Forced Out

by Stephen Frey

  Jack took the last bite of the foot-long. “I want to talk to him,” he said as he chewed. “What’s the best way to do that?”

  Blaine thought for a few moments. “Not here at the park, that’s for sure. He might think you’re press. Then you’d never get a word with him. He hates the press with a passion.”

  Jack didn’t blame Clemant for that. He’d been raked over the coals himself by the New York press four years ago, when everything had gone down. Had his character assassinated by guys he thought were his friends. By guys he’d given inside scoops to for years so they could look good to their editors. They’d rushed to judgment in the name of a story, and that was one part of the bitterness he’d never get past. He had this gnawing suspicion that one of those guys might even be responsible for what had happened. At least had a hand in it. “Any ideas?”

  Blaine nodded. “He goes to this bar down the street from here some nights after home games. They got the best cheeseburgers around.”

  From the looks of Blaine’s belly, he was speaking from experience. “What’s it called?” Jack asked.

  “The Dugout.”

  “When’s your father gonna be home?” Bobby leaned back, pulled the curtains to one side, and peered nervously out the window. He and Cheryl were sitting on the couch in the living room. “I don’t want him coming in here and finding me like this. Christ, he’d be so pissed off if he caught me in the house alone with you.”

  “Oh, stop. It’s not like I’m fifteen.”

  Bobby raised one eyebrow. “More like thirteen. At least in his eyes.”

  Cheryl waved. “Don’t worry. Daddy won’t be home for a while. A couple of hours at least.”

  “Yeah? How do you know?”

  “He told me he was going out to dinner with some friends.”

  “That’s impossible.”

  “Why?”

  Bobby stole another suspicious glance out the window. “Nobody could possibly like him enough to want to spend a whole dinner with him.”

  Cheryl laughed. “You might be right about that.” She put her hand on Bobby’s knee, then slid her fingers up his thigh a little. Usually he made the first move. “I don’t think he went out to dinner with anybody. I think he went to another Tarpon game. He wanted to watch that kid he was all into last night again.”

  Bobby turned away from the window. “Really? That’s kind of weird, don’t you think?”

  She got on her knees on the couch beside Bobby and put both hands on his shoulders. “I would if it was anybody but my dad.” She hesitated, uncertain of how much to say. Daddy had asked her not to tell the neighbors, but he’d never said anything about anyone else. “He was with the New York Yankees until a few years ago. A real important guy in the scouting group.”

  Suddenly Bobby wasn’t at all interested in what was outside. “Really? Hey, that’s pretty cool. What did he do exactly?”

  “During the season he was usually a city ahead of the Yankees, checking out the next team they were playing. During the off-season, he’d go all over the country looking for talent. Down into Central America, too.” She was sure she was never going to see him again when he made those trips. “Once he snuck into Cuba to watch this guy play and almost got caught by the secret police. He hitched a ride off a beach near Havana with some guys in a rowboat late at night and finally got picked up by the coast guard.”

  “Jesus.” Bobby shook his head in disbelief. “He snuck into Cuba? That was crazy. Well, what happened? Did he retire?”

  Cheryl nodded hesitantly. She wasn’t going to tell Bobby about that. “Yeah, but I guess he can’t get baseball out of his system. It was his life for so long. It was everything to him,” she said, hoping she wasn’t sounding bitter. “He’s amazing. He can remember games from years ago like it was yesterday.”

  “No wonder he nailed me on the pitch speeds last night.”

  A distant look drifted to Cheryl’s face. “He saw that kid make those great plays last night, and he wants to get him to the Show.” Before going to bed she’d followed her father’s moves on the Internet and seen that it was the Tarpon home page he’d gone to. And the kid’s personal page after that. “I know that’s what’s going on.”

  “‘The Show’? What’s that?”

  Cheryl eyed Bobby suspiciously. “You know what that means. Come on.”

  “No, I really don’t. What’s ‘the Show’? What’s that mean?”

