Eliza looked at her for a few seconds, nodded, and then left, shutting the door behind her. Madeline was trying really hard not to cry. She couldn’t imagine what her brother must be going through, and her poor parents. No one in the family had ever been in trouble with the law before, so she couldn’t even imagine the ringer everyone was going through at the station. All she knew about processing and jail was from reruns of cop shows, and it was not a great place to be hanging out to keep your sanity. She did a quick internet search of the South Shore Sherriff’s department to see where they keep people that were arrested before their arraignments.
Not finding any helpful information, she closed her laptop in frustration and turned her chair to face the window. Taking a few deep breaths, she calmed herself down a bit. The family lawyer was a good guy who would do everything he could to help Ben out. She knew what she had to do. She had to find the real killer and clear her brother’s name. To do that, she had to talk to William Chase. He seemed to be the key to this whole mess. He knew the victim, had shady dealings with him in the past, and had been awfully anxious to talk to her for the past few weeks. He must have more information.
Before she could hightail it out the door to track down William Chase in Barnstable, she remembered that the press was still waiting outside for some sort of statement. Plus, they had a game in just six more hours. She couldn’t believe that it was just after 1 p.m. She thought they should stick with the game schedule, no cancellations, and business as usual. The extent of the statement was going to follow the usual “no comment, see the police for details” until further notice.
Madeline ran out to Eliza’s desk, clutching her purse in one hand and her cell phone in the other. She gave Eliza a quick rundown on what to say if anyone called the office looking for scoops and also told her she was going to be out for a few hours to run an errand. Eliza looked at her funny for a few seconds, and then nodded her agreement. After promising to keep her cell phone on, Madeline braced herself to face the horde of reporters outside.
There were about five different people standing out front of the ballpark with various modes of recording equipment. She counted two TV stations, including Jennifer’s, and three reporters holding cell phones with what looked like the voice recording app open. She gave Dan, the security guard, a tap on the arm to get by, took a deep breath, and held up her hand to the reporters.
“Okay, guys, I have just a quick statement for you at this time. Basically, the team has no comment regarding the current situation and instead refer you to the Abington Police Department and the South Shore Sherriff’s Department if you have any questions.” She gave them her sternest look when they began to ask questions as she walked towards her car. All five followed her but backed away as soon as she started the car. No one was looking to get run over for this story. In the mood she was in? She couldn’t guarantee that she would press the brakes if they got in front of her car. Not the best thing to do, but it would probably feel pretty satisfying.
She shook her head, and saw Jennifer Roberts standing off to the side fluffing her hair and talking to her cameraman. She made eye contact with her as she pulled out of the parking lot. Jennifer gave a little smiled and wagged her fingers at Madeline. Madeline pressed her mouth together and pulled on to the street next to the park on the way to the highway. Even with all the drama, the day was beautiful. Madeline powered the windows in her blue Honda Accord down and started to blast her Britney Spears mix off her phone through the speakers. She figured by not calling ahead, William would be caught unaware and wouldn’t have time to think of a story about how he knew Dailey. She was determined she was going to get to the bottom of everything and he would not get away with it if he was involved.
Chapter Sixteen
The trip to the Barnstable Barnstormers stadium took just under an hour on Route 3 for Madeline. Since it was a beautiful weekend, traffic was pretty steady all the way down to Cape Cod. Surprisingly, there was only a two-mile back up leading to the Sagamore Bridge. The summer months were usually so much worse trying to get on the Cape. She remembered one time there was a ten-mile backup to get over the bridge.
The Boucher family had a beach house on the Cape for as long as she could remember. She had some family that lived out there year-round, too. With baseball season falling right into prime beach season, they usually took advantage of the off-season to hit the beach cottage. It was much less crowded after Labor Day and still warm enough to enjoy the beach until the end of September. Plus, when the season was over the family could relax just that much more.
Crossing over the bridge, she knew she had about ten minutes before she arrived at the Barnstable stadium. Right off the highway, it was centrally located on the Cape for people to get to. Since the Cape Cod Baseball League only ran through July, the Barnstormers were the only other baseball game in town until their season ended after Labor Day weekend. Since there were only five teams in the greater Boston area, including New Hampshire and Rhode Island, the Armadillos played the Barnstable team a lot. One member of the family attended every game, just to keep up-to-date on all the players and other teams. She tried to think of the upcoming baseball schedule. She thought the next game against the Barnstormers was scheduled for about two weeks away.
Madeline pulled into the parking lot of their stadium and found only two other cars parked haphazardly in the front parking spaces. One, a gleaming silver Porsche looked like it pulled in quickly and didn’t even make sure their lights were off yet. Even though the sun was out, the lights on the car were on and throwing two bright beams on the front gate of the ballpark. The other, a more sedate black Toyota sedan was parked nearby.
The Barnstable stadium was much newer than the Abington stadium and had a completely different setup. The front offices actually faced the outside of the park and their entry way was outside of the park. The Abington offices were only accessible through the interior of the park.
