Play Dirty (18 page)

“A fraction of what I made when I was playing football. A tiny fraction. That guy works hard and doesn’t earn as much as I spent on having my tailored shirts laundered. He doesn’t hate me for making more money than him. What he hates is that I was living the life every guy dreams of, and I threw it away. I took money for cheating. I was stupid and selfish, and I broke the law. There’s no getting around that.”

“But you’re not bad now.”

He was screwing a paraplegic’s wife for money. That was pretty damn bad. The only thing worse would be to want to screw her whether he was being paid to or not.

He’d tried not to think at all about what had happened. When he did, he tried passing it off as physiological cause and effect, sexual mechanics that, with all the gears oiled and working, had produced a predictable result.

Or as caprice. A fluke. Stars had collided, but it wouldn’t happen again for another million years.

But in whatever terms he tried to explain it, it stayed on his mind. Constantly. Every time he thought about her teeth sinking into the bottom of his thumb, he got hard, his gut tightened with longing, and all he wanted was to be inside her again.

“I’m nobody’s hero, Jason. Don’t make me into one. You want a hero, look at your dad.”

“My dad?” Jason scoffed. “What’s he do that’s heroic?”

“He loves your mom. He loves you. He takes care of you, worries about you.”

Jason, still sullen, said, “That’s nothing.”

“That’s huge.” Then, to keep from sounding too preachy, he added, “But he can’t throw a football for shit. And don’t tell him I said
shit
in front of you.”

“He says it all the time.”

Griff laughed. “Then he’s
my
hero.”

Jason started smiling again.

The following day started out like every other. Griff got out of bed and went into the bathroom. As soon as he’d peed, he consulted the calendar he’d tacked to the wall. This was his routine now. He was marking off the days, for crissake.

He’d bought a computer and taught himself to use it. After extensive Internet research, he thought he had a fairly comprehensive overview of the female reproductive system and how it worked, more than he had learned from basic biology in school.

Some of the message boards he’d logged on to gave him more information than he wanted—did he really need to know about mucus plugs and yolk sacs?—but he’d learned a lot about timing and what happened within that twenty-eight-day cycle. He’d learned what an LH surge was.

If he’d been with Laura on the day she ovulated, he approximated when she would have menstruated—if she was going to. Those five days had come and gone. If she’d had a period, and if his calculations were correct, he should have heard from her three days ago, when she should have been ovulating again.

But she hadn’t summoned him back to the house on Windsor Street. So did that mean she hadn’t had a period and therefore had conceived? Maybe she was holding off breaking the glad news until she’d had her pregnancy confirmed by a doctor. Or maybe, because of what had happened the last time, she didn’t intend to call him, ever again. But wouldn’t he have been notified that the deal was off?

Not knowing was making him crazy, but all he could do was wait.

As he did every morning, he made a notation on the calendar, then showered. When he stepped out of the tub, he heard his newspaper being thunked against his front door. Disinclined to dress yet, he wrapped a towel around his waist. He retrieved the paper from his small porch, went into the kitchen, and started a pot of coffee.

While waiting for it to brew, he perused the front page and drank orange juice from the carton. He flipped the paper over, read the headlines beneath the fold, and finding them relating to the same world crises that they’d related to yesterday, he pulled out the sports section.

The headline caused his heart to stutter. Blood rushed to his head and made him momentarily dizzy. “The fuck is this?”

BURKETT QUESTIONED IN DEATH OF BOOKMAKER,
the headline read.

FURTHER WOES FOR FORMER COWBOY?

VETERAN COACH DENOUNCES FALLEN STAR.

Recognizing the stories, he looked at the dateline. Not this morning’s issue. It was five years old, and though it was well preserved, he saw now that the paper on which the sports section was printed didn’t match the rest of the newspaper. It had yellowed some with age.

Rodarte.

He knocked over a kitchen chair in his rush. In seconds, he was out of the kitchen, through the living area, and flinging open his front door. He charged out onto his narrow patch of yard and scanned the street. He didn’t really expect to see the green sedan, and he didn’t. Rodarte had given himself time to get away.

