Robert B. Parker's Debt to Pay (23 page)

N
ow there were two: Hale Hunsicker and Jesse. Ari drove them over to Ace's and dropped them by the front door. The noise from the upstairs lounge was a low roar.

“Just a nightcap,” Hale said, as they got out of the Escalade. “Besides, you haven't been to Vineland Park until you've been to the Jungle Bar.”

“Where the big cats and kittens prowl.”

Hunsicker laughed, shaking his head as he did so.

Vineland Park Village was more impressive at night than it had been during the daytime. Every branch of every tree was strewn with strings of lightbulbs, so many that you lost sight of the individual bulbs and the trees themselves seemed to glow. The effect was enhanced by the hot breeze gently swaying the trees in the clear Texas night. Or, Jesse thought, maybe that was more a product of the beer, scotch, and descending fatigue. The dome at the top of the movie theater was lit up like a beacon. In Paradise the only light that bright was the one on the old Quilty Lighthouse up the coast, a few miles offshore on Indian Rock.

Jesse recognized the bar downstairs at Ace's from his earlier
meeting with Jenn. It was pretty crowded, but sedate in comparison to the scene upstairs. In some ways the Jungle Bar was the same as any other bar of its type in Boston, L.A., or New York. It was a moneyed meat/meet market. Jesse was impressed because of the absurdity of it. There seemed to be a dress code, though not one as simple as jacket, collared shirt, no sneakers. It appeared far more specific than that. The men's sport jackets were limited to three colors: black, gray, or camel. Cowboy boots were a must, though showy was frowned upon. White, pale blue, or gray shirts were all collared, top button open. Too much jewelry was a no-no. Wedding bands were optional, yet watches the size of Fiats were everywhere. There was an awful lot of carefully managed facial scruff as well as salt-and-pepper hair worn swept back, not slicked back. Bald heads and neatly trimmed beards were also acceptable.

But it was the women who fascinated Jesse. It was like the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders meet the Stepford Wives, only they weren't wives, at least not most of them, not anymore. Jesse hadn't seen this many blond heads in one place, not even in L.A., a place where sun-streaked blond hair was everywhere. And their dress code seemed more restrictive than the men's. Tight pants, tight dresses, or tight skirts, frequently white. The operative word being
tight
. Heels were high. Tops were silver or black, often shiny, always showing cleavage. There was more jewelry on the women and it ranged from diamond necklaces to silver-and-turquoise bracelets. The makeup was all perfect, if generally too heavy to suit Jesse. There was no smoking in here, but between the spicy aftershaves, grassy colognes, and exotic perfumes, there was almost as much alcohol in the air as was in the bottles at the bar.

“Amazing, isn't it?” Hale asked.

“Uh-huh.”

“It's like this from Wednesday to Sunday. What are you drinking?”

“Black Label, rocks.”

With Hale waving at the barman and Jesse facing the same way, neither noticed the woman walking up behind them.

“Hey, Hale Hunsicker. Don't you dare ignore me.” She had Lauren Bacall's voice with an exaggerated Texas twang.

Jesse turned his head around to see a stunning black-haired woman with fire in her copper eyes. She was folding her long, sinewy arms around Hale's shoulders and chest. Her legs were long, too, and she took the definition of tight and white to new extremes. Her shiny silver blouse was open down the front in such a way as to expose a large, tapering V of tan, lightly freckled skin stretching from her clavicle to a point beyond her cleavage. She kissed Hale's neck in a way that couldn't be mistaken for a friendly peck. He turned around, handing Jesse his drink. But as stunning as this woman was, and she was all of that, Hale seemed as pleased to have her holding him as he had been at the sight of Elroy Cates.

“Aren't you going to introduce me to your handsome friend, Hale, or are you goin' to get all jealous on me?” she asked, leaning into Hunsicker as if performing a vertical lap dance.

“Jesse Stone,” Hale said, turning to face the bar to get his own drink and to put some space between him and the woman. “Meet Cassie Cates.”

“Cates as in Elroy Cates?” Jesse asked, shaking her hand. “A pleasure.”

“Pleasure's all mine, honey. I can assure you.” She squeezed Jesse's hand a little too tightly. “So you've met that human fireplug masqueradin' as my ex-husband?”

Jesse nodded.

