“Look,” I said. “Benton’s dead. I still don’t know exactly how or why, but he don’t care. I believe Big Wyn is behind it, somehow. That woman has ruined a bunch of lives, including, indirectly, probably yours. I think it’s time someone said stop. I can start the ball rolling, but I gotta have a source or two. You’re it. You’re the hold she had on Benton, which drove him to death. Think about it. He apparently gave up. I’m not going to. I need your help.”
She was chewing on her bottom lip nervously as I gave her my best freedom-of-the-press sermon. Hold high the banner of truth and all that.
It might have been working, but just at that moment a huge, sunburned man in a sleeveless T-shirt and dirty jeans staggered into our private cubicle. His face was shaggy with several days’ beard, his eyes were unfocused, he smelled of hard liquor. He had a large gut, flabby arms and brown leather cowboy boots.
“Omigod,” he gasped, staring at Tawny in her purple teddy. “Honeybunch, you and me got some serious dancin’ to do. C’mere!”
He lurched forward and his big beefy hands grabbed the front of her teddy and pulled it apart. It happened so fast, she didn’t have time to react until he was pawing her breasts and making strange mewing sounds.
“Hey!” I yelled and started beating on the guy’s back, trying to grab his arms and pull them away. Tawny let out a bellow of rage, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blur of black as the bouncer, moving far quicker than a man of his size should be able to, moved in. With one hand, he shoved me down into a chair, with the other he smashed a forearm into the drunken fool’s beefy neck. The drunks’ head and shoulders came up in surprise at the sudden pain. That gave Tawny the opportunity to get a knee free, which she brought up sharply into the man’s groin. At the same time, the bouncer slipped his arm under the guy’s chin and began applying pressure, choking off his oxygen.
A second black-clad bouncer burst into the room, picked me up out of the chair, off my feet, whirled me around and smashed me face first against the wall. He grabbed my arm and twisted it painfully up behind my back. “Go ahead, motherfucker,” he said softly into my ear. “Resist me. I haven’t broken an arm in almost a month and I’m starting to get restless.”
“Lay off him Rocky,” Tawny called out. “It wasn’t him. We was just talking when this boozer staggered in and started pawing at me.”
The drunk had passed out and lay face first on the floor. He started to snore. Rocky reluctantly let go of my arm, and I turned around, checking to make sure all my teeth were still intact. Tawny was examining her breasts and wincing.
“Goddamn it,” she said as she fingered each one of her breasts unself-consciously. “Son of a bitch grabbed so hard he left bruises. Shit!”
“Baby, are you okay?” wailed a soft, feminine voice from just outside the cubicle. One of the other dancers ran in and gave Tawny a big hug. She had lots of curly red hair piled atop her head and wore a white stretchy number and high heels. “What happened, baby, are you OK? Do you need to see a doctor?” The redhead hugged Tawny close and then turned to look at the two bouncers standing there. “Where the hell were you guys?” she snapped. “You’re supposed to protect us, goddam it. She coulda been hurt!”
“It’s okay, Doris, calm down,” Tawny said. “I’m fine. Just a run-in with a drunk with fast hands. I may be wearing his fingerprints on my tits for a couple days. That’s all.”
“Oh, baby, how awful!” Doris wailed. “You come back with me right now and let me look. I’ve got some lotion that should help. And some pancake that should hide the marks. C’mon baby, I’ll make you better. You know I can.”
Doris slipped her arm around Tawny and began to lead her away.
“Cindy?”
I threw my hands out in appeal. She looked back at me once. “Okay, Hacker,” she said. “For Benton’s sake.”
“I’ll leave you some tickets,” I said. “Thanks.”
She nodded and turned to go with Doris. I saw her rest her head gently on the other woman’s shoulder and slip her own arm lovingly around the waist of Doris.
The two bouncers watched the women go. “Shit,” one of them growled. The other bent over, grabbed the snoring, bloodied drunk by the belt and the scruff of the neck and effortlessly hauled him out the door. The other one glared wordlessly at me, so I left, under my own power.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
When I got back to the hotel at around half past nine, the message light on my phone was blinking. I called the operator who told me that Don Collier had called. I dialed the extension for the security office.
