Page 44

Jimmy

THEY ARE SEATED AT a corner table at Jimmy’s bar late, the place still fairly crowded on a Friday night. Jimmy called the meeting on his way back from the city.

His whole life Jimmy Cunniff has never called it Manhattan or thought of it that way. Always the city. If you grew up in the outer boroughs like he did, you were always going to the city. Or coming back from it. Even if all you ever wanted, even as a kid, was the NYPD, the city was the goal.

He called both Jane and Danny Esposito once he had his phone back and told them what he had—or might have—and that they couldn’t wait until tomorrow to decide what to do with it.

“How did you know I might not be on a date?” Jane asks.

“You already had your date night for the week.”

“Am I really that predictable?” she says.

“We both know the answer to that,” Jimmy says.

The gun he took from Kellye is on the table in front of them. He had the girl put it in the baggie that he held open for her, even knowing that the only usable prints on the thing were likely going to be hers.

“So you think this could be the gun Rob used on the Carsons?” Esposito says.

“I think you meant to say that someone might have used on the Carsons,” Jane says.

Jimmy sees a cocky grin from the guy. By now Jimmy is well aware what a cocky bastard Danny Esposito is.

But he has to admit Esposito wears it well, like the leather jacket, and the long hair, and the shades that he at least manages to take off when he’s indoors, sometimes only as a last resort, the sunglasses being one more piece to help him stay in character.

“Whatever could have gotten into me?” Esposito says to Jane, and drinks some beer. “Occasionally I forget I’m a dedicated public servant.” He toasts her with his mug. “My apologies.”

“Accepted,” Jane says, “even though we both know you’re not really sorry.”

“But as you are a dedicated public servant,” Jimmy says to Esposito, “and a sneaky shit when you need to be, you are going to test-fire this thing tomorrow—or have somebody test-fire it for you—as a way of looking at the lands and the groove measurements of the rounds they recovered at the scene and in a couple of the bodies.”

“And if the gun turns out to be the murder weapon,” Danny says to Jane, “then you, being a dedicated officer of the court, will be duty bound to turn it over to Katherine Welsh, correct?”

“Shit,” Jane says. “I was afraid of that.”

Esposito makes eye contact with a good-looking blonde at the far end of the bar and gives her the nod.

“Stay with us,” Jimmy tells him.

“Guy can look,” Esposito says.

“And dream,” Jane says, looking across the room at the blonde.

Now Esposito says, “Has it occurred to either one of you that somebody besides Jacobson might have hid that gun at his place?”

Kellye showed Jimmy where in the town house she’d found it, in a closet in the master bedroom, top shelf, underneath more cashmere sweaters than you’d find in the men’s department at Bloomingdale’s.

“What was this Kellye girl doing in there, by the way?” Jane asks.

“She says she searches the place from time to time, hoping she might find cash he might have stashed and forgotten,” Jimmy says. “Like his rainy-day fund.”

“Sounds like a sweet kid,” Esposito says.

“Daddy’s little girl,” Jimmy says.

“Well, sugar daddy maybe,” Jane says.

Jane takes a sip of red wine. Jimmy was surprised when she ordered it, but doesn’t say anything. Maybe she’s feeling better tonight.

“Or maybe the gun really does belong to Jacobson and he wanted her to find it,” Esposito says.

“Or wanted me to find it when he agreed to let me search the place,” Jimmy says.

“But you didn’t. She did. And why plant his own murder weapon, if that’s what it is?” Jane says.

“To mess with us?” Jimmy muses. “Wouldn’t be the first time, right? And it’s a long-established fact that the guy obviously thinks he can get away with anything.”

“Maybe he wanted to see if you’d actually turn it over if you did find it?” Esposito says.

“The asshole does love playing games,” Jimmy says. “And not just sex games.”

“Does he own this particular gun?” Jane asks Jimmy. “I know you’ve already checked.”

“If he does own it,” Jimmy says, “he didn’t buy it legally, because I did make a couple of calls on my way out.”

“Means shit,” Esposito says. “You know who can get a gun these days? Everybody. You know where? Anywhere.”

“But let’s say, for the sake of conversation, that it was used on the Carsons that night,” Jane says. “Why keep it instead of tossing it into the ocean, or one of the many other bodies of water available to him?”

Jimmy drinks some of his beer. “Because he’s batshit crazy?” he says.

“Or because he’s just hot-messing around with the two of you all over again,” Danny Esposito says.

“But if it isn’t Jacobson who wanted the gun found,” Jimmy says, “who did?”

Quietly Jane says, “Maybe somebody who wants Rob to look guiltier than he already does. And who knows even he isn’t batshit crazy enough to keep the murder weapon around like a keepsake.”

No one says anything until Jimmy suddenly slaps the table hard with the palm of his hand, making the mugs and Jane’s wineglass jump.

“Fuck!” he yells, causing heads to turn in their direction from the bar.

“What’s wrong?” Jane asks him.

“What’s wrong,” he says, “is that I’m suddenly not nearly as sure as I’d like to be that our guy did it.”

He drains his beer and holds up his empty mug so that Kenny the bartender can see it.

“Sonofabitch,” Jimmy says, lowering his voice now. “Did those words really just come out of my mouth?”

He sees Jane smiling at him, as she reaches over to pat his hand.

“You’re the one who sounds sick,” she says.