The Jesse Stone Novels 6-9

by Robert B. Parker

  Jesse nodded.

  “What’s that about?” Molly said.

  “I don’t know,” Jesse said.

  “Are you like that?” Molly said.

  Jesse nodded slowly.

  “Pretty much,” he said.

  “In the time you’ve been a cop,” Molly said, “have you ever heard of a female Peeping Tom?”

  “Nope.”

  “I don’t get it,” Molly said.

  “Me either.”

  “I mean, have no interest in seeing a man with his clothes off,” Molly said.

  “Not even certain Native Americans from the Apache tribe?” Jesse said.

  “Oh, hell,” Molly said. “Will you ever let up on that?”

  “I have no plans to,” Jesse said.

  “One little indiscretion,” she said. “Why did I ever tell you?”

  “I’m the chief of police,” Jesse said.

  Molly nodded.

  “Sad but true,” she said. “So, is this part of my case?”

  “We gotta hang on to the pictures,” Jesse said. “They’re evidence. But I don’t want a bunch of male cops looking at nude pictures of them. I don’t want those women humiliated any more than they have been.”

  Molly nodded again and picked up the folder. She stood for a moment, looking at Jesse.

  “You’re not so bad,” she said. “For a guy.”

  “If only I were Apache,” Jesse said.

  Molly looked at him for another moment.

  “Oh, fuck you,” she said.

  “Hey,” Jesse said. “How ’bout a little respect.”

  Molly grinned.

  “Oh, fuck you, Chief,” she said, and left the office.

  30

  JESSE BROUGHT a copy of the Night Hawk’s letter with him when he went to see Dix.

  “Could you read this for me?” Jesse said.

  Dix nodded and picked up the letter. He read it carefully and handed it back to Jesse.

  “The serial home invader in Paradise?” Dix said.

  “Yes. There were pictures of his victims, but I didn’t bring them.”

  “No need,” Dix said.

  “Whaddya think?” Jesse said.

  Dix tipped his chair back with his elbows resting on the arms and his fingers laced across his flat stomach.

  “He seems to understand himself,” Dix said.

  “You don’t think he’s crazy?” Jesse said.

  “I do,” Dix said. “And that is what he seems to understand.”

  Jesse nodded.

  “Anything in there that will help me catch him?”

  “Not much,” Dix said. “Tell me about the women.”

  “Married, mothers, all around forty, dark hair, good-enough-looking, but not head-turners.”

  “Three so far,” Dix said.

  “Yes.”

  “So we may have some idea of what kind of woman he favors.”

  “Kind of a small sample,” Jesse said.

  “It’s all you have at the moment,” Dix said. “Theory of the case?”

  “Guy likes to take pictures of naked women,” Jesse said.

  Dix smiled.

  “Hard to argue against that,” he said.

  “Anything you see in the letter?” Jesse said. “Besides he knows he’s crazy?”

  “He promises to keep doing it,” Dix said.

  “It’s my impression that it is unusual for Peeping Toms to graduate to home invasion,” Jesse said.

  “That is my impression as well,” Dix said.

  “But it happens.”

  “Yes,” Dix said.

  “And it happened with this guy,” Jesse said.

  “Unless he’s lying about being the Peeping Tom.”

  “You think he is?”

  “Don’t know,” Dix said.

  “So, say it’s the truth. Why would someone take that step?”

  “There’s no way to know, as was the case with your panty checker,” Dix said. “We have no idea what all of this means to him.”

  “Peeping Tom work is so much less dangerous,” Jesse said. “And if you are caught, the consequences are much less severe.”

  “Maybe that’s the charm of home invasion,” Dix said.

  “The risk?”

  “It seems from his letter that he wants to be caught,” Dix said.

  “So we just sit around and wait until he catches himself?” Jesse said.

  “He also doesn’t want to be caught,” Dix said.

  “Conflicted,” Jesse said.

  Dix smiled and nodded.

  “And obsessive,” Jesse said.

