The Jesse Stone Novels 6-9
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“Had a big arm, Oz,” Jesse said. “Bigger than yours, to tell you the truth. Didn’t have your hands. Didn’t probably have your bat. Couldn’t do a backflip. But I had a gun.”
He took his drink back to the balcony. Sixteen-ounce glass, lot of ice, lot of soda. The warm evening made the condensation bead up on the glass and run in tiny rivulets down the side.
Now I gotta worry about whether this guy needs respect enough to hurt one of these women. He drank.
“I guess we have to assume he might,” he said aloud in the empty stillness. “We got to assume he might.”
He drank some more.
37
SUITCASE SIMPSON came into Jesse’s office carrying a large paper bag.
“Seth Ralston,” Suit said.
He took a large Italian sandwich out of the bag and unwrapped it on Jesse’s desk.
“Is that a sub I see before me?” Jesse said.
“From AJ’s sub shop,” Suit said. “The best.”
“You have Daisy Dyke right up the street, who makes her own bread, and you’re buying mass-produced submarine sandwiches at AJ’s?”
“Yeah. I got one for you, if you want it.”
“You bet I do,” Jesse said.
Suit handed him a second sandwich, and Jesse unwrapped it on his desk.
“Seth Ralston?” Jesse said.
“And Hannah Wechsler,” Suit said. “Got ’em both for you.”
“And still managed to pick up some subs,” Jesse said. “What have you got.”
“I gotta get a Coke first,” Suit said. “You want one?”
“Just some water,” Jesse said.
Suit went out and returned in a minute with a Coke and a water from the refrigerator in the squad room.
“Seth Ralston lives in one of those new condos on Beach Plum Ave., near the beach.”
“I know the place,” Jesse said.
They both paused to eat a bite of sandwich.
“Lives there with his wife, Hannah Wechsler. She kept her maiden name.”
“Kind of figured that,” Jesse said.
“Been there five years. Married for seven. No kids. He’s a college professor. Taft University in Walford. She used to be his graduate student. She’s still in grad school, and she also teaches some night classes at Taft.”
“After seven years?”
“She’s been in grad school for ten,” Suit said.
“Slow learner,” Jesse said. “What’s he a professor of?”
Suit glanced down at his small notebook.
“English and American literature,” Suit said.
“And that’s what she’s doing her graduate work in?”
“Uh-huh. She got a master’s. Now she’s working on a Ph.D.”
“An English professor is just the kind of guy who would use a phrase like ‘cri de coeur,’ ” Jesse said.
“What?”
“He used it in one of his letters to me,” Jesse said.
“What’s it mean?” Suit said.
“Something like a cry from the heart,” Jesse said.
“Latin?”
“French,” Jesse said.
“Wow, no wonder you made chief.”
“I looked it up,” Jesse said.
“What’s the missus teach?”
“Freshman English,” Suit said. “On Wednesday nights.”
“How ’bout him?” Jesse said.
“He don’t teach any nights,” Suit said. “Matter of fact, he don’t seem to teach much at all.”
“What’s his rank?” Jesse said.
“Rank?”
“You know, academic rank,” Jesse said. “Is he a professor?”
“Yeah.”
“What kind?” Jesse said.
“Kind?”
“He a full professor?” Jesse said.
“I guess so,” Suit said.
“That’s why he doesn’t teach much,” Jesse said.
Suit finished his sandwich and wiped his mouth and hands on one of the napkins.
“So I’m thinking,” he said, “here’s a guy likes to watch. And his wife’s out every Wednesday night, so I go back over all the Peeping Tom reports . . . and they all took place on a Wednesday night.”
“Before he started working days,” Jesse said.
“I wonder what she does days,” Suit said.
“Maybe you should find out,” Jesse said. “Especially the days of the photo shoots.”
“Great idea,” Suit said. “Another reason you’re the chief.”
“I’m chief,” Jesse said, “because some years back Hasty Hathaway assumed if he hired me I’d be a useless drunk and he could run the town as he wished.”
“And where’s Hasty now?” Suit said.
Jesse smiled.
“Excellent point,” he said.
38
THEY SAT in the squad room, just the three of them, with the door closed.
“I’ve asked Steve to come in and run the desk,” Jesse said. “Me and the rest of the guys will run the department, and you will be the Night Hawk task force.”
“Me and Molly?” Suit said. “Ain’t a hell of a big task force.”
“I’ll be involved,” Jesse said. “But with a twelve-man department, how big a task force do you think we can put together.”
“Besides,” Molly said, “we’re worth several ordinary task forces.”
“There’s that,” Suit said.
“What did you find out about Hannah Wechsler’s daytime activity?” Jesse said.
“No pattern,” Suit said. “No pattern to the photo sessions, except they were all on weekdays.”
“As they’d need to be anyway,” Molly said. “Have to have the husband and kids out of the house.”
“And no daytime obligations for Hannah,” Suit said. “That I can find out about.”
“I wonder if he’s still peeping at night?” Jesse said.
“We’ve been assuming he’s moved on to home invasion,” Suit said.
