Fade Route (Burnside Mystery 2)

by Chill, David

  Crystal finally spoke. "I believe I'd like to put that event behind me. So much has happened since, it almost seems trivial by comparison."

  "Whatever you think is best," I said.

  She shifted around in her chair. "So you found out Callison was corrupt."

  I nodded. "Callison was corrupt."

  "And now he's out of office."

  "Right. Unlike love, there aren't many second chances in politics. One false step and..." I held out my left palm and flipped it over to signify something falling. "Kaput."

  "Did Wayne know about this?" she asked.

  "If he did, he kept mum about it."

  Crystal took a deep breath and looked down at the floor. "And have you learned anything about who killed my husband?" she asked.

  "I believe I have."

  Her eyes shot up and met mine. Her breathing stopped. "Who?" she whispered in a hoarse voice.

  I shook my head. "Not yet. The police are running some tests. All I can tell you is we should have an answer soon. Maybe today. Maybe tomorrow."

  "Can you give me any idea?"

  "No," I said. "Not until they're taken into custody."

  "Did it have anything to do with T & R? Or the election?"

  "No on both counts. And I simply can't tell you anymore. You'll find out soon enough."

  I left it at that, and despite Crystal's prodding I gave her no further information. I wanted to be absolutely positive. There was no margin for error here.

  *

  At four o'clock I called Barney Sack's office but all I got was a busy signal. One of the nice things about my iPhone was the ability to call someone over and over with the tap of a button. So for the next twenty minutes I let my phone do most of the work. As I was beginning to wonder if the receiver had been taken off its cradle, the busy signal was replaced by a soft ring.

  "Sack, here."

  "At long last, I've finally gotten through. My but you're long winded, Detective."

  "Who the hell is this?" he demanded.

  "This is your friendly neighborhood private eye."

  "Oh, Burnside. I'm glad you called."

  I blinked a few times. "That may be a first," I said. "What've you got?"

  "The prints on that birthday card of Fairborn's matches up perfectly with Nina Lovejoy's business card. I think we've got a winner here, but I doubt there's enough evidence to convict on this alone. We'll go ahead with it because you never know what'll come out of the woodwork. A witness would be a help."

  "Or a confession," I added.

  "They don't come so easy. The days of beating perps with a rubber hose and shining a bright light in their eyes are over. At least in Bay City."

  "I may have an idea. When are you bringing in the suspect?"

  "ASAP. The warrant was issued this morning and we're working with the Harbor division at LAPD for a pickup. For all I know it's already done. It's a bitch to figure out who's got jurisdiction in that City Strip area."

  "True enough," I said. "I may take a ride down there and see what's what."

  "Don't get in the way," he warned.

  "No worries. I have one last piece of business to finish."

  "And hey, Burnside?"

  "Yeah?"

  "I didn't think I'd be saying this, but thanks for your help. You do good work."

  "Aw, Sack. I'll bet you say that to all the PIs."

  The exasperated sigh on the other end of the line was followed by the sharp click of the receiver. I just knew I'd win him over eventually.

  I landed smack in the middle of rush hour. The San Diego freeway moved at a snail's pace for almost an hour, nearly double the time it would take in clear traffic. I exited on Crenshaw and it took another twenty minutes to reach that drab green building with the strips of paint peeling from the exterior. A blue Plymouth Fury was parked in front of the apartment, so I knew Rusty Haas was home. The license plate holder read "Go Irish".

  I noticed a bulky man with a shaved head walk through the alley and toss a bag of garbage into a bin. It landed with a loud clunk. As he walked back towards the front of the building, I moved into his path.

  "Doing a little sprucing up for the little woman?" I asked.

  Rusty stopped. "Burnside. What do you want?"

  "I want to talk to you. I guess it's my good fortune to get here before the police."

  His lips parted slightly. "The police? What are you talking about?"

  "C'mon. It's over. They're swearing out a warrant right now. The name Haas is right on it. It's over. You can't run and you can't hide."

