Stranger in Paradise js-7

by Robert B. Parker

  He listened to the phone again as he watched a young woman take her beach robe off near the edge of the water.

  “He knows the cell phone number,” Crow said. “Tell him to give me a ringy-dingy.”

  The young woman’s bathing suit was white, and barely sufficient to its task, though it contrasted nicely with her tan skin. She looked to be about twenty-five.

  “Sure thing,” Crow said, and closed the phone.

  Crow wasn’t choosy about age, though at twenty-five most women didn’t seem very interesting. Older women had more to talk about. But younger women usually had firmer thighs.

  “It’s all good,” Crow said aloud.

  Most of the people on the beach were women and children. The women generally the mothers of the children, or the nannies. Most of them were a little softer-looking than Crow liked, a little too thick in the thighs, a little too wide in the butt.

  Probably not a lot of time to work out when you got kids.

  Not that Crow would have turned them away. Crow liked to be with women. And the women didn’t need to be perfect. He liked to look at women. He thought about them sexually. Just as he liked to be with them sexually. But he thought about them in many other ways as well. He liked the way they moved, the way they were always aware of their hair. He liked the way they were with the children. He liked the thought they gave to their clothes, even at the beach. He liked how most of them found a way to keep a towel or something around their waists when they were in bathing suits. In health clubs, he noticed they did the same thing in workout tights. It always amused him. They wore revealing clothes for a reason, and covered the clothes with towels for a reason. Crow had never been able to figure out the reasons.

  Ambivalence?

  He’d asked sometimes but had never gotten an answer that made sense to him. He didn’t mind. Part of what he liked in women was the uncertainty that they created. There was always a sense of puzzlement, of tension. Tension was much better than boredom.

  Crow’s phone rang. He smiled and nodded his head.

  “Bingo,” he said.

  66.

  “I need to run this by you,” Jesse said.

  Dix nodded.

  “I’m not sure I’m doing the right thing,” Jesse said.

  “And you think I’ll know?” Dix said.

  “I think you’ll have an informed opinion,” Jesse said. “I will value it.”

  Dix tilted his head very slightly, as if he was almost acknowledging a compliment.

  “I am conspiring with a contract killer, a known felon, named Wilson Cromartie, to keep a fourteen-year-old female runaway from the custody of her father, her mother is dead, and establish a life for her here in Paradise.”

  “Fourteen,” Dix said.

  “Yes, and a mess. Her father is a major criminal figure in Florida. I believe he had her mother killed. My guess is that when she lived with him she was molested, though probably not by him.”

  “Others around him?” Dix said.

  “I think so,” Jesse said. “I have her a job and a place to stay at Daisy Dyke’s restaurant once we have worked something out with the father.”

  “Can you do that?”

  “Not in any conventional sense, but Crow and I have a plan.”

  “Crow?”

  “Wilson Cromartie,” Jesse said. “If it works she will be on her own.”

  “At fourteen,” Dix said.

  “With Daisy Dyke, and I’ll be responsible for her—school, doctor, stuff like that.”

  “Money?”

  “We’re working on that,” Jesse said.

  “You and Crow.”

  “Yes.”

  “Have you thought of Youth Services,” Dix said. “Other agencies?”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “I turn her over to an agency,” Jesse said, “and she’ll be gone in an hour.”

  “She might be gone in an hour anyway.”

  “Be her choice,” Jesse said. “I won’t have delivered her into the hands of what she would see as the enemy.”

  Dix nodded.

  “Ever have a dog?” Dix said.

  “Yes.”

  “Was it spoiled?” Dix said.

  “Yes.”

  Dix smiled.

  “For as tough a cop as you are,” he said, “you are a very big old softie.”

  “That’s why I’m talking to you,” Jesse said.

  “There may be other reasons,” Dix said. “But for now, fill me in on this.”

  “You want details?” Jesse said.

  “That’s where the devil is,” Dix said.

  67.

  “Francisco will do the wire transfer today,” Crow said.

  “One million?”

