06 Fatal Mistake (16 page)

“Maybe not, but it would’ve been nice to hear about the incident from you when we asked if anyone had spouted off after the game,” Sam said.

“I told you to be forthcoming,” Ray said, visibly displeased with his manager.

“I didn’t think a thing of it!” Bob said. “Of course Lind was pissed. A lot of people were.”

“Including Mulroney?” Hill asked.

“What did you hear about him?” Bob asked.

“Just that he had a lot to say about Vasquez after the game,” Hill said.

Bob glared at Hill. “Do you have the
first clue
what Willie denied his teammates by missing that ball? Do you have any idea how hard we’d all worked to get to that moment? All he had to do was catch the goddamned ball!
We pay him sixteen million dollars a year to catch the goddamned ball!
”

“That’s enough, Bob,” Ray said. “People were understandably upset. I think that goes without saying.”

“Perhaps it does,” Sam said, “but when we asked you yesterday if anyone was particularly vocal, this was the information we were looking for.”

“We apologize for our failure to provide that information,” Ray said. “We were shocked by the news of Willie’s death on top of the shock of the loss. Yesterday was a rough day around here, to say the least. I hope you’ll accept my apology on behalf of my organization.”

Sam appreciated a good suck-up as much as the next cop, but this guy was a little much. Just as she was about to say so, the office door opened and a tall, model-thin blonde breezed into the room like she owned the place.
Ah
, Sam thought,
the wife
. Elle Kopelsman Jestings—socialite, philanthropist and newspaper publisher, who did, in fact, own the place. Right behind her were two tall, muscular men, who appeared to be identical twins. They stood like lumps of meat right inside the door, keeping a close watch on Elle.

Very interesting
, Sam thought, that she had such obvious security.

She went right to Hill, who stood to greet her with a hug.

“Nice to see you again, Avery.” She spoke with a cultured, upper-crust voice that sounded rich—if a voice could sound rich. “Dreadful circumstances.”

“Nice to see you too, Elle. I don’t believe you know Lieutenant Holland from the Metro PD?”

Elle turned her formidable blue-eyed gaze on Sam. “Everyone knows Lieutenant Holland and her very handsome senator husband.”

Sam wasn’t sure she liked the almost predatory way Elle described her husband. It was all right for her to say that about Nick, but anyone else... “Good to meet you,” Sam said, returning the handshake.

“I’m
thrilled
to meet you. I was just saying to Ray last week that we need to get you and the senator to one of our dinner parties.”

“We’re a little busy investigating a murder and running for reelection to be talking about social events,” Sam said.

Judging by the surprise that registered in her expression, Elle was unused to being rebuffed when extending a coveted social invitation. “My apologies for interrupting. I came over to find out if there’s any news about Willie. It’s such an awful tragedy.”

“Yes, it is,” Sam said. “If you wouldn’t mind, we’d like to conclude our meeting with your husband and Mr. Minor.” Sam would never say so out loud, but she very much enjoyed the moment when it registered with Elle that Sam was asking her to leave.

Ray got up and went to his wife. With a hand on her lower back he guided her to the door.

“Why are they bothering you when it’s clear that a crazy fan killed him?” Elle asked, loudly enough to ensure that everyone heard her.

“They’re being thorough, honey. Give us a few minutes, and I’ll be right out.”

“Fine,” Elle said in a frosty note of displeasure that spoke of entitlement and all the things Sam hated most about rich people who thought they owned the world. She wondered if poor Ray, who seemed like a nice enough guy, would be made to pay for his audacity in showing her out of a room her father had put him into in the first place.

The two hunks of meat followed their boss out of the room like faithful dogs.

Ray returned to his spot behind the desk. “Sorry about the interruption.”

“Were you aware of the problem Willie was having with his brother-in-law?” Sam asked, unwilling to waste any more time with pleasantries.

Both men nodded.

“One of Carmen’s brothers is a troublemaker,” Ray said. “He’s had issues with drugs, multiple arrests. He was always after Willie to bail him out. During spring training, Willie cut off the money and got a restraining order to keep the brother-in-law away from him, Carmen and the kids. Apparently, Willie’s refusal to give him more money caused a big rift in Carmen’s family because her parents felt that she and Willie ought to be helping the brother.”

