The Perk (49 page)

"So what, you became the team doctor?"

"I tried to educate them so they didn't
hurt themselves. Some guy at a bodybuilding gym in Austin would tell Slade
what to do, he'd tell the others, and the whole team's overdosing on the
stuff. I had a bunch of goddamn psychos on the practice field. That's when I
decided to help them."

"What'd you do?"

"Explained how to cycle, not to overdo it.
Checked the stuff to make sure it wasn't made in Mexico from bull testicles."

"Did you supply the steroids?"

"No. Slade did. He bought the stuff in Austin."

"Jesus, Aubrey. I don't think you
committed a crime, just giving them information, but you should've stopped
them."

"Beck, they were gonna juice whether I
liked it or not. These boys want out, and a football scholarship is a ticket
out."

Beck sat back. "What am I supposed to do
now, Aubrey? Look the other way? Aubrey, both of us should've done the right
thing. Only two people in a small town with the power to stand up and do the
right thing—the football coach and the judge."

Aubrey left, and Beck picked up the local
paper. An entire section was devoted to Slade McQuade: his football career from
seventh grade when he moved to town through his senior season that had just
ended with a state championship. Slade's photos filled the pages; at nineteen
his face was that of an action-hero chiseled from stone; at fifteen his face
was still boyish and thin and … familiar. Where had Beck seen that face?

Kim Krause answered Beck's knock on her front door. He
said, "May I see that video of Heidi again?"

She shrugged, went inside, and returned with the
laptop. They sat on the steps, and she played Heidi's music video again. Beck
watched closely.

"Stop. The face in the mirror. That's not
you. That's Slade."

She nodded.

"Slade was the father of Heidi's child,"
he said.

Kim stared past him. "They were the two
most beautiful kids in town." She shrugged. "They had to hook up."

"Did Slade know about the baby?"

She nodded. "His dad paid for the
abortion."

Beck felt so tired. "Was she ever
happy?"

"
Happy?
Who's happy?" Kim
tapped on the computer. "Here's her
Oprah
interview."

"She was on
Oprah?
"

"We just pretended. She was
practicing."

The video began playing. Heidi's image appeared
on the screen. She was in her pink and blue room and wearing jeans, high
heels, and a sweater. She sat in a chair next to her bed and faced the camera.

Kim said, "I was Oprah."

Kim's voice came
across: "My special guest today is Heidi Fay, the nineteen-year-old star
of the hit movie,
Once Upon A Time
. Heidi, this must be a dream come
true."

Heidi, with a movie-star smile: "Oh,
Oprah, it is. It really really is." She stopped abruptly. "I
shouldn't say really twice. Sounds like a hick." She recaptured the
moment and said, "Oh, Oprah, it is. It really is."

Kim as Oprah: "Tell us about your
childhood back in Texas."

Heidi: "Oh, it was wonderful, Oprah. I
grew up in a small Texas town, very quaint and beautiful, the perfect
all-American town. My childhood was just wonderful. My parents are the greatest. They've been so supportive of my dreams and …"

The smile dropped off her face. Her shoulders
slumped. She suddenly appeared sad. She said, "My father's a fucking
prison warden, my mother's a fucking stage mother, and my hometown is a bunch
of fucking goat ranchers scared of the outside world. Other than that, it's
been a fucking great childhood, Oprah."

She looked at the camera—at Kim. She shook her
head.

"God, Kim, I'd do anything to get out of
this town. And when I go to Hollywood, it's just gonna be me and you. My
mother is not coming."

She just sat there.
Finally, Kim's voice came across: "I don't think you
can say 'fuck' on
Oprah
."

Heidi looked at the camera, broke into a big
grin, grabbed a pillow off the bed, and flung it at the camera. She jumped
forward and knocked the camera over; it captured them rolling on the floor and
giggling like little girls.

Beck now looked at Kim. Tears were rolling down
her face.

"They both wanted to be stars. Now they're
both dead."

Texas law requires that the medical examiner investigate
all suicides, and if necessary to determine the cause of death, conduct an
autopsy. Slade's body lay on a stainless steel table in the Travis County
Medical Examiner's office in Austin. Beck went back to his chambers and called
Dr. Janofsky; the M.E. said he would complete the autopsy and have results from
blood tests back the next day.

