Blackbird, Farewell

by Robert Greer

  And then it hit him. Paul Grimes and Alicia Phillips had even touched on it in their manuscript, and it appeared, he told himself, that Shandell had honed it to perfection. What Shandell had done was spent his all-too-brief lifetime mastering the art of hiding who he was. And who better to pull off a charade like that than a world-class athlete, someone used to the grueling and repetitive aspects of practice? Someone adept at masking physical and mental pain? If Shandell had been gay, he was one person who could have played his heterosexual part so perfectly that no one, not even his best friend, could've seen beyond the facade.

  It would have been easy for someone who was performing such a charade to spend his entire freshman year of college orchestrating a reputation as the ultimate playboy. Tossing coeds aside one by one and never bedding one of them until he could settle down with someone Machiavellian, callous, and cagey enough to go along with the game. And it had worked until Shandell had come up against a ruthless sports psychologist itching to write a book, an investigative reporter looking for his own pot of gold, and perhaps even a long-absent father who wouldn't leave Shandell alone.

  The question now, as Damion saw it, was who among all the people Shandell had conned—including teachers, coaches, teammates, gangsters, family members, and friends—had had a reason to kill him.

  Glancing at Damion as she took the Fort Collins–bound Prospect Road off-ramp from I-25, Flora Jean said, “You've been too quiet for too long, Blood. Gonna pop a gasket, you don't get your feelin's out real soon.”

  “I'm okay,” Damion said sullenly.

  “And I say you aren't. Wanta tell me what you been thinkin’ about these past twenty minutes?”

  “I've been thinking about Shandell and who might have killed him. And right now, after that latest bombshell, I've gotta admit, I'm pretty confused.”

  “No need for confusion, sugar. We start where we said we would back at the office. First we run down Rodney Sands and Jackie Wood-son. Then we head for a little powwow with Dr. Phillips. Sometimes bein’ a good soldier means holin’ your position when you're under fire. A lot of times when you think long, you think wrong, Blood. Remember that.”

  Smiling at the sage advice, Damion said, “I will.”

  “Be sure you do. You don't wanta end up missin’ the forest for the trees.”

  With Flora Jean's admonition reverberating in his head, Damion relaxed back in his seat, recalling that Alicia Phillips and Paul Grimes had used pretty much the same words to describe his archetype in their manuscript. Sensing that things were about to come to a head, he had the feeling he'd soon find out if they were right.

  It was always when she looked at the photograph of her two horses that Alicia Phillips regressed the most. Generally she let the past stay where it was, encased in the same mystical place as the long-lost cattle ranch she'd grown up on and her dead father and mother. Lost forever in a sea of tall grass, meandering trout streams, and alpine timber. But whenever she decided to take a close, hard look at the photograph of her horses, who'd been auctioned off at a sheriff's sale, the enormity of her loss resurfaced.

  She'd just turned fourteen when her father had lost their ranch through a combination of bad business decisions, bad management, hostile neighbors, and a city miles away in need of a commodity as precious as gold: their water. The psychological scars that had come with the loss of her five-thousand-acre playground remained, and even though she now had a life that most people would envy, it was a life she'd never fully embraced, or for that matter even wanted.

  In the years since the loss of their ranch, she'd battled to re-create her own version of it. Progress had been slow and measured, but real. Ten years earlier she'd purchased a five-acre parcel thirty miles northeast of Fort Collins, and soon after that an adjoining fifteen acres. In the past year she'd bought the 160-acre quarter section that abutted her land directly to the south, and although she realized that the 180 acres she now owned could never replace the five thousand she'd lost, it was a start. Once she finished reassembling her dream, she'd kiss academia and CSU good-bye, turn her back on research proposals, across-the-hall geniuses, and recalcitrant students, and return to where she belonged.

  She'd hoped that the book she'd been writing with Paul Grimes was going to put her there more quickly, but for the moment it would have to stay in limbo, forced to take a back seat to the murder of Shandell Bird. But when the crisis passed, she would return to rebuilding her dream.

