Read Online (5/10) Sea Change by Robert B. Parker - Free Book Online

at Jesse and smiled.
    “Remember I said I’d come to help you?” she said.
    “Yes.”
    “Are you wondering what help I’m bringing?”
    “Yes.”
    “Well, you are certainly calm about it.”
    “I try,” Jesse said.
    “What was that sports jacket you were wearing on the boat?”
    “Paradise Twi-league,” Jesse said. “Softball.”
    “What’s your position?”
    “Shortstop.”
    “Are you good?”
    “Yes.”
    “Very good?”
    “Yes.”
    “You look like you’d be very good,” Blondie said. “If you’re so good, why aren’t you playing someplace instead of being Chief Yokel?”
    “Hurt my shoulder,” Jesse said. “Can’t throw much anymore.”
    “But you’re still playing.”
    “I can throw enough for the Paradise Twi-league,” Jesse said. “Not for the Show.”
    “Show?”
    “Big leagues,” Jesse said.
    “Were you good enough for the, ah, Show, before you got hurt?”
    “Yes.”
    “Bummer,” Blondie said.
    Jesse waited. She drank more coffee. She couldn’t smoke. He wasn’t serving cocktails. Any stimulant in a pinch.
    “At least two people on the Lady Jane were lying to you the other day,” Blondie said.
    “Happens a lot,” Jesse said.
    “Harrison knew those two guys in the pictures you showed us.”
    Jesse waited.
    “They crewed for him last year. I was on the boat with him a few times last year. I recognized them both.”
    “Anyone else that should have recognized them?” Jesse said.
    “No, just Harrison and me.”
    “Why didn’t you tell me on the boat?”
    “Didn’t want Harrison getting mad. I’m a long way from home and he’s my ride back.”
    “Where’s home?”
    “Palm Beach. Harrison picked me up there and we came on up for Race Week.”
    “You with him?” Jesse said.
    “Sort of, I guess,” Blondie said. “Got to be with somebody.”

19

    J esse was at his desk, checking overtime slips and drinking coffee, when Molly stuck her head in.
    “Wait’ll you get a load of this,” she said.
    Jesse looked up.
    “More sex tapes?”
    “Live action,” Molly said. “The sisters Plum.”
    “Florence Horvath’s sisters?”
    “In the, ah, flesh,” Molly said.
    Jesse put the neat pile of overtime slips aside.
    “Bring them in,” he said.
    Corliss and Claudia Plum were very blond, very slim, very tanned and very slightly dressed. They wore very dark eye makeup, very light lipstick. One of them had on a sleeveless aqua-and-coral patterned summer dress with a short skirt, and showed very deep cleavage. The other had on a robin’s-egg-blue-and-pink dress of the same length, and showed lots of cleavage. Both wore slip-on shoes with very high heels. One pair was aqua, the other was blue. Neither wore stockings. It was also clear that neither was wearing a bra. Jesse stood when they came in.
    Aqua and coral said, “I’m Corliss.”
    Blue and pink said, “I’m Claudia.”
    “Jesse Stone.”
    Both girls shook his hand and then sat without much regard to the minimal length of their dresses.
    Well, Jesse thought, at least they’re wearing underpants.
    “I’m very sorry about your sister,” Jesse said.
    “That’s why we’re here,” Claudia said.
    “We want to know the truth,” Corliss said.
    “We found your sister floating in the harbor,” Jesse said.
    “So who killed her,” Corliss said.
    “We don’t know that anyone did.”
    “You don’t know? How come you don’t know. You think she just jumped in the ocean?”
    “We don’t know exactly how she got in the ocean,” Jesse said.
    “Well, she sure didn’t jump in,” Claudia said.
    “Do you have a theory?” Jesse said.
    “What about DNA?”
    “We know her identity,” Jesse said. “Why do you think someone killed her?”
    “She wouldn’t just fall in,” Corliss said.
    “Did she drink?” Jesse said.
    “Course,” Corliss said. “But she could handle it, she wouldn’t get drunk and fall in the ocean.”
    Jesse nodded.
    “I thought you were in Europe,” Jesse said.
    The twins