by Camel Press
“An advance? Did he say why?”
“I didn’t ask; that’s the least of my worries today.”
She nodded.
Roger frowned and massaged his temples. “Though I can’t imagine he’d need one. The kids making the league minimum are still earning more than my teammates and I did in our heyday.”
Cat suppressed a smile. To begin with, that just wasn’t true. Roger had played up until the early nineties and his salary had capped out at four million a year. He was now one of the highest paid managers in baseball to boot. She played along, though. The old guys loved to grouse about the old days, when they had played for peanuts and Cracker Jack and walked nine miles to the ballpark, uphill both ways.
“I’d offer to tell him for you, but I don’t think he’d want to hear it from me. It’s probably best to tell everyone at the same time anyway.”
Roger ran a large hand over his creased, dark forehead and rested it on his bald pate. “Isn’t it too early to have a headache?”
“I don’t think headaches can tell time.” Cat glanced at the wall clock and Roger followed her gaze.
“I’m meeting the players at ten o’clock,” he said. “I’ll buzz you when you can release the story but if you want to get a head start writing it—”
“Will do.” She rose to her feet. “Hang in there, boss.”
He smiled. “Thanks.”
Cat shut the door behind her and headed to her office. She was glad the place was empty. She might be able to hustle pool and bluff at poker, but her “I’ve Got a Secret” face was hard to hide. She turned the corner to her cubicle, stopping in her tracks at the sight waiting for her. She scoffed. “Comfortable?”
“Ms. McDaniel.” Detective Kahn swirled around in her desk chair. “I hope you don’t mind me making myself at home. I’ve been here for quite a while. If you’re going to make your guests wait, maybe you should get a subscription to Sports Illustrated. Your old articles can only keep me entertained for so long.” He crossed one leg over the other and smiled at her.
“Guests are invited.” She smiled back as an eerie sense of déjà vu washed over her. One might be a cop and the other a scammer, but Detective Kahn and Quinn had more in common than just an interest in crime. “I was in Roger Aiken’s office.”
The smarmy smile slid off of his face. “Then I take it you’ve heard.”
“He just told me, so perhaps you can understand why I don’t have time to spar with you today.” Cat cleared her throat and looked behind her, hoping no coworkers had came in and spied this badged visitor. So far no nosy parkers had prairie-dogged over the top of her cubicle wall.
“I appreciate that, but I’m sure Roger would want you to cooperate with me.” He pointed to the phone with an expression of mock-innocence. “But I can call him and ask if you’d like?”
“No!” She made a slashing gesture in the air. “Let’s go for a walk, okay?”
Detective Kahn shrugged and followed her out of the office. Once they were in the open hallway, she said, “Can we make this quick?”
“The truth is quick. You tell me that and I’ll be in the parking lot before you’re back in your little cubby hole.”
“I’ve told you the truth, again and again. Quinn is supposed to call you today.”
“I look forward to that.” Detective Kahn wasn’t impressed. “So you spoke to Roger?”
“Yeah, he told me about Damien. That he’s—”
“Out of the lineup?” He smiled coldly. “That makes two guys out of the … what was it again, five? You said five guys at the poker game? And four of the players. Fifty percent of your guest list is off the team.”
“You can’t possibly be suggesting that a player’s accidental death has anything to do with that stupid poker game?”
“Accident? Who said accident?”
“Roger. He said that you gave h-him the impression that uh—”
“The county M.E. is waiting for identification before he proceeds with an examination, but I certainly didn’t mean to leave Mr. Aiken with that impression.”
“What do you think happened?”
“Time will tell; it always does. Take Ryan Brokaw’s so-called accident, for example.”
He paused, for dramatic effect, Cat thought. She swallowed and fought to keep a stiff upper lip. “This is obviously where you want me to ask you what you’re talking about, so let’s just pretend I did.”
“Do you know what a Forensic Biomechanics Consultant does?”
“Tries to find a font small enough to fit all that on a business card?”