  “One million,” Crow said. “Wired to your account. When it arrives, I’ll call him. He gets his daughter.”

  The two men stood with their backs to the seawall at midpoint on the causeway.

  “That’s what you told him,” Jesse said.

  “That’s what I told him.”

  “You are a lying bastard,” Jesse said.

  “Doesn’t make me a bad person,” Crow said.

  “Something did,” Jesse said. “What I don’t get is, Francisco gives no sign that he loves her, but he’s willing to pay a million to get her back.”

  “A,” Crow said, “a million dollars doesn’t mean much to him. And B, he’s Louis Francisco. No one is allowed to tell him no.”

  “Ego,” Jesse said.

  “Partly,” Crow said.

  “And business.”

  “Yep.”

  “Power is real,” Jesse said. “But it’s a lot less real if it’s not perceived as power.”

  Crow nodded. He was looking down the causeway toward the mainland end.

  “Something like that,” he said. “Timing is going to be pretty much everything here.”

  “I can help you with the timing,” Jesse said.

  “I’ve timed it out half a dozen times,” Crow said. “We gotta start Francisco’s car about ten seconds after Esteban hits the causeway.”

  “We’ll set up some construction, and have one of my guys directing traffic,” Jesse said.

  “How you gonna know it’s Francisco?” Crow said.

  “You told him he had to come himself.”

  “Yeah. And he will. He won’t come alone. But he’s annoyed. He’ll want to kill me himself.”

  “After he gets the girl,” Jesse said.

  “Yep. He can’t let me get away with holding him up like this,” Crow said.

  “I’ve seen him,” Jesse said. “I’ll recognize him.”

  “Even in the backseat?” Crow said.

  Jesse smiled.

  “When he came to visit me, I made his car. Lincoln Town Car. A rental. He rented two of them. Got his license plate number while he was driving away. Got the other number from the rental company.”

  “Wow,” Crow said. “What a cop!”

  “Ever alert,” Jesse said.

  “We need somebody at the other end to let us know when Esteban starts,” Crow said. “He’ll be around the bend.”

  “If he comes from there,” Jesse said.

  “He’ll come from that end,” Crow said.

  “And Francisco from the other,” Jesse said.

  Crow nodded.

  “Scorpions in a bottle,” he said. “You got enough people to keep them penned on the causeway?”

  “I can get some Staties for backup,” Jesse said.

  “They’ll go along with this?” Crow said.

  “I may not tell them exactly what’s going down,” Jesse said.

  Crow grinned.

  “You lying bastard,” he said.

  “Doesn’t make me a bad person,” Jesse said. “When you want to do it?”

  “Day after the money shows up in your account,” Crow said.

  “Time of day?”

  “Morning is good, late enough for everybody to get here, early enough for m
e to have the sun at my back and shining in their eyes.”

  “Say about ten-thirty?” Jesse said.

  “You been doing a few practice runs yourself,” Crow said.

  “Plan ahead,” Jesse said.

  They were quiet then, looking at the length of the causeway.

  “I need a day to walk my people through it,” Jesse said.

  “You got tomorrow,” Crow said, “even if the money shows up tomorrow.”

  “Wednesday morning, ten-thirty,” Jesse said. “Rain or shine.”

  “Rain might not be a bad thing,” Crow said. “If it blurred things a little.”

  “Sixty percent chance of rain,” Jesse said, “for Wednesday.”

  “Like they know,” Crow said.

  “They sound like they know,” Jesse said.

  Crow snorted.

  “Either way,” Crow said. “What are the odds of pulling this off?”

  “Terrible odds,” Jesse said.

  Crow grinned.

  “Worst case,” Crow said, “we got his money, and we’re no worse off than we were before.”

  “Except some people might be dead,” Jesse said. “Including you.”

  “What’s the fun in winning,” Crow said, “you got no chance to lose?”

  68.

  The easy late-summer rain had emptied the beach. Jesse sat with Jenn on the bench in the small pavilion watching the raindrops pock the surface of the ocean.