“Wait just one second,” Cassie said, screwing up her face. “Jesse
Stone. So it's your ex that's set to marry this fool? Shoulda been me, ya know, taking the vows, but this big coward over—”

Hale cut her off. “C'mon, Cassie. We've been over this territory till there's ruts in the ground. There's no need to involve Jesse and Jenn in our drama.”

“Drama! Hale Hunsicker, you weren't calling it drama when you couldn't get enough of me, now, were ya, honey?” She showed Jesse the back of her left hand, wriggling her naked ring finger. “When I was still married.”

Jesse saw that look in Hale's eyes again. This time he understood its implication and turned to see Elroy Cates, head down, charging at Hale. Jesse stepped in front of Cassie and nudged her out of the way. Hale slammed his drink-holding hand down on the top of Elroy Cates's hat, splashing bourbon all over Elroy's hat and clothes. Cates caromed into the base of the bar and went down to the floor. Jesse stepped between Cates and Hunsicker, extending his hand to help Cates up. It might've ended there or at least not escalated if Cates's friend hadn't decided to appear out of the crowd.

He was bigger than Hunsicker and a few years his junior. He rammed his shoulder into Hale's midsection. He caught Hale in just the wrong spot and the air went out of him with an audible
ooph.
Hale doubled over and the big man landed a short, chopping right to Hunsicker's jaw. Hale went down. Jesse threw the point of his elbow into the big man's ribs to get his attention, then kicked the back of his right knee and sent him sprawling. By this time, Elroy Cates had scrambled to his feet and caught Jesse in the belly with a straight right. It was quite a punch for a toad. Reflexively, Jesse's right arm shot out and the back of his hand caught Cates in the mouth. Jesse felt Cates's lips split open and felt the scrape of his teeth rip the skin of his hand.

Now Hunsicker was up and grabbing his attacker by the back of his hair. He slammed Cates's friend face-first into the bar rail. Everything paused for a second after the sickening dull cracking sound the big man's nose made against the rail. There was blood everywhere as Hunsicker let go of the big man's hair. He slumped to the floor, choking on his blood and mucus. That's when Jesse became conscious of the sirens. He was about to pull out his shield when Hunsicker turned his attention to Cates. Hale had Elroy by the throat, hoisting him off the ground. That was trouble, the kind that led to crushed windpipes and manslaughter charges.

Jesse had to do something and fast. No one in the crowd seemed willing to join the fray, and asking Hale to kindly put Cates down or demanding it didn't seem like viable options. He tried, anyway, to no avail. He grabbed Hale's arms. Same lack of results. Jesse threw a punch at Hale's solar plexus, but because of the angle, he missed and it glanced harmlessly off his ribs. Hunsicker swung Cates around so that Cates was now between him and Jesse. Jesse slid the nine-millimeter out of its holster and racked the slide. That sound alone was usually enough to stop people from doing what they were doing. It doesn't do any good if no one can hear it. So Jesse stepped around Cates and stuck the barrel of the gun to the side of Hale's neck.

“Let him go, Hale. Now!”

As Cates hit the floor, half the Vineland Park PD came charging up the stairs and into the Jungle Bar.

H
e was exhausted from his day of travel and the drive down from Oklahoma City. It had taken longer than he anticipated. There they were again, he thought, those unanticipated circumstances. This time they took the form of a semi and a church bus, not some dumbass deputy cop swimming at the wrong end of the pool. The semi had rammed the church bus on I-35 just north of Ardmore, causing a ten-mile backup and a ninety-minute delay.

Things at the storage unit had gone more smoothly. He had considered bunking at the unit for the night. He always kept a sleeping bag and MREs, bottled water, and a first-aid kit in his storage rental units, wherever he was operating. He also kept ten thousand dollars, a SIG nine-millimeter, a Taser, an assault knife, a roll of duct tape, and a change of clothes in a bag just in case. But he knew that his movements would be on closed-circuit TV—every self-storage facility he ever used was monitored—and he didn't want to draw unwanted attention by entering a unit at night and failing to leave. Instead he ate an MRE, which tasted worse than the packaging it came in, washed it down with a bottle of water, loaded up his car with what he had come for, and left.

