"Why not?" Jake agreed, lifting his glass. He thought for a second and then decided to go with what was simple. "To legally sanctioned co-habitation and all of the tax exempt benefits that it represents."
Helen looked at him in alarm for a moment, about to bark at him. But then she looked at the happy couple. Their faces were filled with emotion.
"That was beautiful, Jake," Sharon said. "Thank you."
"You've always had a way with words, Jake," Nerdly agreed, rubbing a tear from his eye.
They clinked their glasses together and drank.
Chapter 12a
Newport Beach, California
May 22, 1989, 11:00 AM
Jake had finally made the decision to get rid of the Corvette that Mindy Snow had bought him years before. It had been an agonizing decision. Though the relationship with Mindy was a semi-painful, semi-lurid memory, he had truly loved that car. But, after almost six years and ninety thousand miles of being driven hard and well, the car was starting to fall apart. The interior was trashed and worn, the paint was fading and chipped, and some major component in the engine would fail every two thousand miles or so, requiring costly and time-consuming repairs. And so, with a heavy heart, he had let it go, selling it for an absurdly large amount of money — more than three times the Kelly Blue Book for that model, year, and mileage — to a collector who wanted to own a genuine Jake Kingsley vehicle.
He had debated buying another Corvette to replace it but had reluctantly decided that another maintenance intensive sports car was not something he wanted to deal with at this stage of his life. After considerable deliberation over different makes, models, and styles of automobile, he finally decided he wanted a high-end luxury car, something that would haul ass if he wanted it to, but that would also have a reliable, low-maintenance engine, comfortable seating, and all the bells and whistles that someone with his income would expect from a motor vehicle.
He was behind the wheel of his choice now. It was a royal blue, 1989 BMW 750 iL. It was the top of the line model for BMW and it was loaded with virtually every accessory available. The sticker price, which Jake had paid in cash, had been sixty-four thousand dollars. It featured leather seats that were electrically adjustable and heated, a $2000 Blaupunkt sound system complete with twelve-CD changer and six speakers, and a twelve cylinder, five liter engine that produced three hundred horsepower and was capable of propelling the car to speeds of one hundred and seventy miles per hour. Not quite as fast as Matt's Maserati, but pretty damn close. He had picked the car up just two days before. The odometer was now showing ninety-three miles on it, more than half of which had been put on during this trip to Newport Beach. As Jake felt the smooth handling of the car, as he felt the barely restrained power of its engine, as he listened to the virtual absence of outside noise that the sound insulation gave him, he thought that maybe he could fall just as much in love with this car as with the Corvette.
He was a little nervous about the trip itself, however. He was on his way to the Gallahad Gardens Correctional Institute to visit Matt, who had been incarcerated there for a week now. Three days after returning home from their international tour, Matt had had his sentencing hearing before Judge Waters and officially received his punishment for the little incident back in November. He had gone in on May 15 and, assuming he did not get into any trouble (something that was doubtful, considering it was Matt they were talking about here), he would accrue one "good time day" for each actual day he served and be released on June 29. And though the GGCI, as it was known, was a privately run jail facility that was reputed to be worlds apart from the county facility Matt could have ended up in if not for the plea bargain, it was still a jail. Jake had been in jail three times in his life — once in Texarkana, once in New York City, and once in Cincinnati — and his memories were of orange suits, horrible food, bars on the doors and windows, guards who liked to thump on people with telephone books, and absolutely no privacy of any kind. He knew that Matt had to be miserable in there and Jake himself was not looking forward to entering such a stifling environment, even as a visitor.
He was on Highway 1, just outside of Newport Beach and just west of Costa Mesa. This part of the coast was very hilly and rugged. As the highway crested one of the hills, giving a spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean, Jake found himself driving alongside an ornate wrought iron fence surrounded with shrubbery. The fence was about ten feet high and small signs every fifty feet or so proclaimed that there was no trespassing as this was private property. Since the turn-off to the entrance of the GGCI was supposed to be less than half a mile in front of him, Jake was forced to conclude that he was looking at the security fence for the facility. He found it strange that there was no razor wire atop the fence, no chain link beyond it. If someone wanted to escape from the facility it would be child's play to scale the fence.
Exactly half a mile from the first sighting of the fence, a paved access road led off to the northeast from Highway 1. A simple sign with an arrow proclaimed that this was the Gallahad Gardens Correctional Institute and that you should turn right if you wanted to go there. Jake turned right onto the road, which was lined with date palms on both sides. Another sign told him there was a guard booth ahead and that all visitors much check in and were subjected to search. His nervousness ramped up a few notches. He was entering a goddamn prison.
The first surprise of the day came when he stopped at the guard booth. It was a simple glass and steel booth with two men inside of it. They were not wearing the uniforms of prison guards, but were instead dressed in suits and ties. They carried no weapons upon them. Their faces were neatly groomed and their expressions were subservient instead of interrogating.
"Good morning, sir," one of them greeted Jake as he stopped and rolled down his window. "Are you here to visit one of our guests?"
"Your guests?" Jake asked.
"Yes, sir," the guard said. "If you'll forgive my impertinence, I do recognize you, sir. You are Jake Kingsley, correct?"
"Uh... yeah," Jake said. "I am."
"Then you would be here to visit Mr. Tisdale?"
"Yeah, that's right," Jake said.
"Very good," the guard said, tapping a few things on a computer screen. "I have you registered as a visitor today. You may proceed to the visitor parking area. Just follow this road and there will be signs in front of the main entrance."
"Uh... okay," Jake said.
The guard pushed a button and the gate slid open, allowing him access. Jake was puzzled. Weren't they going to look under his car with a mirror on a pole? Weren't they going to check his identification? Weren't they going to look through his trunk?
"Is there something wrong, Mr. Kingsley?" the guard asked.
"Uh... no," he said. "I guess not."
He dropped the BMW into first gear and pulled forward. The access road wound through a small grove of trees and then came out into the open ground on the other side of it. Now Jake was able to see the prison grounds for the first time. It looked absolutely nothing like a penal institution. The main building was a sprawling, eight-story complex of classic Spanish architecture. There were lots of windows on the building. It looked more like a luxury hotel than anything else. Surrounding the main building were acres of meticulously groomed lawns, gardens, tree groves, and even a putting green and a row of tennis courts. There were no gun towers anywhere that he could see, no guards roaming around with rifles.
The access road led him to a large circular driveway in front of the main entrance. A sign here read VISITORS AND NEWLY ARRIVING GUESTS, PLEASE WAIT HERE FOR VALET SERVICE.
"Freakin' valet service?" Jake muttered. "You gotta be shittin' me."
They weren't shitting him. The moment he stopped his car, two men dressed in the same style of suit as the gate guard emerged from a small booth beside the building. They walked over and opened Jake's door for him.