“That Cole guy, the one who stayed here for a few days.”
“What about him?”
“You know I had to pack up his things in a hurry, right?”
“I do. What’s this about?”
“Well, Jesse, I don’t know if this means anything, but when I was packing up the kid’s stuff I found something that was a little . . . I don’t know, strange. Weird, maybe. I’m not sure.”
“You’ve got my attention. What did you find?”
“A picture.”
“A picture?”
“A photo.”
“Of?”
“You, I think, and a woman. She was very pretty—beautiful, really. She had dark hair and a real dark tan and a great smile. You were much younger, with sunglasses on, and you were wearing an LAPD uniform. She was sitting on your lap with her arms around your neck.”
Jesse said, “Did it say anything on the back? Was it dated?”
“I don’t think so. I don’t like snooping at personal stuff, and if I didn’t think I recognized you in the picture, I wouldn’t’ve even looked as closely as I did.”
“I understand.”
“What do you think it means, Jesse?”
“I’m not sure. Thanks for the heads-up.”
“Like I said, no problem. I just thought you should know.”
Connor’s call had brought it all back to him in a rush. Jesse didn’t like focusing on his life in L.A. The way things ended for him out there with Jenn’s cheating, his dive down the bottle, and his getting fired, it was all pretty ugly stuff. One thing was clear, the woman in the photo wasn’t Jenn. He’d dated a lot of women before hooking up with Jenn, but there weren’t any very serious relationships before her, not in L.A. He tried matching Connor’s description of the woman with a name. Problem was, it fit a few women from those days. That wasn’t the real issue. The issue was why Cole Slayton should have a photo of Jesse with any woman. Whatever the reason, it would have to wait. Jesse walked across the parking lot and through the range’s front door.
The somewhat acrid smell of gunpowder was noticeable as Jesse stepped inside. He recognized the man at the front counter from the video Weld had shown him.
“Can I help you, Officer?” the counterman asked.
“That obvious?”
“You work a place like this, you get to recognize professionals from the buffs and the freaks.” Then, realizing what he’d said, the counterman looked around to make sure no one other than Jesse had heard him.
Jesse flashed his chief’s shield. “I’m Jesse Stone, Paradise police chief.”
The smile slid right off the counterman’s face. “Tough news today about your cop. You’re not here to shoot, are you?”
Jesse shook his head. “I’d like to look at all the footage from the day John Vandercamp shot here.”
Jesse could see the counterman’s wheels turning. “Look, Chief, it’s not my place. Maybe I better call the owner and see what he says.”
“You could do that and I could bring a warrant. But that would piss me off and I would have to ask the state police to sit outside in the parking lot night and day for the next few weeks, maybe searching some of the patrons’ vehicles for weapons that—”
“Right this way, Chief.”
65
Jesse wasn’t exactly sure what he was looking for, but that was sometimes what police work was all about. It was especially true of reviewing surveillance tape. Luckily for Jesse, he didn’t need to run through endless footage, because he already knew the time John Vandercamp had arrived and the time he’d left.
“It’s cued up, Chief,” said the counterman. “I’ve got to get back out front.”
Although he was fifty feet removed from the indoor range and two sets of concrete walls separated the office from the range, Jesse could still hear the dull echoes of shots. When he listened carefully, he could distinguish between the eager amateurs who were there for their first times or there on a dare. They were the ones wasting their ammo with long bursts or the ones who kept pulling the triggers on their rented pistols. The experienced shooters took their time between shots. They fired two-round bursts. They weren’t interested in shredding their targets into confetti. Jesse stopped listening and turned back to the monitor.
The screen was divided in four for the four cameras that covered the front entrance, the counter, the shop, and the indoor range. Jesse hadn’t asked how to isolate footage from the individual cameras, because he wanted to see as much as he could see as fast as he could see it. He had no doubt that the counterman was back up front calling the gun range owner, who would be displeased. The relationship between law enforcement agencies, who often supported more restrictive gun laws, and the people who profited from the sale and use of firearms was an uneasy and frequently unfriendly one.
Jesse watched John Vandercamp shoot. It was obvious he knew how to handle the weapons he had rented. Though he didn’t know Vandercamp at all, it seemed to Jesse that something had been bothering him. The video wasn’t crystal clear, but it looked to Jesse as if Vandercamp’s arms were shaking and that he was working very hard to steady himself. At least three times during his session, Vandercamp stopped, bent over, and took deep breaths. Nerves? What, Jesse wondered, was he nervous about? And when he brought his paper targets forward, Vandercamp seemed disappointed in the results. Jesse could see the hits on the targets were all over the place, very erratic. Odd for someone so familiar with handguns and for such an experienced shooter. But there wasn’t anything Jesse could put his finger on, nothing he could use to help Alisha’s cause. And then . . .
