The Second Mouse - Archer Mayor [15]
For that last reason, if for nothing else, all contacts between them since had originated from Gail.
“They gave us a break from a bunch of special hearings they’re holding up here, so I thought I’d find out how you were doing.”
She was a newly anointed state senator, and, as was typical with everything she took on, she was attacking it head-on. He knew for a fact that the meetings she mentioned were low-level affairs, usually skipped by the old-timers during the summer months, when most of Vermont’s citizen legislators were scrambling to do the jobs they couldn’t attend to during the half year the legislature was in session.
But, in addition to being hypermotivated by nature, Gail was also wealthy, not just by birth but via a long-abandoned, very successful career as a Realtor. She would make being a senator a year-round job, regardless of the low pay and other people’s expectations.
“Not bad. Things are under control, if not exactly slow.”
“Anything interesting?”
There was a time when he had regularly used her as a sounding board. “Not really. Crooks must be losing their creativity.”
“How’s your mom and Leo?”
Leo was his brother, who still lived with their mother on the farm they’d both been born on—a handy development for Joe, selfishly speaking, since the old lady now got around only in a wheelchair. “They’re good. No colds or mishaps. She was asking after you a couple of weeks ago. You ought to give her a call. She’d love to hear from you.”
There was a small hesitation at the other end. “I will. I hate to bother them.”
“You don’t, Gail. You never will.”
Another pause. “Well, I can hear them getting restless behind me. I better get back. Take care of yourself, and give them my love.”
“Will do. Take care.”
The line died in his ear, and he slowly replaced the phone, reflecting on the irony of the two last calls coinciding—the ache of the past bumping into the giddiness of the future. But that giddiness belonged only to Matthews. Joe had enjoyed meeting Linda Rubinstein but had felt no urge to go further.
Across the room, Willy watched him over the top of a gun magazine he was pretending to read.
“Old ghosts?” he asked, not unsympathetically.
“Yeah,” Joe answered, staring into middle space.
Chapter 4
It was stiflingly hot, the pickup had no air-conditioning, and they were moving slowly enough that the one thing circulating through the open windows was an ever-shifting cloud of bugs. As far as Ellis Robbinson was concerned, the only saving grace was that Nancy was sitting in the middle. He kept his eyes glued to the right, sightlessly watching the passing trees, but his mind was completely focused on the soft touch of her thigh and occasionally her breast as she jostled him every time her husband hit a root or pothole.
Nancy was clearly not as distracted. “Damn, Mel. Do we always have to drive so far out?” she asked, reaching to steady herself on the scarred and dented dashboard after one impressive lurch.
Mel would not be pushed out of the good mood he’d been in all morning. “Well,” he answered, smiling broadly, “I considered asking the state police if their firing range was available, but then I figured, you know, if I do that, it would just be nag, nag, nag, all day long.”
He laughed uproariously, and despite herself, so did Nancy. In truth, on days like today, he reminded her of the man she married—making love when they woke up, saying nice things about the breakfast she fixed, being civil to Ellis when they picked him up at