Detective Kahn chuckled. “Actually, it’s an individual who analyzes human motion with regard to injuries and uses that knowledge to help legal investigations. I’m currently taking a night class being taught by our county consultant, which is why I took a special interest in this case.”
Cat’s stoic expression gave way to a relieved smile. She shook her head. “That’s what this is all about? The interrogations? The harassment? The search warrant? You’ve been on me like dirt on cleats just so you can get an ‘A’ on your science project?”
“Not quite.” Their stroll took them to the main lobby and Detective Kahn pointed to a corner bench. “Let’s sit. I assume your fiancé told you we were at your place?”
She joined him on the bench, sitting as close to the edge as she could without falling into the potted plant. “Of course he did. I was out of town for the road trip, but something tells me you already knew that.”
“I brought our county consultant with me to your place ’cause there’s a few things about the accounts that have really stuck in my craw since that night. First, Brokaw landed on his left arm.”
Cat mocked a gasp. “That must be why he broke it. Damn, Detective, those night classes are paying off.”
He allowed her a small smile. “You told me when we first met that you looked over the balcony and saw Brokaw on the ground before you sprinted downstairs to help him.”
Cat waited for two players to pass through the lobby before she answered. “That’s what happened.”
“Had he moved when you reached him? I mean, was he in the same position that you’d seen from above?”
“Uh ….” She tried to recall that terrible night. “I think he was on his back still. He was unconscious so it’s not like he was writhing around or anything.”
“Exactly. That’s why I sought the expertise of forensic biomechanics. See, we can reconstruct the fall using 3-D motion analysis.”
Cat raised her eyebrow. “Drunken idiot falls off a balcony and you Weird Science the whole thing? Gee, it sounds like my tax dollars are hard at work.”
He composed himself with a deep breath. As his lips began to part into a thin smile, she reconsidered continuing to test his patience.
“Sorry. It’s been a long day.”
“I got the search warrant for your apartment so that I could measure the exact distance to the ground and the height of your balcony ledge, and also to obtain a few physical characteristics from Ryan Brokaw, since he’s been about as cooperative as you in all this.”
“Physical characteristics? You mean like his height and weight?”
“No, I can get those on a trading card. I’m talking about his joint centers and physical parameters. Using these values, we can determine the exact dynamic movement that had to occur for him to land in the position the EMTs found him in.
Confusion clouded her guarded skepticism. It was becoming clear what the detective was angling toward, but there were still too many pieces of the puzzle missing and she couldn’t provide a corner piece just yet.
Detective Kahn’s dark brown eyes searched her face. He was trying to solve this puzzle himself.
“So what did you find?”
“Neither his injuries nor the simulated body rotation that he would’ve taken are consistent with the story that both you and your guests keep spinning. Furthermore, we’re doing some forensics on the ground itself. Ryan Brokaw’s a big b
oy and he smacked the ground with a lot of force, but if he hit that grass with so much as an extra pound of pressure, we’ll know.”
“You think he was pushed.” It was not a question. She’d known from the start that’s what the detective suspected.
“I think it’s possible a fight broke out. These cats were drinking and gambling; I wouldn’t be surprised if someone got riled up. Your neighbor heard shouting. I’m thinking someone got carried away and now you’re all covering up for him. Maybe because that someone is pretty important to your team—say, for example, a fiery closer?”
“Oh.” His insinuation began to dawn on her. “Oh! You think I’d cover for Adam Alvarez?”
“Would you?”
“No!” She looked around the empty lobby and dropped her voice. “Even if I liked him I wouldn’t, but trust me, that ass doesn’t inspire me to martyrdom. He makes John Rocker look like Roberto Clemente.”
Detective Kahn smiled again, but this time it was genuine. “Pretty harsh for a guy you had over to your house.”
“For the last time—”
“I know, I know. It was your brother.”
“Do you know how much hell that night heaped on me from this town, while AA remains their golden boy? As long as he’s not blowing saves, he could burn down the children’s hospital and this town would love him.”
