Page 93 of Hard to Kill
“If it was Joe, what does it matter now?”
“It matters to me,” Jimmy says. “So if you know where Licata is, you tell me right here and right now.”
“All I ever knew was that he had a place in Montauk somewhere. Or maybe it was Napeague.”
Jimmy says, “He’s got paper on a place on Elm Lane.”
“Not that one,” Jacobson says. “I think there was a bigger place somewhere, but neither me nor Eddie ever knew where. I never even had a phone number for the guy. When he had something to tell me, if one of the money transfers was even a day late, he’d call me.”
“When’s the last time you talked to him?” I ask.
“After Jane shot Joe. Licata wanted me to know that nothing had changed between us even with Joe gone. We met for a drink at the American Hotel. One drink. He told me it was still business as usual until it wasn’t. Then they got up and left.”
“They?”I ask.
“Anthony and his girlfriend. This little Asian woman. He called her Mei, never told me her last name. I got the feeling that she maybe had taken Joe’s place in the operation. She didn’t say much, but before we finished our drinks, I asked her what she did for Joe. She smiled at me and said, ‘Shoot.’”
SEVENTY-FIVE
Jimmy
“YOU’RE NOT GOING TO let this go, are you?” Jane asks when Jimmy drops her off at her house.
“Have you ever known me to let things go?”
Jimmy heads back to his bar after that to make some calls. One of them is to Dick Kelley. Before they left Dorrian’s, Kelley mentioned in passing how ten years ago Paul Harrington retired to eastern Long Island. Everybody thought he’d hang around for a deputy inspector job, maybe even at the 24th. But Harrington put in his papers and walked away. Jimmy asks Kelley now if he can find out where Harrington lives.
Kelley calls back in less than five minutes. “Where are you right now?”
Jimmy tells him.
“Well, my friend, you’re in luck, because it turns out the Lieu lives over in a town called Water Mill, which even I know is pretty close to you. You want me to find an exact address?”
“I’ll find it,” Jimmy says. “Sonofabitch, I knew I had to catch a break sooner or later.”
He finally comes up with an address on Cobb Road for retired lieutenant Paul Harrington, and a phone number. WhenHarrington answers the phone, first ring, Jimmy tells him who he is and what he wants to talk about. Harrington says come ahead.
It is, as Jimmy discovers when Harrington shows him in, a very nice house.
“My Sharon had family money she never told me about until she got that headache and never got better,” Harrington says, as if answering a question Jimmy hasn’t asked. “When she passed, I found out just how much family money. As soon as the check cleared, I found this place and moved out here. I felt like I’d earned it, even if it was my girl’s money and not mine.”
“Bet your ass you earned it,” Jimmy says. “You were a great cop.”
“Still am. Don’t you feel the same way?”
Jimmy grins. “Until they cover me in dirt.”
“Could’ve waited a little longer to retire, beefed up the pension. But it’s like I heard some old baseball manager said when he finally called it quits. It had reached the point where the wins stopped making up for the losses.”
They make their way out to the backyard, where Jimmy can see some pretty amazing gardens.
“I could never afford a place like this now,” Harrington says. “I could barely afford it at the time. But if I was going to live it out alone, I decided I’d live it out in style.” There’s a catch in his throat. “I was just supposed to do that with my best girl.”
He still has a lot of white hair. About Jimmy’s height, maybe a little taller, though he’s a little stooped now. Ruddy face. Drinker’s nose. Bright blue eyes. Young eyes. Big hands that look arthritic to Jimmy, some of the fingers zigging when they should be zagging.
Jimmy still has the feeling he had when he was just starting out and first ran into Harrington on a case, right after Harrington had been elevated to commander of the detectives at the 24th:
Legend.