The Franchise (75 page)

The service elevator returned as Taylor regained composure and tried to recall where he had parked his yellow car and the best route to it. The door
shooshed
open, disgorging Wendy Chandler, Bob Travers and Mr. Rice.

The lawyer glared at Taylor, furious that a football player had interfered with his role. The plans that he had spent time and money formulating destroyed by a jock. A jock! The next day Rice bet five thousand dollars against the Pistols and prayed for Taylor Rusk’s public humiliation on international television.

“Bye, Sam.” Wendy’s voice lilted sweetly.

The lawyer waved as he walked off; he kept his back to them.

“Don’t take it so hard,” Taylor yelled after him. “Learn to add long columns of numbers and you can be an orthopedic surgeon.”

“Shush.” Wendy slipped up next to Taylor and slid under his arm.

Bob stood back about five feet, his eyes moving constantly, checking the corners and shadows.

“Okay, so we don’t need lawyers.” Wendy clutched his arm. “I’m sorry I told him about the documents. I should know by now that Sunday is enough problem.”

“Right now I’m just trying to remember where I parked my car.” Deep furrows dug into his brow. “I think it’s this way.”

“You didn’t drive.” Wendy laughed lightly. “Bob drove us over. Take us to the car, will you, Bob?”

The bodyguard looked at Taylor, shook his head, then pointed in the opposite direction Taylor had picked.

“Oh. Yeah. Right ... I ... ah ...” Taylor’s voice trailed off as he followed Bob. Wendy clung to his side. On the way to the commissioner’s party Taylor had been running plays in his head, reading defenses, considering adjustments. He did not remember the trip at all.

The white Ford was parked next to three matching Rolls-Royce Corniche convertibles. As he and Wendy crawled into the Ford’s backseat, Taylor purposely banged the door into one of them, gouging out paint down to the bare metal.

“Where’s Randall?” Taylor asked once Bob got the Ford moving.

“At the hotel where we left him,” Wendy said. “Watching television with Shaggy—I mean Toby.”

“Oh ... yeah ... ah ... I forgot. It’s all in my head,” Taylor mumbled. “Somewhere.”

M
AJOR
J
ACK “
P
AT”
G
ARRETT’S
company had the Pistol Dome contract for “security and crowd control.” The Major also was supplying security dogs to Investico. He was dealing with J. Edgar Jones.

J. Edgar had risen quickly through Investico’s ranks. It was his responsibility to cut the “dog deal.” For Pat Garrett the Super Bowl dog deal was frosting on the SSI cake—and all the Major had to do was kick back five percent of his gross to J. Edgar Jones.

The Major still procured his dogs through his contact at the Air Force base. They were canine washouts from the security school—incorrigible and marked for extermination. Major Garrett bought them cheap and leased them dear to Investico, recouping twice his investment.

The day before Super Sunday, J. Edgar and the Major went to see a couple of the dogs that SSI was letting Investico use for sniffing out explosives, drugs, illegal aliens and for crowd control. J. Edgar was awed by the terrible size and visible fury of the sleek black Dobermans. Unchained, so the handler could demonstrate a few simple commands, the enormous dogs went right for J. Edgar, ripping him ragged.

In the growling, slashing, screaming confusion, the Major drew his pistol and shot the dogs off the agent. One shot blew off J. Edgar’s right kneecap, costing SSI the “dog deal.”

The Major covered his own ass by immediately calling the commissioner and telling him of the kickback scheme. He sent Robbie Burden copies of incriminating tape-recorded conversations with J. Edgar.

The commissioner turned down J. Edgar’s claim for disability and fired him the day he was released from the hospital.

Lamar Jean Lukas spent that Saturday, the coldest day of the year, getting ready. A certain snap returned to his life; he moved with command and purpose. He felt alive, exhilarated, alert to the world; learning, seeing, smelling, moving with the lean, quick economy that got him out of Vietnam alive.

His SSI uniform would be perfect camouflage for his mission at the Pistol Dome. The high turnover of minimum-wage security guards made it doubtful that he would be recognized.

Picking up his uniform at the cleaners, Lamar Jean then stopped at the hardware store for aluminum powder, a gallon of kerosene, and an empty two-gallon paint can. At the Target store he bought two bicycle inner tubes, a pair of surgical rubber gloves, a two-gallon gas can, and an official Texas Pistols duffel bag. He filled the gasoline can at the new self-serve Exxon that replaced Louie Deal’s Crockett Street station.