  "I don't know what you're talking about, but I'm gonna kick your ass but good if you don't get out of my way. You got lucky last time, but I'll box your ears, so help me."

  "No you won't," I said and watched Rusty's expression carefully. If I could get him going, I might just get what I needed. "Two people have been murdered and somebody's going to pay. I say it's going to be you."

  "Me?! You're nuts! I didn't kill anybody!"

  "I say you did. And you're going to spend the rest of your life in jail. You'll rot there. Somebody has to pay."

  Rusty's face had turned scarlet and his breath was wheezing through his nostrils. His body was rigid and his fists were clenched. "You're not that tough."

  "Try me."

  "Man I owe you. I should pound your face into pulp. You cocksucker. First, you ruin my career and now you're trying to ruin my life!"

  "You still hold twenty years ago against me?" I asked. "It was a clean hit, Rusty. Fair and square."

  "I never played another down of football again after that play. I made freshman all-America and I was on my way to the NFL. You ended that for me, you prick." He stared angrily at me.

  It had been an overcast day in South Bend many years ago, cold, with the game outlined against the classic blue-grey October sky. USC had been in a real dog fight with Notre Dame, the lead going back and forth all day. The Trojans were winning 17-13, with two minutes left in the game. The Irish had the ball deep in USC territory, at the fifteen yard line, and were faced with a critical third down and short yardage. Notre Dame lined up as if they were going to run the ball up the middle to get the first down. Our defense was playing in tight to stop the run. But the quarterback motioned rapidly with his arms and began calling an audible, changing the play at the line of scrimmage.

  I was at free safety and my job was to be the last line of defense. If anyone got past me it was a touchdown. As the quarterback barked the new play, I saw Rusty move out of his fullback position and began going into motion, trotting laterally across the field. This wasn't supposed to happen. If anything, Rusty would have been the guy to hand the ball off to and run for the first down. Or block for the tailback. And as Rusty moved, I watched our linebackers and none of them reacted. Maybe they didn't see him. maybe they thought someone else would cover him. Maybe they were convinced Rusty was in motion just to get them to spread the field. Open up our defense for a short running play to get the first down. Something felt wrong. It was taking a big chance but I started to drift over and follow Rusty.

  The quarterback took the snap, faked a handoff to the tailback and went back to pass. Rusty started running up the field and then switched direction and began moving towards the corner of the end zone. It was a great call, and most of the defense was fooled. Rusty was running a fade route and no one was covering him.

  I had lined up about ten yards deep, but began backpedaling at the snap of the ball. When the quarterback went back in the pocket to pass, I took off after Rusty at a dead sprint. The quarterback pump faked and then lofted the ball towards him, aiming for his back shoulder. This meant it would be tough to intercept, but the pump fake meant that Rusty would have to slow down and wait a beat for the ball to arrive. That beat was all I needed.

  My back was to the quarterback so I didn't know where the ball was. I had one shot to stop the touchdown, and that was to break up the play and prevent Rusty from catching the pass. I saw Rusty stop and wait while
adjusting his body to where the ball was coming. As it fell into his outstretched hands, I lowered my helmet and launched the full force of my body into his rib cage. I don't know if it was pure luck or divine intervention, but I arrived at the exact moment as the football. I hit Rusty hard. Hard enough to dislodge the ball from his grasp and prevent the touchdown. What happened next would change Rusty's life forever.

  We tumbled out of bounds, and I landed directly on top of him. But somehow Rusty's knee had become twisted and he landed at a strange angle. His anguished scream was jarring and he kept screaming after I rolled off of him. The trainers came racing over to work on him, but after a few minutes they brought a stretcher out and carted him away. He had torn knee ligaments, and back then the medical technology wasn't able to repair this injury in the same way they can today. Rusty's playing career was over. And when the Irish failed to convert on fourth down, USC had won the game.

