The Third Fan: A Reed Ferguson Mystery (A Private Investigator Mystery Series - Crime Suspense Thriller Book 9)

by Renee Pawlish

  “I’m Wilbur Dennison, but everyone calls me Wil.”

  “Wil, as long as you keep this to yourself, you have nothing to worry about.”

  “Of course, sir. Is there anything else I can do?”

  “That’s it.”

  I whirled around and walked away before he thought to ask me for my name or badge number, which of course I didn’t have. Instead of going down the same escalator, I continued on until I found a wide set of stairs. I took them down to the main concourse, strolled along the first base side, then up a different escalator to our seats on the upper deck.

  “What happened?” Willie asked after I sat down.

  Cal and the Goofball Brothers leaned over so they could hear me tell them about my adventure on the Club Level.

  “I feel kind of bad about lying to that usher,” I concluded. “But I needed the information.”

  “The poor guy won’t look at any of the fans in his section the same way again,” Willie said.

  “And what about the old guy you talked to?” Ace grinned at Willie, then turned to me. “Reed, you should’ve seen her. She acted like she was lost and he kept telling her where to go, and she would get confused and ask him again and point the wrong way. By the time we left him, he thought we were all crazy.”

  “She was good,” Deuce agreed. “That usher didn’t know what was going on.”

  I laughed. “You were good, hon,” I said to her.

  “Thanks.” Willie pecked my cheek. “Now what are you going to do?”

  “I need Cal to help me find who buys those season tickets.”

  “That shouldn’t be too hard,” Cal said. “When do you want to do this?”

  “Now?”

  “I thought you’d never ask.” He stood up and looked down at Willie. “Sorry, but I’m not a sports fan.”

  “It’s okay,” she said, then turned back to me. “What if the boys and I stay and watch the rest of the game? Or do you need our help?”

  I shook my head. “You’ve all been a big help.”

  “Okay,” Deuce said. “We’ll see you later, then.” He focused on the game.

  “That’s my cue to leave,” I murmured to Willie.

  “Uh-huh.” I kissed her, and Cal and I left.

  ***

  “This is more like it,” Cal said.

  We were sitting at my kitchen table. I had opened a beer, while Cal sat with his laptop open. I’d put on an 80s alternative mix CD and I almost felt as if Cal and I were back in our college apartment, working on homework.

  I tipped my bottle at him. “You’re back where you belong, in front of a computer.”

  “You said it.”

  “Hey, helping me this time didn’t involve any danger.”

  He glanced at me over the laptop. “Don’t be so sure of that. My heart rate still hasn’t returned to normal.”

  I laughed. “Oh, the horror.”

  He ignored my mocking. “Okay, what are the seat numbers the usher gave you?” I gave them to him and he started typing. I peeled at the label on my beer while he worked. “Huh,” he said a few minutes later.

  I leaned forward. “What?”

  “Cherry Creek Family Practice buys the tickets.”

  “It’s a business?”

  “Doctors,” Cal said. “Let me Google them.” He paused. “It’s a practice with three doctors: Florence Bascomb, Theodore Grassbauer, and George Prados.”

  “It’ll take too long to visit them all.” I stared into space and ran through my conversation with the usher. “Wil said those three women are in college.” I pointed at Cal’s laptop. “See if any of the doctors have college-aged daughters.”

  “Oh, that’s not a bad idea. And who’s Wil?”

  “The usher I talked to.”

  He focused on the screen. “This is going to take a little longer.”

  “You want anything to eat?”

  “No, I had a hot dog at the stadium,” he said as he typed.

  “I didn’t,” I said, “and I’m hungry.” I got up and warmed up some leftover pizza. “Oh, I forgot to tell you. Mom sent a ring from her grandmother.” I went into the bedroom, grabbed the ring from my nightstand drawer, where I’d hidden it, and returned to the kitchen. “What do you think?” I held up the ring.

  He sat back. “Oh, Reed, this is all so sudden!”