  “Can we walk on the beach?” Jenn said.

  “Umbrella?” Jesse said.

  “No. I’d like to walk in the rain and get wet.”

  “And your hair?” Jesse said.

  “I’ll fix it when we get home,” Jenn said.

  The phrase pinched in Jesse’s solar plexus. Home.

  They stood and began to walk down the empty beach. The rain was steady but not hard. There was no wind.

  “So the gang from Marshport,” Jenn said. “They think Crow has been set up by Amber and is expecting to meet her on the causeway, where instead they will shoot him dead.”

  “Correct,” Jesse said.

  “God, I wish I could use some of this,” Jenn said.

  “Maybe someday,” Jesse said.

  “And Amber’s father thinks Crow will deliver his daughter to him in the middle of the causeway,” Jenn said.

  “Correct.”

  “And you hope to provoke conflict between the two groups and arrest them all.”

  “Exactly,” Jesse said.

  “Is any of this plan legal?” Jenn said.

  “I may be able to make it look so,” Jesse said.

  “But you know who most of the villains are already,” Jenn said.

  “Plus, I know Crow killed a guy in Marshport, and certainly a couple guys here,” Jesse said. “Though I can’t prove it.”

  “But you’re not trying to catch Crow,” Jenn said.

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I’m not sure,” Jesse said.

  “Can you trust Crow in this?”

  “Probably not,” Jesse said. “And I know that Esteban Carty and the Horn Street gang killed Amber’s mother. And I know they have a contract on Crow, but all I have is secondhand information from a known felon, who would probably say anything he thought would serve him.”

  “What do you suppose Crow is up to in all this?” Jenn said.

  “He may be looking out for the girl,” Jesse said. “He may have an issue I don’t know about that he’s resolving with Francisco. But to tell you the truth, I think he’s just playing.”

  “God,” Jenn said.

  “Crow’s unusual,” Jesse said.

  “And doesn’t the father have a legal right to his daughter?” Jenn said.

  “Probably,” Jesse said. “I got somebody from Rita Fiore’s firm working on that.”

  “And the million dollars Crow has extorted from the father?” Jenn said.

  “Rita’s people are setting up a trust for Amber,” Jesse said. “She stays here and finishes school and gets it at age eighteen. Meanwhile, we support her on the income.”

  “And if she runs off?”

  “I don’t know,” Jesse said.

  “This could blow up in your face,” Jenn said.

  “I know.”

  “You could lose your job,” Jenn said. “Everything.”

  “I know.”

  “For what?” Jenn said.

  Jesse shrugged.

  “What does Dix say?” Jenn asked.

  “He thinks that Amber is probably too damaged to save,” Jesse said. “Though, being a shrink, he doesn’t exactly say that.”

  “So you’re going to jump off the cliff,” Jenn said, “for maybe nothing.”

  Jesse shrugged again.

  “Why?” Jenn said.

  “Seems like the right thing to do,” Jesse said.

  They walked in silence then, except for the murmur of the ocean, and the hushed sound of the rain and the wet crunch their feet made in the sand.

  “Be a better chance of all of this working if I could actually put Amber out there with Crow.”

  “Which you can’t.”

  “No,” Jesse said. “Nor Molly dressed up as Amber.”

  “I could…” Jenn started.

  “No,” Jesse said.

  Jenn smiled faintly.

  “Thank God,” she said. “I didn’t really want to.”

  “I wouldn’t let you,” Jesse said. “Even if you did.”

  “But,” Jenn said, “I have a thought.”

  They stopped and stood in the rain. Their clothes were wet through. Neither of them minded.

  “During my breathtaking film career,” Jenn said, “I encountered an occasional stunt dummy.”

  “And went out with him?” Jesse said.

  “Not that kind of dummy,” Jenn said. “It’s a floppy replica, like a rag doll with a realistic look. You know, the guy falls off the building and you see him land on the roof of a car?…What’s landing is the stunt dummy.”

  “Can you get one?”

