“At you?”
Coach glanced at me and then away, as if ashamed. “Yeah, at me. Clocked me good.”
“He hit you?”
“Oh, yeah. Didn’t break my nose but it bled pretty good.”
“What happened?”
Coach let out a long slow breath, and I felt twenty years of bad dreams waft into the room.
“I hit back. I shouldn’t have, not ever, but I did.”
“It was self-defense, Coach, surely.”
“That was the story. The whole thing was hushed up. Pete’s parents wanted it kept quiet because he threw the first punch and it turned out he had spent some time in juvenile hall, and they were concerned he would go back. We swore the team to silence, for Pete. Or at least that was how it was explained.”
“Sounds like that’s how it was, Coach.”
He shook his head, gently. “No. It wasn’t. Because I could have stopped. I knew it then and I know it now. It wasn’t self-defense, it wasn’t reflex. I had a moment—just a second, but I had it—to think it through. I could have stepped away. But I didn’t. A year of yap, yap, yap from him, like a little dog, and then he hit me. So I took my shot. No one else knew. It was all pretty instantaneous, but I knew. I knew.”
“I hate to say, Coach, it sounds like he had it coming.”
“Son, when you become a teacher, you enter a covenant. You tell these parents that you will teach to the best of your ability, but at the very least, you will keep their kids safe, do no harm. I broke that covenant.”
“But his parents agreed with you.”
“Doesn’t matter. I broke the covenant.”
I let him sip his beer and I thought about what he was saying. He was right, about the covenant thing, but there were limits to everything.
“Did you ever speak to him about it?” I asked. “Later?”
“No. His family moved back to Illinois at Christmas that year.”
“Have you thought about getting in touch?”
“No. Can’t do it.”
“You could try.”
“No. Word got back a few years later that Pete had taken his own life while at college.”
I said nothing. There was nothing to say. There was no closure to be had. Coach wasn’t responsible for what had happened, not that night and not later. At least that’s how I saw it. He saw it different. Perhaps he saw a kid in trouble like me, but wasn’t able to reach them.
“I’m sorry, Coach,” I said.
Coach nodded. “Yeah. Me too, Son, me too.”
He finished his beer and I finished mine and he took the empty bottles.
“I should let you get some sleep,” he said, moving to the door.
“Sure, Coach. You sleep well.”
“You, too.”
He opened the door and the cold rushed in and he stood there for a moment like he thought the room needed cooling down. Then he turned to me.
“I’m glad you’re here,” he said. “Whatever happens. I’m glad you’re here.”
I nodded. Coach stepped out and closed the door behind himself.
I lay back on the bed the way I had done so many times before, and stared at the ceiling. I thought about the mistakes I had made. I had made many. I had probably helped a lot of people, too, but I had to admit that those people didn’t visit my dreams very often. The other ones did. Just like Coach. He had to live with his demons, as we all did. It made me think of high school, of him calling the final play of a game, the play to win or lose. He would give me the play, and then wait for me to go and execute. He didn’t think I wouldn’t. He assumed I would. It was pressure, but the pressure was released by the hours and hours of training. Now the pressure was back.
And there was no playbook for what I was going to do next.
Chapter Thirty-Two
It doesn’t matter how far ahead you prepare, there are always a thousand things to do the day before Thanksgiving. Everyone was up early. Mrs. D was into the initial food prep, and Ray was making a run to the wine store, which he said would be busy of course, because people had to be prepared, since state law prevented alcohol sales on Sundays and holidays. Coach was lugging wood from the pile behind the house into the living room, kicking dustings of snow off his boots as he came back inside.
It wasn’t a heavy snow cover but it was there, and the temperature showed no inclination toward rising, so it was not likely to melt away anytime soon. I took some toast and coffee to go, and headed back along the Merritt. The road had been salted and although there wasn’t enough snow to plow, I could see the trucks parked in the depots off the Parkway, ready to go should the weather turn.
The light snow had dusted the trees and made many of the last leaves fall, so the foliage has started to take on the naked winter look that it would wear for the next few months. I had forgotten how leafless trees looked, and as I drove toward New Canaan I felt a sense of melancholy sweep over me. Locals often referred to it as the winter garden, but to me the flora looked dead.
As I passed Trumbull, my phone rang. It was a number I wished I could forget.
“Nurlan says yes to deal,” said the round man.
“Good.”
“We meet today. You come to warehouse.”
“No.”
“No?”
“No. Today is good, but not at the warehouse.” I had no intention of trying to collect two hundred fifty thousand in cash from a mob guy in his own warehouse. I’d seen too many Scorsese movies. We were doing it somewhere a lot more public.
I gave the round man the place and asked if he knew it, and he said it wasn’t a good place and I told him it was a great place and I’d see Nurlan there or I wouldn’t. Then I hung up. I was pretty confident he would show. He’d suspect a set up, but he was a pragmatic guy. He’d get there early and check it all out, and I gave him plenty of time to do that. I had no intention of double-crossing him. Unless he tried to double-cross me.
