Free Repairman Jack [07]-Gateways by F. Paul Wilson Page B

tried to think of a public figure who was a true straight shooter, whose integrity was beyond reproach, but came up blank. There had to be somebody. But no one came to mind. He almost said Mr. Deeds but Adam Sandler had screwed up that reference.
    “He’s like Casper Milquetoast.” Jack saw no hint of recognition in Hernandez’s face. “He’s a regular everyday Joe who minds his own business and doesn’t take chances. My dad is not a risk taker.” Jack didn’t want to call him timid, because he wasn’t. Once he took a position he could be a bulldog about defending it. “He lived in Jersey most of his life, not fifty miles from Atlantic City, and in all that time I don’t think he once visited the casinos. So the idea of him being involved in something even remotely criminal is, well, crazy.”
    Hernandez shrugged. “Doesn’t have to be criminal. He could have been fooling around with the wrong guy’s wife or—”
    Jack held up his hands. “Wait. Stop. Not him. I promise you. No way.”
    Hernandez was studying him.
    Uh-oh. Here it comes.
    “Do you live around here?”
    “No. I’m still in Jersey.” Where did Tyleski live? All these identities…after a while they ran together in his head. “In Hoboken.”
    “How often do you see your father? How many times a year do you visit him?”
    “He hasn’t been here that long. Less than a year.”
    “And?”
    “And this is my first visit.”
    “Do you talk often?”
    “Uh, no.”
    “Then you really don’t know that much about your father’s life down here.”
    Jack sighed. There it was again. “I guess not. But I know what kind of man he is, and he’s not a sneak or a liar, and people who are have no place in his life.”
    But how much more do I know? he wondered. What do you know about anyone, even someone who raised you, beyond how they act and what they’ve told you about themselves?
    Anya’s comment from this afternoon stole back to him: Trust me, kiddo, there’s more to your father than you ever dreamed .
    He hadn’t paid much attention to it then, but now with Dad the victim of a hit-and-run accident in the middle…
    “Say, if he got hit in the middle of nowhere…” He turned to Anita. “Didn’t you say a call came in?”
    She nodded. “It’s in the report.”
    “But that means someone must have witnessed it.”
    “That’s the obvious conclusion but…” Hernandez’s macho cop persona wavered. Just a little.
    “But what?”
    “Well, it took me about twenty minutes to reach the intersection, and when I got there, your father’s car was the only vehicle at the scene and it looked like the accident had just happened. The car was sitting across Pemberton Road. From the debris spray I reckoned your father had been proceeding west on Pemberton. He had a stop sign at South. Looked like he was almost halfway across when he got hit. Maybe he hadn’t been paying attention, maybe he ran the stop sign, maybe he was having a little stroke. All I know is that something hit him hard enough to spin the car ninety degrees, and there was no one else in sight when I got there.”
    “Then who called in?” Jack said. “Man or woman?”
    “Tony, the desk sergeant took it. I asked him but he couldn’t tell. Said the person was whispering, real quick like. Said, ‘Bad accident at Pemberton and South. Hurry.’ That was it.”
    “Did they ID the number?”
    Hernandez glanced at Anita. “That’s another thing we can’t figure out. The call came from a pay phone outside the Publix.”
    “Publix? What’s a Publix?”
    “Like a Winn-Dixie.”
    “I’m sorry.” Was this another language they were speaking? “I’m from up north and I still don’t—”
    “Publix is a chain of grocery stores down here,” Anita said. “It’s like…” She snapped her fingers. “I’ve been up your way. What’s it called…? A&P. That’s right. Like an A&P.”
    “Okay. And where’s this Publix?”
    “About three blocks from here.”
    “What? But