“But it isn’t necessarily either or,” Molly said. “He could do both.”
“Any reports of peeping?”
“No, but people don’t always notice,” Molly said.
“And even if they do,” Suit said, “they don’t always report it.”
“They would now,” Jesse said. “With the home invasions being talked about.”
“Still,” Molly said. “They might not always know. I mean, that’s one of the points about peeping, isn’t it? That the person being peeped doesn’t know it?”
Jesse nodded.
“You have the file,” Jesse said to Molly.
She patted the big brown envelope on the desk in front of her.
“Good, you keep it. Share it fully with Suit as needed, and no one else.”
“You worried about the pictures?” Suit said.
“I am,” Jesse said. “I don’t want them circulating. These women have been through enough without having a bunch of people looking at them naked.”
Suit nodded.
“You think I’d circulate them?”
“No,” Jesse said. “I think you might examine them closely, as I did, but you’re a good cop and a good guy. You’ll be fine.”
“And Molly got no interest in them, being a straight woman,” Suit said.
Jesse nodded.
“Okay,” Suit said. “I see that.”
Jesse smiled.
“Thank you,” he said. “We got no real evidence that this guy is our man.”
“But you think he is,” Molly said.
“Yes,” Jesse said.
“The Wednesday-night thing could be a coincidence,” Molly said.
“Could be,” Jesse said. “But if I decide it is, where does that get me?”
Molly and Suit both nodded.
“What do we do?” Suit said.
Jesse inhaled audibly. Then he was quiet for a bit.
Finally, he said, “I think he’s feeling some pressure. His last letter, after Gloria
Fisher chased him away, sounded a little hysterical.”
“What’s he feeling pressure about?” Molly said. “He has no reason to think we’re getting close to him.”
“I think it’s the pressure of his craziness,” Jesse said. “I think he knows his behavior is obsessive, and he’s afraid of where it will take him.”
“And he won’t be able to stop himself,” Molly said.
“I think that’s his fear.”
“So this thing he does, because he needs to do it, because he seems to get pleasure from it, is also a torment and could lead him to disaster,” Molly said.
“You’ve read the letters,” Jesse said. “That’s my sense.”
“Christ,” Suit said. “He’s like a victim, too.”
“Of himself,” Molly said.
“This may be getting too deep for me,” Suit said.
Molly grinned at him.
“You should be used to that,” she said.
Suit grinned.
“Can I be on another task force?” he said.
“Nope,” Jesse said. “You’re stuck with her.”
Suit nodded.
“So what’s the plan?” he said.
“You guys are assigned to this full-time. I know you got lives to live as well,” Jesse said, “especially you, Moll. But I’d like as much surveillance on Seth as you can do. And if he spots you, no harm to it. Just cranks the pressure a little.”
They both nodded.
“And,” Jesse said, “I’ll start asking about him. Interview the wife, their swinger friends, academic colleagues . . . him.”
“That ought to squeeze his ’nads a little,” Suit said.
“Isn’t that sweet,” Molly said. “My task force partner. ‘Squeeze his ’nads a little.’ ”
“Short for gonads,” Suit said.
“I know what it’s short for,” Molly said.
“So?” Suit said. “Your point?”
“Oh, God,” Molly said.
39
“I THINK I have a lead on the home invader,” Jesse said when he sat down in Dix’s office.
“That’s what you’re supposed to do,” Dix said.
“Get a lead on the home invader?”
“Yeah,” Dix said. “You’re a cop. It’s your job.”
“So?”
“So it’s not my job,” Dix said.
“Which means what?”
“Which means for the last several weeks you’ve been busy telling me about the cases you’re working on.”
“You’ve been helpful,” Jesse said.
“And nothing about the case I’m working on,” Dix said.
“Which is me,” Jesse said.
“Yes.”
“Being a skilled investigator,” Jesse said, “I conclude that you want to talk about me.”
“That’s another thing you’ve been doing,” Dix said. “You kid about it.”
“About what?”
“About whatever it is,” Dix said, “that you don’t want to talk to me about.”
“And kidding is a clue to that?”
“It is,” Dix said. “It’s a distancing technique.”
Jesse was quiet. He looked around the office.
“Jenn went to New York,” Jesse said.
Dix sat back in his chair, clasped his hands in front of his mouth and waited, looking directly at Jesse.
“She got a job on a syndicated morning show, and she’s bunking with the producer till she finds her own place,” Jesse said.
“The producer is male?” Dix said.
“Yep,” Jesse said. “I suppose it would be cynical to suggest that she might have been bunking with him before she got the job.”
“Or it may be simply learning from experience,” Dix said.
“It’s her M.O.,” Jesse said.
Dix nodded. Jesse shook his head.
“I don’t know,” Jesse said.
Dix waited.
“I love her,” Jesse said.
Dix nodded.
“And,” Jesse said, “she loves me . . . or at least she hangs on to me.”
Dix nodded again. He had an attitudinal mode sometimes that encouraged you to follow a subject in the direction you had taken. He had another one that let you know he thought you were going the wrong way. This time Jesse knew he should pursue this topic.
