by Gemma Bruce
When he finally closed the binder, it was late. The beer was gone, and the crickets had stopped their nightly serenade. They’d sung the night J.T. had come for dinner.
But now she was gone and he was going to bed alone. He stood up, swayed on his feet. He was drunk and lonely.
His life was so fucked.
Chapter 27
J.T. awoke in a strange bed on top of the covers, surrounded by papers, foils of half-eaten food, a sleeping laptop, and Good Morning America. She stared blearily around the darkened room until she found a crack of light. She rolled off the bed and stumbled toward it, pulled the drapes apart, and discovered sunlight.
Shit. It was the next day and she hadn’t figured out how to get started. But she had a new respect for investigative reporters. She’d completed a substantial list of suspects and witnesses before it occurred to her that she couldn’t interview people if she didn’t want them to know she was back in town.
And she knew the success rate of interviewing hostile witnesses via cell phone. None. She’d have to try a different approach. She sat down in front of the television and surfed the channels until she came to CNN. More terrorists, not even a ticker tape about Tommy’s arrest.
For a second, hope swelled that it had already blown over. She tuned into her least favorite network. Of course, they would latch on to the story. Two interviewees were yammering on about sports and the corruption of family values.
She turned off the television, showered, and dressed in her new clothes, tore a banana off the bunch, and opened her door. A copy of USA Today was on the floor. She opened it to the sports section. Just a few paragraphs of facts. A quote from the Galaxy’s general manager that must have been retrieved by phone. “I’ve known Tommy Bainbridge for years. Everyone knows his stand on drugs. This is obviously some disgruntled player seeking vengeance.”
Good for him. He made up for the fools on the television.
She drove to the mall to pick up a copy of Sports Today from the newsstand. If Skinny hadn’t printed the retraction, she didn’t know what she’d do, except that it would involve tearing him apart, slowly and very painfully.
But he’d been good to his word, or at least to her threat. The papers were still bundled together. But she could see the Headlines. SPORTS TODAY APOLOGIZES.
She waited impatiently for the clerk to cut the twine. She bought two copies and looked for the nearest coffee.
She sat at one of the little tables at the back of the coffee bar, where she could slip off her sunglasses to read. Skinny had printed her entire article for a change, with a paragraph at the beginning personally apologizing to Tommy Bainbridge for printing a story without having all the facts.
J.T. leaned back in the chair to bask in her success. She didn’t have false hope about it completely erasing the stigma the first article had created—some people would stick to the “no smoke without fire” philosophy. But she intended to do a lot more.
She’d already fielded several calls from fellow journalists, some seeking information, some just wanting to cuss her out. But she gave each one the full scoop as she knew it. More calls had come in during the night, and she expected more, once everyone had gotten a look at today’s ST.
But she could answer calls anywhere. She needed to start delving into who was responsible for the article in the first place. That would require her to go into Gilbeytown proper and try to ferret out some facts before someone recognized her and rode her out on a rail.
Tommy stared down at the copy of Sports Today his brother-in-law had just dropped off. Bill had seen it when he’d stopped at the 7-Eleven on his way home from work. He’d brought it straight to Tommy.
Tommy’s mood alternated between confusion, disbelief, gratefulness, and relief. And awe. How had J.T. managed to get it printed so quickly? She would have had to write it as soon as she left the locker room.
But not back at the Night n Day. She’d already left by the time he’d gone to look for her and found only her discarded binder. She must have stopped somewhere on the highway to write it and send it off.
She was probably halfway to Atlanta by now. He’d called her twice more, not really expecting her to answer. He’d played this game with her before. Only this time there was much more at stake.
He’d hurt her. Questioned her integrity and her loyalty to him. He wouldn’t blame her if she never forgave him.
For a minute he considered just hopping on a plane and meeting her in Atlanta when she got back. But he was still under arrest and any flight might look suspicious. He’d already consulted with his lawyers and his agent that morning. His agent had sent out a press release denying the charges. His lawyers were preparing a boilerplate suit for whenever they caught whoever had written it.
Then he began returning phone calls. Answering questions, laughing it off with some, expressing outrage with others. He was exhausted and it wasn’t even lunchtime. By noon, he’d returned a good chunk of them. That was when he started hearing that J.T. had also been returning their calls. But not his.
“What a girl,” said Collin Alms from USA Today. “She explained everything. We’ve got it going to press right now. She’s a good person to have on your team, Tommy. Good luck.”
Tommy hung up. Except that she wasn’t on his team. She was gone. He read the article again, amazed at what she’d written. Did she really see him like that? As some kind of hometown hero.
She’d not for a second questioned his innocence. She’d defended him to Jeff Whitelaw. Told him she would stand by him. She came through in spades.
And he’d let her down.
The phone calls started again; everyone wanted to know his reaction to the retraction. He was generous, excused ST’s mistake. Told them he never once worried about the obvious ploy to attack his character. Told them how he felt about J.T.’s own integrity being put at risk. And how brave she was. Now, if he could just say those things to Jess.
He only hoped that she would read about it. Then maybe she would call him back.