“Son of a bitch!” Griff grabbed the towel, which was slipping off his waist, and stormed back inside, slamming the door behind him. Rodarte hadn’t reappeared in almost two months. Now, just when Griff had begun to think—hope—the bastard had given up and gone away, this.

Clever of him, planting this old sports section in today’s newspaper where Griff was certain to find it. Rodarte was rubbing his nose in the shit he’d made of his life five years ago.

When he felt composed enough to confront the fine print, he righted the chair and poured himself a cup of coffee, then sat down at the kitchen table and began to read. Every word was like a blow, hurtful because it was true.

Not since Pete Rose’s gambling and Jose Canseco’s admission to using steroids had a professional athlete scandalized himself as much as the record-breaking, all-star quarterback Griff Burkett had. Media coverage had been extensive and pervasive. The story had made headlines internationally. ESPN had dedicated hours of programming to it.

But Rodarte had done well to choose this particular issue of
The Dallas Morning News,
because these stories were summarizing chronicles of his long, inexorable fall.

The gambling had started small, but it grew like a creeping vine he couldn’t kill or control, until it dominated, becoming more exciting for him than the Sunday games. Winning big on a wager was more thrilling than winning big on the gridiron.

It had evolved into an addiction. Before it had got out of hand, he should have been smart enough to recognize the danger signs. Maybe he had. Maybe he had just ignored them.

He got caught up in a dangerous but exhilarating spiral. If he won, he raised the stakes of the next bet in order to win more. If he lost, he raised the stakes to recover the loss. The spiral became a maelstrom that eventually sucked him under.

Bill Bandy looked more like a tax accountant than one’s idea of a bookie. He was a slightly built man who probably had weighed no more on the day he died than on the day he graduated high school. He had thinning brown hair, a small face with a pointed chin, and a sharp nose. His pinched nostrils and pale blue eyes waged a constant war with airborne allergens. His hands were as soft and white as a woman’s, and one got the sense they would feel moist if touched.

No one would have pegged him for a mobster. Yet that was exactly what he was. It was rumored that, back in St. Louis, before he’d been relocated to Dallas, he had poisoned an uncle who had double-crossed him. Griff never knew if that was fact or fiction.

Bandy worked for Vista, the syndicate’s dummy corporation that ostensibly ran a tin-mining operation somewhere in South America. The actual location and other details were vague. Vista’s real enterprises were high-stakes gambling, money laundering, and, Griff suspected, drug trafficking.

Vista’s
miners
in the Las Colinas high-rise wore designer suits and diamond-studded Rolexes. They packed heat even when they went to the men’s room. They had bodyguards with automatic pistols and cars with bulletproof windows.

You did not fuck with them.

That was what Bill Bandy had told Griff over a plate of chicken enchiladas one night at his favorite Mexican restaurant. Griff was midway into his fourth season with the Cowboys. Bandy had invited him to dinner to discuss business, specifically the repayment of his gambling debt, which was now three hundred thousand and change.

“You don’t fuck with these guys, Griff. If it was me, I’d extend you some more credit. Hell, you make millions. I know you’ll be good for the money in a few months. But these guys?” He blotted his dripping nose with a damp white handkerchief. “There’s no charity in their hearts. Believe me.”

Griff dunked a tortilla chip into the salsa and munched it noisily. He took a sip of frozen margarita and winked at the starstruck teenage girls staring at him from the next table. “What are they going to do? Send some guy with hairy knuckles to break both my legs?”

“You think this is funny?”

“I think you’re about to panic when panic isn’t called for. They compound the interest every week, making me a profit center for them. So what’s their problem?”

“They want their money.”

Finally Bandy’s funereal tone captured Griff’s attention. No longer nervous or fidgety, Bandy’s pale gaze was rock steady. Even his nose had dried up temporarily. Griff thought maybe the fable of his poisoning an elderly uncle was true.

Maintaining that cold expression, he continued. “Be glad they sent me as the messenger, or you might not be starting on Sunday, or any Sunday for the remainder of the season. Make no mistake, they can inflict serious injury on you, Griff. They
will.
”

“It wouldn’t make sense for them to injure me. If I can’t play, they’ll never get their money.”