Just as John Vandercamp was finishing up, another young man came onto the range. He took the lane directly to Vandercamp’s left. The two men nodded to each other, and there was something in their nods that indicated more than a casual greeting between strangers. They knew each other. Jesse was sure of it. And there was something else. The shooter to Vandercamp’s left looked familiar. It was Gary Cummings Jr., the owner’s son from the convenience store/gas station, who had sold the kerosene for the cross-burning to Vandercamp. Jesse pumped his fist without being conscious of it. This was a break, finally. He didn’t know what it would ultimately mean or how significant it would be, but it meant one thing for certain: The younger Cummings was somehow connected to Vandercamp. Weld would have had no way of knowing the significance when she reviewed the footage. But this wasn’t enough to bring to her or the DA. It proved nothing by itself. Since everybody involved seemed willing to believe in preposterous coincidences, they would count this as just one more. Jesse froze the video right where it was, with both Vandercamp and Cummings in the frame.
He wanted the counterman to see where he’d stopped it, because Jesse meant to start a fire of his own, one that didn’t require kerosene.
“You done?” the counterman asked when Jesse emerged from the office. “My boss is pretty pissed off at me for letting you back there.”
“You’ll live.”
“Easy for you to say. It’s not you who just got yelled at on the phone.”
Jesse ignored that. “Gary Cummings Junior come to shoot here much?”
A flash of panic crossed the counterman’s face before he recovered. “Who?”
Jesse laughed at him. “I hope you’re better with that,” Jesse said, pointing to the SIG Sauer holstered to the counterman’s hip, “than you are at lying.”
“Lying?”
“You know Cummings. It was all over your face when I mentioned his name.”
“Look, Chief, I don’t know who you’re talking about.”
Jesse leaned over the counter and put his face very close to the counterman’s.
“Listen to me. I worked LAPD Robbery Homicide for ten years. I’ve been lied to by stone-cold killers, so don’t try to play me. I’m going to ask you again: Does Gary Cummings Junior shoot here much?�
�
“Twice a week,” the counterman answered as the front door opened.
“That’s better. Now get me the records.”
“Don’t you do a damned thing if you want to keep your job.”
Jesse turned around to see a fit man in his mid-fifties, bald and sporting a gray goatee. He had a football player’s neck and was decked out in khaki camo. He aimed his fierce brown eyes at Jesse’s.
“You want anything, you come back here with a warrant. Otherwise, get the fuck out.”
Jesse asked, “Who are you?”
“Ian Kern. I own this place. And don’t go start making threats,” he said. “I’m no dumbass like him.” Kern pointed to the counterman. “All my paperwork is in order. I’m in compliance with every freakin’ law, rule, and regulation you bastards can throw my way.”
“‘You bastards,’” Jesse repeated. “I’ve been called worse.”
Kern smiled with all the dead-eyed warmth of a feeding shark.
Jesse came right up close to him and whispered in his ear, “You tell Cummings I know the truth and that when he looks over his shoulder, that’ll be me.”
Before Kern could answer, Jesse walked out of the range and headed straight to his Explorer.
66
Jesse didn’t waste any time making his threat a reality. He drove straight from the Magic Valley Handgun and Rifle Range to the Cummingses’ place of business just outside of Paradise. He’d lit the spark, and now it was time to fan the flames. And it was apparent from the second Jesse walked in that Kern or his counterman had called ahead and delivered the message. What made it even better was that Gary Jr.—who struck Jesse as more than a little arrogant and full of himself—was on duty and that his daddy was nowhere in sight. Junior’s face flushed and his body language said he was girding for a fight.
Jesse walked straight up to him, smiling the whole time.
“Who called you, Kern himself, or did he make the guy who works the counter do it?”
That confused Junior. He had expected Jesse to come at him, but angrily, not smiling and not sideways. But Jesse wanted to keep Junior off balance. So far, so good.
“Relax, kid,” Jesse said, knowing the “kid” would get under Junior’s skin. “Far as I can tell, you haven’t broken any laws . . . yet.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Junior asked, puffing out his chest.
“You speak English, right, kid? It wasn’t a hard sentence to understand.”
“Get out of here. Go bother someone who cares.”
Jesse laughed at him. “You always talk this way to the police? Your father had more respect.”
“My father hates cops as much as I do. He just thinks acting polite means something.”
“But you don’t, do you, kid?”
“Fuckin’ A. And stop calling me ‘kid.’ I’m not a kid.”
“Really? You tie your own shoelaces and cut your own meat?”
“Go fuck yourself. You guys are a waste of time and taxes. You let people alone to take care of justice, there’d be no crime in this country. We’d know who to watch and keep in their place. We wouldn’t let them run things the way they do.”
“Who would you watch, kid? Which people?”
Gary Jr. smiled a knowing smile at Jesse. “You know who. We’d make sure they stayed where they belonged. They like the jungle, so let them live there and leave us alone.”
Jesse switched gears. “So, how long did you know John Vandercamp?”
“Who?”
“You’re going to play it that way? Okay, kid. Let’s you and me make a bet.”
“What are you talking about?” Junior said, as off balance as Jesse had hoped.
“They told me you shoot twice a week at Magic Valley. My guess is you shoot on the same days all the time, but this past week, I bet not. It was no coincidence that you shot on the same day as John Vandercamp or that you took the stand right next to his in an otherwise empty range.” Jesse held his right hand out to Junior. “A bet?”
