“He came into the dressing room today before the game to wish us all good luck,” David said. “I actually got to talk to him for a while.”
“I met him at a hockey game in Toronto,” Henry said. “Alan introduced me to him when he was dropping off some new sports jackets.” They spent the rest of the night watching the hockey game which resulted in a win for the Leafs.
The next day Henry and the boys met Laura at the football stadium to watch the Miami Dolphins who were taking on the New York Jets. Whereas there were very few people at the soccer game the day before, there were thousands of people outside of the football stadium and it took them a while to locate her.
“Hi Laura,” Henry yelled when he finally saw her. He could tell she couldn’t hear him so they pushed their way through the crowd to get closer. She didn’t see him until he was almost right in front of her. “Hi Laura,” Henry said again. “You remember Robert from yesterday and this is my youngest son, David.”
“Nice to meet you,” Laura said, reaching out her hand. She barely got an acknowledgement from David, but that may have been due to him getting jostled by the people trying to get by them. “I’ve got the tickets,” Laura said, holding them up. “We should probably get inside and out of this chaos.”
“Great seats,” Henry said when they finally got to their seats.
“Yeah, one of the sports-writers at the Tribune called in a few markers from the guys at the Miami Herald to get these,” Laura said. “I think I’ll be taking the guy to lunch every day for a month.”
“These are great,” Robert said. “Thanks so much.”
David didn’t say a thing until Robert secretly gave him an elbow to the ribs. “Thanks,” David said, but quickly turned his focus back to the field where the players were going through their pre-game warm-ups.
Henry was about to say something to David, but Laura stopped him. “Why don’t you and Robert go get us some drinks,” Laura said. “It will give David and me a chance to get to know each other.” Henry gave Laura a worried look, but relented to her request.
“I was glad to get to go to your soccer game yesterday,” Laura said after Henry and Robert had left. “Your dad’s quite proud of you for being selected to the National team.”
“It’s no big deal,” David said. “I just sat on the bench for the whole game.” David still hadn’t really looked at her.
“Maybe you’ll get to play in the next game,” Laura said. “When is the next game?”
“We play an exhibition game against a team from England here in Florida in the middle of February and another game against the U.S. team in Washington at March Break.”
“That should be exciting,” Laura said, but she didn’t get a response. “Are you a Dolphins fan?” Laura asked, trying to keep the conversation going.
“Not really,” David answered, shutting it down.
After an awkward silence of a minute that seemed more like an hour, David looked over at Laura. He could tell she was important to his dad and because of that, he decided he should make more of an effort to like her. Even though he’d just met Laura, he could tell that it was important to her as well.
“I’m a big NFL fan,” David said, “but I’ve never really followed the Dolphins. Boy, they sure love Dan Marino down here. It seems like he’s in every commercial for cars and restaurants.”
Laura lit up when David started the conversation again. “I know what you mean,” Laura said. “To be honest, I’m not even sure why he’s so famous,” she whispered to David, making sure none of the fans around them could hear her.
Henry and Robert arrived a few minutes later with drinks and snacks. The football game was one-sided with Miami winning easily, but that seemed to get the crowd more into a party mood. If there were any fans of the opposing team there, they were keeping that fact to themselves.
Henry hadn’t noticed the man that had followed him from the concession stand and up into the stands. He looked like any other fan at the game, except his sunglasses hid the fact that he was watching Henry more than he was watching the game. He kept going up the stands until he sat down beside his partner about fifteen rows behind where Henry was sitting. “I don’t know why the boss wants us to keep following this guy,” Cujo whispered to his partner. “I think his brother is long-gone.”
“We just do as we’re told,” Carter whispered back. “Someone is using that laptop. If Bronson and his brother somehow survived their little plane ride, the boss thinks he’ll eventually contact this guy and that will lead us directly to Bronson.”
After the game, David headed off with Robert to buy a Dolphins jersey. Although he wasn’t a Dolphins fan, he was trying to build a collection of jerseys from every team. This gave Henry and Laura some time to be alone, if you could call being among sixty thousand people being alone.
“I really like your boys,” Laura said, giving Henry a hug. “Robert’s warm and friendly and I can tell he’s the type who would never let anyone down. David’s a bit more of a puzzle, but I like him as well. He seems like he’s carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. He’s going to do great things – I don’t know what, but I can just tell.”
“I’m glad you liked them,” Henry said.
“Let me know if they liked me,” Laura said.
“How could they not?” Henry said, giving her a big kiss.
*** Chapter 23 ***
The next week Henry was off to Chicago again. Since the merger had been completed long ago and things were running smoothly, he was now only going there about twice a month. He really looked forward to seeing Laura on each trip and the weeks they were apart seemed to drag on forever.
They had been talking more and more about their relationship. Neither of them liked the long distance aspect, but they didn’t know what to do about it. Laura was now back into her job with the same dedication and enthusiasm that she used to have, so she really didn’t want to leave Chicago. And Henry loved his job and his family life so couldn’t see himself making any changes either, at least not at this point.