The argument didn’t make a dent in Bandy’s resolute expression. Griff pushed aside his plate and sighed with disgust that he had to deal with this now. The team was facing the Falcons on Sunday in Atlanta. The Cowboys were favored, but not by much. It wasn’t going to be a cakewalk by any stretch. He should have been psyching himself up for a tough game, studying the playbook, not pandering to gangsters.

“Okay. Give me a few days,” he told Bandy. “I’ll liquidate something. A car. My condo in Florida. Something. What’s the minimum amount that would temporarily satisfy them? Two hundred thousand? That’s more than half what I owe them. Would that buy me some grace?”

Bandy dabbed his leaking eyes with a corner of his handkerchief. “There may be another way.”

“To buy me time?”

“To cancel the debt.”

Griff gaped at him as if he’d said that he could have a week on a desert island with every Playmate of the Month for the past year, that they were all nymphomaniacs with the hots for him, and that no clothes were allowed.

Bandy asked, “Are you willing to meet with them? Discuss options?”

“Where and what time?”

The “them” Bandy had referred to were three men, who welcomed Griff into Vista’s opulent offices with hearty handshakes and unlimited hospitality.
What would you like to drink? Help yourself to the tray of sandwiches there. I highly recommend the beef tenderloin with the horseradish sauce. How about a massage after the meeting? We’ve got a girl on staff who’ll give you a massage with a happy ending.
Wink, wink.
If you get my meaning.
Which Griff did.

You’d never know by the reception they gave him that he owed them over a quarter million dollars and that they were making threats against his person if he didn’t pay this debt immediately.

The only native Texan was tall, trim, darkly tanned, with large and very white teeth. He was an avid golfer who talked loudly, lewdly, and nonstop. It was he who placed his arm across Griff’s shoulders and told him about the masseuse with the magic hands and mouth. Larry was the guy’s name.

Martin had a swarthy, Mediterranean look. He was obese. He didn’t breathe, he wheezed like an off-key bagpipe, and looked like he could go into cardiac arrest at any moment if only his heart could work up the energy.

The third, Bennett, was quiet and unobtrusive. Balding and fair skinned, he sat apart, contributing little but studying Griff with the unblinking, lashless stare of something scaly and venomous.

After the initial greetings, they got down to business. The terms of their proposal were simple: Throw the Atlanta game on Sunday, and his debt would disappear. That was not how they put it, but that was the bottom line.

Martin told him they didn’t expect him to try to lose. “Just don’t play up to your full potential.”

Larry winked again. “Give the fucking Falcons a fucking chance. That’s all.”

“And who knows,” Martin wheezed, “if the Falcons pull out a win, we could throw a little extra bonus your way, in addition to clearing your debt.” Gasp. “Right, Bennett?”

Bennett the Silent nodded his stiff comb-over.

Griff told them he’d think about it.

Fine, they said. He had till Sunday to make up his mind. And just to show their goodwill, they insisted that he avail himself of the massage with the girl, who capped off the fifty-minute rubdown with a blow job. Not that he couldn’t get head whenever he wanted it. There were always girls just dying to notch their bedposts with the Lone Star logo of the Dallas Cowboys. But this girl was exceptional.

On Sunday, while he was suiting up, during the singing of the national anthem, even as he took the field following the opening kickoff, he was still wrestling with his decision. He didn’t know what he would do until late in the fourth quarter, with a 10–10 score, when Dallas was deep in their own territory and it was third and twelve.

He took the snap. Dallas linemen went down like bowling pins under a Falcons blitz. His fastest, strongest running back got blocked by two linebackers. The third one was chugging toward Griff, smelling blood. Scrambling, looking for an open receiver, Griff realized how easy—and convincing—it would be to throw an interception.

Atlanta won 17 to 10.

The partnership was forged.

I
F YOU WANT TO PUT SPIN ON IT, YOU GOTTA GET YOUR THUMB
under it.” Griff demonstrated the rotating hand motion to Jason Rich. “See? You gotta whip your thumb under just as you release the ball. Now try again.”

He handed over the football. Jason’s face was tense with concentration as he gripped the ball the way Griff had demonstrated and threw a pass. “Much better.”