He drove a few miles below the speed limit in Vineland Park because he'd scouted the area and discovered the VPPD was renowned for speed traps. Not even the residents of Vineland Park speeded, not ever. Their money and clout might get them good tickets at Cowboy games, but not out of speeding tickets. He was particularly careful because this was one of the few places in the country where his taste in automobiles worked against him. Subcompacts were the exception in Vineland Park and were as conspicuous as a tarantula in a basket of downy yellow chicks.

He didn't care if the cops ran his plates. A car rented to Milton James of Pewaukee, Wisconsin, wouldn't raise any red flags. Even if he was pulled over, he looked like a Milton James. That's why he had chosen the identity. Just another plain face from a faceless place in a cold northern state. The trouble wouldn't be getting pulled over. Nor would it come from a cop typing his name into his computer. No, trouble would come only if the cops asked him to pop his trunk.

He didn't think he'd have any trouble explaining the old Lee-Enfield rifle in the trunk. This was Texas, after all. Texans respected gun rights, they hunted here, and a classic rifle with a scope wouldn't necessarily raise any eyebrows. The three bombs, on the other hand, would be an issue. There would be no explaining those away. If a cop took one step toward the trunk or asked to inspect the car, he would have to be put down. But there was no reason for him to be pulled over and no reason for him to borrow trouble at this point.

And just as he felt himself relax, pulling up to a stop sign, he spotted a VPPD cruiser hidden behind a row of hedges to his right. He made sure his stop was a full one. He counted to three before moving on. He didn't turn to look at the cop as he passed him. He kept his eyes straight ahead and his speed at a steady twenty. A block away from the cop, he exhaled. He'd already surveyed the vantage
point from which he would spring his surprise, and would be out of Vineland Park soon enough. He heard his motel bed calling him.

He was another two blocks ahead when he heard something else: a siren. He shrugged his rounded little shoulders.
So what?
If you listened carefully, you could hear sirens of one sort or another every few minutes. And since the uniformed services in Vineland Park were all cross-trained, a siren around these parts was just as likely to mean a brush fire was burning or an old millionaire had fallen down and broken his hip as a crime being committed. But then he saw the flashing lights in his rearview mirror. He immediately pulled over, watching the cruiser come flying his way.

He reached under the seat, feeling for the butt of the SIG he had taped there at the self-storage warehouse. It hadn't moved and would be easy enough for him to reach if and when the time came. He heard another siren and another. When he looked back up out the front windshield, there was another cruiser headed toward him and a third coming up the street to his left. This wasn't good. One cop, two, he could handle, but it was unlikely he could put down all three before fire was returned. And the cops in Vineland Park weren't slouches, as far as he could tell. Certainly not by reputation. These weren't the Keystone Kops of Paradise, Massachusetts. His shoulder ached, remembering the bullet Luther Simpson had fired into it.

He took deep breaths, trying to clear his mind so that when he made his move he could do so without hesitation.
One bullet each. Tap. Tap. Tap. Wound them in the gut. Then finish them one at a time. Quickly. Head shot. Head shot. Head shot.
He cleared his mind of any idea of failure or of being wounded. As the cruiser rushed up behind him, he forced himself to take another deeper breath.
Wait. Wait. Wait. React, don't act.
But the Impala screamed by him, its tires screeching as it swung a hard right. The cruiser that had been racing
toward him turned hard left, following the first cruiser. The third cop followed the first two and their sirens faded quickly into the night, not nearly as loud as they had been when they were coming at him.

He pulled away from the curb and continued on his way to his motel. He felt his shirt glued to his back by sweat. About five minutes later, he passed Vineland Park Village and saw where all those cops had been headed. He didn't waste time wondering what the trouble was all about. He had one more errand to run in West Dallas, and before surrendering to the song his motel bed was singing to him.

T
hey were at the Vineland Park station. Funny, no matter how pretty the exterior, no matter how comfortable the station décor, jails were jails, though Jesse had to admit that these holding cells were better than some of the accommodations he'd been forced to put up with as a minor-leaguer. Hale and Jesse were in one of the fenced-in cages; Elroy and his buddy were in the other. Cates was handcuffed to a steel bar in his cell as one of the cops attended to his pal's newly realigned nose. A cop at the scene had already attended to Jesse's hand and Cates's mouth.

“So,” Jesse said, leaning over to Hale, “I take it that Cassie is who Jenn saved you from.”

“You know it.”

“I can see the attraction. She is something.”