  Dix smiled and nodded again.

  “If we knew why,” Jesse said.

  “Probably wouldn’t do you much good,” Dix said. “A lot of obsessions are rooted in long-ago events that the obsessed aren’t even aware of.”

  Jesse nodded.

  “I mean, pretty much every guy I know would look at a nude woman if he could,” Jesse said.

  Dix nodded.

  “Wouldn’t you?”

  Dix smiled.

  “I’m behind the desk,” Dix said. “You’re in front of it.”

  “Which means I don’t get to know anything about you?” Jesse said.

  “You know several things,” Dix said.

  “I know you used to be a cop and you used to be a drunk,” Jesse said.

  “And you also know that I have a Ph.D. from Chicago, and an M.D. from Harvard.”

  “How would I know that?” Jesse said.

  “And you a trained detective,” Dix said.

  He pointed to the diplomas framed on his wall.

  “Okay,” Jesse said. “But you know what I’m saying. Most men are interested in female nudity.”

  “Most straight men,” Dix said.

  Jesse nodded.

  “But most men don’t do what this guy does,” he said.

  “Because they are not driven by his need,” Dix said.

  “So what the fuck is his need?” Jesse said.

  “There may be a clue,” Dix said. “In the letter he speaks of a need to see.”

  “ ‘I need to see,’ ” Jesse quoted. “ ‘I need to know their secret.’ ”

  “You didn’t miss it,” Dix said.

  “What’s the secret?” Jesse said.

  “We have no way to know,” Dix said.

  “How about a guess?” Jesse said. “Anything is better than nothing.”

  Dix paused and didn’t speak for a moment.

  “There was a famous British aesthete,” Dix said, “who, on his wedding night, was so traumatized by the sight of his bride’s pubic hair that he could not consummate the marriage.”

  “He was a virgin?” Jesse said.

  “Apparently,” Dix said.

  “That had to be a while ago,” Jesse said.

  “Long time, yes,” Dix said. “It is difficult, in our time, to reach marriage age without being aware that women have pubic hair.”

  “But,” Jesse said. “If it was a kid discovering that . . .”

  “And the circumstances were sufficiently traumatizing . . .” Dix said.

  “The shameful secret,” Jesse said.

  Dix nodded.

  “Every woman’s shameful secret,” Jesse said.

  “To one degree or another,” Dix said.

  “He might need to keep going over it,” Jesse said.

  Dix shrugged.

  “Might,” he said.

  “Either because he is hoping it won’t be true this time?” Jesse said.

  “Or because he wants to reaffirm the essential baseness of women,” Dix said.

  “And the pictures would be evidence,” Jesse said. “Proof of the secret.”

  “Maybe,” Dix said. “You’ve interviewed the victims?”

  “Of course.”

  “Did he touch them?”

  “No. He never got close to them,” Jesse said.

  “Threaten them?”

  “Just along the lines of ‘Do
what I say and you won’t get hurt,’ ” Jesse said.

  “Verbally abusive?”

  “No,” Jesse said. “Course, it might not be that.”

  “True,” Dix said.

  “Might be something entirely different,” Jesse said.

  “Might,” Dix said.

  “So what difference does it make?” Jesse said.

  “None that I can see,” Dix said.

  “So why are we talking about it?”

  “It’s your session,” Dix said.

  Jesse was silent for a moment.

  Then he said, “Maybe it’s better than talking about me.”

  Dix nodded and looked at his watch.

  “Or maybe you think it is,” Dix said. “Let’s talk about that next time.”

  31

  SUIT CAME into Jesse’s office and sat down across the desk from him.

  “And now,” he said, “this update from swingers’ correspondent Suitcase Simpson.”

  “You converted yet?”

  “I been trying to,” Suit said. “But like I told you, no single guys.”

  “Maybe you could bring Cissy Hathaway,” Jesse said.

  “That’s over,” Suit said. “She’s too old for me.”