  “Ha ha,” I said. “Do you think Willie will like it?”

  He examined the ring closely. “I think it’s perfect.” He started typing again. “When are you going to ask her?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. I leaned against the counter and ate a piece of pizza while I talked. “When this case is solved, I guess. I want everything to be perfect, so I don’t want to be distracted.”

  “Yeah, because you’ll be nervous enough as it is.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Okay, here we go.” He sat back again and gestured at the screen. I came around the table and glanced over his shoulder. “Two of the doctors have college-age daughters: Florence Bascomb and Theodore Grassbauer. We can eliminate George Prados because he has two sons and they’re both in their forties.”

  “Okay, can you –”

  He held up a hand. “I’m not finished.”

  “Sorry,” I murmured.

  “Florence Bascomb’s daughter is named Sharonda. She’s twenty-one and goes to Yale.”

  “Not bad.”

  “It’s not Harvard.”

  “True,” I said. Both Cal and I had graduated from Harvard, Yale’s main rival. But where he had breezed through, I’d struggled much more.

  “And Theodore Grassbauer’s daughter is twenty. Her name is Haley and she goes to CU.” The University of Colorado is located in Boulder, a city thirty miles northwest of Denver.

  “Can you pull up driver’s license photos of the two girls?”

  “Hang on.”

  He did more of his hacker magic and a moment later we were staring at photos of two young women. Sharonda was the pencil-thin African-American girl.

  “She’s prettier in person,” I said.

  Cal snorted. “Tell me what driver’s license photo is good.”

  “True.”

  Haley Grassbauer was the taller one with dark hair.

  “Neither one is the girl in the camo cap who keeps hanging around Charlie’s condo,” I said.

  “But one of these two,” Cal pointed at the screen, “knows who she is and how to get in touch with her.”

  I nodded. “I’ll have to talk to both of them.” I ran a hand through my hair. “I wonder if they both live with their parents.”

  “Why?”

  “I really don’t want to visit them at their parents’ houses and have to explain what’s going on to the good doctors. And since Sharonda goes to college out-of-state, I’ll bet she lives at home during the summer.”

  “Let me check.” A pause and then he said, “Yep, she lives with her parents. Or her mother, to be exact. Looks like the Bascombs are divorced.”

  “What about Haley?” I said. “Maybe she lives in Boulder.”

  Cal turned back to the laptop and typed. “I can’t find an address for her, other than her parents. But…” he paused. I waited. “You’re in luck. She’s taking some summer classes. Here’s her schedule.”

  “Good work!” I looked at the screen where Cal had pulled up her class schedule. “She’s got a ‘Women and Religion’ class tomorrow morning at ten, and nothing else for the rest of the day. I can go up to Boulder and talk to her there.”

  “And never have to bother her parents,” Cal said.

  I nodded. “And hopefully she’ll tell me who the third fan is.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Haley’s “Women and Religion” class was held in Eaton Humanities from 10 to 10:50 on Saturdays. I wouldn’t have thought it was the ideal day to take a class, although it would leave students time to work during the week, if they wanted to. The University of Colorado’s sprawling main campus is nestled at the base of the Ro
cky Mountains, and the setting is spectacular. All the buildings on campus have rough-sandstone walls and red-tiled roofs, creating a unified effect that is beautiful.

  The temperature had already climbed into the eighties as I walked from a parking lot on the southeast side of campus to the Eaton Humanities building, which is on the north side of the Norlin Quadrangle, the center of the main campus.

  Haley’s class was in Room 205. It was just past 9:30 when I strolled into Eaton and upstairs. I checked the room, but it was empty. Too early for any students, but no professor either. I milled around the hallway and killed time by checking some bulletin boards on the walls. And I kept my eye on the door. The first student for the “Women and Religion” class was a petite girl who arrived ten minutes early and disappeared into the room.

  Man, was I ever that young?

  A few minutes later, more students – mostly young women – arrived, and then an older woman in tan slacks and a short-sleeved red blouse came up the stairs. She carried a worn briefcase and had a stack of papers under one arm.