“She's all of that. But she's like a whirlwind that won't never die out,” Hale said, lapsing into his good-ole-boy persona, a wistful look in his eyes. “The thing about it is that we would have burned each other out in a few years. It's hard to keep a woman like Cassie's attention. She's the type of gal just as soon fight you as fuck you. You know what I mean?”

Jesse nodded. He had known a few women like Cassie. His relationship with Jenn had had some of the same components, but he was thinking more of Maxie Connolly. An older woman he'd met very briefly the year before. Maxie was in her sixties, but she had once been the talk of Paradise, a true force of nature.

“You two do realize I can hear y'all,” Cates said. “That's my wife you're discussin'.”

“Not to put too fine a point on it, but she's your ex-wife, Elroy. That aside, is there anything I've said about Cassie that ain't the truth?” Hale asked.

“Can't argue with the veracity of a single damned word of it, Hunsicker. Cassie is a woman worth fightin' for.”

“Well, Elroy, it's a little late to be closing that barn door.”

“I suppose, but there's no gettin' around the fact that you were sleepin' with another man's woman, Hale Hunsicker. That's nothin' to be proud of or to be braggin' on.”

“No arguing that,” Hale said, “but she was worth it.”

“And then you just dumped her. Broke her heart, you know? She don't show it, but she ain't healed yet. Then you got to go to the bar and rub your getting married in her face. I hate your guts, Hunsicker, but I would've expected more of you than to do that.”

Hunsicker had no answer for that. Instead, he rubbed his jaw where Cates's friend had landed the punch. It wasn't broken, but it was red and swollen. There'd be a hell of a bruise there by morning. Jenn wasn't going to be pleased. It seemed both of them realized that at once.

“Jenn's going to have my balls on a platter for this,” he said to Jesse. “She wanted everything to be perfect for the wedding and now I'm going to look like I got an eggplant growing out of my jaw.”

“They'll get you ice and some anti-inflammatories. With a little makeup, you'll be fine for the wedding.”

“Jenn may look past the bump on my jaw, but not the reason I got it. Cassie Cates is a sore subject with Jenn.”

Jesse was about to ask a question when Jed Pruitt walked down the hallway toward the cells. He didn't look pleased. Angry. Simmering, but not boiling over. He had two of his cops behind him.

“Okay, boys, you had to have your fun, I suppose, but I'm not laughing,” Pruitt said, his demeanor making it clear he wasn't yet finished. “I've assured Ace that reparations will be made and that there will be some charity event or other that somehow compensates this department for the time and manpower it wasted breaking up an overgrown, drunken bunch of babies playing at being men.”

“Sure thing, Jed,” Hale said. “Sorry about the trouble.”

Cates seconded the motion. “Absolutely, Chief Pruitt. ‘Sorry' don't quite say it.”

“Officer Ambler, you done tending to King Kong over there?” Pruitt asked the cop working on the big man's broken nose.

“I've done all I can do with him, Chief.” Then he turned to Elroy Cates. “Mr. Cates, you should take your friend over to Vineland Memorial and have the nose reset.”

“All right, then, let 'em go,” Pruitt said, motioning to the cops behind him.

The cops stepped around Pruitt. One opened Cates's cell door and stood aside.

“Hale, let's let Mr. Cates and his pal here exit the station first.” Pruitt's tone made it evident that it wasn't a friendly request.

The cop who was working on the big man's nose uncuffed Cates and busied himself with cleaning up and packing away his equipment.
Cates and company left the cell, the cop who had opened their cell door in tow. When the hall door slammed shut, Pruitt nodded to his cop to open the other cell door. Hale left, still rubbing his jaw, but when Jesse tried to follow, Pruitt stopped him.

“Sorry, Jesse, I truly am, but you're staying. This may be Texas, but it's Vineland Park's little parcel of it. And here, no citizen pulls a weapon in a public place and gets a walk. We'll put you in a decent cell for the night as soon as Hale leaves. I'm sure the judge will see it your way and you'll be out by noon tomorrow.”

Jesse nodded, knowing that this was a possibility when he pulled his nine. He turned and sat back down.

“But—”

“No buts, Hale. From what everyone tells me, Jesse's sitting in there because you didn't give him much of a choice. Anything happens to Jenn because he's in there, that's on you, son. Now get.”