On November 22, 1963, Texas Governor John
Connally sat directly in front of President Kennedy in the presidential
limousine in the motorcade through downtown Dallas. According to the Warren Commission,
Lee Harvey Oswald's first or second shot struck Kennedy in the back of his
neck, exited his throat, then struck Connally in his back, exited his chest, then
struck his wrist, and finally lodged in his thigh. A pristine bullet was found
on Connally's gurney at Parkland Memorial Hospital. The so-called "magic
bullet" made Lee Harvey Oswald the lone gunman and John Connally a Texas legend.

Real estate made him bankrupt.

In 1985, Connally borrowed $93 million to
develop Barton Creek Estates and Resort on the western outskirts of Austin and above the environmentally sensitive Barton Creek watershed that fed the Barton
Creek pool where for hundreds of years everyone from the Comanches to Robert
Redford had swum. But where the Indians and Redford had seen untouched land
and cool spring-fed waters, Connally saw million-dollar homes, a European spa,
and a world-class golf course. The environmental group Save Our Springs
opposed the development, but they were not Texas legends. John Connally built his
Barton Creek Resort.

Two years later, it bankrupted him.

Now Beck was watching another Texas legend named
Connelly whacking golf balls wildly on the driving range at the Barton Creek
Golf Club. Chase Connelly was smaller than he seemed on television, no more
than five-ten and perhaps one-fifty. He appeared almost gaunt, and he coughed
like a heavy smoker. But he seemed congenial. He stopped when interrupted by
fans seeking autographs; he signed, he smiled, and he allowed photos.

Beck sighed.

Chase Connelly had a wife and a four-year-old
daughter. Would it be justice to put his wife's husband and his daughter's
father in prison? Heidi had looked twenty-five and sexy. She had stalked him.
She had voluntarily gotten into his limo and drank alcohol, snorted cocaine,
and had sex. She had intentionally used her body to get an audition in Hollywood. Heidi had used Chase as much as he had used her. They were two of a kind.

Except she had been sixteen, and he had been
twenty-nine.

That was almost five years ago. Chase was
thirty-four now. Maybe he had grown up. Maybe he had been a boy back then and
was a man now. Maybe he was a loving father and a faithful husband.

Maybe not.

A stunning girl wearing a tight blue sweat suit walked
over to Chase and gave him a full-body hug and a strong kiss on the lips. She
was too young to be Chase's wife and too old to be his daughter. Beck thought,
Chase's wife and daughter would be better off without him.

Unlike in Chicago, golf courses in Texas remained open for play every day except Christmas. It was December 27th and
sixty-eight degrees. Beck had walked into the clubhouse and found the golf pro
on duty that day. He was middle-aged and a Notre Dame football fan; he
remembered Beck Hardin. Beck gave him an autograph, and he gave Beck the tee
time just before Chase's. For a $300 green fee.

Beck drove his cart over to the first tee on the
Foothills Course. It was a 460-yard par four from the pro tees. Beck figured Chase's
ego for the pro tees. At the country club in Chicago, Beck had been a
two-handicap. He had given up golf when Annie had gotten sick, so his game
would be rusty; but seeing Chase's swing, he wouldn't need to play to a two
that day. Beck wanted to catch Chase on the course, so he hit his tee shot and
drove the cart to the ball sitting in the fairway. He hit his second shot to
the green and putted out in two. He waited for Chase on the second tee box.

When Chase arrived, he was smoking a cigar and
drinking a beer. He walked over to Beck. He coughed into his hand, so Beck
did not offer to shake hands. Instead Beck said, "I hate to play alone because
I can't bet against myself. You a betting man?"

"Hundred a hole with carryovers?"

"Works for me."

Beck nodded toward the girl in the cart. "Your
wife?"

"A perk."

"Perk?"

"Perks of the trade—girls, limos,
jets."

"You must have a good trade."

Chase gave him a funny look. "I'm Chase
Connelly … the movie star."

"A movie star? No kidding? What brings
you to Austin?"

"Celebrity golf tournament Saturday.
Something about AIDS."

"Then back to L.A. Sunday?"

"Oh, yeah."

The second hole was a 381-yard par four. Beck
stepped up on the tee box and drilled his drive down the center cut of the
fairway. Chase drove his ball into the rough.