  It had always been tough for her growing up—especially after she’d started dating. She always seemed to know more about baseball than the boys, so she’d learned to hold back and not say anything sometimes, learned to seem like she didn’t know. Not say everything anyway, because a couple of times she’d embarrassed boys in front of their friends or dads with how much more she knew than they did. But Bobby didn’t seem like the type who’d get worked up about it.

  “It’s what baseball players call the major leagues,” she explained, her eyes narrowing quickly. Bobby was already grinning guiltily. “You jerk,” she said, punching him gently. “You knew.”

  “Yeah, I was testing you,” Bobby admitted, pulling her close and kissing her. “Well, if your dad’s so into baseball, why was it so damn tough to get him to the Tarpon game last night?” Bobby asked when they finished their kiss. “I mean, we basically had to put chains on him and drag him out there.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe he had a hard time with it because he didn’t really want to retire. But they have this mandatory thing,” she said, hoping Bobby wouldn’t pursue it.

  Bobby pulled her close again. “Must have been tough for you growing up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He was probably gone a lot.”

  Suddenly she regretted opening up a crack. Bobby had hit the nail on the head, and now the door was swinging wide open against a torrent of emotion.

  Daddy had been gone a lot. A whole lot. And when he was home, all he wanted to do was spend time with David, her older brother. David had been a star baseball player in high school, then joined the New York City Fire Department. Now he was a decorated veteran who’d won all kinds of medals for his bravery at the World Trade Center, and many times since. He was the family favorite—at least the way she saw it. She’d spent her whole life trying to get her father’s attention, spent her whole life competing with David for it. And rarely won.

  She glanced around the tiny house. Maybe that was why she was here. There wasn’t any competition. At least not right here, not right in her face.

  She’d always figured she was here because she was so disappointed in her mother. Disappointed with the deceit, the sneaking around, the lies. Mom had denied it all, but Cheryl knew the truth. Mom had forced her to choose sides right before the divorce was finalized. Well, she must have wished she hadn’t done that now. They hadn’t spoken in four years. The calls from up North had finally stopped a year ago.

  Cheryl had always hoped she was here simply because she loved Daddy that much and couldn’t bear to think of him alone without his family or his career. Because she was afraid of what might happen in the early hours of a Florida morning after he’d guzzled a pint of scotch after convincing himself he didn’t have anything to live for. She’d never have forgiven herself.

  But maybe it really was because the competition wasn’t here. Maybe that was the answer after all. She finally had Daddy all to herself.

  “Must have been really tough,” Bobby repeated, his expression sympathetic.

  “Yeah,” she murmured, “it was.”

  Bobby leaned over and kissed her hard.

  Too hard. Cheryl had wanted to tell him to be gentler ever since their first kiss, but she didn’t want to embarrass him, either. She kissed him back, trying to lead him to tenderness with her technique. But it didn’t work; he was still rough. “Daddy thinks you’re using me,” she said, giving up for now. “He doesn’t think you want a real relationship with me.”

  “What? That’s ridiculous. You know how much I
care about you.”

  “How much?”

  He put one of his big palms on her soft cheek. “I love you, baby,” he whispered, leaning forward to kiss her again. “I really do.”

  And for the first time his lips seemed soft, really soft, and she could tell he was serious. It felt so good. Daddy was wrong. That felt good, too. “Come on,” she murmured, standing up and taking his hand. “Let’s go to my bedroom.”

  “You sure?” Bobby asked, wide-eyed.

  They’d been dating for a few months, but she hadn’t made love to him yet. She’d given him other things to keep him satisfied, to keep him coming back, but she hadn’t let him have her entire body. Now she wanted to. “Very sure.”

  The Dugout was a hole-in-the-wall wedged between a dry cleaner and a dive Chinese restaurant on a deserted side street a few blocks from the stadium. Just ten bar stools and ten Formica-top tables with baseball memorabilia everywhere. Covering the walls were signed photographs of famous players who’d spent time in Sarasota before going on to the majors. And there were autographed bats, balls, and gloves hanging from the ceiling. Beneath the clear cover of the bar were tons of baseball cards, some that were valuable, Jack noticed.