“Did it cause a rift between Willie and Carmen too?” Sam asked.

“That I don’t know,” Ray said.

Bob shrugged. “He didn’t talk about it beyond notifying team security about the restraining order.”

“How many of your players have restraining orders in place?”

Ray glanced at Bob, who shrugged.

“I’d say all of them have at least one,” Bob said. “If they spend a night with a woman, she’s got them married with three kids by the next day. Some of them don’t get the brush-off message without legal intervention.”

Sam made a note that pushed getting the details on the various restraining orders attached to members of the team to the top of her to-do list. “That’s all for now,” she said, standing. “I’d ask that you both remain in town and available for additional questioning should the need arise.”

“For how long?” Bob asked.

“For as long as it takes.”

Chapter Ten

Armed with home addresses for Jamie Clark, Rick Lind and Cecil Mulroney, Sam and Hill left the stadium and headed for Carmen Vasquez’s home in Georgetown. On the way, Sam left a message for Captain Malone, asking him to push the restraining order report to the top of his priorities.

“Why does Elle have such obvious security?”

“She’s had them since one of her father’s enemies tried to kidnap her as a child. Boris and Horace have been with her for years.”

Outside the main gates to Carmen’s building, several bunches of flowers had been laid, a couple of candles flickered in the breeze and a picture of Willie in his Feds uniform had been taped to the brick wall.

“Sort of a pathetic display of grief,” Sam said.

“Especially when you consider that if something had happened to him two days ago, there would’ve been a sea of flowers and mourners.”

“No kidding.”

Security around the luxury condo complex had eased up since the day before, and they were shown right in to the elevator that took them to Carmen’s top floor home. A muscular Hispanic man answered the door and eyed them suspiciously.

“What do you want?”

“Lieutenant Holland, Metro PD, and FBI Special Agent Hill to see Mrs. Vasquez.”

“She’s not seeing anyone right now.”

“She’s seeing us.” Sam engaged in a staring contest, which she won when he turned away, leaving the door open.

Inside, they found several adults of various ages in the living room with the Vasquez children. Toys were scattered on the floor, and the coffee table was laden with a wide variety of food. They spoke in rapid-fire Spanish that Sam was unable to follow, but the suspicious glances directed their way were easy to understand. These people were distrustful of cops.

The man who’d answered the door returned with his arm around Carmen. She looked at them with glazed eyes.

Seeing their mother, the two little boys let out shrieks and ran toward her. Family members scooped them up before they could get to her.

Carmen watched the scene with a detached aura about her, only glancing at her children when one of them began to cry.

“Has she been medicated?” Hill asked.

“The doctor gave her something to help her sleep.”

“How long ago?” Sam asked.

“Around five in the morning.”

Enough time had passed, she decided, that they might be able to have a coherent conversation with her.

“We’d like to speak to her in private,” Sam said.

“I’m not leaving her,” the man said in heavily accented English.

“And you are?”

“Her older brother. Eduardo Peña.”

“Who are all these other people?”

“Our parents, two aunts and a cousin. They came with me last night to be with her and the children.”

Realizing she wasn’t going to be able to get rid of the brother, Sam said, “All right. Just you. Find us a private space.”

“This way.”

He led them to an office behind the kitchen and settled his sister into a chair before going back to close the door.

Carmen stared straight ahead, her face devoid of expression.

Sam sat across from her and dragged her chair closer to the other woman. “Carmen,” Sam said, placing her hand on top of Carmen’s freezing cold hand.

She glanced at Sam with dead-looking eyes. “Do you know who killed my husband?”

“Not yet, but we’re working really hard to find out what happened. I need to ask you a couple more questions that I hope you’ll feel up to answering.”

She gave a small nod.

“You have another brother?” Sam asked.

“Yes,” she said softly. “Marco.”

“What does he have to do with anything?” Eduardo asked sharply.

“Mr. Peña, we’re interested in speaking with your sister,” Hill said. “Not you. Be quiet or leave the room.”

Judging by the hostile stare he directed at Hill, Eduardo wasn’t accustomed to being spoken to that way.

“Willie had some problems with Marco?” Sam asked.