  Glancing out her office window and placing the photograph of her two Swedish warmbloods back on her desk, she decided she'd given the university enough of herself for one day. If she left right then and said to hell with students and research papers and poorly written master's theses, she'd be able to get to her ranch in time to enjoy the smell of the earth, the warmth of the sun, and maybe even a horseback ride at sunset.

  She'd turned to lock a file cabinet when a wide-eyed Connie East-land rushed into her office, looking perturbed. Not at all surprised by the unannounced visit, since like most of her colleagues in the building she reserved Monday afternoon for office hours and student visits, Alicia gave Connie a thoughtful look and said, “You're lucky you caught me. I was just about to leave.”

  Returning the greeting with half a nod, Connie said breathlessly, “We've got serious problems, Alicia.”

  Familiar with Connie's emotional ebbs and flows, Alicia said, “So tell me about it.”

  Connie's words came out in a shower of spittle. “I got a call from one of my college sorority sisters a little bit ago. Someone I'd trust with my life. She said she'd just had lunch with Niki Estaban, Damion Madrid's girlfriend, and that Niki had given her the third degree about me and Shandell's relationship. Asking her questions like how close had we really been, had I really cared about Shandell, and whether I was seeing other men. To top it off, Niki mentioned Garrett Asalon. Damion's getting closer, Alicia. I know it. He's going to figure everything out. You've got to do something.”

  Patting Connie reassuringly on the shoulder, Alicia said, “Take a deep breath, Connie. And for once in your life let your head do your thinking instead of your pocketbook. Damion's not going to figure out anything because there's nothing to figure out.”

  “What? How can you be so blasé? He'll figure out that I was using his best friend, and sooner or later he's going to figure out that in effect I was pretty much blackmailing Shandell.”

  “I don't think so. Blackmail involves the extortion of money. Did you ever extort money from Shandell?”

  Looking confused, Connie said, “Well, no. You know what I did. I agreed not to out him to the world in exchange for a ticket to the good life. You knew our deal.”

  “And your deal was for him to give you money for that favor?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Case closed, then. Shandell made his choice. Just like you and me. He could either tell the world who he really was or continue to dribble a basketball, rake in the money, and have the masses grovel at his feet. He chose the latter.”

  “And when Damion figures that all out, he'll come after me. I'm not made of cast iron like you are, Alicia. I didn't grow up battling rattlesnakes and coyotes on some hardscrabble ranch. And I didn't have to overcome losing my mother and father to suicide or have to deal with some spinster aunt who beat the hell out of me. And I certainly don't have what it takes to look someone in the eye and ask probing questions about their life, knowing I'm writing a book about that life that could destroy them. I'm not as hardened as you are, Alicia. Let's face it—that's how you and Grimes got your so-call gladiators to cooperate. You looked them sympathetically in the eye, lied to them, and got them to pour out their souls.”

  For the first time since Connie had rushed in, Alicia looked truly aggravated. “Could be you're right. But then again, where's the proof? We shredded all those counseling session records, remember?”

  “Yes. And that might very well get you off the hook. But I'm still the one in the hot seat when it comes to Damion.”r />
  “And I'll take care of that. Why don't you run down the hall and get yourself some water before you blow a gasket? I'll make a couple of phone calls that'll short-circuit the would-be doctor. Then we'll head out to the ranch and talk this over more thoroughly. Craigy Theisman called me earlier anyway. Said he wanted to talk to us both. I was going to call you and tell you.”

  “The ranch? I can't. I've got plans. And what are you going to have that gorilla of a man do to Damion?”

  “Nothing that will hurt anything but his ego. What Damion needs is to be wrapped in a nice, neat-fitting homosexuality shroud, just like Shandell. Now, are you going to game-plan with me or not? We'll only be at the ranch for an hour or so.”

  “Okay,” Connie said hesitantly.

  “Fine. Let me make those phone calls, and instead of water, why don't you run across the street to Starbucks and get us a couple of lattes? I could use the caffeine jolt.” She reached into her purse, extracted a twenty-dollar bill, and handed it to Connie.

  Looking relieved, Connie said, “Yes, that might be better.”