  Jack signaled to the lone bartender. “Another one.” There were only a few people in the place, and they were all at tables. He was the only one at the bar.

  He was about to lift his glass and down the CD-thin sip of scotch remaining when the front door opened and Clemant sauntered in. The kid sat at the far end of the bar on a stool that let him rest his back against the wall—and keep an eye on the door.

  Up close he was bigger than Jack had anticipated. At least six four and 230 pounds. He wore a gray sleeveless T-shirt, white nylon shorts that hung to his knees, flip-flops, and a plain blue logoless cap with the bill pulled way down. Muscles rippled all over him as he moved, like a big cat. He was a walking advertisement for the perfect physique.

  Jack was careful not to make eye contact, just nursed what was left of his drink and took sidelong glances every once in a while. He wanted to make sure the kid had time to relax, time to settle in. The bartender said the kid usually drank a couple of beers with dinner, so Jack waited, hoping the alcohol might loosen him up. Waited until the kid had almost finished off two big cheeseburgers, a whole plate of fries, and three Miller Lites before casually walking over and sitting down on the bar stool beside him.

  He hesitated a few moments, laying his left palm flat on the bar, giving Clemant a wide-screen view of the World Series ring. Finally he turned toward the kid. “Name’s Jack Barrett,” he said smoothly, holding out his hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

  The kid took his time responding. Slowly finished the last French fry before wiping his palms thoroughly with a napkin and shaking hands. “Mikey Clemant,” he said with a friendly smile.

  “Saw your game last night.” The kid’s hands were so powerful. Like Thurman Munson’s before he died in that tragic plane crash. “Two of the best plays I ever saw. The catch in the first and the homer in the ninth. And I’ve seen a lot of great plays.”

  “Thanks.” The kid stroked his beard, then reached for his beer. “You at tonight’s game?”

  Jack nodded, glancing quickly into Clemant’s eyes, trying to get a read without lingering. Just like you wouldn’t look into a wild animal’s eyes for long because it might set off the beast inside. But it was tough to see anything. The bill of the hat came way down, and the beard made the shadow from the hat seem even darker. “Yup.”

  “Not quite as good, huh?”

  Clemant had gone oh for three tonight—two strikeouts and a pop-up—and he’d made a hideous throwing error. Jack shrugged. “That’s baseball.” Strange. It almost seemed like the kid had grinned for a second. Like he found his awful performance tonight amusing—even satisfying—in some way. Maybe that was why his teammates couldn’t stand him. Maybe he was one of those guys who didn’t care. Which was what athletes hated most in a teammate. And you couldn’t teach someone to care. “Some nights that’s just the way it goes.”

  The kid gestured at Jack’s hand. “What’s with the ring?”

  Jack held it up for maximum effect. “I was with the Yankees for a long time.”

  “Doing what?”

  “I was on the scouting side.” Jack leaned toward the kid. The conversation was going even better than he’d hoped. Christ, from what everyone had said, he hadn’t been expecting much. Well, it was time to attack. “Look, I know talent when I see it, and you’re it. You got all the tools to make it big in the Show. And I wanna help you get there. You’re wasting your time here in Sarasota.”

  For a long time the kid said nothing, just drew invisible shapes on the bar with his finger.

  All right, he’d take another tack. “So, you’re from Minnesota,” Jack tried. “I read that on the team’s website. What’s the name of—”

  “Mr. Barrett,” Clemant interrupted calmly, “I don’t care how good you think you are at scaring up talent from small towns and bad teams.” He stood up and dropped two tens on the bar beside his ketchup-smeared plate. “If you ever come up to me like this again, you’re gonna be sorry. Real sorry.”

  He hadn’t raised his voice, hadn’t gotten angry. Just said what he had to say matter-of-factly. Like he was damn serious, Jack realized.

  “Am I clear?”

  Jack nodded ever so subtly.

