The Professional by Robert B. Parker Read Free Book Online

coming here a long time, most of them are politicians or lawyers.”
    “That you met in your work,” I said.
    “Yep,” Quirk said.
    He grinned.
    “Arrested some of them,” he said.
    “Not enough,” I said.
    “Everybody got arrested that should get arrested,” Quirk said, “we wouldn’t have no place to put them.”
    “How about the butter knife?” I said.
    Quirk nodded.
    “There were prints on the butter knife,” he said. “Yours were on the blade, and there were two others.”
    “One would be whoever set the table,” I said.
    “Young woman named Lucille Malinkowski,” Quirk said.
    “Why have you got her prints on file?”
    “Don’t know, nothing criminal. Maybe she was in the army, maybe she has a gun license, maybe she used to work someplace where she had to have clearance. I didn’t know you’d care.”
    “And the other one?
    “Belongs to a guy named Goran Pappas,” Quirk said.
    “ ‘Goran’?”
    “Aka Gary Pappas,” Quirk said.
    “Why is Gary in the system,” I said.
    “He did three in MCI-Shirley for swindling,” Quirk said.
    “From a woman?” I said.
    “Yes.”
    “What’d Gary look like?” I said.
    “Six feet one inch, one hundred seventy pounds, dark hair, brown eyes, even features, age thirty-eight at the time of his arrest.”
    “Which was?”
    “In 2002,” Quirk said.
    He produced a computer printout of Gary Pappas’s mug shot. It was Gary Eisenhower.
    “Anybody want him now for anything?” I said.
    “He’s not in the system,” Quirk said. “Course, the system’s imperfect.”
    “It is?” I said. “How did that happen?”
    Quirk didn’t bother to answer.
    “You want to discuss Gary with me?” he said.
    “He’s blackmailing a bunch of women,” I said.
    “Tell me about it,” Quirk said.
    I told him most of it, leaving out the names.
    “Not a bad gig,” Quirk said. “Banging good-looking women every day, getting money for it.”
    “It might get boring,” I said.
    Quirk looked at me.
    “Or not,” I said.
    Quirk nodded.
    “So they hired you to make him stop,” Quirk said.
    “Yes.”
    “You got any evidence?” Quirk said.
    “Got no evidence we can use.”
    “Women won’t testify?”
    “No.”
    “So what are you supposed to do?” Quirk said. “Scare him?”
    “I tried that,” I said.
    “How’d that work for you?” Quirk said.
    “It didn’t,” I said.
    “Disappointing,” Quirk said.
    “Makes me feel old,” I said.
    “Want me to stop by and have a talk with him?” Quirk said. “Unofficially?”
    I shook my head.
    “Don’t think he’d care,” I said.
    “About the homicide commander?” Quirk said.
    “I don’t think cops worry him,” I said.
    “Now I feel old,” Quirk said.
    “This is a pretty cool guy,” I said. “He knows what he’s doing, and he doesn’t seem to scare.”
    “Like you and me,” Quirk said.
    “Yeah, but he’s better-looking,” I said.
    “Than you and me?” Quirk said. “How is that possible?”

Chapter15

    SUSAN AND I made love on Sunday morning at her place with the bedroom door closed and Pearl grumbling unhappily outside it. When we were through, Susan whisked the covers up over us, as she always did, and we lay quietly on the bed for a while.
    “You know, don’t you,” Susan said, “that I was a cheerleader at Swampscott High School?”
    “I do know that,” I said.
    Susan flipped the covers back and rolled out of bed, and stood naked beside it.
    “Sis-boom-bah,” she said, and jumped into the air and kicked her heels back.
    “Is that in honor of my performance?” I said.
    “Ours,” she said. “And us.”
    I nodded.
    “Sis-boom-bah,” I said.
    Susan opened the bedroom door and Pearl bounded in, jumped on the bed, turned around maybe fifteen times, and flopped down where Susan had been. I looked at her. Then I looked at Susan.
    “There’s a definite difference,” I said.
    “Pearl was never a cheerleader,” Susan said.
    We showered and dressed, which took me