“He did blow a save, though, didn’t he?”
Cat nodded. “Two nights ago.”
“Maybe a guilty conscience?”
She scoffed. “He’d have to have a conscience first. I once saw him refuse to sign an autograph for a kid with Muscular Dystrophy because the boy’s wheelchair wheels were decorated with the Mets’ logo instead of Soldiers’. Trust me, Adam Alvarez isn’t losing sleep over anybody. That act he put on after the game was just that, an act.”
“Well, humor me for a minute. There were five guys there that night, right?”
“For the hundredth time, yes.”
Cat steadied her breathing. Detective Kahn had asked that question too many times. He must know that was a lie and was observing her every move. She remembered the fingerprint dusting on that night and wondered if Spencer’s set had came up after all.
“The guilty party would have to be pretty important for everyone to cover for him. Your brother is a nobody—no offense.”
“None taken.” Cat shrugged. She knew how it worked here. In this building, Quinn was a nobody, Cat was a nobody, even the gun-toting, stalwart officer of the law Kahn was a nobody.
“There’d be no reason to cover for Joel Faulk. He may have been last night’s hero, but the team could go on without him at any point. That leaves two other guys and from what the sports pages tell me, the team wouldn’t have made it to the playoffs without the lights-out closer and the clutch first baseman. Unless someone else was there that night?”
“Again, no.” Cat cursed her decision to keep the secret, but she couldn’t come clean now. Detective Kahn really would think she was a liar and Spencer would be thrown to the wolves.
“Maybe it was Damien, then. Maybe the guilt from ruining his friend’s postseason run drove him to do something stupid.”
“Suicide? You think he killed himself?” That would explain why a guy who couldn’t swim would wander along the riverfront in the middle of the night.
“I’m just laying scenarios on you, Ms. McDaniel. I think there’s only a few people who can help me figure out what happened that night and you’re one of them.”
He didn’t seem as hostile as before. His voice had softened and he no longer eyed her with gruff suspicion. Cat hesitated. She wanted so badly to spill her guts and get this off her chest, but maybe that’s what Detective Kahn wanted—to lull her into a false sense of security and then revert to his obsessive witch hunt. Or maybe he was like her—caught in a web and not sure where the spider was.
“Detective, I do know these guys pretty well. There’s twenty-five guys on the team and it’s no coincidence that Adam, Damien and Ryan hang out with each other over the other twenty-two.”
“What do you mean, they’re friends?”
“They’re as tight as it gets, but I wouldn’t call them friends. Guys like them aren’t capable of friendship. They’re selfish, mean and greedy. They make fun of little kids who ask for their autographs, they blow off charity events, they cheat on their wives, they don’t pay child support to their mistresses …. Simply put, they’re assholes. I love my brother, but it’s no surprise that they hit it off with Quinn, too.”
Detective Kahn was hanging on her every word, but didn’t look surprised. If he was any kind of investigator, he surely knew this already.
“What about Joel Faulk?”
“I was surprised to see Joel with them that night because he seems like a pretty nice guy.” She shrugged it off. “But those three covering up for one another? It would never happen. They’d sooner hand over their own mothers.”
“This is an eye-opener. I went through a substantial amount of your archived articles and I don’t recall reading any of this. You describe these guys like they’re Boy Scouts.”
“I work for the team, not the Enquirer.” She smiled. “If I did, you’d read about our road trips. The team hotels have to put them on a different floor and a different wing than every other member of the club because of how much they party. When we were in Los Angeles, they stuck the team with a thirty-thousand-dollar bill for damages to a suite at the Ritz. They’re drunken idiots, Detective. I don’t know why your biomechanic thingy would say that Brokaw didn’t fall, but that’s really the only answer. They just aren’t the kind of guys who would cover for each other.”
“Hmm.” He tapped his foot on the lobby’s hardwood floor.
“There’s something else.”
He perked up. “I’m listening.”
“Damien couldn’t swim.”
“How do you know this?”