  “Sure, there’s a couple theatrical supply houses in town that have them,” Jenn said. “We dress it like Amber, put on a black wig with a maroon stripe, maybe, and voilà.”

  “Better than an inflate-a-mate,” Jesse said.

  “Most things are,” Jenn said. “I’ll get it this afternoon and bring it out.”

  “Thank you,” Jesse said.

  They walked on. It had gotten darker. The sky was lower. The rain was coming a little harder.

  “I don’t know,” Jenn said. “It may be all wrong, what you’re doing.”

  “I know.”

  “But it’s for all the right motives,” Jenn said.

  “Story of my life,” Jesse said.

  Jenn stopped and turned to him and put her arms around him and pressed her face against his chest.

  “Jesse,” she said. “Jesse, Jesse, Jesse.”

  He patted her back slowly.

  69.

  “Suit,” Jesse said. “You and Molly bring Amber here tomorrow morning. No later than nine.”

  “If she objects?” Suit said.

  “Bring her,” Jesse said. “Handcuff her if you have to. Arthur, you man the desk. If there’s an emergency, and I mean a real one, not somebody’s cat is missing, you cover it and Suit will take the desk. Otherwise, Suit, you and Molly are in a cell with Amber. Vests and shotguns.”

  Suit nodded. Jesse looked around the squad room.

  “She’ll want to know why,” Molly said.

  “Don’t tell her,” Jesse said. “Peter, you’re on the Neck. Buddy, you’re at the construction detour. Murph, you’re on the backhoe. Eddie, you’re in a car on the Neck with John. Peter will join you when the balloon goes up. Steve and Bobby, you’re in a car at the other end. Buddy and Murph will join you. There will be some Staties in unmarked cars in the parking lot at the beach. Commander is a corporal named Jenks. They’ll pitch in…at my request…if they’re needed.”
<
br />   “And you’re in the van,” Paul Murphy said.

  Jesse nodded.

  “At the construction site,” he said. “I’ll be in radio contact with everybody, including Crow. When it goes down, you wait for me, and when I say so, we come in from both ends and arrest everybody in sight.”

  “And do what with them?” Peter Perkins said. “We don’t have a paddy wagon, and even if we did, we probably don’t have enough cell space.”

  “Healy promised me a State Police wagon, and we can use the Salem City jail.”

  “Crow?” Suit said.

  “Except Crow,” Jesse said.

  “I still don’t get what’s in this for Crow,” Peter Perkins said.

  “Nobody does,” Jesse said. “He seems to think it’s fun.”

  “Hell,” Peter Perkins said. “I’m not sure what we’re getting out of this.”

  “We might close a couple of cases, and give Amber Francisco a life,” Jesse said.

  “Sounds like protect and serve to me,” Suit said.

  “Me, too,” Jesse said.

  “On the other hand,” Suit said, “how you gonna explain the million bucks to the IRS?”

  “That’s why they make accountants, Suit,” Jesse said.

  “Oh,” Suit said. “I knew there was a reason.”

  “Screw the IRS,” Steve Friedman said. “How you gonna explain it to Healy?”

  “First,” Jesse said, “let’s see if it works.”

  “You’re gonna have to explain this to a lot of people whether it works or not,” Peter Perkins said. “We’re all just obeying orders. But you’re in charge.”

  “Glad you noticed,” Jesse said.

  “Healy ain’t gonna like it,” Perkins said.

  “Maybe I’ll get lucky,” Jesse said. “Maybe somebody will shoot me.”

  70.

  It was 6:15 in the morning, still raining as it had yesterday. Not a downpour but steady. Drinking coffee, Crow was putting on a Kevlar vest in a van at the construction site at the start of the causeway. Peter Perkins had slipped the radio into his hip pocket and was running the microphone and earpiece wires. When that was done, Crow strapped on two .40-caliber semiautomatic handguns below the vest, and slipped into a hooded sweatshirt. The microphone was clipped inside the neck, and the hood concealed the earphone.