Tommy could kick himself for not having the presence of mind to stand up for J.T. like she had for him. Then they could be working together, instead of him standing here alone and her hundreds of miles away.
But that was life. Tommy hadn’t doubted her. He’d been stunned. And now he’d have to depend on his own wits to discover who was behind the smear campaign. He had no idea who could have orchestrated it, who had known that he was being arrested and had been able to leak it to the press so quickly.
Jeff had wondered, too. But the only answer he’d gotten from the newsmen was “anonymous tip” before he shut the door in their faces.
It had to be part of the bigger plan to destroy the Beavers. But what was Kurtz getting out of it?
Kurtz could have planted the drugs in his car. He had access to Tommy’s locker. He could have lifted the keys and returned them without anyone noticing. So could anyone on the team and half the front office. And what had he ever done to Kurtz?
Except get him suspended. Tommy didn’t really believe the scout had come to see him personally. Kurtz was never going to make it back to the big leagues, not even to the minors. And he certainly couldn’t have written a newspaper article, signed J.T.’s name to it, and sent it off for publication. Especially not in a matter of hours.
For the life of him, Tommy couldn’t think of anyone capable of something this well planned. Except maybe Charlie Wiggins.
Charlie wasn’t stupid, just single minded. But Tommy had a hard time imagining Charlie going to such lengths even for his pet project. Besides, Tommy owned the factory. There was no way for Charlie to get it back. Unless he thought that with Tommy in jail, he could reclaim the property under the eminent domain statute.
Too far fetched. Too desperate. But if not Charlie, who?
J.T. pulled the Taurus over to the curb and slumped down in the seat to eat her takeout. It was a hot day and she kept the engine running to pump air-conditioning onto her heated body and restless mind
.
She’d been driving around aimlessly trying to come up with a plan. What did she think she could accomplish by coming back to Gilbeytown? She didn’t know how to investigate. Didn’t even know anybody to call for advice.
She was used to being where the action was, reporting on what was happening, not trying to figure out the machinations of evil minds. After her brief spurt of defiance, she was left feeling totally stupid. The Coach hadn’t even tried calling her back. Probably didn’t care.
Skinny had left a terse message on her voice mail. Two special editions in one week cost a fortune. Tough shit. But he should have checked his sources. Anybody with a brain could tell she didn’t write that first article.
Tommy has a brain and he didn’t know. She shut that voice up. J.T. was afraid to think about Tommy. Afraid to look too closely at the real reason she was here.
She hated having left him when he needed her. Except that he didn’t need her. He had lawyers and agents and had probably hired a whole battalion of private detectives. Maybe she should hire a private detective, because she was batting zero.
She’d managed to work herself into such a brown study that she almost missed the white SUV passing by.
She sat up. It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t dare show his face in town. She was so surprised that for a few seconds she just stared after it. Then she tossed her sandwich onto the passenger seat and followed it—right back to the Holiday Inn Express.
Okay. It might be a coincidence. There were a lot of white SUVs. It was probably just some guy in a white car. She slowed to a crawl and watched him drive around to the back of the motel. She waited several heartbeats and drove after him.
She rounded the corner of the building just in time to see Bobby Kurtz get out of the car, quickly look around before inserting his key card into the door, and let himself inside.
Now what was he up to? Not going to practice that was for sure. She had no doubt that Bernie had fired him by now. And if not, the other players would tear him limb from limb. But what other reasons would he have for staying? If he had more interviews, he would have chosen a motel closer to the big stations in Pittsburgh.
So there had to be some other, more compelling reason. She was onto something. What it was, she didn’t know. And she didn’t have a clue as to what she was going to do about it.
Tommy finally went to the field just to keep his mind off J.T. He walked into an empty locker room. A copy of Sports Today lay discarded on the table. He went outside.
The bullpen was busy. Bernie was working with Frankenberger at shortstop. The bench coach was hitting line drives toward him. The rest of the team was running laps around the field, except for Sanchez, who was back at practice but still on the disabled list.
Tommy wandered over to him.
Sanchez looked up, nodded, then looked back at the field.
Tommy looked, too, thinking about his own beginnings in baseball and wondering what his life was going to be like now that he’d moved on. Bernie caught sight of him and made his way off the infield.
“Did you see the retraction? I feel like shit.”
“Me, too,” Tommy agreed. “And she won’t return my calls.”
“Yeah, but who could have guessed something like this would happen? Have you ever heard of anything like it?”
“No. But whoever is doing this is getting desperate. Think about it. The Beavers win. That night, Kurtz comes out with the photo in the tabloid. That got nixed. So they plant drugs in my car. I get out of jail, and someone writes that article and puts J.T.’s name on it. They’re trying to get us out of the way.”
“You keep saying ‘them.’ You make it sound like a conspiracy.”
“It is. A conspiracy to keep us from upsetting the plans for building a new stadium.”
Bernie looked at him like he was crazy. Finally he said, “Yeah, okay, I see it. But who?”
“I’ve been asking myself the same question. I don’t think Kurtz could have pulled it off by himself.”
