Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
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Copyright © 2009 by Robert B. Parker
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Published simultaneously in Canada
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Parker, Robert B., date.
Night and day / Robert B. Parker.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-101-01600-8
1. Police chiefs—Massachusetts—Fiction. 2. Sex crimes—
Investigation—Fiction. 3. Voyeurism—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3566.A686N53 2009b 2008054245
813’.54—dc22
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
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For Joan:
Only you beneath the moon
and under the sun.
1
JESSE STONE sat in his office at the Paradise police station, looking at the sign painted on the pebbled-glass window of his office door. From the inside it read FEIHC , or it would have, if the letters hadn’t been backward. He tried pronouncing the word, decided he couldn’t, and stopped thinking about it. On his desk was a glamour head shot of his ex-wife. He looked at it for a time, and decided not to think about that, either.
Molly Crane came from the front desk and opened the door.
“Suit just called in,” she said. “There’s some kind of disturbance at the junior high school and he thinks you and I ought to come down.”
“Girls involved?” Jesse said.
“That’s why he wants me,” Molly said.
“I understand,” Jesse said. “But why does he want me?”
“You’re the chief of police,” Molly said. “Everybody wants you.”
Jesse glanced at Jenn’s picture again.
“Oh,” Jesse said. “Yeah.”
Jesse stood, and clipped his gun to his belt.
“Though you sure don’t dress like a chief,” Molly said.
Jesse was wearing a uniform shirt, blue jeans, Nikes, a dark blue Paradise police baseball hat, and a badge that said Chief . He tapped the badge.
“I do where it counts,” he said. “Who’s on the desk?”
“Steve,” Molly said.
“Okay,” Jesse said. “You drive. No siren.”
“Oh, damn,” Molly said. “I never get to use the siren.”
“Maybe when you make sergeant,” Jesse said.
There were two Paradise police cruisers parked outside of the junior high school.
“Who’s in the other cruiser,” Jesse said as they got out of the car.
“Eddie Cox,” Molly said. “He and Suit have seven to eleven this week.”
They walked into the school lobby, where a thick mill of parents was being held at bay by two Paradise cops. Most of the parents were mothers, with a scatter of fathers looking oddly out of place. When Jesse came in they all swarmed toward him, many of them speaking to him loudly.
“You’re the chief of police, are you gonna do something?”
“I want that woman arrested!”
“She’s a goddamned child molester!”
“What are you going to do about this?”
“Do you know what she did?”
“Did they tell you what happened here?”
Jesse ignored them.