“One more time, Griff? I think I let go a little too late.”

“Okay, but only one. Practice is about to start.”

Griff saw improvement in the second pass. “Good work, Jason. You’re getting the hang of it. Throw a few thousand more and you’ll have it down pat. You’ll be breaking records.”

Behind his mask, Jason’s sweaty face broke into a grin. “Yesterday was fun. Except for…you know.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“I told my dad. He said you handled it the only way you could. If you had fought them, it would’ve made it worse.”

“I’ll say. Did you see the size of those guys?”

Jason laughed, then said tentatively, “Maybe we could go for milk shakes again sometime.”

“I’d like that.”

“Me, too. See you tomorrow.”

Griff knocked on the top of the boy’s helmet, two taps. “I’ll be here.”

Jason trotted off to join his teammates, who were assembling on the sideline of the practice field. Bolly was among the other dads. Griff raised his hand in greeting, and Bolly waved back.

Griff jogged across the field to retrieve the footballs Jason had thrown and stuffed them into the cloth bag he kept in the trunk of his car. He pulled the drawstring to close the bag and slung it over his shoulder.

That was when he saw Rodarte, standing outside the chain-link fence, watching him.

Griff was already hot from being in the sun for the hour with Jason. When he saw Rodarte, it seemed his blood reached the boiling point in seconds. He had to force himself not to charge the fence.

Unhurried, he went through the gate and joined Rodarte on the other side. The son of a bitch didn’t even deign to look at him. Instead, he stared across the field to the far sideline, where the middle school head coach was cautioning his young team not to let themselves become overheated or dehydrated during practice.

“You’re pathetic, Rodarte,” Griff said. “Collecting old newspapers like a bag lady.”

Rodarte chuckled but still didn’t turn to face him. “Fun reading. I hated keeping it to myself.”

Griff started to grab him by the shoulder and force him around, but he didn’t dare lay a hand on the man. Rodarte would fight back. And if it got ugly, which it inevitably would, there were too many witnesses. In particular Bolly. Griff had promised him there wouldn’t be any trouble. Yesterday the sportswriter had entrusted his son to him. Griff would have hated like hell to betray that trust now.

He could tell Rodarte to go to hell and simply walk away. Let him stand there and dissolve from the heat till he was nothing but a puddle of sweat being absorbed by the hard, baked ground.

But ignoring him wouldn’t be smart. Rodarte’s being there wasn’t coincidence, any more than this morning’s incident with the newspaper was a harmless prank. After staying invisible for weeks, Rodarte had resurfaced. Until Griff knew why, he wouldn’t turn his back on him.

Rodarte reached into his pocket and took out a pack of gum. “I’m trying to quit smoking.”

“Good luck with that. It would be just awful if you got sick and died.”

Rodarte gave him a sly grin as he unwrapped a stick of gum and put it in his mouth. “You still banging that broad?”

Griff’s jaw tensed.

“I suppose since your favorite whore is still out of commission, you gotta get it somewhere.” His grin got slier. “You could do a lot worse. Not only has Mrs. Speakman got a sweet ass but she’s loaded. But I’m sure you know that. Nobody ever called you stupid, Number Ten. A lot of other ugly names, but never stupid.”

Griff didn’t rise to the bait.

“Is she footing your bills these days? Buying you all that neat new stuff?” Rodarte laughed that nasty laugh again and noisily smacked his chewing gum. “Sure she is. And glad to do it. Stuck with a husband who’s only half a man, I’ll bet she’s willing to pay any price to ride a big, strong football hero like you.”

Griff didn’t move, even though he craved to see Rodarte bleed.

Lowering his voice to a suggestive whisper, Rodarte said, “I’ll bet she’s one of those no-nonsense businesswoman types who goes absolutely wild in the sack. Am I right? She works out all her career insecurities on your dick, and she likes to be on top. Come on, Burkett, share. Is she one of those?”

“You’re maggot shit.”

Rodarte barked a laugh. “You’re fucking a paraplegic’s wife and
I’m
maggot shit?”

“What do you want?”

