overtly,” Miriam said.
Jesse dropped his head so she wouldn’t see him smile. This does not bode well for Suit, he thought.
“Does Walter know all of this?” Jesse said.
“No.”
“Any?” Jesse said.
“No.”
“Was his opposition to the Crowne estate project at your solicitation?”
“He was not hard to solicit,” she said. “No one was. Out here we were uniformly opposed to a bunch of little slum kids coming into the neighborhood.”
“Do you know anything about the Francisco woman’s body being found on the Crowne estate lawn?” Jesse said.
“No.”
Jesse looked at her. She looked back.
“I did not,” she said, with a small tremor of feeling in her voice.
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