before,” Mrs. Feeney
said.
“And now he is,” Jesse said.
“But he won’t have to go to
jail?”
“Mrs. Feeney,” Jesse said. “He
participated in the gang rape of
a sixteen-year-old girl. He’ll have to answer for that.”
“Oh, my God,” she said and cried harder.
34
Jesse’s condo was only a block away from the Gray Gull, and they
walked to it after dinner. There was a hard wind off the harbor and Abby put her arm through Jesse’s and pressed against him.
Inside
the condo Jesse poured them each a Poire Williams and they stood at the glass slider and looked out past his deck at the dark harbor.
There was a storm coming up from the southwest and the water was restless.
Abby turned so that she could look up into Jesse’s face. She had
drunk two Rob Roys before dinner, and they had shared a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.
“You look tired, Jesse.”
“Busy time at the office,” Jesse said.
“I know,” Abby said. “How many
television interviews have you
done?”
“Many.”
“And you always say it’s an ongoing
investigation and you can’t
discuss it.”
“I know.”
“I suppose they have to keep asking.”
“It’s sort of news
manufacturing,” Jesse said. “They do a stand-up in front of the police station and interview me, and ask me things like, have you caught the killer. And I say no. And they say, this is Tony Baloney live in Paradise, now back to you, Harry.”
Abby smiled.
“It’s not quite that bad,” she
said.
“I suppose not,” Jesse said.
“Sometimes they just ask if there
are any developments.”
“Are there?”
“Sure. We know that there were two
twenty-two-caliber guns
involved.”
“Two?”
“Un-huh. And we think he, she, or they drives a Saab sedan. And
we speculate that he, she, or they lives in Paradise.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all.”
“Any connection among the victims?”
“Not that we can find.”
“You think the killings are random?”
“Don’t know. For all we know, he, she, or they had a reason to