“Want? Nothing,” Rodarte said innocently. “Just thought I’d drop by, say hi. Didn’t want you to think I’d forgotten you. I wanted to reassure you that when you self-destruct—and you will, you know—I’m gonna be there to see it, and hopefully to help bring it about. I’m so far up your ass, Burkett. You have no idea.”

Griff feared if he stayed any longer he was going to take the first step toward the predicted self-destruction. Which was precisely what Rodarte wanted. Despite his resolve not to turn his back on the man, he did so and began walking away.

“Jason’s showing progress.”

Griff whipped back around. Rodarte, laughing softly, spat his wad of gum into the dirt. “The boy hasn’t got much natural talent, but he works hard. Plain to see he worships the ground you walk on. Probably wants to follow in your footsteps. Well, not the cheating and murdering path you took, but your football glory days.”

Squinting at Griff across the space separating them, Rodarte let his evil grin spread across his acne-cratered face. “Be a shame if something were to happen to the boy. A crippling accident or something that would prevent him from following his dream. He might even die.”

Griff took the steps necessary to close the distance between them. “You lay one hand on that kid and—”

“Calm down,” Rodarte said in a cajoling voice. “I was just speculating on the fickle finger of fate. Jesus, you’re a hothead. I try to have a friendly little chat here at the middle school athletic field and you—”

“What do you want, Rodarte?”

He dropped his saccharine pretense, and his eyes turned flinty. “You know what I want.”

“I don’t have any of Vista’s money.”

“They’re not convinced. I’m sure as hell not. And I’m not going to stop with you till I break you and you give it up. I’m as permanent as a birthmark.”

Griff aimed his index finger at him and began backing away. “You stay away from me. You stay away from everyone around me.”

Rodarte laughed. “Or what, Number Ten? Or what?”

Griff violated a condition of his probation, the primo one that Jerry Arnold continually reminded him of:
Don’t go near your former associates
.

The way Griff saw it, he had no choice. Rodarte had threatened Jason. And the way he’d talked about Laura…The implied threat, which went beyond the nasty stuff, had raised the hair on the back of Griff’s neck. Rodarte wouldn’t have a qualm against harming either of them. Even Laura’s money couldn’t protect her. He would hurt her and Jason without a blink, and would enjoy the hell out of doing it.

To prevent that, Griff must confront this issue head-on, now. He wasn’t willing to live with the constant threat of Rodarte. He certainly didn’t want to inflict it on two people who were entirely innocent. He couldn’t bear the guilt of someone else falling victim to Rodarte’s brutality the way Marcia had.

Griff drove straight home from the practice field, rushed through a shower, and dressed. He left behind his new Armani jacket in favor of one he’d had before his incarceration, not wanting to look too well heeled.

It was nervy to arrive at Vista’s offices unannounced, but he was betting that the triumvirate would agree to see him, out of curiosity if for no other reason. He was right. After waiting in a reception area for almost half an hour, he was summoned into the inner sanctum where he’d met with them the first time.

Same paneled walls, indirect lighting, and sound-absorbing rugs, but the hospitality was noticeably lacking. No sandwich tray, no open bar. Larry’s tan was just as bronze, but it appeared that more time may have been spent in the club bar than on the links. He’d gone a little soft around the middle.

Griff was surprised to see that Martin could still breathe without some form of respiratory apparatus. But he was now relying heavily on a cane to help support his immense body.

Bennett had given up on the comb-over and shaved his head. It was perfectly white and round, and from the back looked like an overgrown billiard ball sitting on his shoulders. With even fewer lashes now, his eyes were more reptilian than before.

Larry had one hip propped on the corner of a desk. Bennett was in an armchair, legs crossed. As Griff walked in, Martin collapsed onto a short leather sofa that was barely wide enough to accommodate him. Both his lungs and the seat cushions emitted a whoosh of air as he settled.

Griff wasn’t invited to sit.

Martin began. “What do you want?”

Griff responded just as bluntly. “Call off Rodarte.”

No one said anything for a full thirty seconds. Finally Larry broke the taut silence. “Would that be Stanley Rodarte you’re talking about?”

