Robert B. Parker's Blind Spot by Reed Farrel Coleman

Author:Reed Farrel Coleman
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi, pdf
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2014-08-08T16:00:00+00:00

46

Molly Crane showed Harlan Salter and Monty Bernstein into Jesse Stone’s office. Jesse was at it again, standing back to the door, pounding a ball into the pocket of his old Rawlings glove. Sometimes he did the ball-and-glove ritual, like praying the rosary, to calm his mind, to help him think. Sometimes it was purely distraction, a way to occupy himself and not to give in to his desire to drink. Sometimes, like that day, it was both. He was frustrated at his lack of progress in the investigation. The Salter kid was in bad shape, but he would survive. It was Martina Penworth that concerned Jesse. If he was to speak for her, so far he hadn’t given her much of a voice.

Voice. That was the problem. He couldn’t get straight answers. People, often innocent people, gave slightly crooked answers or, as Yogi Berra might have said, they talked out of both sides of their faces. It was natural for people to put themselves in the best light even in bad situations. Good cops understood as much and corrected accordingly. This was different. Salter and his lawyer made the right noises about wanting to help catch the killer, but that’s all it felt like to Jesse: noise. From the start, Salter and Bernstein seemed reluctant at best. They parsed their words with great care and hid behind straw walls of worry and concern for Martina and the younger Salter. There was something else going on here that he just couldn’t see. Frustrated as he was by that, it wasn’t what was making him thirsty for the bottle in his desk drawer.

He had almost fooled himself that he had moved beyond his minor-league days and the haunting ifs and should-have-beens in his life. At least he thought he had come to some kind of peace about it, but the invitation to that damned reunion had put the lie to that bit of self-deception. Jesse discovered the hard way that he was no more at peace with that play at second base than he had been the night it happened. He supposed he always drank a little more than he should have, even before that stupid exhibition game in Pueblo. Still, he could draw a crooked line back in time that would connect that aborted double play to the beginning of his losing battle with alcohol. And when his marriage fell to pieces, it totally set him off. His marriage to Jenn had been yet another serious long-term commitment that, just like baseball, had crashed and burned. Dix might say that Jesse had let the alcohol ruin his L.A.P.D. career before it too came tumbling down due to something coming at him out of a blind spot. Laymen see alcohol as a means to lose control. For you, Jesse, it was a way to exert control. Still is. God, he wanted a drink, and the internal tape loop of Julio Blanco’s voice wasn’t helping any.

“Jesse,” Molly said. “Jesse.”

But he didn’t acknowledge her, continuing to pound the ball into the glove.

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