  “Make mine hazelnut. And Connie, try and calm down. We'll be out of this thunderstorm in no time.”

  “I hope so,” Connie said, turning to leave.

  “We will. I'd bet the ranch on it, and you know if I wasn't certain of the outcome, I'd never do that.”

  As a transplant to the Mile High City from Massachusetts, Craigy Theisman had been robbed of his favorite Bay State delicacy for over a decade, forced all that time to eat water-logged Rocky Mountain imitations served on tasteless, often rock-hard buns instead of the signature East Coast Thumann's hot dogs he'd grown up on. That was, until Steve's Snappin’ Dogs had debuted on Denver's East Col-fax Avenue a few years earlier. Since that time Theisman had never failed to stop by Steve's on any trip that put him within fifteen minutes of the place.

  Theisman had taken his time on the trip from Louisville to Fort Collins that morning. Garrett Asalon had told him to take things leisurely. His instructions were to talk to Phillips and an increasingly nervous Connie Eastland, together if at all possible, and remind them that they'd both signed on for the long haul when they'd agreed to use the threat of a tell-all book about his homosexuality to get Shandell Bird to shave a few points in critical basketball games. He also had meetings scheduled with Jackie Woodson and Rodney Sands to remind them that they needed to keep their mouths shut about those point-shaving schemes.

  Theisman hadn't heard from Connie, but he had called her condo and left a message, and he expected that before he finally got to the overgrazed, windy patch of cow pasture Alicia Phillips liked to call a ranch, Connie would call him back.

  The man who had served Theisman two Jersey dogs—an all-beef hot dog loaded with spicy mustard, relish, caraway sauerkraut, red onions, and bacon—and a basket of skin-on French fries was busy talking with another customer when Theisman waved across the restaurant at him and said, “Snappin’ good as usual, Joey.”

  “We aim to please,” Joey Farthing said, cocking his arm and giving Theisman a crisp salute. “Don't want people leaving here on a half-empty stomach. Could be dangerous to their health.” Farthing broke into a booming laugh.

  “That it could be,” said Theisman, patting the 9-mm in his jacket pocket. “A hungry man is a mistake-prone man, and the world's got enough mistakes runnin’ around already.” Rising from the stool he'd occupied for almost half an hour, Theisman exited the restaurant and walked across the parking lot toward his car to head for Fort Collins. He'd deal with every issue Asalon had assigned him, even if it took until midnight to round up Eastland, Phillips, and Jackie Woodson.

  Concerned that Connie might come back any second and interrupt her conversation, Alicia Phillips was thirty seconds into a phone conversation that had her seething. “I want you to be out at my ranch and set up within ninety minutes.” Sounding like an infantry officer barking orders at an inept subordinate, she said, “I'll give you directions.” “Why the hell are you so nervous? Calm down, would you?” Ignoring the directive, she said, “You can set up down by the creek. The spot will be marked for you.”

  “Are you sure we need to take her out? Maybe we should talk it over first.” “Would I be calling you if I wasn't? She's poison.” “Okay. I'll set up. But you're taking the blame on this if anything goes wrong.”

  “It won't come to that. Just wait for me to walk her down to the creek and take your shot when she's on the downstream side of the creek bend.” “Okay.”

  “Gotta get off. I think I hear her coming back. Be ready, okay?” “Always am.” The phone clicked off without another word being said.

  Chapter 26

  Like most people trying to locate someone who likely didn't want to be found, Damion had never realized how large the so-called sleepy college town of Fort Collins could be. He and Flora Jean had spent an hour and a half trying to find three people, with absolutely no success. No Jackie Woodson and no Rodney Sands in any of the places Damion thought they might be. No returned phone calls, and worst of all, Coach Haroldson turned out to be out of town on a hastily arranged recruiting trip, according to his secretary.

  Frustrated at having wasted an hour and a half, Damion glanced across the front seat of the Suburban at Flora Jean and shook his head. “Maybe we should've called earlier, let them all know we wanted to talk to them. Chances are we would've stumbled across at least one of them.”