Griff didn’t buy the dumb act. “You’ll be glad to know your watchdog is persistent. He was in Big Spring the day I got out, and he’s been making a nuisance of himself ever since. He assaulted a friend of mine. A woman. Sodomized her and ruined her face. When that failed to win me over, he set two guys on me. For a week after, I could barely walk and my pee ran red.”

“Gee, Griff, we’re sorry to hear that,” Larry said, his voice dripping sarcasm. “And this would be our problem…why?”

Griff resented their playing innocent. He wasn’t telling them anything they didn’t already know, so he’d rather they just own up to it and tell him that he and Marcia had it coming.

“Look, it sucks for you if Bill Bandy hid money where you can’t find it. But get off my back about it. I didn’t take anything from him. And you know damn well I didn’t kill him.”

“You had motive.”

“So did you.”

The FBI had arrested Bandy on charges of illegal gambling. Facing several years in federal prison, Bandy had played his bargaining chip—Griff Burkett. He told the feds about Griff’s association with Vista, specifically about the upcoming play-off game against Washington. No one in Dallas was happy about the loss that day, except the federal agents who were building a strong racketeering case against the Cowboys’ QB.

The deal Bandy had struck worked out great for him. Griff got caught; all charges against Bandy were dropped. But this exchange had made the Vista men nervous. What if the FBI wanted more from Bill Bandy than a cheating football player? The bookie might have been tempted to use them as another free pass at some point in the future.

The Vista trio had removed the temptation from Bandy by killing him.

At least that was what Griff had surmised and now had essentially accused them of. Unfazed, their stares remained unblinking.

“Maybe there was some secret stash,” he continued, “but I haven’t spent the last five years on a treasure hunt. I don’t want back in your operation, and I’m not working for a competing outfit. You can threaten me till doomsday, and you’ll still come up empty. So whatever you’re paying Rodarte to put pressure on me is money wasted. Call him off.”

Several moments passed. They sat like statues. Eventually Martin looked over at Larry, Larry looked over at Bennett, and Bennett continued to stare at Griff.

If Griff had still been a wagering man, he’d have put his money on Bennett as the enforcer of the group. Larry was the windbag, the people person, the public relations guy. Martin was the brains and the puppet master. Bennett, silent and stationary Bennett, who seemed to have ice water in his veins, was responsible for damage control.

It was Martin who finally spoke. “What makes you think…” Wheeze. “…that we’d have dealings…” Gasp. “…with a scumbag like Rodarte?”

“He told me himself. He said he’d talked to you. He passed along your message that there might be a way for me to make amends. That you might be willing to forgive and forget.”

“Forgive and forget?”

This was the first and only time Griff had actually seen Martin smile, and it made his balls contract.

“Is Rodarte delusional, or are you?” Larry asked. “After you gave the grand jury the juice on us, you think we’d ever welcome you back?” He snorted his opinion on the chances of that. “First of all, asshole, we’re not forgiving or forgetful. Number two, you’re the last person we want in our operation. We’re not slow learners. Once you screw us over,
you’re
screwed. Third, if one of our competitors—not that we have any that matter—takes you in, that’s good news to us. It only shows that they’re fucking ignoramuses.

“Lastly, you’re actually right about one thing. Rodarte did come sniffing around just before your release. He’s always had the mistaken idea that he’s a hotshot and that we’re impressed by him. We’re not. He’s a lowlife thug, is all.

“But, hey, we don’t want to appear unfriendly, especially to someone so inferior. So we dazzled him with bullshit and a couple shots of eighteen-year-old scotch, then sent him on his way. If he’s squeezing you, he’s doing it on his own time and for his own reasons.”

“And more power to him,” Martin wheezed.

“Amen to that,” Larry said. “More power to him. We won’t be brokenhearted the day you die, Burkett. The only reason you’re still breathing is because you deserve no better than Rodarte. We’d rather somebody of his caliber handle an asswipe like you, save us having to get our hands dirty. Now get the fuck out of here before we remember just how pissed off we really are.”

On his drive back from Las Colinas, Griff got stuck in a traffic jam behind a freeway accident that had two lanes closed. Staring into the brake lights of the car ahead of him, he ruminated over what Larry had told him. It felt like the truth. They wouldn’t mourn his passing, but if they’d wanted him dead, he’d be dead.