He hauled all the gear back to Taylor’s apartment, into the private patio with the barbecue grill and eight-foot stockade fence.

After starting the charcoal fire, he pulled on the rubber gloves and went to work cutting up the inner tubes into sleeves six inches long, sealing them at one end. Then, sitting down at the small table with a pair of pliers, he pulled the slugs from several of his .357 Magnum cartridges, dumped the gunpowder in a bowl with the aluminum powder from the paint store and mixed them. He poured the mixture into packets of thin paper and sealed them with wax, then placed the packets in a manila envelope inside the purple and white bag.

While the charcoal burned down to glowing red coals, he returned inside to get a long wooden spoon and a cookie tin.

Lamar placed the empty paint bucket on the grill and poured in about two inches of water. Letting it come to a boil, he shaved a bar of soap into the water with his pocket knife, stirring with the wooden spoon until the mixture cooked to a paste. Then he began adding and stirring, very carefully, a fifty-fifty mixture of kerosene and gasoline. The gasoline would burn hot; the kerosene would keep it from burning too fast. The soap paste would make it stick. Several times the mixture flared into flame; Lamar quickly smothered the fire by placing the cookie tin over the mouth of the paint can. He removed the can from the grill when he had an approximate twenty-to-one ratio of gasoline-kerosene to the water-soap combination.

After cooling, the mixture turned gelatinous and Lamar proceeded to pour it into the rubber sleeves cut from the inner tubes, sealing both ends tightly, placing them in the vegetable bin of Taylor’s refrigerator.

Lamar dug in his coat pocket for some cherry bombs and firecrackers left over from New Year’s Day. He tossed them into the bag, along with some old rags, two new disposable lighters and three railroad flares.

From the broom closet, he pulled the small .22 automatic rifle and a box of .22 shorts. The small rifle fit neatly into the purple and white bag with the crossed Walker Colts on the side.

Lamar poured the remaining gasoline and kerosene into two empty quart bottles, capping and placing them in the duffel bag, wrapping them heavily with industrial toweling he stole from the gas station where he’d filled his gas can. Lamar carefully cleaned up the mess, ditched it off the Red River Bridge, returned to the apartment satisfied with his work and fell asleep on the couch.

Lamar Jean Lukas had adeptly used a skill taught to him by his government. Finally he’d found military training that was adaptable to civilian life.

Lamar Jean Lukas had spent the day making napalm.

Around one in the morning at the commissioner’s party in the Pistol Dome, John and Roger Cobianco had four hands inside Monique’s Pistolettes uniform, leaving little room for Monique and none for A.D. Koster, looking on helplessly.

At Taylor Rusk’s apartment Lamar Jean suddenly awoke and sat straight up, listening and waiting, his eyes probing the darkness. Lamar gradually returned from the central highlands of Vietnam.

Carefully making his way back to the kitchen, he opened the silverware drawer and removed the envelope containing the Super Bowl ticket from Tiny Walton. Lamar handled it like fine china, padding catlike to the purple and white bag, he placed the ticket carefully inside and zipped the bag shut.

Returning to the living room, squatting cross-legged, arms folded, back against the wall, Lamar Jean Lukas slept with one eye and an ear open. It all came flooding back. He Finally understood the trade his government had promised to teach him and a few good men. He was on a mission. A mission with the few and proud on the muddy road ahead.

A
T DAYBREAK
L
AMAR
Jean Lukas donned his SSI uniform, strapped on his pistol, checked his official Pistols’ duffel bag, carefully filled with his handicraft and set out for the Texas Pistol Dome.

The parking lot was nearly empty when Lamar, wearing reflector lens aviator sunglasses, arrived. The fat SSI guard at the gate waved him through without looking up from his television set.

The network had started nonstop coverage of the game the night before. It was cheap, highly rated programming that commanded exorbitant advertising rates of over $500,000 a minute.

Lamar walked completely around the dome, checking the security areas, communications centers and television trucks. The TV technicians had been in the dome all night, checking the cameras and making final decisions on their broadcast strategy.

On his second trip around the parking lot, Lamar picked his spot: a twenty-eight-foot Winnebago with Colorado plates parked directly opposite the exit from Insiders’ parking.