“Why did you pick me?” Henry asked as they lay in bed that night.
“What do you mean?”
“That night in the bar at the Chicago airport,” Henry said. “You could have any guy you wanted. Why did you pick me?”
“I don’t know,” Laura said. “Sam and I had been there for quite a while. She kept trying to talk me out of it. We must have talked about twenty different guys that we saw in that bar that day. Some of them were downright creepy. We could hear you talking with your friends and I liked your voice. I liked your hands.”
“My hands?” Henry asked. “I’ve heard of people with a foot fetish but I’ve never heard of anyone with a hand fetish.”
“You asked,” Laura said laughing. “Sam liked you too, but I think she thought you were the most likely to turn me down. She really didn’t want me to go through with it. In fact, we were just about to leave and call the whole thing off when I saw your friends head off to catch their flight. When I saw you sitting alone at the bar, I decided to go for it. I had no idea what I was going to say when I got there.”
“Yeah, I thought you were a hooker,” Henry said, “except they’re usually a little more subtle.”
“I didn’t mean to say that,” Laura said continuing to laugh. “In fact, Sam and I had talked about me just sitting at the bar and letting the guy make the first move. When I touched you on the arm and you turned to look at me, I just blurted it out.”
“Any regrets?” Henry asked.
“None,” Laura said.
* * *
Over the next few weeks, David and Alex continued to work hard during their training sessions, building their “core strength” as the coach called it. David had once again been asked to travel with the team back to Florida for their friendly game against the team from England, although he was not expected to get any game time. Henry wanted to fly down to Florida to attend the game but David had talked him out of it.
> Henry was at home that evening half asleep in front of the TV when the phone rang. “Hi Dad,” David said. He couldn’t hide the excitement in his voice.
“Hi David. How did your game go today?”
“I got to play,” David said. “I wasn’t supposed to, but Tim hurt his knee when he crashed into their keeper and he got a yellow card on the play. The coach was pretty mad at Tim and pulled him out of the game, moved Doug up to striker and I got to go in at midfield.”
“Good for you!” Henry said. “Oh, I wish I had been there to see it.”
“I only got to play for the last five or six minutes of the game and I didn’t even touch the ball once.”
“Did you guys win?” Henry asked.
“No, we got waxed,” David said. “Those guys are so good. They were up three-nil at the half and I think they played their second-stringers for the second half, but we still didn’t get anywhere close to scoring a goal. They beat us five-nil. It’s easy to see why they’re ranked number four in the world and we’re still trying to break into the top fifty. The coach wasn’t happy with our play.”
Henry regretted that he’d let David talk him out of not flying down for the game. He would not make the same mistake for their next game in Washington.
David flew back with the rest of the team the next day. When Henry got home from work that day, he found David in his room pinning the jerseys from the other teams on his wall with help from his grandmother.
“This is the jersey I got from the U.S. team,” David said.
“It’s a little crooked,” Grandma said. “Raise it up a bit on the left side.”
“And this is the jersey I got from the English team,” David said. “Turgott was one of their best players.”
Grandma noticed that the threads on one of the letters of his name had come unravelled. “Here, give me that,” she said. “It will only take me a minute to fix it.” She gave it back to David after she fixed it, along with a little sewing kit she always carried with her.
“You should keep this with your own soccer jersey in case it gets ripped,” Grandma said giving him the sewing kit. “I’ve seen the way those players hold and tug on each other’s jersey. They should get a penalty when they do that.” David pinned the England jersey up on his wall beside the one from the U.S. team.
Henry noticed a World Cup soccer ball sitting on the shelf. “When did you get the World Cup soccer ball?” Henry asked. “I’ve been trying to find one of those for months.”
“That’s actually the ball that Uncle Alan got for me,” David said. “I’ve been using the ball at practice and I was out in the driveway kicking it against the garage when I noticed the Goliath logo was starting to peel off the ball. I thought I had wrecked the ball, but when I pulled off the Goliath logo it had the Adidas logo underneath. I thought I should keep the ball because Uncle Alan…”
David stopped in mid-sentence and wished he would have stopped talking sooner. He could see the tear come into his grandmother’s eye before she quickly left the room.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to…”
“It’s OK David,” Henry said. “She’s still hoping they’ll find Uncle Alan. We all do.” Henry followed his mother down the hall to try to console her.
* * *
As the weeks went by, Henry found himself thinking less and less about his missing brother. At the start, detective Benedetti would call him every day or two giving him updates on the progress of their investigation. It had now been over two weeks since Henry had last heard from him so he decided to give him a call.
“Sorry,” Benedetti said. “I should have been keeping you updated but, to be honest, we’ve got nothing new to report. We’ve followed up every lead and come up with nothing, with the missing plane or on whoever broke into your house and stole the laptop. The RCMP are still investigating the matter as well but have got nothing so far. They did say the FBI is picking up chatter that the secret network that Bronson was involved in is still active, so we’re hopeful that some of their work will lead us to Bronson and your brother.”