  The professor, the Great Detective deduced.

  Then right before ten, two more women ran up the stairs. One was tall with dark hair – Haley. She wore khaki shorts and a low-cut T-shirt. She carried a small backpack slung over one shoulder. I let her walk past me and into the room. I’d talk to her afterward, when she wouldn’t be rushing.

  I didn’t want to draw attention to myself, so I went outside and sat under a tree near the building. Some students milled about the quadrangle, but since it was summer, I’m sure it was less crowded than normal. I’d worn slacks and a dress shirt as I was going for the professional private-investigator look. But as the sun beat down on me, I was soon sweating. I got up and strolled back into the building. The hallway wasn’t air-conditioned, so it was still warm, but not as bad as outside. I paced the hall.

  At ten-fifty, the class ended and students streamed out of the room, some hurrying, others slow and meandering. Then Haley walked out of the room and past me. I followed her downstairs and outside. She started across the quadrangle and I hurried to catch up with her.

  “Haley?” I called out.

  She stopped and turned around. “Yes?”

  “My name is Marlowe,” I said, again using Chandler’s detective as my pseudonym. I pulled out my wallet, flipped to my cheap private investigator’s license –which was getting a good workout – did my usual flash-it-quick trick, and then put my wallet back in my pocket. It fooled her.

  “What’s going on?” she asked, worry lines creeping around the edges of her eyes.

  “I’m hoping you can help me find someone,” I said. “I just need a few moments of your time.” I gestured at a picnic table that sat under a huge maple tree to our left. “How about we sit down?” I hoped that by staying in the open she’d feel more comfortable and not wonder if I was some creep posing as a cop.

  “Okay.” She studied me, apparently concluding I didn’t pose a danger to her. “I guess I can.”

  We walked over to the table. She sat down on one side and waited while I took a seat across from her. Then she said, “Am I in some kind of trouble?”

  “Not at all. Like I said, I’m trying to locate a friend of yours.”

  “Who?” Caution in her voice.

  “That’s the problem. I don’t know her name, but I know you go with her to Rockies games, along with Sharonda Bascomb, and you’ve watched Charlie Preston’s condo with her.”

  Pink appeared in her cheeks and she looked away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She reached up and began twisting a strand of hair.

  “You’re not a good liar. Not only has Charlie seen you three several times, I saw you, too.”

  She stayed quiet. I waited. “We didn’t think it was hurting anything,” she finally whispered. “We think Charlie’s cute.” She threw me a wan smile.

  “It’s okay. My girlfriend thinks he’s cute, too,” I said.

  She let out a small laugh. “You probably think we’re silly.”

  “Not at all.”

  She stared past me for a moment and watched a squirrel run across the grass near us. “So Charlie noticed us.”

  “Yes.”

  “We weren’t going to do anything. He was so nice when we met him and got his autograph, and it kinda went on from there.”

  “I get it,” I said. She seemed to soften so I pressed forward carefully. “But you know what kind of trouble Charlie’s in, right?”

  “Yeah, I read about it online.” She gasped. “You don’t think we had something to do with that!”

  “No, but Charlie hired me to clear his name.”

  “So he’s innocent.”

  “That’s what I’m trying to prove.”

  “He didn’t do it,” she said with force.

  “How do you know?”

  “He’s too nice.” She gave a weak smile. “I know, that won’t stand up in court.”

  “Afraid not.”

  “What do you need from us? We’re just three crazy fans.”

  I put my hands on the table, a gesture conveying that I wasn’t hiding anything. Nothing up my sleeves. “I need to talk to your friend, the one with the tattoo on her neck.”

  “Trisha? Why do you want to talk to her? She –” Haley stopped. “You don’t think she killed that guy?”

  I turned it back on her. “Do you?”

  “No way! Trisha may be a little obsessed with Charlie, but she’s sweet. There’s no way she could do something like that.”

