dead men in their basement, they’ll need to talk to them. An apparent double murder and then a suicide, the chief’s finger still in the trigger guard. Will the forensics man find something that doesn’t add up? What can you find when you’re dealing with shotgun blasts? How hard will they even look?
They’ll go to her, of course. To the whole family. They’ll have to talk to them.
Oh my God, she’ll say. It can’t be. The chief was such a good man. He told me he’d help me. He told me he wouldn’t let those men hurt me. But my God, Officer, I had no idea.
You’ve got your own story to tell the police, Alex. Your own little theory, with absolutely no proof. And yourself right in the middle of it. First you threatened Whitley and Harwood at gunpoint; then you ended up in Maria’s bed. Then you had a nightcap with the chief, at the bar and then back at his house, where you then knocked a shotgun out of his hands. And took the shells out. For all you know, your fingerprints are still on it. Unless you go lift that gun off the chief’s chest and wipe it clean.
Think about what you’ve got, Alex. This is the hand you’re holding if you try to make this whole thing come out differently in the end.
I made myself turn around and go back up the stairs. I didn’t have to read the note on the floor. I knew what it said. The words scrawled below the official seal, with the cannon in the sand.
“For Maria, and everything I wanted to believe.”
CHAPTER 24
“Alex.”
I opened my eyes.
“Alex.”
I sat up straight in the hard wooden chair, feeling a sudden pain run down my neck and into my back.
“Alex.” His voice was low, like a whisper.
I looked across the room. Randy’s eyes were open.
“Do you need the doctor?” I said. I looked at my watch. It was after 11:00 P.M. I had gotten there at 9:00, just in time to catch the doctor writing out his charts at the nurses’ station. Randy had regained consciousness just after I had left that afternoon, the doctor told me. He still had some localized weakness on the left side of his body, but aside from that, he was doing remarkably well. They took the tube out of his throat and hooked up a minidose morphine drip. They had told him he had been shot, and that there was a county deputy stationed outside his door. He had been awake for a couple hours, but by the time I got back there, he was asleep. I sat down in the chair and did the same. Now he was awake again, and I didn’t know which question to ask him first.
“They told me what happened,” he said. He still had the bandages on, but without the tube running down his throat, he looked human again.
“Yeah,” I said. “I talked to the doctor.”
He looked toward the window. “What time is it?”
“Just after eleven.”
“Were you here the whole time?”
“No, I was up in Orcus Beach.”
He looked at me, then closed his eyes.
“The last thing I remember,” he said, “was going to her door.”
“Her daughter told you where she lives,” I said.
He opened his eyes again. “Yes.”
“Maria told me she thought you were Harwood,” I said. “Or somebody he sent.”
“You saw her.”
“Yes. I saw her.”
“What else did she say?”
“She said a lot of things,” I said. “Of course, every single thing she said was a lie.”
“I could use something to drink,” he said.
“She’s a very good liar, isn’t she,” I said. “Not unlike yourself.”
“The doctor said I’m not supposed to talk too much.”
“You may have some permanent damage to your vocal cords,” I said. “That’s gonna affect your technique a little bit.”
“Alex…”
“I know the whole story,” I said. “Your record in California, the arrest warrant waiting for you when you get back. That deputy’s been sitting outside your door the whole time.”
“You should have gone home,” he said.
“I called your family. I thought they should know.”
“Let me guess,” he said. “They were not overwhelmed with concern.”
“Your youngest son came the closest,” I said. “He seemed to care a little bit.”
Randy closed his eyes again.
“Feel free to tell me why you did all this,” I said. “Anytime. I’m all ears.”
“I didn’t lie to you,” he said.
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” he said. “I didn’t lie to you.”
“Good-bye,” I said, turning toward the door. “I’m gone.”
“Alex, wait.”
I stopped.
“I didn’t lie,” he said. “Not exactly. I just didn’t tell you everything.”
I rubbed my forehead. “Oh God,” I said. “Here we go. You should run for office, you know that?”
“Let me explain.”
I moved back. I stood over him with my arms folded across my chest. “Give it your best shot. First lie you tell me, I’m out the door. This time, I’ll know it. Believe me.”
He took a long breath and rested his head back on the pillow. For a moment, there was nothing but the sound of the heart monitor, still attached to his chest. Then be began.
“Everything they told you about me is true,” he said. “Everything and then some. I have no excuse for it, Alex. I’m not going to try to defend myself. All I can say is, there was a time, many years ago, when things were different. You knew me then. You knew how much I loved playing ball. It was the only thing I ever wanted to do. When I got my big chance and failed, it was all taken away from me. In one game, in one inning, it was all gone. I knew it right then. I knew I’d never get another chance. Even though I ended up getting kicked around in the minors for another six years, deep down I knew it was hopeless. I’d never get another shot.”
He paused to catch his breath.
“When I got sent up to Detroit, it was the best month of my life. When I met Maria, it got even better. I figured this was the girl I’d spend the rest of my life with. I’d be a big-league pitcher for twenty years and I’d go to the Hall of Fame one day, and she’d be there in Cooperstown with me, sitting in the front row. With our three kids. I could see my whole life opening up in front of me. I really could. When I got knocked out of that game, I went down into the clubhouse and I just sat there, Alex. I didn’t cry. I didn’t take a bat and destroy a television set or anything. I just sat there and thought to myself, This is what life is really like. Dreams don’t come true. Things don’t happen just because you want them to. Nothing is fair. Nothing is really good. Are you following me, Alex?”
“Keep going,” I said.
“All I’m trying to say is, in that exact moment, I saw things the way they really were. This girl I was spending so much time with, this beautiful, wonderful Maria, she didn’t really love me. She was just setting me up. It was all a big scam.”
“Giving up seven runs made you realize that.”
“The night before the game,” he said. “She told me about this debt her father had, going all the way back to the old country. He couldn’t repay it. No matter how she begged him, this man was so old-fashioned, he was willing to take his whole family back to Europe just so they could work as servants in some guy’s house to repay the debt
