by April Smith
People were hyped, transistors on, the Dodgers about to face the Pirates at Pittsburgh. If they won and the Rockies lost, the Dodgers would move into first place—cause for the traditional ice cream party in the “ice cream area” in the front office and the first hopeful turn of the season. But all of that seemed to Cassidy as foreign as a festival in Istanbul. When Dulce saw her coming, she scuttled away like a crab, joining the other assistants in the dim reaches of the filing stacks. Rumors were rampant. People knew something was up, most of them betting it was Cassidy Sanderson’s career. You don’t assemble two detectives, three attorneys for the Dodgers and a special agent from the FBI in the scouting director’s office to talk lowball hitters and career trends.
Cassidy put her game face on and walked the gauntlet.
She opened the door to find Raymond staring right at her with both big palms flat on the empty desk, the others (including Allen in the dark blue suit and Simms, wearing Adidas) posed on window ledges and chairs with cups of coffee, legal pads and absent smiles.
It didn’t get any better.
During the next hour and a half she made a statement in which she admitted to taking an unauthorized trip to the DR, to being drunk in a car along with a newly signed prospect and an American developer who later became her lover—who, she stated in a barely audible voice, to the best of her knowledge and recollection, was driving the Rover when they hit an unidentified female, apparently killing her, and who, without informing Ms. Sanderson or Mr. Cruz of the severity of the accident, drove away from the scene. The developer, before he disappeared, an apparent victim of a blackmail scheme turned kidnapping, repeatedly tried to manipulate her into putting the blame on the boy.
That was fun, saying that to a room full of men.
Afterward, when the investigators left, Raymond asked her to stay.
He closed the door. Cassidy drew up her feet cross-legged in the chair, not her usual posture in Raymond’s office.
“I’m just going to go for it,” he told her. “I feel like a piker. From the day you went down there you kept me three steps behind when we should have been on the same page. I should have known you were taking off, I should have known what was happening with Cruz, not hear it through official channels. Damn, you get the shit beat out of you in Vero Beach and I’m the last to know? You should have come to me in every instance, and you didn’t, and that hurts. I feel like my faith in you has been abused.”
“I’m very, very sorry, Ray, it’s totally my fault. I thought I was taking care of everyone.”
“You did a hell of a great job with Cruz.”
“I got him to the game.”
“No you haven’t. With all your shenanigans, you’ve made it doubly hard.”
“How is he doing? I tracked him down at the USC Medical Center. I left a message but he didn’t call me back.”
“He had some kind of tropical parasite. The infection went to his liver. They had to do an operation, but he’s all right, he’ll be fine. Physically. But that’s not all there is to it.”
“I realize that.”
“He has to make a statement to the police. Then there’s the fiasco with the birth certificate—”
Raymond heaved up and for an instant his bulk blocked the daylight.
“—Then, he has to play!”
Blushing, “I know he has to play.”
“I trust your evaluation of a prospect. If I didn’t trust you, then you and I could not be in business.” His voice had left the cool reserves. “So would you please explain exactly what it is that keeps you from trusting me?”
Standing in front of an empty oak bookshelf, dressed according to code in forest green plaid shirt and pressed slacks, Raymond appeared as frustrated as a gifted African-American principal in an all-white school, fed up with the racial crap that keeps him from doing his job.
Cassidy saw it, and the faint gleam of sweat on his forehead.
“I do trust you. I wouldn’t want to work for anyone else. You do a great job in player development and you’ve more than once stepped up for me. And I’m grateful.”
Raymond sat back down at the bare desk in the empty office. Clearly, he was moving in or out of there at any moment.
“I guess I’m disappointed all around. Disappointed and disgusted.” His hand formed a soft fist. “The Dodgers are family. That’s what makes this club different, and to me that’s not a bunch of public relations horseshit.”
“Me, either.”
“Well, now we can kiss our little family good-bye.”
“What do you mean?”
He swiveled away and looked out at the field.
“The rumor is the O’Malleys are going to sell.”
Cassidy’s body went limp in the chair.
“Not possible.”
“Another reason everybody’s nuts around here. Peter wanted to build that football stadium and the city council wouldn’t come through. I think he was disillusioned … There’s a lot of reasons.”
“I can’t even process this—”
“… a solid franchise,” Raymond was saying, “but that’s all we do,” earnestly, “see, we do baseball, and it’s becoming so as one baseball family can’t hold on anymore against the big diversified corporations that have TV networks and newspapers and whatnot to absorb the bottom line.”
“What’s going to happen to everybody?” Cassidy wondered out loud.
“Nobody knows,” Raymond answered. “Depends who the buyer is.”
Their eyes met.
“People say baseball’s slow, the players are overpaid … Hopefully the buyer will be someone who can go all out to promote the game.”
“Sure.”
“Cultivate the younger fan.”
“Right.”
“Better in the end.” The phone rang. “At this point the intention to sell is not common knowledge. So don’t go trading in it.”
“I wouldn’t!”
“See? I’m trusting you with that.”
He spoke for a few minutes, hung up.