There was no car in the driveway when I reached the Pickerings, so I tried the doorbell and got no response. I wondered for a moment if they had fled town. I couldn’t blame them for that, even if it would have solved nothing. I was sitting in my car with the heat on, wondering about the likelihood of carbon monoxide poisoning, when the Taurus pulled in behind me. I saw Ellen Pickering get out alone, so I turned off my car and joined her on the front steps. She held up an envelope.
“Got the money,” she said, unlocking the front door.
“From the lake house?”
“Yes.”
“That was quick.”
“I told you. He has money and lawyers.”
We went inside and I sat at the kitchen counter while she made coffee, and I pulled out Sal’s list of creditors and checked it off one more time.
“You’ll need to deposit this into the business and then get Brett to write checks to all the creditors.”
“The checks are written,” she said. “I had him do them last night. We didn’t exactly sleep well.”
“No, understandable. How are the girls?”
“Confused. It doesn’t seem like they were harmed in any way, at least physically, so they don’t really understand why they spent time with the limo driver.”
“Where are they?”
“With Brett, at his parents’ house. I dropped them off this morning before I went to settle the sale of the lake house.”
“I’m sorry you had to do that.”
She shrugged. “I’m thankful we had the resources to buy our way out of this. A lot of people wouldn’t have.”
I nodded. That much was true.
She dropped a coffee mug in front of me. “We have bought our way out, haven’t we?”
“I hope so,” I said. “I’m meeting him this afternoon. Do you have the contract?”
Ellen opened her bag and pulled out a sheaf of papers.
“My real estate agent friend drew everything up. Brett has signed, so have I.” She handed me the papers. “I trust you know what you’re doing. Technically, the second
he signs these, he owns this house, even if he doesn’t give us the money. There’s no escrow on this one.”
“Don’t worry, I got this. He’s not going to do that. That would be a bad faith contract, and you could contest it in court.”
“And how would we pay for the lawyer?”
“You wouldn’t. He wouldn’t want to go to court because that brings your relationship to the attention of the legal system, and trust me, he wants to be as far from that as possible.”
I tucked the paper in my jacket pocket and sipped my coffee.
“Any luck on a new house?” I asked.
“My real estate agent friend found us a two-bedroom townhouse in North Stamford.”
“North Stamford?”
“Yes. Not too far away, so the girls can still be near their friends.”
“But how will Brett get to work? That’s nowhere near a train line.”
“No, its not. But our neighbor, the one who bought the lake house, he says he has a job opening. And his office is in Pound Ridge, so it’s a short drive away.”
I was glad that Brett had some work, and that he had gotten it before his past had caught up with him, but part of me still feared that he might fall back into bad habits, even as an employee.
“Do you think he’s learned his lesson?”
“Brett? I think he has.”
“You’re not worried he might do something silly in his new job?”
“His new job? Oh, you mean the job offer? Sorry, no. The job offer wasn’t for him. It was for me.”
I sat back in my stool and looked at her. She wasn’t leaving anything to chance.
“Brett’s background was in mutuals and stock-based funds. My Wall Street experience was in REITs—real estate investment trusts. This guy knows my work. The job isn’t quite at my level, but it’s a job, and I can work my way up.”
“What will Brett do?”
“He’ll learn a little about being a stay-at-home dad. Might do him good.”
I nodded. I had no doubt it would do him good.
“And he can get a job in a hardware store,” she said with a grin.
“That would do him some good, too. But the job doesn’t pay enough to get a single family home?”
“It could, at a stretch. But since we’ve prepaid the girls’ school tuition, they are good for this year. If we watch our pennies, we might be able to keep them there next year. But we can’t do that and get a big house. So we cut our coat according to our cloth. Maybe we all learn a little bit about the value of things. Lessons we might have lost.”
I nodded. I couldn’t help but feel like the Pickering family was in good hands now.
I just hoped I could hold up my end of the bargain.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Everywhere was busy on the day before Thanksgiving, and there was nowhere quite as busy as Stew Leonard’s. Stew’s was a Connecticut institution, a dairy store with humble beginnings that had grown into a local grocery chain, and according to Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, was the largest dairy store in the world.
I wasn’t sure what qualified as a dairy store anymore, but Stew’s was exactly the kind of place I wanted to meet Nurlan. The store was built like a Vegas casino—an obvious entry point, but once inside, it was a twisting tunnel of a place, with no real way to get out until you reached the end. It reminded me of the lines at the theme parks in Orlando, twisting and turning around on themselves, herding people ever forward with entertainment at various points to distract them from the fact that they were standing in a long line for hours on end. Stew’s even had the entertainment, from animatronic fruit and vegetables to singing sticks of butter and costumed cows wandering the store.
I had visited Stew Leonard’s as a kid, and remembered vividly the Christmases where half the parking area had been transformed into a Christmas tree lot. It was run like clockwork. Select your tree, pay, go get your car, guys would pop the tree on top of your vehicle and then tie it up there, and you’d be on your way. It was the McDonalds drive-through of Christmas tree lots.
There were no trees out yet, but the large lot was full to bursting, and attendants directed drivers with fraying tempers into slots as they became available. I headed straight to the rear of the lot. I had no issue with walking, despite the heavier snow that was starting to fall.