Jesse was half hoping the kid would swat his hand away so that he could get just physical enough with Junior to throw a real scare into him. But Junior left Jesse’s hand hanging and told him to get out.
“That’s impolite,” Jesse said, taking back his hand. “If I don’t get out, what are you going to do about it? You going to come around the counter and do something about it or are you going to call your daddy to come rescue you?”
Junior’s face turned bright red and the veins in his neck were really popping out. Jesse almost had him provoked enough to take a swing at him, but the door to the convenience store opened and a young woman stepped in and broke the tension. She handed Gary Cummings Jr. a twenty-dollar bill.
“Twenty dollars on . . .” she said, turning back to look outside. “My car’s on pump four.” She had a Boston accent thick enough to cut with a knife. “Where you keep ya tallboys at?”
“Beer’s over there,” Junior said, and she walked to the beer case.
“C’mon, call your daddy. I’m going to speak to him soon, anyway. Tonight works as well for me as tomorrow.”
But Junior had regained his footing. “Look, you want to stand there all night, stand there. I don’t care. You want to talk to my father . . .” Junior looked at the digital clock. “He’ll be here in seven hours.”
When the woman brought the six-pack of bottles to the counter, Junior was smart enough to ask for proof.
“Yaw kiddin’ me, right?” she said.
Junior pointed at Jesse. “Police.”
She shook her head, showed him her license, paid for the beers, and went to pump her gas.
Jesse just smiled at Junior. “Tell your daddy I’ll be in tomorrow to speak with him.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Don’t think on it too long, kid. Not your strong suit, thinking. And I’m curious to know how it was that you knew John Vandercamp but your daddy still alerted the police to his buying the kerosene here and told us he didn’t recognize him.”
Jesse didn’t wait for an answer. He turned around and left.
* * *
—
THE SOLDIER WAS SITTING IN HIS CAMO JEEP. He had parked it so that it was covered in shadows cast by the walls surrounding the trash compactor at the side of the store. It was where he had parked the night he had sent his half-brother to buy the kerosene. He had already taken note of Jesse Stone’s arrival and now checked his watch as the Paradise police chief drove away. He’d been inside for a while and had come out empty-handed. That could only be trouble.
67
By the time Jesse got back to his condo after making his ritual good-night drive through Paradise, Cole Slayton was fast asleep in the spare bedroom. Jesse hadn’t really had much opportunity to think through what Connor had said about Cole having that old photograph. He wasn’t sure why Cole would have it or how he came to possess it, but there was an easy way to find out. Still, it could wait until morning.
It was too early in the game to call Molly, Suit, Healy, or Dylan Taylor to discuss the connection between John Vandercamp and Gary Cummings Jr. They were all still probably on stakeout. Jesse was most hopeful for results from Healy. James Earl was definitely the weak link, and Healy was an old pro at extracting information. Plus, as Jesse knew from experience, Healy could hold his liquor and keep his wits about him. In spite of his hopes and the first bit of good news in terms of aiding Alisha’s cause, Jesse’s mind kept drifting back to thoughts of the photo of him in his LAPD uniform and the beautiful woman on his lap.
He looked around the room and saw that Cole had neatened up, put some of the contents of the boxes in logical places: towels in the linen closet, cleaning products under the sink, et cetera. But Jesse was looking for the box that contained his old photographs. He knew he had probably posed for many photos of himself in uniform with w
omen he had dated in L.A. It was funny how there was something about the uniform itself that attracted women—not all of them, though. Jesse wasn’t egotistical, but he knew he wasn’t half bad to look at, especially back then, his body still in baseball shape. He found the box he was looking for, the one with his old photo albums and the envelopes processed photos used to come in.
* * *
—
AS HE HAD DONE ON HIS PREVIOUS VISIT, the soldier scouted the area before approaching the Cummingses’ property. Good thing, too, because he spotted the big man sitting in his Dodge pickup on the side of the road, about a hundred yards from the front of the house. He always had mixed feelings about his father, the Colonel. Even before they had had their falling out over 9/11 and his enlisting, it was never easy to know how to feel about his father. Regardless, Lee Harvey couldn’t deny that the man had been right to be wary of the Cummingses. The Colonel had an uncanny ability to see trouble coming around the corner when most people couldn’t even see the corner. He supposed that was how his father had survived all this time with so many enemies at his heels.
He had texted the Colonel to meet him in the woods behind the house. He watched the Colonel come out the rear door and walk into the woods. The soldier watched and waited before approaching to make sure his father’s midnight stroll hadn’t attracted the attention of anyone in the house or other curious onlookers. No one followed. No lights went on in the house that hadn’t been on before. There were no signs that anyone had noticed, so he circled around to where the Colonel stood.
“You were right, sir,” the soldier said. “Stone has stumbled onto something. He showed up at the gas station and spent several minutes inside with the son. He also has a tail on you. One of his deputies is parked about a football field down the road from this development.”
“Stone is a problem,” said Leon Vandercamp. “He was at the shooting range earlier and knows that there was a connection between John W. and Cummings’s son. Cummings Senior came to me and reported that Stone pushed his boy pretty hard, but that the kid did not break.”
Robert B. Parker's Colorblind Page 20