“I know.”
Again the line was silent.
Then Jesse said, “Maybe not completely.”
After a time, Molly said, “Will you be there if I need you?”
“Yep.”
“I’ll talk with Lutz,” Molly said. “And call you back.”
“Talk about phoning it in,” Jesse said.
He hung up and stood and walked past his picture of Ozzie to the French doors and opened them and went out and stood on the balcony and looked at the harbor and thought. 4 9
14
This is absolutely insane,” Sunny Randall said.
“I know,” Jesse said.
“She and I can’t be together,” Jenn said.
“Of course not,” Jesse said.
He was sitting on a stool at the bar in his living room in front of his picture of Ozzie Smith. Jenn sat in a chair to his left, near the bedroom corridor. Sunny sat in a chair to his right.
“Jesse, there’s a guy here from the governor’s office,” Molly said. “Looking for you.”
H I G H P R O F I L E
“Tell him I’m not available now.”
“He won’t like that,” Molly said.
“I can’t worry, right now,” Jesse said, “about what people like.”
“I’ll try to handle it,” Molly said.
“Thanks, Moll.”
“But I’m not the chief of police,” Molly said.
“Do what you can,” Jesse said. “I’ll be there when I can be there.”
He hung up and looked at the two women. Neither of them said anything. It was late morning, and the sun coming through the French doors made a long, bright parallelogram on the living-room floor. Jesse picked up an empty highball glass from the bar. It was made of thick glass and had a nice heft to it.
“I need a drink,” Jesse said.
Neither woman spoke.
“Probably needed too many drinks in my life,” Jesse said. The women stayed quiet. Jesse smiled without happiness. He turned the empty glass slowly in both hands.
“Booze aside,” he said, “there are, as far as I can tell, three things in life that matter to me. Jenn, Sunny, and being a cop. Things have not gone well with us, Jenn. But because I can’t quite let you go, things aren’t going as well as they should with you, Sunny.”