“Ah, Hacker,” he said, “Where you been?”
“Sampling some of Miami’s most elegant nightlife,” I told him.
“Well, there have been all sorts of interesting developments,” he informed me.
The autopsy on Benton Bergmeister had taken place that afternoon. The medical examiner had found that Benton’s blood alcohol level was right through the roof. He had apparently downed most of that bottle of Scotch the evening he died. No surprise there. But that hadn’t killed the man…at least not by itself. It was the Nembutal interacting with all that booze that had killed him.
“Nembutal?” I said. “Isn’t that like a sleeping pill or something?”
“Yeah,” Collier said. “A depressant. Used as a sedative. Not good to mix with alcohol. It’ll kill ya.”
I thought for a minute. “Bergmeister must have known that,” I said. “He wasn’t stupid. So that means he either killed himself or, drunk, he accidentally swallowed the wrong pills.”
“Well, it’s not quite as simple as that,” Collier told me. “I went back and checked my inventory…you remember the list I made when I was trying not to stare down that woman’s dress?”
“And?”
“And none of the medications she packed up was Nembutal. He was taking stuff for his ulcer, high blood pressure and cholesterol, but he didn’t have any sedatives in his room.”
“Nothing he was taking would interact with a snootfull of booze?”
“Not according to a doc I talked to at the morgue,” Collier said. “But the lab will do a complete analysis as soon as they get the pills back.”
“Back?”
“Yeah, that bombshell from the Tour had already mailed them off to the guy’s daughter in California, along with the rest of his stuff from the room. It will take a few days for them to get out there and then get sent back.”
“Damn,” I said. Unanswered questions. Then I thought of something.
“A couple days ago, Benton mentioned to me that he needed to have a prescription filled,” I said. “If he did, there’s got to be a record of it somewhere that we can check. Find out what he got and when it was filled.”
“Shit, Hacker,” Collier groaned. “There’s gotta be a thousand pharmacies within a mile of this hotel. You want me to tell the cops to start calling each one?”
“Isn’t there one that the hotel recommends when a guest asks?” I wondered. “I’ll bet that he went there.”
“Hmmm. Not bad, Hacker. I’ll check into it.” Collier rang off.
I sat in my room for a while, thinking, turning ideas over in my head. I picked up the phone and called the Dade County Medical Examiner’s office, and after waiting for half an hour to get through to the right person, confirmed the basic information that Collier had given me. Death had been due to the hyper-depressive action of Nembutal combined with excess amounts of alcohol in Benton’s system. His organs had basically been depressed into silence. Pending further investigation, Bergmeister’s case was still open.
I pulled out my laptop and began to write. Sometimes, when I need to step back and take a clear look at a problem, I go ahead and compose a first draft. Then, re-reading, I can see where the biggest holes are in my story and can figure out how to plug them. After a half-hour, this is what I had:
Benton T. Bergmeister, the commissioner of the Ladies Professional Golf Tour who died su
ddenly yesterday in Miami, had been blackmailed for more than ten years by one of the Tour’s most famous players, the Boston Journal has learned.
In a stunning revelation, sources indicated that allegations of sexual misconduct by Bergmeister had long been used against him to ensure his continued allegiance and support for the policies of Wynnona Stilwell, the president of the LPGA Player’s Council and one of the most accomplished players in the history of golf.
The story was confirmed by Cindy D’Angelo, a former golfer on the LPGA Tour who was the victim of the decade-old alleged sexual attack by Bergmeister. Ms. D’Angelo, who is now a dancer in a Miami nightclub, said she was duped by LPGA officials, including Ms. Stilwell, into signing a document which was allegedly used to blackmail the commissioner and ensure his cooperation.
Bergmeister, 64, died suddenly Thursday in his hotel room in Miami, where the LPGA is staging its Miami Classic golf tournament this weekend.
