“Probably,” Kelly Cruz said.
Jesse nodded.
“No jail time,” Kelly Cruz said.
Jesse shrugged.
“I arrest, they prosecute,” he said.
Kelly Cruz looked at Jesse’s Virgin Mary.
“Drinking problem?” she said.
“Yes.”
“How long you been sober?”
“I haven’t had a drink going onto a year,” Jesse said.
“Miss it?”
“Yes.”
“My husband was a drunk,” Kelly Cruz said.
2 8 8
S E A C H A N G E
“You divorced?”
Kelly Cruz nodded.
“Know where he is now?”
“No,” Kelly Cruz said.
“How are the kids?”
“Good,” she said. “Two boys. We live with my parents.
My father’s a good father for all of us.”
Jesse finished his Virgin Mary and gestured for another one.
“No wonder you got a problem,” Kelly Cruz said. “You’ll drink a lot of anything.”
“Vitamin C,” Jesse said as the bartender set the new drink in front of him.
“Why do you suppose Willis Plum sent the videotape of his daughter to Darnell?”
Jesse shook his head.
“He’s way past anything I understand,” Jesse said.
“Maybe he thought it would embarrass her,” Kelly Cruz said.
Jesse nodded.
“Maybe he was sending it to her, you know, dismissing it by returning it,” Kelly Cruz said.
“Blondie Martin says it was addressed to Darnell.”
“Maybe he did it because he’s a whack job,” Kelly Cruz said.
“Not such a whack job that he flew up there and left a paper trail with the airlines,” Jesse said.
Kelly Cruz drank some bourbon.
2 8 9
R O B E R T B . P A R K E R
“You going home tomorrow?” Kelly Cruz said.
“Yeah. Paperwork’s done. I’m supposed to take him back with me.”
“Got anyone waiting?” Kelly Cruz said.
“My ex-wife,” Jesse said.
“You have an ex-wife waiting for you?”
“We’re trying to rework things,” Jesse said.
“How’s that going?”
“So far,” Jesse said, “so good.”
“Plum girls are home, staying with their mother,” Kelly Cruz said.
“Good,” Jesse said.
“Think anything good will happen to them?” Kelly Cruz said.
“Probably not,” Jesse said.
“Father’s gone,” Kelly Cruz said. “They’re with their mother.”
“Who is not a real lot better than their father,” Jesse said.
“No,” Kelly Cruz said.