“He had that article and he could have planted the drugs in your trunk. None of the other guys here would do something like that.”
“I know, but could he write an article and send it in to ST?”
Bernie reached for his antacids. “No.” He chewed, swallowed. “So who did?”
Tommy wasn’t ready to accuse the mayor, but he couldn’t come up with another suspect. “I don’t know.”
“Aw, shit. What are we going to do?”
“Well,” said Tommy. “I don’t know about you, but I’d like to talk to Kurtz. I don’t think he could have figured any of this out on his own. He must be doing it for someone else.”
“The knees, Frankenberger. Bend down to the ball, not over to it…. Well, you won’t find Kurtz here.”
“Did you send him packing?”
Bernie grunted. “If it was up to me. But Larry nixed that. Kurtz has a contract for the season. He’s suspended and he won’t see another game with this team if I can help it.
“The guys say he packed out of the Night n Day. And I say good riddance. Stiffed Harriett and Hank for the last two weeks. I’ll find a way to pay ’em. I hope he’s way the hell out of here.”
Tommy shook his head. “Do you think he really checked himself into rehab?”
Bernie gave him a look. “Got any other dumbass questions? Frankenberger, damn it!”
“So where is he?”
“I don’t know, don’t care. As long as he’s not here. Maybe he told Larry.”
They stood for another minute watching the playing field. Frankenberger was all legs. Now if he could just get them coordinated.
Bernie shook his head at the shortstop. “What a dumbass thing for Kurtz to do. Did he really think a better team, hell, any team, would take him after this? Damn that kid.” Bernie hopped out of the dugout and swung his way out to the second baseline to correct Frankenberger. Tommy went to find Larry.
He was in his office, fielding calls. “Haven’t heard from him. Been hearing from everybody else, though. A real popular guy. Drops a bombshell like he did, then drops out of sight. Sorry this happened, Tommy. It can’t be doing your image any good.”
“No. Mine, nor J.T.’s.”
“Screw J.T. None of this would have happened if she hadn’t stuck her nose into things in the first place.”
Tommy frowned at him. “How do you figure that?”
“Come on, Tommy, don’t tell me she didn’t push you into asking for that drug test.”
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this. You would have let it slide if J.T. or I hadn’t brought it to your attention?”
“I’m just saying that things were fine before she came. Now, she’s flown. Good riddance. Maybe we can get back to playing some ball.”
Tommy couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You weren’t fine. Two players are nabbed by the Feds, Pisano is mugged, Sanchez is a victim of hit-and-run, drugs in my trunk? How much has to happen before you see what’s sitting in front of you?”
Larry interrupted. “I know, I know, but it was just a run of bad luck. It happens. And maybe Kurtz had it out for you, but it wasn’t some big conspiracy like J.T. Green told the whole damn world. We look like a bunch of fools.”
“You are a fool if you would have let Kurtz play in his condition.”
“We would have suspended him eventually. But no, you two had to have your drug test. One more day and Kurtz woulda been picked up by the minors and he’d be their problem.”
“You can’t tell me the Hurricanes sent a scout—” Tommy stopped. “Is Charlie Wiggins negotiating to move the Hurricanes here to the new stadium?”
Larry shrugged. “How should I know?”
“You sat with them at the game.”
“Hell, I was just being polite.”
“And you didn’t overhear anything? Get a feeling for what was going down?”
“No. They just watched the game and that was it. I thought he was here for Kurtz.”
“Gi
ve me a break. The Hurricanes never had any intention of drafting him. And they wouldn’t waste their time coming here unless it was to listen to the mayor’s offer.”
Larry gave him a long look. “Don’t get your hopes up, Tommy. You may have bought the factory. They’ll just find another place for the stadium. The writing’s on the wall for the Beavers.”
“I can’t believe I’m hearing this from you. Are you at least looking for relocation possibilities?”
Larry shook his head. “The owners aren’t interested. They’ll declare a chapter eleven or something and bail. No one is going to pick up this team. We’ll try to place what players we can, but there aren’t many openings out there. Bernie will get another job somewhere, maybe retire. I don’t know about the other coaches. They’re probably thinking ahead.”
“And what about you?”
“I’m thinking ahead, too.”
“To what?”
Larry just shrugged. The telephone rang.
Tommy walked out. Disgusted with Larry for not trying harder. Disgusted with himself for letting J.T. walk out of his life. Sick at heart.
Maybe the writing was on the wall and the Beavers had run their full course. Maybe he should just sign with one of the sports stations and forget about Gilbeytown. That is if anyone still wanted him.
So far he’d let the commentators handle the coverage. He probably should grant a few interviews. Fly to New York to appear on one of the sports talk shows. Or go to Atlanta and appear on CNN.
He’d go to Atlanta. That was the smartest idea he’d had since the whole stupid thing had started.
It was a rotten time to leave the Bucks. They’d just lost J.T. and had their world shaken. But he’d meet with them before he left. Explain things. Tell them he was coming back and get on the next plane.
Tommy was halfway home before he remembered that he was still officially under arrest.