The circumstances surrounding his death have yet to be officially confirmed, but the Journal has learned that an unusual change in Bergmeister’s medication may have been responsible for his death.
According to an autopsy performed by the Dade County Medical Examiner yesterday, Bergmeister’s death was attributed to a fatal combination of alcohol and the drug Nembutal, a barbiturate.
While Bergmeister was known as a heavy drinker, investigators in Miami are trying to trace the source of the Nembutal, a medication not among those prescribed for Bergmeister. Police do not know how Bergmesiter got the drug or why he took it.
Sources within the LPGA have painted a picture of that organization as being under the firm control of Mrs. Stilwell, who has been a member of the Tour since 1965 and president of the policy-making players’ council for the last thirteen years.
Re-reading it, I knew I had more than a few holes to fill and assumptions that needed confirmation. I also knew I’d eventually have to get Big Wyn’s reaction. I glanced at my watch and decided it was too late to call her for a quote. And since all hell would undoubtedly break loose once I did, I wasn’t all that unhappy about letting it wait until tomorrow. I read the piece to myself one more time, this time trying to imagine what Frankie Donatello, my editor up in Boston, would think as he read it. He’d once been a helluva reporter himself, but once they move upstairs and plop their ever-widening butts into one of those cushy executive chairs, they seem to lose about nine-tenth of their guts. Every other word out of their mouths suddenly becomes “liability” and “verifiable.”
I was still working a few minutes later when I was startled by a rap at the door. I looked at my watch: just shy of midnight. When I opened the door, a waiter in a starched white coat stood in the hall, a heavily laden trolley in front of him.
“Room service,” he said, smiling.
“You must have the wrong room,” I told him. “I didn’t order anything from room service.”
“No, but I think you asked a girl out to dinner,” said a soft female voice, and Sybil Montgomery stepped into view. I slapped my forehead. “Omigod, I forgot,” I said sheepishly.
“Well, I didn’t,” she said smartly and pushed me aside. “Come along. Let the man work. I am utterly famished.”
Sybil plopped down in a chair while the smiling waiter laid out the meal. She had ordered two steaks, salad, baked potatoes and a nice bottle of red merlot. It smelled heavenly when the waiter popped the metal covers off the plates. It occurred to me that I had eaten nothing all day except for all the beer I had downed at La Doll House. I was hungry, too.
“You are amazing,” I told Sybil.
“Not at all,” she smiled back. “I just know how to take care of myself. No sense waiting around for other people to do what I can very well do for myself.”
“How’d you play today?”
“Not awful,” she said, waving a hand dismissively. “Two under. I should think two more rounds the same would do very nicely.”
“I should think rather,” I tweaked.
The waiter finished and made to leave. “No ticket?” I asked. He said the lady had taken care of it. The lady smiled enigmatically at me. I slipped the guy a couple of dollars and he bowed out of the room.
As I opened the wine, I looked at Sybil and the dinner spread.
“You do seem to know how to take care of yourself,” I said.
“Quite,” she said.
“And you appear to get what you want,” I mused. “Up to and including, it seems, me.”
“What I want right now is dinner,” she said. “First things first.” She picked up her knife and fork and sawed into her steak.
“And after?”
Her chin jutted out. “Very bloody likely the same thing as you,” she said defiantly, her eyes flashing angrily. “It is one of the primary human drives, you know. I do not apologize for that, nor do I feel it necessary to explain myself.”
“No,” I countered. “You don’t have to explain. You just pop in and pop out when you feel like it.”
She threw down her fork and stood up, her facing turning red. “Do you wish me to leave, Hacker?” she demanded, voice quavering with anger and embarrassment.
“No, Sybil,” I said quietly. “I want you to stay. I just want more than your drives. I want to know the real you, the inside you. Not your bloody human drives.”
Our eyes locked across the table. Slowly, she sat back down. Silently, I poured two glasses of wine. She took hers, sipped, replaced the glass and sighed.
