The band couldn’t have seen anything. The church’s rear entrance was 150 feet from the stage. Eddie was next door when he tossed the gun. Pile on the light show and the sea of bodies that was the audience, and the exercise turned futile.
But Lynch wanted to see who in the room took notice of Devlin’s exit, and only the stage footage (shot from the tripod) was clear enough to examine.
“I think we’re ready, Chaz. Go ahead.”
“With pleasure, my man!”
The song kicked on in ultra hi-def. The two detectives probed every movement of every musician from the first note to the last. Lynch took the singer and the bass player. Gomez took the guitar player, keyboard player, and drummer. The singer played to the audience for the entire set. The bass player kept his eyes mostly on his left hand. He looked up now and then, but not high or long enough to see anything at the back of the hall. It fit. The bass player is, as a rule, least obligated to put on a show. The guitar player was all over the place. He didn’t focus anywhere for more than a couple seconds, and never past the front row. The keyboard player didn’t look up at all. The drummer was difficult to read for a very specific reason. Gomez waited until the tune was over, and the vid was paused to say something. He pointed to the still image on the screen.
“Yo, Chaz, what’s with the sunglasses?”
“Oh, that. I’ll tell you, bro if you don’t mind an unrelated story.”
Gomez prayed that, whatever the story was, Chaz would act it out.
“We don’t mind.”
“Jerry…that’s the drummer’s name…he’s covering up a black eye. He and Mick, the sound guy, went at it a couple of days before the show.”
Chaz had the detectives’ instant and undivided attention. Lynch spoke as the two of them gravitated toward the Mac Book.
“Went at it over what?”
“Jerry and I have been friends for a long time. That band kicks ass, but they have serious drama issues. We’re talking Fleetwood Mac-level drama.”
“So, a love triangle then?”
Chaz nodded.
“Patty, that’s the singer, and Mick are married.”
“We got that much.”
“Cool, well, Patty and Jerry were together first. This was maybe seven years ago.”
“Who broke up with whom?”
Gomez rolled his eyes at Lynch’s sensitivity to grammar.
“Understand man, I only got one side of the story, and Jerry wasn’t exactly sober when he told it. Mick is more than the band’s sound guy. He does the booking, writes a lot of the music, and writes most of the lyrics. He’s a talented guy to the bitchin’ degree. Pity Party is his. You heard it; the music just flows out of him Amadeus-style.
“But here’s where the drama starts. He’s not an original member of the group. He wasn’t even voted in. He was…and, mind you, this is drunk Jerry talkin’…forced on them by Bro Devlin.”
“How’d that happen?”
“I’m shaky on details. Mick joined ‘Maplewood E’, like I said, about seven years ago. I don’t know what drove him there. I get the vibe, just like from his tats and stuff; he was kind of a lost soul. Drunk Jerry says Devlin took the dude under his wing pretty hard. Word has it Mick studied music engineering somewhere, Berklee maybe, I don’t know. Bro Devlin put him in charge of running sound during services at Maplewood. Three guesses who lost the job to him…that’s right, Jerry. Anyway, cut to a few months later, the band is kicking ass, and everyone is thanking Mick for it.”
“So that’s a couple of nails in the coffin. How did Mick hook up with Patty?”
“The regular way: alpha male shit.”
“You still haven’t told me who did the breaking.”
It was like talking to Samuel all over again, only with half the attitude and twice the cholesterol.
“Drunk Jerry said he did, but I don’t really know. Our band played the wedding reception. Damn, I guess that’s like six years ago. Doesn’t seem like it.”
“Six years and these two guys are still scrapping over it?”
“Man, you don’t know the half of it. You guys want a beer?”
The detectives politely rejected the offer. Chaz reached under the console and produced a Miller Lite from a camouflaged mini-fridge. With a pop of the tab and an unreturned “cheers,” he slammed back the majority of it.
“Anyway, that’s not why they were fighting. Not really. You see…”
Chaz belched and set down his beer.
“…Jerry found out that Mick was cheating on Patty.”
Lynch’s reply was more out of reflex than interest.
“With who?”
Gomez joyfully corrected him.
“With whom.”
“I don’t know the chick. You know the funny thing is…and again…drunk Jerry…I don’t think it was the actual cheating that pissed him off the most. I mean, the chick has a kid, and I don’t even think that was it. Mick got Patty smoking again, and I don’t even…Aw, I’m sorry, guys. I’m babbling. You don’t need to know this shit.”
“No Chaz, it’s okay. What do you think pissed him off the most?”
“Look, you’ve got to understand, they take their beliefs like mondo-seriously over there at Maplewood. Stuff bugs them that doesn’t bug us mere mortals.”
“Chaz…what?”
The drummer picked up his Miller Lite and took it down to backwash.
“The chick Mick is banging … she’s Catholic.”
The words hung in the air like a bubble asking to be popped. Lynch thrust his hand in his pocket and yanked out the plastic bag containing the three pictures from Bishop Ryan’s last Mass. He spoke as he fiddled with the seal.
“How old is the girlfriend’s kid?”
“Whoa dude! Did I say something important?”
“How old!??”
“Okay, man. Chill. I think Jerry said she was ten or eleven. That was a couple years ago so…”
“So, confirmation age then.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Lynch rifled through the pictures, trying to find the back of Mick’s head, but he couldn’t clearly remember what the guy looked like. He slapped the pictures down in front of Chaz.
“Does anyone in any of these pictures look like Mick to you?”
Chaz, wishing he had the theme to