“I heard him telling Adam. You want to know what I think happened?”
“I do, actually.”
“He had a really good game the night he went missing. I bet he was meeting one of his skanky girlfriends at that skanky motel and had too much to drink. He probably stumbled into the water and drowned.”
Now that he’d washed ashore, she knew no one in the organization would say that, but they would all be thinking it.
“Do you know any of his girlfriends?”
She scoffed. “No. The only person I ever saw him with was his wife, but everyone knows he screws—screwed—around on her.”
Detective Kahn’s head bobbled back and forth as he weighed her theory with careful consideration. “Would any of the players know her?”
“I doubt it. It isn’t really a double date kind of situation.”
He nodded. “Well, we’re canvassing the motel room. Maybe her name will turn up.”
“Maybe. I’m just saying the only connection between the night at my apartment and the night he went missing is that he was an idiot both nights and I know that because he’s always an idiot.”
“Are you always this compassionate about the recently deceased?”
“I’m sorry, Detective, but Damien and his friends brought a lot of crap my way, so I’m not going to pretend he was something he wasn’t.”
“No, please don’t. I find this bout of honesty refreshing.”
She returned his smile, signaling a truce between the two of them. “Now can I ask you something?”
“I suppose.”
“Let’s say you’re right and I’m wrong: Quinn and the players are covering up about what happened on that balcony. Ryan, the supposed victim, isn’t reporting it.”
“No, he’s not.”
“So why do you care? Aren’t there more sympathetic victims out there that actually want and need your help? Why bother with this?”
“Because I don’t think it’s right for anyone to hide behind their power and money.”
A laugh bubbled through her lips and echoed through the empty lobb
y. “You know what’s funny? I think that if the circumstances were different, you and I could actually be friends.”
“Well, maybe there’s hope for us yet.” He stood up and held his hand out.
She took his large mitt in hers. “Will I see you tonight at the vigil? I imagine all the guys will be there.”
“Nah, I think I might close the book on this one.”
“What about the forensics? The fingerprints?”
He winked at her in response. “If anything new comes up, you call me.” With that, he sauntered out the lobby doors, sticking one long arm in the pocket of his pinstriped pants and using the other to dial on his cellphone.
Cat frowned as the door slammed shut behind him.
He’d played her.
Chapter 17
The vigil was announced two hours later, after it buzzed around the stadium that a body found downstream had been positively identified as Damien Staats: husband, father and—most importantly to this bunch—first baseman. The past week was forgotten and Cat was once again at the forefront of Soldiers’ business. She helped the media relations spread word of the six o’clock vigil and made the fifty mile trek to a candle warehouse to pick up thirty thousand tapers and drip protectors. It felt good to be a part of the team again.
As the sun began to set, the fans arrived at the gates and were handed a candle and a program. A makeshift stage had been placed in the outfield with rows of chairs extending all the way into the infield. The sight of a hundred folding chairs digging into the lush Kentucky bluegrass was sure to make the grounds crew cringe, for when the vigil was over, they would only have twelve hours to get the field back into playoff shape.
Cat stood behind the stage, near the field access doors, watching the sad faces mourn the first baseman. She’d been present for a team death before. Her first professional club in Las Vegas had witnessed the death of a star rookie. Only there, his life had been gone in an instant. This was different. Damien had been missing for five days now. The team had played without him and would continue doing so tomorrow.
No one would admit it, of course, but you could almost hear the sighs of relief emerging from the first row, the seats that housed the front office staff. Damien’s death was a tragic conclusion, but for the Buffalo Soldiers, the conclusion to the philanderer’s disappearance could have been much worse—a PR nightmare. He could’ve been found alive but passed out in the back alley of a strip club. The team would’ve gotten their first baseman back, but they would’ve been painted as a troubled team undeserving of a title. Instead, the death afforded the team the world’s pity and put them in the enviable spot of being mourners at tomorrow’s home game. People would say, “Win it for Damien,” and boo Chicago for giving anything more than a medial effort.