  “Tell me about Trisha. What’s her last name?”

  “Appleton,” she blurted out, then she grimaced with regret.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “I just want to know a little more about her.”

  “She’s nice, smart. She loves animals and she wants to be a vet. And she loves baseball.”

  “She’s in school, like you, right?”

  “At DU.” That was the University of Denver – a good school. “She’s got a place of her own, down near the campus.” Jealousy in her tone.

  “What do you think about Trisha’s…obsession with Charlie?”

  “It’s a little nuts, I guess. She hoped that she could get a date with Charlie, and she was trying to figure out a way to get introduced to him. I think she even went to his friend’s house to see if she could talk him into a meeting with Charlie.”

  “You mean Pete Westhaven? That’s Charlie’s friend she went to talk to?”

  “She talked about it. I don’t know if she ever actually met with him.”

  “Trisha’s been hanging around Charlie’s condo a lot since Pete Westhaven was killed, and I think I saw her the other night at Pete’s apartment. Was she jealous of Pete’s friendship with Charlie?”

  “No, no way.” She shook her head to punctuate her words. “I see where you’re going with this. You think instead of talking to that guy, she might’ve killed him, but I’ve known Trisha since grade school. She wouldn’t harm a fly.”

  “I didn’t say she would.” Although I was wondering if Trisha was crazy enough to kill Pete. But how would she have gotten Charlie’s gun? Had she been in Charlie’s condo without his knowing? “Has she been acting different lately?”

  She mulled that over. “She has been a little weird the last week, almost scared.”

  “What’s she scared about?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I need to talk to Trisha,” I said. “If she didn’t do anything, then she doesn’t have anything to worry about. But she might have information about Pete’s death.”

  Haley twisted her hair some more. “Like what?”

  “That’s what I’d like to find out.”

  “I don’t know,” she said slowly.

  “Please, it’s important.” I treaded carefully. “Tell you what. Call her and get her to meet me some place public. That way she knows I don’t mean her any harm. I need to talk to her,” I repeated.

  She thought for a moment. “I guess I could do
that.”

  I waited. Her eyes darted all around, then she made eye contact and finally pulled a phone from her backpack. She looked at the phone, slowly touched the screen, and put the phone to her ear.

  “Hey,” she said a moment later. There was small talk for a moment and then she said, “You’re never going to believe who I’m talking to. A private investigator.” Haley told Trisha about me and that I wanted to meet with her. “Yeah, he’ll meet you someplace public.” A pause. “He’s trying to help Charlie Preston.” Another pause and she eyed me critically. “Yeah, I trust him.” She nodded then, as if Trisha could see her. “He’s wearing blue pants and a white shirt. Yeah, he’s kind of old.”

  Oh, that was harsh.

  “And he knows what you look like,” she continued. She listened for a moment and then ended the call.

  She looked up at me. “She’ll meet you at Kaladi’s, on Evans, just west of DU, at one.”

  “Kaladi’s?” I glanced at my watch. 11:15. I hoped I could make it in time.

  An eye roll. “It’s a coffee house.”

  “Right.” A place that served coffee seemed to be the meeting place of choice these days. I reached out and shook her hand. “Thanks.”

  “Sure,” she said. “I hope it helps Charlie, and makes you believe we didn’t have anything to do with that guy’s murder.”

  “It will.”

  I stood up to go.

  “Hey, how did you know about Sharonda and me, but not Trisha?” she asked suddenly.

  “I have ways,” I said.

  She frowned. “I think my stalking days are over.”

  “Probably a good idea.” I thanked her again and hurried back through the quadrangle and across campus to my car.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  An hour and forty-five minutes sounded like plenty of time to get from Boulder back to Denver, but by the time I walked back to my car, got out of Boulder, then fought traffic along I-36 east to I-25 and past downtown Denver to Evans Avenue, it was almost one. I headed west on Evans past the University of Denver campus and soon saw Kaladi Brothers Coffee. I parked on a side street off Evans and walked back to the shop.