“You think I don’t know? Hell, I know all about my son.”
“And loved him anyway,” Ben said bitterly.
“I told you, I want to be alone.”
Without another word, Jacoby strode back into the house. In the corner of the veranda, the cigar flared and little points of fire lit the old man’s eyes as he glared at Jo.
“He’s got himself a little blond shiksa this time,” he said. “A shiksa with spine.”
Jo turned and followed Jacoby.
She caught up with him in another room where he’d stopped under a chandelier to speak with a black- haired beauty who had two young boys at her side. As Jo neared them, the woman looked her way.
“Jo,” Jacoby said, “this is Gabriella. Eddie’s widow.”
“How do you do?” Gabriella spoke softly and, like Tony Salguero, with a Spanish accent. She offered a tanned hand with nails red as rose petals. A diamond tennis bracelet sparkled on her wrist.
“I’m sorry about your husband,” Jo said.
“Ben told me you worked with Eddie in Minnesota.”
“Not significantly.”
“Mommy,” one of the boys said. He was perhaps five years old, with his mother’s black hair and fine face, his father’s insolent eyes. “I’m tired. I wanna go.”
“Find your cousin Mark, play with him.”
“Mark’s a dork,” the other boy said. Similar features, older by maybe a year, bored out of his skull.
Gabriella smiled, leaned down, and kissed her son’s black hair. “ Pobrecito,” she said. “Find your uncle George, then. He will entertain you.”
The two boys wandered off, defeated.
Gabriella turned back to Jo. “I’m sorry. Eddie kept business to himself, so I don’t know anything about what he was doing in Minnesota. I hope his death…” She hesitated. “I hope his death does not inconvenience you.”
Inconvenience? Jo thought.
“Excuse me, please.” Gabriella went in the direction her sons had gone.
“She’s from Argentina,” Ben explained. “Her family have been clients for years, but the economy there is shot to hell. My father and her father made the arrangements for the marriage. Eddie sure got the better end of that deal. Poor Gabriella, she had no idea what she was getting herself into.”
“Jo!”
She turned as a woman swept toward her across the room. There was a bit of gray in her hair, a few lines at the edges of her mouth and eyes. Unlike so many of the other women Jo had seen that evening, she didn’t seem especially concerned about fighting time and age. She was smallish, a little round, and had a wry smile on her face. Although two decades had passed, Jo had no trouble recognizing Ben’s sister, Rae.
“This is wonderful.” Rae threw her arms around Jo. “I can’t believe I’m seeing you again after all these years. How are you?”
“Good. And you?”
“Marvelous. Couldn’t be better.” She looked Jo over and shook her head as if in disbelief. “Twenty years and you’re still gorgeous. Come on, let’s go somewhere and sit down. I want to hear all about you.”
“What about me?” Ben said.
“Go have a drink, Benny. I’ll fetch you when I’m done with her.”
Before they could move, from outside came the crunch of metal and the shatter of glass. People crowded the front windows, and someone called, “Ben, you better get out there.”
Jacoby moved quickly. Jo and Rae followed.
Outside, they found Phillip Jacoby standing beside a Jaguar that had plowed into one of the brick pillars that flanked the entrance to the drive. He was staggering a little but seemed unhurt. A woman, also unharmed, stood near him, her arms crossed as if she were cold.
Phillip pointed at the pillar. “That damn thing’s been out to get me for years.”
“You’ve been drinking,” his father said.
“I’m still drinking.” He reached into the Jag and hauled out a bottle of Cuervo Gold. He put his arm around the waist of the woman, several years his senior, with brassy gold hair and dressed in a tight midnight-blue dress that was too skimpy for the cool evening, though it did advertise very nicely her wares.
“This your place?” she said to Ben with a slur.
Jacoby extended his hand. “Give me your keys, Phillip.”
“Like hell.”
“Give me your car keys. You’re in no condition to drive.”
“My fucking car,” Phillip said.
“My fucking insurance,” Jacoby shot back.
“Come on, Phil baby,” the woman in the blue dress said. “This is a drag.”
“Don’t worry, baby, we’re getting out of here.”
He turned toward the Jag. Ben caught his arm, spun him, and used his son’s drunken disequilibrium to throw him to the ground, where he pinned him quickly with his knee against his chest. The young man struggled briefly, then gave in.
“I’ll take those keys.” Jacoby reached into the pocket of his son’s pants and extracted a plastic Baggie and a key ring. He studied the Baggie.
“Ecstasy? A parting gift from Uncle Eddie?”
Phillip glared up at him, his eyes bloodshot, his nostrils wet with mucus. “Fuck you.”
Ben stood up, taking his weight off his son. “Get up. I’m driving you back to campus. We’ll drop your friend wherever she wants.”
Phillip picked himself up. He kicked at the bottle of tequila, which had fallen from his hand when his father tackled him. “I’ll walk.” He spun away and staggered from the drive into the street.
His woman companion watched him go, then said in a quiet voice, “I don’t want to walk.”
“I’ll call you a cab,” Ben told her.
She seemed to realize how alone and out of place she was. She folded her arms across her thin body.
“Why don’t you come inside and wait,” Rae said. She turned to Jo. “I’d love to talk, but this probably isn’t the best time. Maybe lunch tomorrow?”
“I’m at the zoo with the kids.”
“What if I met you there?”
“All right.”
“What time?”
“Eleven. At the sea lion pool.”
“I’ll be there.”
Rae turned her attention to the woman, who’d made no move yet to go inside. “Come with me,” she said gently. “It’ll be all right.”
Most of those who’d come out had, by now, returned to the house. The others followed Rae inside.
Jo walked to Ben, who was inspecting the damage to the Jaguar.
“I’ll give him a few minutes to cool down and sober up, then I’ll go after him.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t imagine this was the way the evening would end. I guess I’ve never been very good at endings, huh?”
“Good night, Ben.”
She kissed his cheek softly and left him standing beside the ruined car, looking toward the dark that had swallowed his son.
33
They moved on Stone’s cabin after nightfall, before the moon rose. Cork, Larson, Rutledge, Willner, and a dozen deputies. They went silently, on foot, in armor, and carrying assault rifles, semiautomatic AR-15s. In the trees that crowded the dirt road, the black was almost impenetrable, but as they filed along the lake with the open