Madeline put the car in park and tried to come up with a plausible reason to stop by out of the blue. Might as well stick to the truth. She knew William Chase was looking for her the past few weeks, so she’d just tell him she was in the neighborhood and decided to stop by. Hopefully, he hadn’t heard about her brother’s arrest yet. She wanted to gauge his reaction to the news for herself.
As she walked towards the front door of the offices, she realized how quiet it was out there. She had thought they had a game that night, but the park looked so empty. She checked her watch and saw that it was only 1 p.m., so maybe they just hadn’t come in yet. Maybe they set everything up the day before. They had lights, so she assumed that the game was at night. When the Abington team installed lights, night games became hugely popular during the summer.
The front office door was unlocked, so she pushed the door open and slowly walked inside. The front reception desk was empty.
“Hello? Is anyone here?” She called to the empty office. No one responded. She looked behind the front desk, and it looked like whoever sat there just stepped away. The computer was still on, and Madeline noticed a purse underneath the desk. She didn’t want to wait, so she walked down the small hallway leading to a couple of offices and large conference rooms.
She had been in these offices a few times, mainly with her father as his assistant before college. She took notes in meetings and generally tried to stay awake. She vaguely knew her way around the small office. She knew that William would have the largest office, probably at the end with all the windows facing the park.
Madeline heard the whir of the air conditioner kick on and shivered. It was always so cold in offices. She even kept a heater, gloves, and a blanket in her own office. Her choice of summer outfit today did not protect against the cold office chill. She wasn’t sure if it was just the cold or the eerie quiet in the office that caused her to shiver.
Still not seeing any movement anywhere, she tentatively knocked on William’s office door. After no response, she tested the doorknob. It was locked.
&nbs
p; “Excuse me.” A sharp voice from behind her caused her to jump. “Can I help you with something?”
Madeline turned and faced an older lady, probably in her late fifties with a severe gray bun and glasses, tapping her foot impatiently. She looked at William’s door and back to the woman and tried to decide if she should lie. Madeline decided the truth wasn’t too bad, so she went with that.
“Hi, there was nobody up front when I got here, and I knew William was anxious to talk to me, so I decided to head back to his office.” Madeline pointed at the door with a rueful smile.
“And you might be who?” The woman asked, arching an eyebrow and crossing her arms over her chest.
“Oh, right. I’m Madeline Boucher. My family owns the Abington Armadillos. Do you know if Mr. Chase is around?”
She gestured for Madeline to follow her back to the front of the office. Madeline followed her dutifully, glancing one more time at William’s closed office door. As the woman settled behind her desk, she clicked a few buttons on her computer and pulled up what looked like a calendar. Madeline was standing next to her, so she could see everything the woman was looking at. She assumed it was William’s calendar. She saw a big red “x” on today’s date. That seemed weird. She could’ve sworn they had a game that night. Why wouldn’t he be around on game day?
“It looks like Mr. Chase is out of the office today. Can I set up an appointment for you at a later date?” She peered down at the screen. “How about next week sometime?”
Madeline must have had an annoyed look on her face, because the woman leaned back her in seat and folded her arms. Shutting her computer off, she said “How about you just call when you can make an appointment?”
Madeline nodded and walked towards the front door, still wondering why it was so empty at the ballpark. As she rested her hands on the door frame, she turned back towards the receptionist. “Is there a game scheduled tonight? I could’ve sworn you guys were playing Lynn tonight. Is that still happening?”
Obviously not too happy to continue to talk to Madeline, the woman huffed. “Yes, the game was rescheduled to tomorrow due to field issues that need to be resolved.”
“Thanks, I appreciate ALL your help.” Madeline walked out with her head held high. She was not going to let this cranky old broad intimidate her. She heard the woman give a snort behind her. To quote her favorite show as a child, “How rude!” Just because she may have caught Madeline attempting to snoop around the office doesn’t give her the right to be so mean. Okay, maybe it did. She would want Eliza to be the same if she caught someone skulking around Madeline’s office. She thought she had a free pass with an empty office, but that old battle axe of a receptionist caught her red handed.
The game being rescheduled was weird though. The glimpse at his calendar showed a whole day blocked off. She wondered if that was significant. She was going to have Eliza check with the Lynn team to see if they had other information about why the game changed.
Back in her car, she turned her phone radio to the “boy band” station. Sometimes a person just needed some good old pop tunes to make the drive go quicker. Making sure the Bluetooth was connected, she cranked the music through the car speakers.
Well, she couldn’t worry about not getting information from William today. She had to regroup back at the office and figure out next steps. She hoped that by the time she was back at the office, there would be an update on her brother. She still couldn’t believe the police arrested him. She needed to find out if Davis got any more information out of the detectives. Since the rest of the family was caught up in that mess, it was up to her to make sure the day’s game went off without a hitch.