It was perfect cover.

The Denver fans were drinking Bloody Marys and fixing breakfast beneath a canvas awning that extended out from the side of the giant RV. They had a camp stove, tables and chairs and plenty of liquor; most important, they were already drunk. The van owner, a real estate developer, was a red-faced, friendly man in a denim outfit and a black wide-brimmed hat. Lamar walked up and began a conversation about alcohol and allowable behavior in the parking lot. Eager to befriend a uniform and large sidearm, the Denver fans fixed Lamar breakfast and treated him like kinfolk.

He lounged in a low canvas chaise in the shade of the awning with his duffel bag by his side, his pistol holstered and his eyes on the Insiders’ lot. “How about letting me borrow that hat?” Lamar asked. The man hesitated, then tossed Lamar the hat.

After breakfast Lamar mentioned it was chilly and was instantly given a red and green plaid flannel shirt. Lamar was now unidentifiable and indistinguishable from the rest of the Colorado people enjoying their pregame party in the Pistol Dome parking lot across from Insiders’ parking.

Having successfully infiltrated, Lamar waited calmly in ambush, his duffel bag at his feet.

Slowly the lot began to fill and Lamar was a fish in an ocean of football fans. The Denver fans left him and went to their end zone seats to drink screwdrivers.

Just before kickoff, the Cobianco brothers arrived in their black limousine. Monique was with them, still in her Pistolette outfit; she’d been their “guest” since the commissioner’s party. The captain of the Texas Pistolettes looked like someone had wrapped her in a wet sheet and beat her with a garden hose. Tiny and the driver had to help her from the car. The three brothers were laughing, having the time of their lives.

Lounging back in the canvas chaise, the big black wide-brim hat tipped forward, hiding his face, absently patting his duffel bag, Lamar watched them through his reflector-lens aviator glasses.

I
T WAS PREDAWN SUNDAY
morning. Taylor lay next to Wendy, going over possible alternatives to draw and delay trap calls on his quick count. If he keyed a blitz with the line ready to go on the first sound, he couldn’t audible. Yet, he had to come off the play. The QB sneak was the simplest adjustment, requiring only Taylor and the center. The quarterback’s signal would be a slap on the lineman’s hip; then, instead of setting back and faking a pass block, the center would fire straight out on the snap with Taylor right behind. Taylor decided to tell his center in the locker room before the game about the adjustment.

In the pregame morning darkness of the penthouse master bedroom, Taylor ran the adjustment to precision in his head. He ran the play more times with slight variations, depending on the type of blitz.

Just in case.

Bob rapped lightly on the door.

“You got company,” he said. “Red Kilroy’s in the sitting room, trying to have a stroke. He said he had to see you, said it was urgent.”

“For him it is.” Taylor opened his eyes. “What time is it?”

“Four in the morning.”

“Not bad.” Taylor stretched and twisted as he rolled out of bed, his bare feet sinking into the carpet. “Before we played Notre Dame, he woke me at two and tried to change the whole game plan. He thought we were playing LSU in the Sugar Bowl. I’ll be right out. Holler if his pupils dilate, his lower lip quivers and his asshole snaps shut.”

Taylor stood in the middle of the room, looking out at Park City’s lights. It was that short moment between dark and daylight where nothing seemed to move. No one was going anywhere. It only lasted a moment, then a blue and white police car rolled south on the freeway toward Clyde.

It was game day and Red was going nuts again.

“Sleeping kind of late, aren’t you, Coach?” Taylor had pulled on a gray sweat suit. He was still barefoot. “I called down to the kitchen for coffee and rolls.”

“Good, Jimmy. Good idea.” Red sat on the edge of the couch, staring at the carpet between his feet while his knees pumped up and down so hard it caused the coffee table in front of him to shake.

“Taylor.” The big quarterback picked up the glass ashtray from the table to keep the clatter of vibrating glass against the tabletop from driving him nuts.

“What?” Red looked up from the floor, his feet still nervously pumping. “What did you say?”

“I said
Taylor.
My name is Taylor.”

“I know that.” The coach looked slightly irritated.

“You called me Jimmy.”

“I did not!” Red stood suddenly and began pacing the room. The swiftness of the movement startled Taylor and he stepped back. “Quit fucking around here, Taylor, goddammit! It’s almost game time and you are fucking around.”