Night Passage (A Jesse Stone Novel)

lifting their gun permits.”
    “Probably a way to do that,” Healy said. “You know the kid blew the whistle on them?”
    “Yes,” Jesse said.
    “Good kid?”
    “Kind of a burnout,” Jesse said.
    “Well, she saved your ass.”
    “I plan to mention that to her,” Jesse said. “Abby Taylor too.”
    The light from the east was whiter now, making the electric lights in Jesse’s office look weak.
    “You should get out of here,” Healy said. “There’s going to be a lot to do later.”
    Jesse nodded and swiveled in his chair and looked out his window. There was a television van with its odd-looking antenna parked next to the police cruisers. Channel Three/Action News was stenciled on the side.
    “And the media is always with us,” he said.
    “I’m getting too old for this all-night shit,” Healy said. “You got a bottle of whiskey somewhere?”
    Jesse took it out of his bottom drawer and put it on the desk in front of Healy.
    “Glass on the windowsill,” Jesse said.
    “Join me?”
    Jesse shook his head. Healy poured about an inch and drank it down. Then he capped the bottle and pushed it back across the desk toward Jesse. Jesse didn’t stir. He was too tired to put it away.
    “How long you been on this job?” Healy said.
    “About six months.”
    “Nice start,” Healy said.
    After Healy left, Jesse sat for a while until he got the strength to get up. He walked past the television crew without speaking, and got in his car and went home. He was so tired it was hard to focus on the road. The sun was up by the time he got home and there was a different tone to the black winter water in the harbor. He parked in his slot and walked heavily up the steps to his condominium. When he opened the door he heard the television. He closed the door quietly behind him and took out his gun and walked softly to the living room. Sitting on the sofa with her feet up on the coffee table watching the early-morning news was his ex-wife.
    “Jesus Christ, Jenn,” Jesse said.
    She stood and smiled at him.
    “You’re okay,” she said.
    Jesse nodded.
    “The janitor let me in,” Jenn said. “I told him I was your wife.”
    “You’re not,” Jesse said. “We’re divorced.”
    “I saw on the news about last night,” Jenn said.
    “It’s over,” Jesse said. “What the hell are you doing here?”
    “I was worried about you. I missed you.”
    “Jenn, I don’t know,” Jesse said.
    “You still seeing that other woman?”
    “No.”
    Jenn smiled.
    “I don’t know either, Jesse. But here I am. At least you could hug me.”
    Jesse realized suddenly that he was still holding his gun. He put it back on his hip, and walked very slowly around the coffee table.
    “Yes,” he said. “I could do that.”

 
    First published in the UK in 1999
    No Exit Press
    an imprint of Oldcastle Books
    P O Box 394,
    Harpenden, AL5 1XJ

     
    www.noexit.co.uk

     
    This ebook edition first published in 2012

     
    First published in the USA by GB Putnam in hardcover in 1997

     
    All rights reserved
    © Robert B. Parker 1997

     
    The right of Robert B. Parker to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

     
    This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly

     
    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.

     
    ISBN
    978-1-84243-521-2 (print)
    978-1- 84243-996-8 (epub)
    978-1-84243-997-5 (kindle)
    978-1-84243-998-2 (pdf)

     
    Typesetting by Avocet, Typeset, Chilton, Aylesbury, Bucks

     
    For more about Crime Fiction go to www.crimetime.co.uk / @crimetimeuk