The team was playing the Weymouth Windjammers that night, and she needed to make sure all the pre-game events were set-up and everyone knew where to be. They had another local group singing the National Anthem and then a local business guy was throwing out the first pitch. He donated a lot of money to some local charities, and they wanted to recognize all he’d done. Madeline was now in charge of making sure the gentleman knew exactly what he was supposed to do. Usually her mother coordinated the first pitch ceremonies, but Madeline knew she was going to be a bit preoccupied at the moment.
The drive didn’t take nearly as long as before since she was flying against traffic to the Abington ballpark. As she pulled into the parking lot, she noticed the same five reporters hanging out smoking cigarettes and leaning against their cars. At the sound of her car pulling in they all jumped up and tossed their cigs into the parking lot. Grimacing in frustration, Madeline tried to park as close to the entrance as she could in hopes of trying to avoid them.
Unfortunately, she wasn’t so lucky. She heard one shrill voice out of the group of reporters that made her turn her head. Running up from behind the group of five was Jennifer Roberts with her microphone outstretched and her cameraman in tow. Madeline felt her face get hot and took a deep breath.
“Madeline Boucher, do you have any comment about your brother, the murderer?” Shoving her microphone in Madeline’s face, she looked at her with a satisfied smirk on her face. Madeline had a moment of rage where she instantly regretted not being able to punch her full in the face. Taking another deep breath, Madeline looked the camera in the lens, and spoke directly to her viewers.
“The team has no comment other than to say we support Ben Boucher and hope the police will realize they have an innocent man in custody. We are fully cooperating with the authorities and don’t put much stock in anonymous reports being perpetuated in the media. A little research would go a long way in learning there is something more involved in this investigation. We support the South Shore Sherriff’s office in their quest to bring resolution to this investigation.” Madeline looked back at Jennifer who didn’t look as smug as she did minutes ago. Madeline thought that Jennifer was probably expecting some sort of blow-up or confrontation to get a good sound bite for her nightly report.
Madeline gave her a fake smile, turned around, and walked quickly through the front gate with Dan, the security guard, barring entrance to the reporters yelling questions. She scurried to the front office and got inside the door without any more trouble. Resting her back against the door, she sighed at Eliza and said, “Thank goodness that’s over for today.”
Eliza looked up from her computer and muted her headset. “How’d it go at the Barnstable stadium?”
“Not great.” Madeline shrugged and rested her elbows on the top of Eliza’s desk. “He wasn’t even there. The park was completely empty. I did meet the, um, authoritative lady at the front desk though. She caught me trying to get into William’s office.”
Eliza laughed. “Oh no! What did you think you were going to find? Plus, I should’ve warned you about that lady. Her name is Edith. She’s been part of that office for as long as I can remember. Well before William bought the team. She’s probably a Cape institution at this point. I bet he’s afraid to fire her.”
“Good to know. Well, at least I found out that the game they were supposed to play tonight got rescheduled. She didn’t give me a very good reason though. Something to do with the field, but it sounds like a lie to me. Could you maybe put in a call to the receptionist over at the Lynn team to find out what reason they were given for the change? I didn’t want to push my luck with Edith. She couldn’t wait to get me out of there.”
Eliza looked through her rolodex of numbers on her desk. “Sure, I’ve got the number for the Lynn Ramblers right here. Give me a few minutes to see what I can learn and then I’ll come find you.”
Thanking her for helping out, Madeline went to her office and shut the door behind her. She pulled out her laptop and logged into the team email system. Waiting there was an email from the gentleman who was supposed to throw out the first pitch that night. He was canceling due to the arrest of her brother. He didn’t want his name or charity work associated with a potential murderer.
Madeline sighed dramatically and put her head in her hands. With such short notice,
she didn’t think she’d be able to pull anyone for the first pitch ceremony. She decided the team would forgo it for that night. The local singers sent an email that said they were still committed to sing. They had known the family for years and wouldn’t let the investigation keep them from supporting the family and team. There were several other emails from various outraged members of the local community about her brother being a bad role model to their children. What ever happened to “innocent until proven guilty?” There were also emails from avid season ticket holders and baseball fans pledging their support for the team and the family.
She closed down her emails and looked at the messages left on her desk by Eliza while she was gone. She couldn’t get Eliza to just transfer people to her voicemail. Eliza liked doing things the old-fashioned way. Nothing seemed too urgent; mostly just requests or interviews from the media. Madeline placed a quick call down to Billy in the manager’s office to let him know that the players should probably refrain from speaking to the media about the situation. They didn’t want any issues or misunderstandings with the players. Billy readily agreed and said he would hold a team meeting before the game to let them know. Madeline let him know that she would stop down to give the family line about the investigation, so the players would understand that they were all in this together.
Madeline heard her phone make a quick pinging noise to let her know she received a text. Looking down, she saw it was from her mom. They got her brother released and they were taking him back to the house to lay low for a while. She let her know that they’d be back in the office the next day, but to call her if there were any problems.
Murder at First Pitch Page 13