  In sports, there is an implicit understanding that injuries are part of the game. They are rarely intentional, and even in a long standing rivalry such as USC-Notre Dame, the aim is simply to win. The last thing I ever did on the football field was to intentionally try and hurt another player. I sent Rusty a few letters after the season, extending sympathy. But there was never a response. The USC game turned out to be Rusty's last one in a football uniform.

  "It was unintentional," I said to him, as he stood before me, chest heaving. "It was part of the game. I was just trying to win."

  "You're a cheap shot artist," he snarled. "You ruined my career."

  "It was a clean hit."

  "And now you're trying to take away the rest of my life. With some bullshit allegation that I killed someone! You're nuts."

  "No I'm not."

  "Yes, you are," he growled. "And you're not gonna frame me with some bogus charge!"

  I looked around at the dilapidated surroundings. "Jail couldn't be much worse than this. I don't think you're giving up much."

  With that he charged me, like a raging bull with smoke streaming out of his nose. He lowered his head and wrapped his arms around my waist but I was ready and clapped my hands on his ears to break the grip. I backed up a few paces to give myself some room, and found myself standing on a patch of grass and milkweed. The turf felt a little soft and I surmised it had just been doused with the sprinklers. Rusty didn't seem to notice.

  He came at me again, fists up and anger thundering out of him. I hit him with two left jabs to slow him down and followed with a hard right that caught him on the chin. Stunned but not dissuaded, he continued towards me and flung an overhand left. I ducked under the punch and hit him with a flurry of punches to the midsection and finished with a left hook to the nose. He bent over for a minute to catch his breath. A few grade school kids stood across the street watching in earnest. This was undoubtedly better than TV.

  Having regained his composure, Rusty started for me once more, albeit a little more warily this time. We bobbed and feigned at one another for ten seconds before Rusty charged and threw a roundhouse right at my ear. I reached up and blocked it with my left wrist and the explosion of pain I felt shoot up my arm was enough to completely immobilize me. Grimacing at the intense pain, I sensed my body recoil backwards.

  The next thing I knew, my face was being pounded savagely and I shortly found myself down on both knees, feeling woozy. I stooped over and drew my arms up to protect my face and head. Rusty grabbed at my arms, trying to separate them. Gathering my reserves, I looked down and saw he was wearing sneakers with cleats, and an idea from a long time ago sprang into my mind.

  There is a common misperception among football fans that linemen are not very bright. That the size of a player's body is inversely related to their I.Q. Nothing could be further from the truth. Offensive linemen are often the smartest players on the team. During my sophomore year at USC my roommate was Khaled Hoddap, a big offensive tackle who went on to play pro ball for the New York Giants. Khaled once told me what he did when a defender started playing dirty. He would jam their cleats into the ground and push them over backwards. If they were lucky, they got away with a sprained knee, but it caused them enough pain to make them reconsider whatever nastiness they were dishing out. He said he only used it rarely, but it was very effective when employed.

  I jerked my hands out of Rusty's grasp and lowered my head. Grabbing the top of his left foot, I shoved the cleat into the soft ground with my right hand, my left being relatively worthless. I reared back and drove my shoulder into Rusty's fat belly and heard a resounding grunt as the air went out of him. I pushed my left shoulder into his chest, jerking his body up. He tried to maintain his balance but the weight had shifted and the only thing keeping him standing was the left cleat stuck into the terrain. I took care of that last detail with a right uppercut to the jaw that landed with a loud smack.

  The blood curdling scream came barely after his enormous frame crashed into the ground. The leg was twisted grotesquely as his shoe was still planted firmly in the ground. The piercing screams drew a crowd of people nearby, and dozens more watched from their windows. One woman emerged from the crowd and approached us cautiously. Rusty grimaced and moaned on the ground, his eyes finally focusing in on me.

  "You prick!" he howled. "You fucking prick! You tore my knee up again!"

  I was panting and tried to catch my breath. "It was self defense," I started. "You came at me and got paid back. When you make a mistake you have to pay."