Carmen bit her lower lip and nodded, her eyes filling with tears. “Marco has been in trouble, and Willie helped him out a few times with money and lawyers. After the most recent situation, he said he was done helping him.”

“What recent situation?”

“I don’t see what this has to do with anything,” Eduardo said.

Sam glanced at Hill, who was already showing the other man to the door.

“You can’t just kick me out! This is my sister’s home. You can’t come in here and push us around. That’s harassment.”

“Unless you’d like to be arrested for interfering with a police investigation,” Sam said, “I’d suggest you shut up and get out before I get pissed off.”

“You don’t want that to happen,” Hill said. “She has a vindictive side.” He opened the door and “helped” Eduardo into the hallway. “Give us a few minutes with your sister, and then we’ll be on our way.”

Eduardo started to say something else, but Hill closed the door in his face.

Sam returned her attention to Carmen. “The incident you referred to... What happened?”

“Marco got involved with some bad people, and he owed them a lot of money. I don’t know all the details, except that Willie refused to give him any more money. Marco said they’d kill him if he didn’t get the money, but Willie refused to give in.”

“Did you agree with his decision?”

“I, um, well... No. I didn’t agree. We argued about it. I didn’t understand why Willie wouldn’t help my brother. He had plenty of money.”

Sam thought it interesting that she said Willie had plenty of money, not
they
had plenty of money. “What did he say when you tried to convince him to give Marco the money?”

“He got mad. He said it had to end at some point. He wasn’t made of money, and just because he had a lot now, didn’t mean he always would. He said he’d be lucky to play for ten more years, and if we spent all the money now, what would happen to us later?”

Sam had to agree with Willie’s smart thinking. “Do you know how much he’d given Marco in the past?”

“Close to a million.”

Sam had to hide her shock at the high number. Who could blame the guy for cutting off the leech? “What did Marco need with that kind of money?”

“He made some bad investments.” Carmen seemed almost ashamed as she spoke of her brother’s poor judgment.

“Was he in trouble with the police?”

She nodded. “He had problems with drugs. That was one reason why Willie said no more. He was afraid Marco was spending it on drugs.”

“Was he?”

“I don’t know. Willie hasn’t let me see him in years.”

“What happened when Willie refused to give him more money?”

“Marco got really mad. My whole family was mad with us.”

“That must’ve made things awkward between you and Willie.”

She cast her gaze downward. “Yes.”

“I know this is very difficult for you, Carmen, but I need to know what was going on in Willie’s life so I can rule out people he knew as possible suspects.”

“What do you need to know?” she asked, her chin quivering.

“Were you and Willie fighting?”

Nodding, she said, “A lot. I wanted to give Marco the money so my family would stop being so angry with us.”

“Was the fighting unusual for you and Willie?”

“We never fought about anything except for my brother and money. We have so much of it,” she said, gesturing at the opulently furnished room. “What would it have mattered to us to give him some of it?”

“What led to the restraining order?”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“It’s a court order that forces Marco to stay away from you and Willie and your family.”

“He... I... I didn’t know about that.”

Sam wanted to shoot herself for being so ham-handed. “I’m sorry. I assumed you knew, which was insensitive of me.”

Carmen broke down, shaking her head as tears spilled down her cheeks. “He went to court to keep my brother away from us?”

“I’m so sorry you had to hear it that way.”

She continued to shake her head. “How could he have done that and not even told me about it? Marco made some mistakes, but he is my brother. He is
family
.”

Sam could easily see both sides of the issue but didn’t share the thought.

“I’ll never get to ask him why he did it. The last time I talked to him...” She choked on a sob. “We fought about the money. He said we’d talk about it after the game, but I knew we wouldn’t. He never wanted to talk about it.”

“Did you have a joint checking account?” Sam asked.

“Yes. Why?”

“Could you have written a check to your brother without Willie knowing about it?”

“I suppose so, but I wouldn’t have done that. Willie would’ve been mad at me.”

“Carmen, I know this is so painful, but I have to ask if Willie was ever violent with you.”

“No! Never! He wouldn’t do that. He loved me. We had a bad time over the situation lately with Marco, but before that, we were always happy. Always.”

“One last question. Could you tell me who his agent and manager were?”

“His agent was George McPhearson. I’m trying to remember his manager’s name. Charlie something. George would know.”

