Robert B. Parker’s Buried Secrets

Ten

Daisy went to Jesse. Because of course she did. She drove right from the Burton house to the station, because Jesse was her friend, and he’d want to know. He’d want to know, and he’d listen to her, and he’d help.

He always did.

She entered the station and walked directly back toward Jesse’s office. She didn’t bother to stop or say hello to Molly, but Molly stood and looked in her direction anyway.

“Daisy?” she said, her voice tentative, like she was afraid of spooking a wild animal. “Are you okay?”

“I need to see Jesse.”

“It’s not a great time.”

“I need to see him, Molly,” she said, and kept going.

Molly didn’t stop her.

She entered Jesse’s office. He had his back to her, staring into nothing, slapping that stupid ball into his stupid mitt.

And then it came pouring out of her, the anger and the fear. She never wanted to look scared. She was tough. She’d made a life out of being tough, because that’s what you had to be when she was growing up. An openly gay woman had to be tough to hear all the insults and the veiled threats and the not-so-veiled ones and keep going forward. It was either that or hide from the world, and Daisy was damned if she’d hide.

“Your fucking new officer is a goddamn lunatic,” she said.

Jesse turned, his face pulled into a deeper frown than usual. If he’d come into the café like this, Daisy might have noticed. She might have seen that something was bothering him, deep down, working its way to the surface. But she’d just been frightened half out of her mind, and this wasn’t the café, so she’d missed it completely.

Instead, all she heard was his heavy sigh and his bored tone. “Come on in, Daisy. Nice to see you, too.”

“Don’t give me that, Jesse. That kid is a menace. He is dangerous, and I cannot believe you put him on the force.”

He put the ball and the mitt down and sat in his chair. “What happened?” He sounded tired. Or bored.

Which only made Daisy angrier. “He pulled a gun on me when I tried to bring muffins and coffee! Muffins, Jesse!”

Jesse sat up. That got his attention. “He pulled a gun on you?”

“Well,” Daisy said, thinking back. It didn’t happen exactly that way. “No. Not all the way out of its holster. He put his hand on it. And he screamed at me. And he—”

“What were you doing?”

“I was bringing muffins! Jesus!”

“I’m sorry. I meant to say, what did he say you were doing? Why did he react like that?”

Daisy didn’t like this. It wasn’t going like she thought it would. “He said I crossed the crime scene tape—”

“Did you?”

“No!” Daisy was shouting again. “Jesus Christ, Jesse, even if I had, would that be a reason to shoot me?”

Jesse put both hands up as if in surrender. “I’m sorry. He’s new. I’m sure he was just a little overanxious. The training says to keep a hand near your weapon when confronting a suspect—”

“I am not a suspect, Jesse!”

“Of course you’re not. But he didn’t know you. And it was an active crime scene—”

Daisy could not quite believe what she was hearing. “Are you saying what he did was right?”

“No. I’m sure it was just a mistake. I’ll speak to him.”

His mouth was a hard line. He seemed to think that was the end of it. But Daisy was not about to leave it there.

She made one last try to explain. “Jesse, you know me. You know I would not come to you if it was just about my feelings getting hurt. This was not normal. It was pure rage. I really thought he was going to shoot me.”

“I’m sure you did. But sometimes a police officer has to make a quick decision—”

That was about all Daisy could stand. “Oh, bullshit. If your cop can’t tell the difference between a middle-aged woman carrying muffins and a hardened criminal, then you need to take away his gun before he hurts someone. What do you think will happen next?”

Now Jesse’s eyes went dark. Daisy had seen it before. Everyone in town knew that Jesse Stone was a dangerous man. He’d proven it a dozen times or more. But Daisy had always thought that his anger was reserved for people who deserved it. Criminals. People who would hurt people like her.

At this moment, she saw it aimed at her.

“What I think is that I am working a case, Daisy. People are dead. And there’s more important things going on here than your muffins, okay?”

Daisy stepped back. She realized they were both facing off like boxers.

“You cannot think this is okay, Jesse. I have supported and helped you and your cops for years. I am your friend.”

“Daisy. I can’t play favorites.”

“I’m not asking you to. I’m asking you to listen.”

“I have. I’ll listen to Tate, and then maybe you can come in and the two of you can talk it over.”

“No,” Daisy said, shuddering at the thought of being in the room with that man again, looking at the pure anger in his eyes. “No. We’re past that.”

Jesse stepped back, too. He rubbed his face with his hands. Tried to smile at her. For a second, she thought they were about to sit down and start over. Talk it out calmly. Then she could make him understand.

Instead, Jesse said, “Daisy, do you think maybe you’re just overreacting a little? Police work isn’t like baking muffins.”

Daisy stood for a moment, making sure she’d actually heard him properly, that he really had just said that to her.

“Goddamn it, Jesse,” Daisy said. “How dare you.”

She turned on her heel and walked out of his office, not looking back.