  “Probably not, sugar. Folks on the run and folks with somethin’ to hide don't sit around waitin’ to have tea and crumpets with the people lookin’ to pin ’em to the wall.”

  “Coach Horse isn't running.”

  “Well, he ain't nowhere to be found, is he?”

  “He's on a recruiting trip,” Damion protested as Flora Jean pulled the Suburban up to a stoplight at the intersection of College Avenue and Prospect Road.

  “Okay, so he's out recruitin’ his next Blood-and-Blackbird tandem while Woodson and Sands are at the library crammin’ for their PhDs. Wanta keep an open mind on this, Damion? Nobody gets excluded as a suspect. Even Coach Haroldson.”

  Recalling their agreement, Damion said, “Yes.”

  “Okay. Let's say for the moment we move on past Sands and Woodson and the coach and down the road to Dr. Phillips. You good with that?”

  “Yeah. I'm pretty sure Mondays are still office-hour days for her. She should be in.”

  “Know the way to her office?”

  “It'll be seven or eight blocks down College Avenue,” Damion said, pointing to the right.

  “Maybe we'll turn up something solid.” Flora Jean turned right onto College, nosing the Suburban due north.

  “Hope so,” said Damion, sounding almost as frustrated as he had after reading his profile in the Phillips and Grimes manuscript.

  The Wilford Hall annex was dark and all but empty when Flora Jean and Damion stepped out of the late-afternoon haze into the building's foyer.

  “Strange-lookin’ place,” said Flora Jean. “Kinda dark and musty. And creaky,” she added, as the hundred-year-old hardwood floors creaked beneath their feet.

  “It's a landmark. The joke around campus has always been that the handful of professors who have offices here need it dark so they can think. Heavy-duty eggheads and faculty superstars occupy the place for the most part.”

  “Dr. Phillips ranks that high up the food chain?”

  “She's pretty damn smart.”

  “Let's hope she's smart enough to have stayed late today. Where's her office?”

  “Second floor, northwest corner.”

  “Corner office? Damn! Do it, girl!”

  “There's an elevator down at the end of the hall, but the stairs are quicker.”

  “You got point, Blood.” Flora Jean motioned for Damion to lead the way.

  The way she'd said point had an eerie ring. More than once, Damion had heard CJ utter that very word in absolutely the same way. Always with the same foreboding tone of a war veteran. As they headed for the b
rass-railed stairway that led to the second floor, he had the sense that after so many miscasts, they were about to finally get a strike.

  The second floor was mustier and darker than the first, but its fifteen-foot-wide hallways and twelve-foot ceilings gave it a surprisingly open feel.

  “Last office on the left,” Damion said a few steps before reaching the door to Alicia Phillips's office. Looking disappointed, he glanced up at the transom above the door. “I don't think she's in. Her transom's closed.” Shaking his head and looking dejected, Damion stepped back from the door. He was about to take a second step backward when the office door directly behind him and across the hall swung open and a tall, gaunt man with wrinkled, sun-damaged skin stepped out into the hallway.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Yes. We're looking for Dr. Phillips,” Damion said, pivoting to face the man.

  “Why, you're Damion Madrid,” the man said, almost in awe.

  Damion nodded and smiled.

  “I saw pretty close to every game you ever played for CSU.” The man extended a hand. “I'm Lucas Hogan, and to tell you the truth, I'm surprised we've never met. Guess you didn't require as much of Alicia's hand-holding as most of your fellow athletes. Hear you're headed off to medical school.”

  “Sure am. In a couple of weeks.”

  “Medicine's a long way from rocks,” Hogan said, pointing to the Geology Department sign next to his door before glancing at Flora Jean.

  Smiling, Flora Jean nodded politely and said, “Flora Jean Benson.”

  “Afraid you just missed Alicia,” said Hogan.

  “How long has she been gone?” asked Flora Jean.

  “No more than fifteen minutes—twenty minutes tops. I'm sure she's headed for her ranch.”

  “Why so certain?”

  The way Flora Jean posed the question, as if he might be mistaken, caused Hogan to hesitate and stroke his chin before answering. “She had her riding boots with her when she left. That usually means she's on her way to her ranch.”