  “Lotta people are,” Jesse said. “Whaddya got?”

  “I been talking to Kim Magruder—Kim Clark—like you said.”

  “And?”

  Suit shrugged.

  “I feel kind of bad for her,” Suit said. “I mean, she was the golden girl, you know, going steady with the star quarterback.”

  “Chase Clark,” Jesse said.

  “Yeah, and he knocked her up. And she was real Catholic and”―Suit shrugged―“they had to get married.”

  “And produced Missy,” Jesse said.

  “Yep. They got a little boy, too. Eric.”

  “Why do you feel sorry for her?” Jesse said.

  “One, because she’s married to Chase Clark, who’s a fucking jerk. Two, because she doesn’t like the swinging thing. But does it because she thinks she has to, to save her marriage.”

  “She say so?”

  “Not exactly. But I’m pretty sure,” Suit said.

  Jesse nodded.

  “She more talkative about things this time?”

  “Yeah, much,” Suit said. “Once we were alone, you know, Debbie Lupo wasn’t around.”

  “Now Debbie Basco,” Jesse said.

  “Right,” Suit said. “Once Debbie wasn’t around, Kimmy kind of relaxed. We talked a little about high school and me dating her kid sister and where Tammy is now, and what she’s doing, and like that. But from the start it seemed like she wanted to talk about the wife-swapping thing. Like she needed to talk with someone about it.”

  Jesse nodded again.

  “She’s known you since you were kids. You used to date her little sister.”

  “It was like, how threatening could I be?” Suit said. “Little Luther Simpson.”

  “She calls you Luther?”

  “Never mind about that,” Suit said.

  “Anything that might help us with the Night Hawk?” Jesse said.

  “I’m not sure,” Suit said. “There are people who like to watch their spouse with someone else.”

  “Men?” Jesse said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Names?”

  “She won’t tell me names,” Suit said. “It’s like a club rule.”

  “You think if you brought her in, she’d talk to me?” Jesse said.

  “Not here,” Suit said.

  “Where?” Jesse said.

  “I don’t know,” Suit said. “I’ll ask her. What do I tell her about why?”

  “I got two reasons,” Jesse said. “One is the Night Hawk, and two is her daughter.”

  “I thought you promised the daughter you wouldn’t give her away.”

  “I did, and I won’t. It’s why I need to talk with her,” Jesse said. “I have to feel my way along.”

  “I can’t tell her that,” Suit said.

  “I know,” Jesse said. “I’ll meet her anywhere she wants.”

  “So what do I tell her it’s for.”

  “You’ll think of something,” Jesse said.

  32

  “THIS IS on me,” Marcy Campbell said to Jesse. “For the business you sent me.”

  They sat across from each other at a window table in the Gray Gull.

  “I thought you were doing me a favor,” Jesse said.

  “Nope. I got to co-broker with Chuck Derby and get half his commission for very little work.”

  “Well, good for me,” Jesse said. “I accept.”

  “I knew you would,” Marcy said.

  She was a handsome woman, several years older than Jesse, divorced, with grown children.

  “Spike seems an unusual man,” Marcy said.

  “I believe he is,” Jesse said. “But he’s Sunny Randall’s best friend.”

  “And you like Sunny a lot,” Marcy said.

  “I do.”

  The waitress brought a vodka gimlet for Marcy, scotch and soda for Jesse.

  “But not as much as Jenn,” Marcy said.

  Jesse looked into his glass for a moment.

  “I don’t know,” Jesse said.

  “You don’t?”

  “I don’t.”

  “My God,” Marcy said.

  Jesse shrugged.

  “I’m trying to rethink things,” Jesse said.

  “She’s gone again?” Marcy said.

  “She’s in New York,” Jesse said.

  “Alone?” Marcy said.

  “Not likely,” Jesse said.

  Marcy nodded.

  “Good news and bad,” Marcy said.

  “The good news?”

  “That you’re starting to rethink.”