“Could she hang on to me for a reason other than love?” Jesse said.
Dix raised his eyebrows slightly.
“Why would she?” Jesse said.
They were both silent. Then Jesse could see Dix decide to prime the pump.
“Think about her life,” Dix said. “She has some talent, but as you said, her M.O. is to sleep with men who can advance her career.”
Jesse nodded.
“So that her life may seem to her to be in the control of others,” Dix said.
Jesse nodded.
“In an out-of-control life,” Dix said, “what stability is there? What can she count on?”
Jesse was silent for a moment.
Then he said, “Me.”
Dix nodded firmly.
“She could have that. Hell, when we were married she did have that,” Jesse said.
Dix nodded.
“Hell, she could have that now if she’d stay with me,” Jesse said.
“But she chooses not to,” Dix said.
“Or can’t choose otherwise,” Jesse said.
Dix nodded.
“I’m not enough,” Jesse said.
“Apparently not,” Dix said.
“So we’re saying that because I love her and she can count on me, she’s free to fuck her way to success,” Jesse said.
Dix smiled faintly and nodded again.
“How’s that working out for both of you?” Dix said.
Jesse leaned back in his chair and stretched his legs out in front of him.
“The Night Hawk,” Jesse said, “writes me these letters, and when you read them they sound like they’re about two people. Him and his obsession. It’s like the obsession needs him to do things to satisfy it, and he does them, and it doesn’t satisfy the obsession . . . and it fucks up his life.”
“Do I hear an analogy being drawn?” Dix said.
“Doing what the obsession wants,” Jesse said, “like, makes it more obsessive.”
“Sometimes,” Dix said.
“So enough is never enough.”
“Never,” Dix said.
“Drinking water makes you thirsty.”
“Yes,” Dix said.
Jesse put his hands behind his head as he leaned back.
“What a great arrangement,” he said.
Dix smiled.
“God is undoubtedly an ironist,” he said.
“Now what the fuck do I do?” Jesse said.
“Be good to catch the Night Hawk,” Dix said.
40
JESSE INTERVIEWED Hannah Wechsler in her office at Taft University. She shared the room with five other teaching assistants, all of whom were scruffy. Hannah was not. She was dressed appropriately enough in an ankle-length dress and sandals, but it had the look of contrivance. Her hair was too well groomed. Her makeup was too good. She was manicured and pedicured, and her teeth were very white.
“Is Seth okay?” she said when Jesse introduced himself.
“He’s fine,” Jesse said. “It’s another case we’re working on, and we hoped maybe you could help us.”
There were three other teaching assistants in the office. They all looked at Jesse with automatic hostility. Philosophically, they were grimly in favor of the working man. In fact, of course, plumbers made them uncomfortable, and they viewed cops with suspicion.
“May I buy you some coffee?” Jesse said.
“Sure,” Hannah said, “the café in the student union.”
It was a short walk to the student union, a short wait for the coffee, and a short search to find a table for two.
“What’s this case you’re working on, Chief Stone,”
Hannah said. “Is it the creepy guy that takes pictures?”
“Call me Jesse.”
“And I’m Hannah,” she said. “Is it him?”
“In fact, it is,” Jesse said.
“Have you seen the pictures?” she said.
“I have.”
“And they’re really naked?” Hannah said.
“Yes.”
“Wow,” she said. “I wonder what that’s like.”
“To be forced to pose naked?” Jesse said.
“Yeah,” Hannah said. “That, and knowing that a bunch of cops and people you don’t even know are looking at you naked.”
“Not too many cops,” Jesse said.
“You’re trying to protect them,” Hannah said.
“No need to humiliate them,” Jesse said, “more than is required.”
“You think they’re humiliated?” Hannah said.
“Wouldn’t you be?”
“Be humiliated?” Hannah said. “No, actually, I think I’d find it kind of exciting.”
“Really,” Jesse said.
“I know, I know. I’m not supposed to think things like that,” Hannah said. “But I do, all right?”
“Okay with me,” Jesse said.
“Lot of women like to be looked at,” Hannah said. “If they’d just admit it.”
“You think any of these women might?”
“If they are not ashamed of their bodies,” Hannah said. “Are able to be genuinely in touch with their own sexuality.”
“You bet,” Jesse said.
“You don’t think so?”
“I’m just listening,” Jesse said.
“Open-shuttered and passive,” Hannah said. “Not thinking, merely recording.”
“Something like that,” Jesse said.
“You know where that comes from?”
“The open-shuttered stuff?” Jesse said. “No.”
“John Van Druten,” Hannah said. “I Am a Camera.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Sorry,” Hannah said. “I’ve been a graduate student too long.”
“I don’t mind,” Jesse said.
“So,” she said, “Jesse. Tell me this. Are you in touch with your sexuality?”
“I was,” Jesse said, “when I was a teenager. But I was afraid it would cause pimples.”
Hannah smiled.
“That’s not quite what I meant,” she said.
“You’re in touch with yours,” Jesse said.
“Absolutely,” Hannah said.
“You’re a member of the Paradise Free Swingers,” Jesse said.