Robert B. Parker’s the Hangman’s Sonnet

When Jesse got back to the table, dinner was waiting for him. Tamara, too. A brick-sized hunk of lemon-scented salmon over arugula and watercress was in front of the ME and a skirt steak over mashed sweet potatoes was at Jesse’s place. The ball of rosemary butter atop his steak had nearly melted away. Tamara took one look at Jesse and knew. She also knew it wasn’t another homicide or her cell would have gone off as well.

“Don’t worry,” she said, waving the waitress over. “Can we have these wrapped separately to go?”

“I’m sorry, Doc. It’s business.”

“I figured. You mind telling me what’s up.”

He leaned over and whispered in her ear the information he’d received about the two likely suspects. She made a face halfway between a smile and a frown. When the waitress returned, Tamara said, “I’ll take care of the bill. Take yours and go on and git.”

Jesse Stone was old-school, and the thought of Tamara paying bugged him, though he knew better than to show it. Instead he focused on something else Tamara had said.

“‘Git’! Your Texas is showing.”

She folded down her middle and ring fingers on her left hand, holding them down with her thumb, and raised her index finger and pinkie. “Hook ’em horns. I bleed burnt orange.”

33

Jesse’s first stop was the station. Alisha had already done as he had asked, putting together two packets on the suspects and two photo arrays. What Alisha didn’t do was ask Jesse where he’d gotten his information from. She was wise that way, and every time she displayed those good cop instincts, he felt better about hiring her instead of some old-pro city cop. Gabe Weathers was good, but he’d been on the job in Boston for only five years before hiring on in Paradise. The problem with who the selectmen and the mayor had wanted him to hire was that retired big-city cops came with all sorts of baggage. They always knew better and their attitudes were hardwired. You had to spend as much time untraining them as training them, and even then you couldn’t beat the big city out of them. And if the last few years had taught him anything, it was that policing a small town came with different challenges. To Jesse, the savings on pension and benefits wasn’t worth it.

“What should I do now, Jesse?”

“Call the mayor and tell her I’ve got two potential suspects, but that I have to talk to Rudy Walsh first.”

“The MassEx deliveryman? To get a positive ID?”

“Exactly. Tell Her Honor that if Walsh IDs them, I’ll be by first thing in the morning. By the way, Alisha, you’ve got an admirer over on Stiles.”

She turned away from Jesse in embarrassment.

“Dylan seems like a good kid,” Jesse said. “Maybe you should give him a chance.”

She smiled at him. “Maybe I already have.”

Jesse plucked one of the two packets on the suspects and a photo array from in front of Alisha and headed out the door.

Before he had gotten a block, the radio went off and the ringing of a phone came through the speakers of his Explorer. It was Lundquist.

“Jesse Stone.”

“You want to tell me where you came up with these two guys?” Lundquist asked, sounding a little bit annoyed. “We haven’t gotten the DNA results back and we didn’t find a single fingerprint. You’d also be amazed at how many cons have the nicknames King and Hump. Still somehow you found out it was these mutts.”

“Does it matter how? I’m on my way over to the hospital to see if Walsh can pick them out of photo arrays.”

“Healy always said you had connections. Never bothered him, but I always wondered what price you had to pay or what you had to trade for their information.”

“Healy never let it bother him too much, Brian. You’ve been at this long enough to know that good information doesn’t come from the sunny side of the street.”

Lundquist let that go. “So what’s the plan if he IDs them?”

“Then I have to go to Mayor Walker with it. She’ll want to do a press conference, but if Walsh IDs them, I’ll give you a heads-up. We can’t let these guys get away because of my mayor’s political aspirations.”

“I’ll be here.”

But then he wasn’t. The familiar two-tone hang-up chime sounded in the Explorer and the music came back on. It was Terry Jester singing “King to Pawn,” one of Jesse’s favorites. He even caught himself singing along.

Deborah Holt, the nurse in charge of Rudy Walsh’s floor, was less than pleased to see Jesse Stone. They’d crossed paths before, usually when Jesse wanted to break hospital rules.

“I’m sorry, Chief Stone,” she said, putting her palm up to cut him off, “but Mr. Walsh is probably asleep and his concussion symptoms haven’t abated as quickly as Dr. Marx had hoped.”

Jesse took a deep breath. Normally he wouldn’t have pushed, but this wasn’t normally.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve got two potential murder suspects out there, the two men who put Mr. Walsh in here to begin with. I need him to make a positive ID so we can get after them.”