“They don’t want you to leave yet. You’re getting a police escort home.”
“That’ll be new.”
“They’re putting you under protective custody. Apparently they believe you yourself are in sufficient danger, with all this horseshit, they don’t want you to leave your house.”
The Dodgers lost.
No ice cream, either.
29
Cassidy makes sure to keep several steps ahead of Detective Allen going up the steps so she can get to the attic bedroom first—to whisk a bra off a doorknob, sideswipe the curling edge of a braided rug into place, block his view of the intimate mess on top of the bamboo dresser by standing in front of it, fists on her waist.
“It’s just a simple tape recorder. Plugs into a phone jack. Can I set it up here?”
“Anywhere you want.”
She removes a pile of laundry (at least it’s folded) from a wooden chair. Detective Allen places a small black tape recorder on the chair but it totters in the scooped-out seat. Cassidy offers a crocheted pad. Still totters. He finds some magazines on the nightstand and positions them on the seat, pad on top, then the tape recorder.
“Impressive.”
“Pick up the phone.”
A red light goes on and the tape whirs. Cassidy hangs up. The machine stops.
“Incoming calls will trigger it as well. Come downstairs, I’ve got something for you to sign.”
Detective Allen jogs energetically down the winding staircase as if he’s lived in this cottage all his life, having traded the bad news suit for a pair of jeans and, apparently, contact lenses for gold-rimmed glasses. The stairs wheeze. He needs to lose those ten pounds.
He opens a briefcase on the dining table. Cassidy peers inside, curious to see if there is a gun, but instead she spots an empty shoulder holster, headphones, a second tape recorder, personal organizer, screwdriver, airline tickets, a roll of antacids, maps, a science fiction novel, yellow pads,
legal documents. Handcuffs.
“This is called a one-party consent. You give us permission to tape-record your conversations.”
“What about whoever I’m talking to?”
“They don’t know they’re being recorded and you don’t tell them.”
“Isn’t that a violation of somebody’s rights?”
“Certain rights are waived under a criminal investigation.”
“Like me being able to come and go from my own house?”
“You agreed to protective custody.”
“Protective custody sucks.”
“Hasn’t even started yet. Wait until day twelve.”
“I’ll go insane.”
“Feel free to have another conversation with your attorney. As far as I’m concerned”—a pen snaps out between his fingers like a knife—“we’ve been over this.”
His condescension irks her and she signs.
“Is Joe now considered a criminal?”
“Joe is a possible kidnap victim as well as a suspect in two separate cases involving laundering of drug money and vehicular manslaughter.”
“Why ‘possible’ victim?”
Allen is unplugging the receiver from the kitchen phone. He substitutes a Y connector and reattaches both receiver and headphones.
“We’re still not clear about the circumstances surrounding the kidnapping.”
“They left a photograph for God’s sake.”
“That’s what bothers me. It’s a little too neat.”
“You mean, like, ‘Hi! I’ve just been kidnapped’? Did you see the expression on his face? He knows as well as you do they cut people up and stuff them in the trunks of cars. They could be torturing him, and do you care?”
“Look, it’s a theory.”
“Okay,” taking breaths to slow the sudden drumming of her heart, to annhilate the images of what they could be doing to Joe right now. “What’s the theory?”
“Let’s say the alleged kidnappers were lying in wait. He parks the car, they approach at gunpoint, take him into the house, leave the note. I’m fine to that point. But then none of the neighbors sees him leave. Nobody hears a thing. Even though the houses are close together and everyone’s got a high-tech alarm system, including Joe. He doesn’t hit the panic button, makes no attempt we know of to resist—which means he had to have walked outside and into their car cooperatively, then they leave the garage door open with a Bentley parked inside—”
“They didn’t leave it open.”
“No?”
“Joe did. He kicked the carton with the paint cans in the way so the door would automatically pop up. That’s why it didn’t stay closed when I closed it.”
“Pretty fast thinking for a high-stress situation.”
“That’s Joe. Quick on his feet.” She grabs a bag of pistachios off the counter. “The open door was a call for help. And I walked right through it. Don’t you think that keeps me up at night?”
She offers the bag to Allen.
“People have been wondering how you got in,” he says, cracking one. “What you were doing there at that particular time.”
“Man, I answered all these questions in Raymond’s office—”
“You did.”
“But?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. I don’t know how you really feel about the guy.”
He works the shell apart carefully.
“Excuse me, but am I the suspect here?”
“No.”
“You think I helped Joe escape? Is that why I’m imprisoned in my own home?”
“You are under protective custody because Monroe knows where you work and probably where you live. He’s already beat the shit out of you once. You’re a witness to the shooting in the 7-Eleven as well as to vehicular manslaughter in which the driver of the car, Mr. Galinis, has disappeared. Two unstable individuals, one target. It’s a no-brainer, Cassidy.”
“Okay, so what’s the drill?”
Allen snaps the briefcase shut. He takes a couple more nuts and shakes them in his hand like dice.