  And just like that the kid was gone. Out of the bar and into the darkness.

  A shiver ran up Jack’s spine as the door swung shut. The same way it did when the umpire yelled “Play ball!” at the beginning of every game. Only a few moments with the young man, but in those fleeting seconds he’d come to a vital and indisputable conclusion. Mikey Clemant could end up being one of the greatest baseball players of all time.

  Part 2

  12

  IT WAS ALWAYS best to get to a loan shark early in the morning, before he had a chance to get out of his house and get moving. Otherwise you’d spend all day bird-dogging him. Crisscrossing New York City—from the Bronx all the way down to Staten Island—trying to catch up with him because he was constantly bouncing from borough to borough trying to gin up business or chasing down deadbeats. Mostly trying to collect as opposed to lend. Lending was the easy part of the racket. Collecting was the backbreaker.

  Which was one of the reasons why the VIG—the vigorish, or interest rate—had to be so steep. To make up for all that running around, which most days didn’t net you a dime. That and the risk factor. In the lender-of-last-resort market, you had to assume people were going to disappear on you despite what they knew could happen to them. Despite that scare-the-hell-out-of-them surprise visit you always paid the day after you loaned them the money even though technically they didn’t owe you anything back at that point. When you showed them the bloody after-pictures of the last guy who tried to stiff the Lucchesi family.

  Johnny knocked three times hard, then stepped to the side. Just in case the man inside the apartment decided the best defense was a good offense and blew a couple of shotgun shells through the door right before sprinting for the fire escape. You could never be too careful, even though Tony Treviso didn’t have a reputation for being quick on the draw.

  In fact, Treviso’s reputation was quite the opposite. No one had ever actually seen Treviso draw, which was why the Lucchesi capos called him Timid Tony. He never did the dirty work himself. When somebody fell behind on a payment schedule, he called in the muscle side of the family to chop off a finger or slice an ear. And he didn’t usually stick around to watch. Most guys in the family loved watching that stuff. Not Treviso. He just identified the guy and left. And when he had to take the ultimate step, those few times he had to make a mortal example out of a way-past-due credit, he always called in the brutes. Loan sharks were supposed to handle their own problems in the Lucchesi family—at least the initial slicing and dicing. But the rumor around was that Treviso didn’t have the stomach.

  W
hich meant he shouldn’t have lasted long. But he had lasted. And it was because he made so much more than the other guys. He had an uncanny knack for sizing up a mark, for knowing who’d be terrified enough to repay the money—and who wouldn’t. Which wasn’t to say he didn’t suffer his share of losses. Every lender in this market did. But his losses were dramatically less than everyone else’s, so his profits were dramatically more, which was why the capos kept him around even though they called him a pussy behind his back, sometimes even to his face. They kept him around because he made them so much money, and, in the end, that was all that mattered. Even if he was a pussy.

  Yeah, Timid Tony had always been a big moneymaker.

  Until that loan to Kyle McLean.

  Johnny reached around and knocked again, pretty sure he wasn’t going to get the shotgun-blast-through-the-door reception, but forcing himself to be cautious. You never knew how it was gonna go when a man felt trapped. Johnny had learned that one the hard way. He still had buckshot in his left thigh from a guy who’d flipped out on him a couple of years ago.

  He’d thought about calling Treviso to let him know he was coming—to avoid a confrontation—then decided against it. He wanted this to be a surprise so he could gauge the gut reactions to the pointed questions, not hear canned responses.

  And there was this one thing about Tony Treviso. This one footnote that belied the pussy tag the capos had pegged on him. This one story that made Johnny Bondano wary. Two years ago, Treviso was supposed to have murdered a guy he’d loaned fifty grand to—even though he’d gotten the money back. Then supposedly he’d sent the guy’s severed head to his wife by overnight delivery service, with a dead rat stuffed in the gaping, bloody mouth. A few seconds after opening the box she’d collapsed and suffered a nervous breakdown. She was still in the psychiatric ward at Bellevue.