“I’m sorry, Hacker,” she said. “You are right. I was presumptuous. I am not used to opening up very much. This is such a nomadic experience most of the time, one learns not to dare. The people one tends to meet along the way are either horrible users or they’re gone in a week’s time.”
“Like I will be,” I pointed out.
“Yes, dammit, like you will be.” She looked up at me, suddenly vulnerable, eyes shiny. “But I feel something different with you,” she said. “Don’t ask me why. Just a feeling. And that’s a little scary for me to have, much less admit to.”
I leaned over the table and clinked her wine glass with mine.
“Here’s to scary feelings,” I said. “And that wonderful, something-special feeling that goes with it. Because I have it too. So even though you’ll be heading west on Monday and I’ll go back to Boston, I think it’s a good bet that our paths will be crossing again, soon. Because I don’t get that feeling much, either.”
She reached over and squeezed my hand. We didn’t have to speak.
“What have you discovered about that Cindy person?” she asked me after a time.
I reached for my laptop, handed it to her, and showed her how to work the scroll keys. While she read, I attacked my steak. When she had finished, she sat back in her chair and looked at me thoughtfully, lips pursed.
“Will they run this?” she asked.
“I think so,” I said.
“The feathers will fly,” she said.
“I know.”
“I’m not sure the Tour will survive,” she said. “Sponsors may drop out. Everyone’s sex life will become front-page reading. The networks will probably cancel our already pitiful schedule. Hacker, do you think this is wise?”
I looked at her. “Don’t you think it’s time somebody got Big Wyn’s jackboot off your necks?” I asked. “Isn’t it time for someone to step forward and say ‘enough is enough?’ Besides, what do you care if the LPGA falls apart? You can just trip on back to England.”
“I don’t think I deserved that,” she said, her face showing hurt.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “That was low. Listen, I didn’t ask to be the one to blow the whistle. But somebody is going to do it, sooner or later. And it’s my job to report what I find. But somebody has to rescue this organization from that woman and make it work the way it’s supposed to. I don’t care if it’s you or Mary Beth Burke or Nancy Lopez or Josephine the Cat. All I know is that Wynnona Stilwell’s reign
as the queen of terror is over.”
She studied me. “I do hope you’re right,” she said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I awoke early and lay in bed thinking while the rising sun filled the room with soft light. After a time, I leaned over and kissed awake the sleeping form beside me. Sybil stirred, moaned softly and finally opened her eyes.
“Sixty-nine,” I said.
“Dear me,” she said. “I don’t know you quite that well yet, do I? Besides, didn’t we already try that last night? Yes, I seem to recall …”
To prove her point, she reached down beneath the sheet and stroked me. She was right.
“No, you boob,” I laughed. “I just had an intuitive flash that you’re going to shoot a sixty-nine today. The number came into my head and stuck there.”
“Ah, well, I do hope you’re right,” she said. “In that case, will you just phone in the score for me? I’d like another hour of sleep.”
“C’mon,” I said, throwing back the sheets. “Up and at ‘em. We have worlds to conquer.”
I ordered breakfast to be sent to the room. We washed off each other’s sticky parts in the steaming shower and threw on the hotel’s soft terry robes. Breakfast came and we took it and the morning newspaper out onto the tiny balcony.
“I believe I’ll need all of that sixty-nine today,” Sybil murmured as she read through the results from yesterday in the sports section. “Beth Daniel did a sixty-six yesterday and she’s been playing very well of late. Ah, well, off we go, then.”
She gathered her things and, before leaving, came back out on the balcony for a farewell kiss. “Do be careful, Hacker dear,” she whispered against my cheek. “The Queen is not yet dead and I fear she may have a few poisoned apples up her sleeve.”
“Thanks for the warning,” I laughed. “But I’ve got truth, justice and the American way on my side.”
She kissed me again, looked into my eyes and left.
When I made it to the pressroom an hour later, I sat down and penned a quick note. Sealing it into an envelope, I sought out Honie, who was busy entering first-round statistics into a computer.
Death from the Ladies Tee Page 17