“Monroe has sent a message with that ransom note. He wants to communicate. We’re going to communicate. He calls. The red light goes on. You hear his voice. ‘Hello?’ Your first reaction will be to stress. But the key is to be patient and control the situation. The guy is dangerous and crazy. He shot a kid in cold blood so we know he’s the type to pull a weapon, show he’s a macho man. Right now he’s under pressure. The uncle is impatient. The extortion thing hasn’t worked out so great, so he’s kicked it up to kidnapping. He figured Cruz is too protected, so he’s gone for the big kahuna, but he knows that could mean greater risk. When you talk to him he could be agitated, possibly high, possibly verbally abusive.”
“How do I know he’s not just looking for a parking space in Beverly Hills?”
“Stay with me. We want Monroe to talk. He ain’t gonna spill his whereabouts, so just try to have a casual conversation. Anything you can get along the way. For example, we have a good case on the 7-Eleven but a confession would be icing on the cake. You ask open-ended, common-sense questions like, ‘Back in Vero—what happened? Why did it go wrong? The cops have been asking around. Word is this clerk was killed and your name popped up. They’re looking for you. I don’t want to be associated with this kind of thing—clear my mind for me—what went down? The clerk pushed the panic button or what?’ ”
The phone rings.
Cassidy jolts. Detective Allen slips the headphones on.
“Just answer it like normal.”
“Hello?”
“Cassidy Sanderson?”
“Yes?”
“This is Pamela Benson of the Los Angeles Times. I’m calling from the sports desk. I cover the Dodgers and—”
Detective Allen, listening through the headphones, raises his eyebrows, Go with it.
“—I was wondering if I could ask a few questions.”
“Ask.”
“There’s a rumor you quit the scouting department.”
“Quit? No,” says Cassidy as normally as possible. “Just taking a leave of absence.”
“In the middle of the season?”
“So what?”
Detective Allen makes a cutoff sign at the throat.
“The rumor is you couldn’t hack it. The pressure was too tough.”
“Who told you this supposed rumor? It wasn’t Travis Conners by any chance?”
“I can’t reveal a source.”
Detective Allen’s hand is sawing back and forth.
“We both know what it’s like for women,” the sweet young voice goes on. “Still a man’s world. Sometimes it’s easier just to bail—”
“No way. Not ever. And you tell whoever came up with that steaming piece of horseshit to respect the game of baseball. I don’t care if they respect me, but respect the game.”
She slams the phone down, strides to the refrigerator and pulls a beer.
“I assume you don’t want one of these?”
Allen shakes his head.
She hooks the bottle under an opener mounted on the wall and yanks it hard so the cap goes flying.
“You’ll get the hang of it,” Detective Allen sighs.
30
They let her run on the beach with one of the officers from the Laguna Beach Police Department. Edith gets walked. The backyard gets watered. The sock drawer almost gets cleaned out, but forget that. Bills get paid. New checks for her account get ordered. It takes forty-five minutes, but finally she prevails in having a seventy-nine-dollar charge she has been carrying for a year for a radial tire she never purchased taken off her credit card.
Hooray.
Late in the afternoon of the third day, during a Padres–Cardinals game, Raymond calls.
“Thought I’d pass along some peace of mind.”
“Great.”
“I’m giving your territory to Travis.”
“Travis!”
The word dickhead has barely formed upon her lips wh
en Raymond adds, “I know that Travis can be a dickhead, but the police have been talking to the VPs. There’s legitimate concern about the safety and well-being of our personnel. The cops think, basically, you shouldn’t be around the players.”
“But I’m on all these great kids—”
“It’s temporary. Until this settles down.”
“There’s one,” she argues, “Garrett Wright, sixteen years old, incredibly hot left-hander just coming up at Long Beach High—”
“You’ll pick up where you left off. We’ll be here.”
“That’s not fair, Raymond, please—”
“You’ve still got business to clean up. When they let you out of there and whatnot, go out and make the sign on Brad Parker. I want to lock that down.”
She blows exasperated air into the phone which apparently infuriates her boss.
“Can you make the sign on Parker?”
“Yes, I can make the sign!”
Hostile silence.
“Taking your stuff on means extra work for Travis. He’s doing you a favor. We’re hanging with you, Cassidy, which is more than you’ve shown us.”
She swallows hard.
“Thank you, Ray. That means a lot.”
“All right.”
Raymond hangs up.
The machine clicks off.
Cassidy thinks about it. After a moment she presses the rewind button. Then she picks up the phone and lets the red light go on, recording five minutes of silence over the conversation with Raymond, thereby wiping it and everything else off the tape.
“What do people do when they’re cooped up like this?”
“Play video games. Watch TV.”
“How can you stand it?”
Detective Allen is sitting on the sofa typing on a laptop. The locals have been working the other shifts. Tonight it will be his turn to sleep on the living room couch.
“I once saw a woman go through boxes and boxes of family photos. I mean like thousands. She sat in a motel room in Fort Lauderdale for three, four weeks, patiently organizing, meticulously putting them into albums. Nice lady.”
“Was she a witness, too?”
“No, it was a domestic violence situation. He ultimately got her anyway.”