NOVELS BY ROBERT B. PARKER
THE SPENSER NOVELS
Robert B. Parker’s Lullaby (by Ace Atkins)
Sixkill
Painted Ladies
The Professional
Rough Weather
Now & Then
Hundred-Dollar Baby
School Days
Cold Service
Bad Business
Back Story
Widow’s Walk
Potshot
Hugger Mugger
Hush Money
Sudden Mischief
Small Vices
Chance
Thin Air
Walking Shadow
Paper Doll
Double Deuce
Pastime
Stardust
Playmates
Crimson Joy
Pale Kings and Princes
Taming a Sea-Horse
A Catskill Eagle
Valediction
The Widening Gyre
Ceremony
A Savage Place
Early Autumn
Looking for Rachel Wallace
The Judas Goat
Promised Land
Mortal Stakes
God Save the Child
The Godwulf Manuscript
THE JESSE STONE NOVELS
Robert B. Parker’s Fool Me Twice (by Michael Brandman)
Robert B. Parker’s Killing the Blues (by Michael Brandman)
Split Image
Night and Day
Stranger in Paradise
High Profile
Sea Change
Stone Cold
Death in Paradise
Trouble in Paradise
Night Passage
THE SUNNY RANDALL NOVELS
Spare Change
Blue Screen
Melancholy Baby
Shrink Rap
Perish Twice
Family Honor
COLE/HITCH WESTERNS
Robert B. Parker’s Ironhorse (by Robert Knott)
Blue-Eyed Devil
Brimstone
Resolution
Appaloosa
ALSO BY ROBERT B. PARKER
Double Play
Gunman’s Rhapsody
All Our Yesterdays
A Year at the Races (with Joan H. Parker)
Perchance to Dream
Poodle Springs (with Raymond Chandler)
Love and Glory
Wilderness
Three Weeks in Spring (with Joan H. Parker)
Training with Weights (with John R. Marsh)
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
Publishers Since 1838
Published by the Penguin Group
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Copyright © 2013 by The Estate of Robert B. Parker
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Published simultaneously in Canada
ISBN 978-1-101-62122-6
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.
For Joan.
Nobody tougher.
Contents
Novels by Robert B. Parker
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Map
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
1
HENRY CIMOLI didn’t mince words.
“Have I ever asked you for a favor?”
“Nope.”
“In all the years I’ve been knowin’ you and Hawk,” Henry said, “I haven’t asked for jack squat.”
“Jack or squat has never been stated.”
We sat at an outdoor table at Kelly’s Roast Beef, facing the ocean at Revere Beach. It was early spring, and people had rediscovered shorts and T-shirts. I was particularly interested in the return of the skirt, bare legs, and high heels with thin straps. Not that Revere was a fashion mecca. Revere was a working-class town and Revere Beach was a working-class beach. But you could live well on the beach, and the seafood and Italian restaurants along the boulevard were very good. I had ordered a bucket of clams from the take-out window.
“I take calls for you guys, keep Pearl when you and Susan want to leave town and moon over each other.”
“Pearl loves you, Henry.”
“Do I complain?”
“She says you withhold affection.”
The wind was sharp and cold, but the sunshine warmed you during the lulls.
I sampled a few fried clams from the bucket. Sadly, I learned Kelly’s did not serve Blue Moon ale, or any beer, for that matter. One cannot enjoy fried clams with a Coke Zero. I dipped a few more in tartar sauce, and studied a leggy brunette in a flowy skirt standing outside the beach pavilion. She kept the skirt from blowing away with the flat of her hand while she walked. Maybe Revere was on the verge of becoming fashionable.
A couple paunchy guys in coveralls stained with grease got up from a table and patted their stomachs. One belched. Perhaps not.
“Do I detect a request for a favor?” I said.
“Why?” Henry said. “Because I’m saying I never asked for one?”
“Did I tell anyone about the time you wore lifts to that Hall of Fame banquet?” I said.
Henry stood about five-four and weighed about 134 pounds. But 133 of it was muscle, and in his youth, he’d gone toe to toe with Willie Pep. Some of that still showed in his face. He had a lot of scar tissue around the eyes; his knuckles looked like thick pebbles. He was a hard and tough man despite my claim that he had once been a member of the Lollipop Guild.