"Shit!"

Chase threw his cigar down, stormed to his cart,
and drove off. Beck bent down, stabbed the cigar with a tee, and carried it
over to his cart. He pulled a plastic baggie from his golf bag, placed the
cigar inside, and zipped it shut. Chase's saliva on the cigar would make a
nice DNA sample.

By the time they made the turn, Beck had
collected Chase's cigar and beer can, and, from the way he was carrying on with
the girl, Beck might soon have a semen sample. He thought about calling Wes in
L.A. and asking how he had obtained the thong with Joe Raines' DNA, but decided against it.

Eight holes and Chase was in the hole $800. On
the tenth tee box, he said, "Let's double the bet."

By the time they reached the eighteenth, a 560-yard
par five, Chase owed Beck $2,500.

"Tell you what, Chase, what do say we go
double or nothing on this hole? You win, we're even. You lose, you owe me
five grand."

Chase coughed. "Let's do it."

Chase Connelly swung like Babe Ruth swinging for
the fences. The ball rocketed off the tee and soared into the blue sky—turning
hard left all the way. A massive hook into the lake. Chase's face turned
bright red. He raised his driver over his head and slammed the clubface down
onto the rock tee marker with great force. The metal shaft split in two.
Chase held onto the top half of the shaft, but the lower half ricocheted up and
the driver head struck him solidly on the mouth. He yelped. And he bled.

"Shit!"

Chase coughed and spit blood. He cupped his
mouth, and blood dripped through his fingers. The girl came running with a
small white towel. Chase grabbed the towel and covered his mouth. He stopped
the bleeding, threw the towel down, and went over to his cart. He got in, guzzled
his beer, and drove off.

Beck went to his cart, got the biggest baggie,
and grabbed the scorecard pencil. He returned, squatted, and used the pencil
to lift the towel from the ground and place it in the baggie. He flung the
pencil into the brush next to the tee box and zipped the baggie locked.

He had Chase Connelly's blood. But he wouldn't
have DNA results before Chase left town. So Beck decided to ratchet up the
pressure. Beck scored a par on the hole; Chase had a ten. They walked off the
green.

"Five grand, Chase."

"Give me your card, I'll send you a
check."

Beck handed his business card to Chase. He
stared at it a long moment then looked back at Beck.

"You're a judge?"

"Yep."

"Where's Gillespie County?"

"Out west of here."

"Never been there."

"Sure you have. Fredericksburg."

Chase's face changed. It was the same change
Beck had seen in Luke's face when Beck told him his mother had died. Beck saw
in his son's eyes the knowledge that his life had just changed for the worse.
Beck saw the same knowledge in Chase's eyes.

"You called my wife."

"New Year's Eve, 2002, you were here for
the film festival. You picked up a blonde girl named Heidi Geisel on Sixth Street. She probably called herself Heidi Fay. You gave her alcohol and cocaine and
you had sex with her. And then she died in your limo. She was a
sixteen-year-old minor, you were a twenty-nine-year-old man. That's statutory
rape. You're also guilty of murder or at least manslaughter, but your lawyer—the
same one you had settle with Heidi's mother for twenty-five million—he'll tell
you we won't be able to convict you on murder or manslaughter, and he's
probably right. But we can convict you of stat rape. So don't make plans for
the Oscars."

"You can't prove nothing."

"Sure I can. We've got your DNA from Heidi." Beck shook his head. "Haven't you heard about safe sex?"

Chase coughed again. "You can't match that
to me."

"Bet I can."

"I'm not giving you my DNA sample."

"You already have. Your cigar, your beer
can, and your blood. I have that bloody towel, Chase. And I'm heading over to
the DPS crime lab right now for DNA testing."

"You can't use those tests against
me."

"What, you're a lawyer now? No, you're
right, we can't use those tests to convict you, but we can use them to indict
you. And then I'll issue a warrant for your arrest. I'll send it out to California, and the next day the L.A. cops will come to your house and handcuff you in
front of your wife and daughter. They'll hand you over to the Gillespie County sheriff, and he'll fly you back here and drive you out to Gillespie County and throw you in his jail. You'll be convicted and sentenced to the maximum
prison term. You ended Heidi's life. Now I'm fixing to end yours—at least
your celebrity life."