Night Passage (A Jesse Stone Novel)

faggot.”
    “And if I did, what’s that to you. Don’t you get it, you jerk. We’re divorced, D-I-V-O-R-C-E-D .”
    She unlocked the side door as she talked and pushed past him into the house. He followed her.
    “Get out of my house,” she said.
    “Your house? Your fucking house? You paid for it?”
    Jo Jo kicked the side door shut with his heel.
    “I’m calling the cops,” Carole said.
    “No,” Jo Jo said. “No. I came here to talk. Lemme talk with you.”
    “Nice start to a talk,” Carole said. “Smacking my date against the car.”
    “I’m sorry,” Jo Jo said. “I just can’t stand seeing you with somebody, you unnerstand? I can’t. You and me are forever, Carole. I can’t stand it, you’re with somebody else.”
    “Well, you better get used to it, Jo Jo, because that is how it is.”
    Jo Jo felt frantic. She was killing him. How could she kill him like this.
    “I was hoping maybe, we could, you know, have sex, just one time, for old times’ sake, you know?”
    “Are you crazy? You come up here, two years we been divorced, you beat up my date and push in here and tell me you want to have sex? Get the hell out of here, Jo Jo. I’m calling the cops.”
    “Carole, please, I need it. I’m going crazy without it. Please.”
    She turned toward the phone and Jo Jo pushed her away. She tried to step around him and he grabbed her arm. She hit him with her free arm, a wild swing punch with her fist closed. He shoved her backward, away from the phone and onto the couch.
    “Please,” he said. “Please.”
    She was trying to hit him, but he held her wrists as he forced her down. She kicked at him, but it seemed to have no effect.
    “Please,” he said. “Please.”
    Her skirt was up over her thighs. He tore at her hose. His mouth pressed against hers. She tried to twist away. She punched, she kicked, she tried to bite him. But he was so oppressively strong, so irresistibly huge, that her struggles had no impact. His face was pressed against hers. She could smell liquor on his breath, or maybe it was liquor on hers. He had gotten most of her clothing out of the way. His weight pressed her helplessly back and his hands were on her and she could barely move and barely breathe and she thought oh, God, what’s one more time, and gave up.

9
     
    The rain stayed with Jesse into western Pennsylvania. It had eased when he stopped on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, west of Pittsburgh. He got a cheeseburger in the restaurant, and a cup of coffee. He ate at the counter looking at the scattering of travelers around him. A lot of truckers, a lot of old people, retired probably, who’d arrived in their RVs. See the country: Trailer parks where you could get water and electrical and sewage hookups. Gas stations where you could fill up on gas and buy a pre-made sandwich wrapped in Saran Wrap, places like this where you could sit among your fellow adventurers and not look at them. They all looked like they’d eaten too much white bread. When he finished eating, he went to the men’s room, and washed, and came out and walked to his car. The rain was firm now, and pleasant. Standing beside his car with one hand on the door, Jesse took off his baseball cap and turned his face up to the rain. He stood a long time letting the hard rain soak into him. He didn’t know why he was doing it, and he stopped only when he became aware that other people were watching. His wet clothes were uncomfortable to drive in and when he reached the next rest stop he got some dry clothes out of his suitcase and changed into them in a bathroom stall. He bought a large coffee at the rest stop, and back in the car added a lot of scotch to it. He sipped the laced coffee as he crossed the Delaware River north of Philadelphia and picked up the Jersey Turnpike. He was in the east now, but it wasn’t yet the east he imagined. This part of the east looked like Anaheim. Except for the rain. This was eastern rain. No sudden outbursts, no scudding clouds, no interruption for sunshine before another downpour, no bright colors made more brilliant by the wetness. Eastern rain was steady and unyielding and gray…. What confused him most was that Jennifer would neither embrace him nor let him go. He was a self-reliant guy. He had spent most of his life staying inside, playing within himself. He was pretty sure he could still do that, but there had to be some sort of completion between them. Having been her lover, he was quite sure he could never