“Do you know how we can reach George?”

“His agency is in New York. I think his name is the name of the company.”

“We’ll find it. Thank you for talking to me and for helping us to figure out what happened to Willie.”

“Do you think you will arrest the person who killed him?”

Under normal circumstances, Sam felt confident giving some assurance that the perpetrator most likely would be caught. In this case, however, she couldn’t say for certain. “I hope so. We’re doing everything we can. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

Sam and Hill were quiet on the elevator ride to the lobby. They’d left Carmen in the care of her family, and Eduardo had thankfully kept his distance as they said their goodbyes.

“The brother is a bit of a thug,” Hill said.

“I think he’s used to getting his way and didn’t like having us tell him what to do.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that.”

“Seems like she has two thugs for brothers. Marco bears looking into.”

“I’m one step ahead of you. My deputy did a run on him yesterday after I first heard about the restraining order.” Reading from his phone, Hill said, “I just heard back from George, my deputy. Marco has quite a sheet in the D.R. Drugs and larceny, B&E, gang-related stuff. He’s a busy dude. I can’t believe Willie gave him close to a million bucks, and he came back for more. That takes some kind of nerve.”

“And yet,” Sam said, “I can see how Carmen wanted to keep the peace. Just give him the money, and make everyone happy.”

“Willie was wise to think about the future. You hear so many stories about professional athletes who blow all the money during the salad years and leave themselves short for the golden years.”

“Hard to believe that people with that kind of money could ever be short on cash.”

“People who’ve never had money tend to go through it like crazy when they get it.”

“True. So where can we find Marco Peña?”

“We were able to track him down in the D.R. My deputy was unable to find any sign of him leaving there in the last week. The last time he was in the U.S. was in April. One of us should probably go there to track him down.”

“I hate to say this because I’ve always said I’d never be this kind of cop, but I can’t go. Nick is heading out of town for a couple of days, and I can’t leave my son. He took the news about Willie really hard and—”

“It’s okay, Sam. You don’t have to explain. I’ll go.”

“Are you sure? Do you have time? I mean, technically this isn’t even your case.”

“The director has given me wide latitude to decide what I want to work on personally and what I want to delegate. This interests me, especially in light of my ties to Ray. I don’t mind going.”

“That would be very helpful. Thank you.” And it would save her limited travel budget from taking a big hit. It occurred to her that once again she’d be indebted to him. His chips were starting to pile up. She wondered when, if ever, he’d call them in.

“No problem,” he said as they got into his car. “Where to now?”

“I want to see Jamie Clark again.”

“What’s the quickest way to get to Adams Morgan?”

“This time of day, take the Whitehurst to Rock Creek. Get off at Calvert Street.”

“Um, okay. Whatever you say.”

“I’ll show you.” Sam said, directing him as she pondered the meeting with Carmen and the next steps with Jamie. “I like Carmen. I don’t want to think he was cheating on her.”

“I know. I’d hate to have to tell her that.”

“It would almost be worse than telling her he was killed,” Sam said. She watched the city fly by through the passenger window as she went over the parts and pieces of what they’d learned so far. “If he was fooling around, let’s hope that info never has to come from us.”

“If this is a case of a random fan exacting revenge, we might never figure out who did it,” Hill said after a long period of silence.

“That thought has occurred to me, but there was just enough chaos in Willie’s life and in the lives of people involved with the team to make it worth our time to dig a little deeper into the people around him. If we’re spinning our wheels, I guess we’ll figure that out soon enough.”

“I don’t get the feeling that we’re spinning our wheels.”

“Neither do I,” Sam said. “Willie missing that ball screwed something up for someone, and that someone was mad enough to kill him. Or it had nothing at all to do with missing the ball, and the error gave someone the opportunity to commit the perfect crime.”

“Also a good possibility.”

“I need to see where we are with Collins.” As she reached for her cell phone it rang. She glanced at the caller ID to find Darren Tabor’s number. Her first impulse was to ignore the pesky reporter, but he’d been good to her in the past so she took the call. “I’m busy, Darren.”

“I know, and I’m sorry to bother you. I just need you to confirm one detail before I run it in an update to the online version of the Vasquez story.”

“What detail is that?”

“Is it true he was found in a Dumpster?”