I didn’t see Nurlan or the round man as I walked to the store, but I didn’t expect to. They should be inside, if I knew anything about them at all. I reached the entrance where a large sign told me that fresh turkeys were all sold out unless previously ordered. I was reading the sign wondering why anyone would leave it until the day before Thanksgiving to buy a turkey, when a woman in a green vest told me that a few canned turkeys were still available. I really had no idea what a canned turkey looked like, and I had no desire to find out.
I joined the line to edge into the store. Inside was slightly warmer but no more quiet. The hum of humanity was supplemented by the sounds bananas singing about being eaten, and cows mooing at giggling children. I passed up the carvery and the chef cooking dishes in flaming woks, and headed for the milk.
Nurlan and the round man were standing by the dairy case, frowning at a couple of human-sized milk cartons that appeared to be doing a tango. The line of shoppers had stopped to view the display, and despite everyone’s hurry and the surly mood being displayed outside in the parking lot, everyone inside appeared to accept this as part of the experience. It was hard not to smile at a dancing milk carton or an animatronic mooing cow.
Nurlan was in his furry coat, and standing up it seemed to envelope him. All I saw was the craggy face and the dead eyes underneath a matching furry hat. He saw me but didn’t smile. I slowly cut my way through the crowd to the milk cabinet.
“Gentlemen,” I smiled. “Gotta love Thanksgiving.”
“You have it,” said Nurlan, or maybe he asked it, but either way, he wasn’t much for small talk.
I pulled the paperwork out of my jacket and handed it to him to look at.
“All signed and proper,” I said. “The mortgage value is the sale price. The two-fifty cash remains between you and me.”
Nurlan looked through the pages like an attorney. He was a cautious guy.
“All you need do is sign,” I said, “and you own the house as of today. There is an addendum that says you will rent the house back to the Pickerings until Monday, so they have time to move out over the weekend. You can take possession then. They’ll leave the keys on the counter and the back door open.”
The milk had finished dancing by the time Nurlan had finished reading the papers. He didn’t sign them, not then and there. He had the contract and he knew how to file the paperwork. He nodded gruffly, as if the cold was getting to him—which I doubted very much—and the round man handed me a check. I had half expected a business check, but it was a bank check, as good as cash to Brett Pickering, or at least to his mortgage provider. I slipped the check into my pocket and looked at Nurlan.
“I think there’s more,” I said.
Nurlan shook his head. “No. That is all.”
“No, there is the little matter of two fifty in cash.”
“I not pay that.”
“I thought you might say that,” I said. I looked across to a bank of small television monitors that were positioned high above the dairy cabinets. In the first monitor we could see a live feed from a dairy farm where cows produced the milk that we stood before. The second monitor showed a view down onto us. I saw myself in Coach’s jacket. I looked cold. Nurlan and the round man were also both in the shot. They looked like this was their normal habitat. I looked at the third monitor, which showed a view of the crowd slowly moving through the entrance into the store. I waited for a moment, but not too long. Timing is everything.
“Well isn’t that a coincidence,” I said, looking at the third monitor.
Nurlan looked up at the screen and saw a tide of tardy shoppers. But I wasn’t concerned with him. I waited for the round man to
get a good look. When he did he turned to Nurlan and spoke in rapid fire, in a language I didn’t know. All I understood were three letters.
F. B. I.
I kept my eyes on the screen as I watched Special Agent Jeffrey Prager float on the tide of people into the store. I heard Nurlan at my ear.
“You double-cross me?”
“I don’t think it’s a double-cross if we made a deal and you welched on it.” I turned to him and raised my eyebrows in a self-satisfied, somewhat condescending manner.
“You don’t want enemy in me,” he said.
I nodded. “I don’t want anything in you, pal. I keep being told that you are a pragmatic guy, and you keep busting that illusion. So here’s the deal. You hand over the cash, as agreed, and I’ll walk out of here, taking the FBI with me. You get to walk away with a house worth a ton of money. Okay? Otherwise, Special Agent Prager will eventually reach us here in the dairy section, and you can explain why you are carrying that much cash, and you can also explain the surveillance video from the soccer fields showing your guy here”—I looked at the round man—“kidnapping the Pickering girls in your car. You choose.”
He looked at me with his dead eyes and I felt the life being sucked out of me by his vision alone. For a moment I believed it was truly happening, and then I realized that it was the refrigeration that was sucking the life from me, and the dead eyes were just giving me the creeps. He must have played all the combinations through his head because he took his sweet time again, but eventually Nurlan said something to the round man, and the round man handed me the small gym bag I had seen him holding all along. They were nothing if not a pragmatic bunch after all.
I didn’t trust him at all so I took a quick look to confirm the cash was inside. Neat bundles of hundred dollar notes, a hundred notes to a bundle. I counted twenty-five bundles roughly, and figured at that point he was either going to stiff me for all of it or none of it, but he wasn’t the type to hold back one or two bundles, so a rough count was good enough.
“You guys stay here,” I said. “I’ll get the FBI’s attention. Why don’t you buy something, take your time leaving. I hear the canned turkey is good.”
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