Henry thanked him for the update and then called his sister to pass on the information. “I’m getting less and less confident that they’re going to find Alan,” Jenny said. “How’s mom taking all of this?”
“She’s probably the most optimistic of all of us,” Henry said. “I wish I shared her view.”
*** Chapter 2 4 ***
Henry sat in the Toronto airport waiting for his flight to Washington. Since it was the beginning of March break, the airport was much busier than normal. The U19 National Team, including David, had already headed down to Washington the previous day by bus. The coach had said a road trip by bus was a good way for the team to bond together but Henry suspected that cost was also a factor in the decision.
Henry was surprised when he saw Greg Blackwood walking toward him. “Hi Greg,” Henry said. “Where are you off to?”
“Washington. I’m meeting with some clients over the next few days.”
“I’m heading to Washington myself. My son David plays for the U19 National Soccer Team and they’ve got an exhibition game against the U.S. team tomorrow.” Greg already knew that David played for the national team as Henry had been talking about it for months, but that didn’t stop Henry from continuing to brag about it.
A few minutes later, they called for boarding to begin for the first class passengers. “What hotel are you staying at?” Greg asked.
“Holiday Inn,” Henry answered.
“I’m staying at the Hilton,” Greg said, “but I think they’re close to each other. After we get off the plane, I’ll wait for you so we can share a cab.”
“That would be great,” Henry said.
By the time Henry boarded, he could see that Greg had already been served a drink and was on the second section of the complimentary newspaper. Henry also saw Frenchie Bouchard sitting in first class and he said hello to Henry as he went by, but Henry noticed he said hello to practically everyone else as well. Henry doubted he remembered that Alan had introduced them several months ago. Henry continued his journey back to seat 26B.
When Henry got off the plane, he saw Frenchie renting a car and wondered whether he would see him at David’s soccer game, or whether he was in Washington to cover a hockey or basketball game.
Greg waved to Henry as he approached. When they got outside of the airport, they were surprised to see how long the lineup was at the taxi stand. Greg signalled to a limo driver who was parked in a separate area and the driver immediately sprinted over to take their bags. “I can’t believe how busy it is,” Greg said. “It costs about $20 more to take a limo but I think it’s worth it on a day like today.”
Henry had the sense that they were being watched and scanned the crowd of people wondering if he would see the two men in suits that he had seen at the soccer game in Florida. He didn’t see them, but there was no shortage of men in suits who seemed to be monitoring the situation. “Welcome to Washington, the city of spies,” Henry thought to himself.
It took them forever to get through the Washington traffic and to their respective hotels. In the end, it probably cost them less by paying a flat fee for the limo rather than watching the meter tick off the dollars in a taxi while stuck in traffic. “Best of luck to your son in his soccer game,” Greg said when he dropped Henry off at his hotel.
* * *
Back at the airport, Frenchie signed the vehicle rental agreement and the agent handed him the keys which had a tag indicating the car was a silver Chrylser 200, but Frenchie was having a hard time finding it in the rows and rows of rental cars. He was pleased when one of the agents offered to help.
“We’ve got so many cars coming and going, it’s hard to keep track of them all,” the agent said as he walked with Frenchie down one of the rows of vehicles. “The cars that are ready to go out again are normally found in this row.”
Frenchie was surprised at how old this agent was as the car rental pla
ces tended to hire kids fresh out of school for this type of job because they paid them practically nothing. They didn’t have any luck locating the vehicle and Frenchie glanced at his watch noting the time.
“You know you can take any car you like from this section,” said the agent. “It doesn’t have to be the Chrysler 200 indicated on your reservation. We just had a Dodge Charger come back that I just cleaned up. I can let you take that vehicle for the same price.”
Frenchie’s eyes lit up when he saw the bright red Charger. He’d always been interested in muscle cars and this car seemed to match his personality. “Deal,” he said as he exchanged the car keys with the agent. As he headed out of the rental parking lot, Frenchie gunned the engine and liked the full-throttle sound. “This is going to be fun,” he thought to himself.
When the agent saw Frenchie pull out of the parking lot, he quickly pulled off the rental company’s uniform and dumped it in the trash. His partner came out of the shadows and handed Carter his regular suit jacket. They both jumped in their car and headed out of the parking lot following Frenchie.
“That was easier than I thought,” Carter said to his partner. “But we better follow him to make sure things go as planned.”
* * *
Henry grabbed some supper at a little restaurant that was beside the Holiday Inn. The flight and sitting through traffic had drained him of energy so he just headed to his room and turned on the TV. The lead story on the news that night was that the President’s new gun control legislation had just squeaked through the Democratic-led Senate. The big challenge now would be getting it through the Republican-led House of Representatives, which now appeared that it would be a much closer vote than first expected.
“It’s a good thing David’s not watching this,” Henry thought to himself. “He hates this kind of politics.”
Henry grabbed the remote control and flipped through the channels until he got to the local sports channel which was preparing to broadcast the Washington-Montreal hockey game.
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