  "Pay? Pay for what?!" he screamed and noticed Sara was now standing over him, a look of shock on her face. "I'm not going to jail! I didn't kill anybody! I didn't kill Wayne! It was Sara! Sara did it!"

  "That's hard to believe," I said and started to smile. Sara's mouth opened but no words came out.

  "You stupid sonuvabitch!" Rusty continued. "She had bloodstains on her blouse that night, the orange one in her closet. Just check it, I tell you. I'm not taking the fall for her! Let her go to prison! Sara killed that bastard Wayne! She did it!"

  I reached over and pulled his cleat from the ground to relieve the pressure. "I know she did it," I said. "And now so does half the neighborhood."

  Chapter 23

  The paramedics took only a few minutes to arrive, and as usual were far more prompt than the police. Rusty Haas was lifted into an ambulance and driven off; one of the paramedics instructed me to have my own wrist x-rayed as soon as possible. He left an ace bandage for me and I gingerly wrapped it around my wrist. No more brawls for a while. I'd have to rely on my razor wit as a weapon, although history proved that was generally better at instigating a fight than avoiding one.

  Sara Haas stood silently by, watching her husband be whisked away. I approached her and we sat down on the curb in front of her apartment building. People milled about, but as far as Sara was concerned, we were the only two people on the face of the earth.

  "How did you find out?" she murmured.

  "It took a while, believe me," I said. "You were very thorough. When you left Second Chance that night, you exited via the alley so most people wouldn't see you. It was dark. I suppose that's why one eyewitness identified your sister Crystal as being on the scene. The two of you do bear a resemblance."

  "That must have been that slut Amy," Sara contended.

  I sighed. "She's hardly the only one to have slept around."

  Sara froze. "What do you mean?"

  "I think you know what I mean."

  "I don't sleep around," she maintained.

  "That one time with Wayne apparently was enough."

  Her cheeks turned a bright shade of crimson. She closed her eyes and whispered something to herself. Looking up at me, she again asked how I found out.

  "If it was something you wanted to keep to yourself, you would have," I said. "It was your ugly little secret and it probably should have remained so. You gave Wayne a nice birthday present, I believe it was a silver engraved pen stand?"

  "Yes," she nodded solemnly.

  "And with it came a birthday card w
here you talked of wanting to make peace with him. That the brief affair you two had was a mistake and should never happen again. That you felt he belonged with Crystal, and that you hoped you two could put this awful liaison in the past. That you could go on with your lives as if nothing ever happened."

  Sara nodded and said nothing. I continued.

  "But when you saw Wayne and Nina Lovejoy together that night in Second Chance, you lost control. You shot him out of hatred for betraying your sister again, and out of hatred for betraying you. You despised him because when you lost your home he wouldn't help you. But he would help the homeless to no end. So you shot him with his own gun out of anger and jealousy and betrayal. I'll bet you thought that interlude between you and Wayne was his first extramarital affair."

  "He told me it was," she whispered in a voice that was barely audible.

  "Well, he lied to you. You weren't the first and you weren't the last. I don't know how many women he's had. But I know I can count you, Amy, Nina, and a woman named Alexa."

  "Alexa?" she frowned.

  "Yes, in fact you've met her, although I gather it was a rather brief encounter."

  "What are you talking about?" she asked.

  "Alexa mentioned not only having an affair with Wayne but of having met somebody at her gym, Sports World I think it was, who had a brief fling with our Mr. Fairborn also. She never described you physically, except to say the woman was bitter about the whole event and was looking to extract some revenge. I figured you and Rusty belonged to that gym because I saw the Sports World workout bags in your living room last week. That in and of itself wasn't enough to go on, but combine it with the birthday card and it adds up to a possible motive."

  "Knowing Wayne, I'm sure you found many people with motives."

  "Oh yeah," I replied. "Too numerous to mention. The obvious ones were political enemies, but they merely engage in blackmail. You can only get so passionate over local politics and money. Love and betrayal stir the beast to a far stronger level. Would you not agree?"