“I’m here because I want to congratulate you.”
“For what?”
“For being a father.”
Jesse smiled in spite of his best efforts not to. “Thank you.”
“You really didn’t know Cole was your son?”
“Not a clue.”
“How’s it going?”
“We’ve got a lot of catching up to do. Right now I think we’re trying not to step on each other’s toes.”
Then Mayor Walker stood up, came around the desk, and kissed Jesse on the cheek. “You’ll be a good dad, Jesse Stone, but if you think this job is hard, just wait.”
As the mayor was leaving, Jesse’s desk phone rang. It was Lundquist.
“What’s up, Brian?”
“Drake Daniels is dead.”
“Dead?”
“Hanged himself in his cell. The threats got to him. He knew that even if they kept him in isolation, he was a dead man. With all the white supremacist gangs inside, he knew he was screwed. He figured he’d do it himself and not eat himself alive waiting to get hacked up.”
“A guy who would know once told me that if you could assassinate a president, there was no such thing as being a hundred percent secure.”
“Here’s the best part. He left a note and confessed to murdering Garrison.”
Jesse changed subjects. “Why do you think Lee Harvey let me get to him so easily? You know if he wanted to, he could have killed me three times over before I fired that shotgun once.”
“Guilt. He did Cain one better. He had a hand in murdering his two brothers.”
“He was willing to kill a building full of people and smiled about it as he was dying.”
“When you figure humans out, let me know. How are you and your kid doing?”
“Why does everybody ask me that?”
“I think we take pleasure in watching you navigate in unknown waters.”
* * *
—
JESSE HAD GONE TO SEVERAL meetings even before he returned to work, and he was no longer keeping his AA visits a secret. He knew it would be unmanageable for him to go to meetings only down in Boston. Bill, the former fence, was officially his sponsor and they had enjoyed their post-meeting coffees since Jesse wasn’t always running off to handle emergencies.
“Has Anya been back?” Jesse had asked Bill at that first meeting after he got out of the hospital.
“Haven’t seen her and I’ve been here a lot.”
“Too bad.”
“That’s the way it is, Jesse. It’s much easier to fall back down a hole than to climb up.”
Three weeks had passed since then, but Jesse was still struggling to make sense of his new life. It wasn’t like him to dwell on things. Still, he couldn’t stop thinking about how easily Lee Harvey might’ve killed him and how he might’ve died without ever knowing he was a father.
When sharing time came, Jesse found himself walking to the front of the room.
“Hi,” he said. “My name is Jesse and I’m an alcoholic.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’d like to thank the estate of Robert B. Parker, Christine Pepe, and Esther Newberg for making my continuation of the series possible.
Special thanks to Tom Schreck for walking me through the potential minefield of AA and sobriety.
As always, I owe the greatest debt to my family. Without the willingness of Rosanne, Kaitlin, and Dylan to make the sacrifices that have allowed me to pursue my passion, none of this would have been possible, nor would it have any meaning. Thank you, guys. I love you more than I could express.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Robert B. Parker was the author of seventy books, including the legendary Spenser detective series, the novels featuring Chief Jesse Stone, and the acclaimed Virgil Cole/Everett Hitch westerns, as well as the Sunny Randall novels. Winner of the Mystery Writers of America Grand Master Award and long considered the undisputed dean of American crime fiction, he died in January 2010.
Reed Farrel Coleman, author of the New York Times—bestselling Robert B. Parker's The Hangman's Sonnet, has been called a "hard-boiled poet" by NPR's Maureen Corrigan and the "noir poet laureate" in The Huffington Post. He has published twenty-seven previous novels, including nine books in the critically acclaimed Moe Prager series, and, most recently, What You Break, featuring Gus Murphy. A four-time winner of the Shamus Award, he has also won the Anthony, Macavity, Barry, and Audie awards. Coleman lives with his family on Long Island.
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Robert B. Parker's Colorblind Page 29