  “You’ve never been a fan of Jenn’s,” Jesse said.

  “I’ve always been a fan of yours,” Marcy said.

  “And you’ve said your say already about Jenn.”

  “Yes,” Marcy said.

  “No need to plow that field again,” Jesse said.

  “No,” Marcy said.

  They each drank a little.

  “Too bad we don’t want to get married,” Jesse said. “We get along so well.”

  “Maybe if we wanted to get married,” Marcy said, “we wouldn’t get along so well.”

  “Possible,” Jesse said.

  He drank some more scotch.

  “You’ve slept with a lot of men,” Jesse said.

  “Excuse me?” Marcy said.

  “Oh, stop it,” Jesse said. “We’ve both slept with a lot of people, and enjoyed it, and neither one of us is embarrassed about it.”

  “Well,” Marcy said. “Yes.”

  “Any of the men you know that didn’t want to look at you naked?”

  “Didn’t?” Marcy said.

  “Didn’t,” Jesse said.

  “Are you implying something dreadful about my body?” Marcy said.

  “No,” Jesse said. “I’m serious. Do you know any straight men who don’t want to look at a woman naked?”

  “No,” Marcy said.

  “Do you want to look at men with their clothes off?”

  “What kind of survey is this?” Marcy said.

  “Bear with me,” Jesse said. “Does male nudity interest you?”

  “If a man’s in good shape, and we’re in the process of making love, yes, I sort of like to look at his body.”

  “If I had a bunch of pictures of naked men, would you want to look?”

  “No.”

  “What about male strippers?” Jesse said. “Many women seem interested in them.”

  “I’m not,” Marcy said. “I think that’s mostly about proving what wild-and-crazy girls they are.”

  “You know any pornography for women?”

  “Not for straight women,” Marcy said.

  “Whorehouses for women?”

  “Where women go to have sex with male prostitutes?” Marc
y said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Ugh,” Marcy said.

  “I’ll take that as a no.”

  Jesse finished his drink and looked around for the waitress.

  “This is about that guy that breaks in and photographs women,” Marcy said.

  “I guess,” Jesse said.

  “You’re trying to figure him out,” Marcy said.

  “I guess.”

  “Jesse,” she said. “Maybe there’s a difference between normal male impulse and this guy.”

  Jesse nodded.

  “He doesn’t forcibly photograph nude women because he’s a man,” Marcy said. “He does it because he’s a wack job.”

  The waitress came with their next round.

  “So I don’t have to wrestle with gender guilt,” Jesse said.

  “You have enough to wrestle with,” Marcy said, “without worrying about basic differences between the sexes.”

  Jesse raised his glass.

  “Vive la différence,” he said.

  Marcy smiled.

  “I’ll drink to that,” she said.

  They looked at their menus quietly for a time.

  “What’s bothersome,” Jesse said, “is that even in normal men, whatever that quite means, there’s never enough.”

  “You mean no matter how many women you see naked, you want to see another one?” Marcy said.

  “Or the same one again.”

  “That’s probably why he takes the pictures,” Marcy said.

  “Maybe,” Jesse said. “It also suggests that he’ll keep going.”

  “And that’s what you’re worried about,” Marcy said.

  “Yep.”

  “It is sort of crazy, isn’t it,” Marcy said. “Lot of men like to take pictures of wives and girlfriends.”

  “Whom they’ve often seen naked,” Jesse said.

  “And will again.”

  “Maybe it’s not exactly about the nudity,” Jesse said.

  “Even if it isn’t,” Marcy said, “how does that help you?”

  “I don’t know,” Jesse said. “I just figure the more I understand about him, the better chance I have to get him.”

  “It would probably be even more helpful if you knew what, exactly, it is about,” Marcy said.

  “Sooner or later,” Jesse said.

  “You really believe that?”

  “Have to,” Jesse said, “to keep being a cop. I know better, but I still have to believe that if I keep looking at it and turning it around and rolling around on it, eventually I’ll come up with something.”