The Palm Beach Murders by James Patterson (the read aloud family .TXT) 📕

almost spits the last two words in my face. Classy.

Paolo goes skulking away from the bar-shack (don’t get me wrong, I’m sure it’s Zagat-rated), and I take my bag and follow him. He walks faster. I match his pace. If this is going to escalate into a chase sequence, it’ll be one of the more absurd ones I’ve been involved in. Lawyer in a Suit vs. Tanned Lifeguard Dude, kicking up sand all the way to the ocean.

“Forgive me, Paolo, but I find it hard to believe you’d turn down this offer. How many friends have you got on your side? I’m willing to bet you don’t have five hundred thousand of them.”

The lifeguard continues walking, but his pace slows a little. Maybe my words are sinking in to that handsome skull of his.

“I’m telling you, Paolo—I don’t give a damn what you did, or didn’t do, or any of that. I’m not a priest. I’m just a guy hired to ascertain a simple answer to a simple question. No matter what it takes.”

Paolo stops, turns in his tracks, then sneers at me. “You’re not a priest. But you’re definitely a cop or a reporter.”

“Oh, yeah?”

I smile, then gently toss my valise at Paolo’s feet. “Go ahead. Open it.”

Chapter 4

THEO (continued)

Paolo glances down at the leather case as if there might be a metal bear trap inside.

“Geez, Paolo,” I say. “You pull kids out of shark-infested waters for a living. You can’t possibly be afraid of my carry-on.”

But Paolo doesn’t trust me. Not. One. Bit. He’s made it this far by keeping his head down and not talking to anyone. The media has given him the usual promises about “protecting his identity” and “being on his side.” But what they haven’t given him is what’s in my leather case.

“Go on.”

Paolo opens it. His eyes widen when he sees what’s inside.

“Take it,” I tell him. “It’s yours.”

He reaches in and pulls out the modest stack of crisp hundred-dollar bills bound with a paper wrapper.

“That’s twenty-five grand,” I say. “Consider it good faith money.”

Paolo looks at the stack in his hand, feeling the weight of it. “You said half a million, Mr. Lawyer.”

“What part of good faith don’t you get? You point me in the direction of Ms. Ryerson’s body, and the next time you’ll need a bag to carry all of your money away. Unless you prefer a check?”

“No, cash is good.”

Of course it’s good. Money is an abstract thing until the moment it’s sitting in your hand.

“So we have a deal, Paolo?”

Finally, the spell of the greenbacks dissipates. Paolo looks at me as if he’s still trying to figure me out.

“You can’t be a cop, because giving me this money would be entrapment or something like that, right?”

I squelch my inner lawyer, who wants to shout, You idiot, that’s not how it works! But I’m here to find the truth—not give this playboy free legal advice.

“You know how little cops make in a year? They aren’t usually in the habit of bribing their way to a murder confession, Paolo.”

“I’m not confessing to anything,” he says, suddenly defensive.

“I told you, all I want to buy is some information. Do you have anything you want to share right now?”

“I know what good faith means, Mr. Lawyer Man. It means you have to give me some time to think it over.”

This is wonderful. I can practically see him doing the mental calculations as he speaks.

“You’re absolutely right, Paolo.” I hand him a fake business card (eggshell, Romalian type) with a real cell phone number on it. “Call me when you’re ready. But my client would like closure as quickly as possible.”

Again, Paolo looks down at the stack of cash in his hand, already lost in his plans for the next few hours. “Yeah, I get it.”

And so do I. A few minutes later I’m calling Quinn in Boston. “I’m really liking Paolo for this.”

“That’s promising to hear. But can you prove it?”

“It’s only a matter of time, my friend.”

“Then…have at it.”

“Of course, but what do you think? You suspected him all along, right?”

“I think you should go with your gut, and I’ll go with mine.”

I’ve known Quinn for two decades now and he hasn’t gotten any easier to read.

Chapter 5

JANA (THE ACTOR)

Oh, my dear Matthew.

You send other Stingrays to the sunny tropics, yet somehow I end up here, in snowy New Hampshire. Sometimes I think you have it in for me.

(Or is it that you wanted to keep me close at hand?)

Even worse: I’m at an elite New England prep school. I didn’t much enjoy school back when I was required to attend, and I’m certainly not in the mood to be here now.

But the two young ladies who invited Paige Ryerson to spring break have returned to St. Paul’s Prep, home to the high-school-age children of the international elite. Hannah and Brooke Clee have resumed their classes and are presumably showing off their tans and resuming their ordinary lives.

Unlike Paige Ryerson.

Today I’m playing the role of a midlevel federal agent pulling down $68,933 a year, so I have to dress the part. I want the Clee girls to feel superior to me but also fear me, because I could be one of those idealistic, low-paid FBI agents who can’t be bought. All of which means I have to pull a slightly hideous pantsuit out of my wardrobe—one I last wore in an off-Broadway production of Catch Me If You Can.

The things I do for this team!

After the usual bureaucratic nonsense (ID checks, phone calls), I make my way to the dorms, where I’m told the girls will be studying. The Clee girls share a room in Brewster, a girls’ dormitory known for the rooster perched over the entrance. This fowl theme is carried into the hallways, where each door is marked with paper roosters—made from the handprints of the students—that are adorned with the names of the residents. It doesn’t take long to find Hannah and Brooke’s door birds.

I knock,