by Tom Fowler
“What makes you think so?”
“When I got sick, we didn’t know what we would do. I have a job and insurance, but it only covers so much. Not to mention the time I’d need to be off.” I had a feeling I knew where this was headed, but I let her keep going. “Calvin took it hard. He’s my only child. His father . . .” She snorted. “Well, he’s sniffing around again now that his son’s probably going to the NBA. He left when Calvin was young, though, and ain’t been involved.
“Maybe a week after I told Calvin my diagnosis, he said he felt it would all be taken care of. I didn’t know what he meant. When I went to my doctor a few days later, she told me my treatment and medicine was all paid for. I didn’t know what to say. She wouldn’t tell me who set it all up.”
“Seems pretty apparent Calvin arranged it,” I said.
“No one else could’ve. You think he got the money from this point-shaving thing?”
“I don’t know how much cancer treatment costs, but I imagine it’s expensive. Seems like a lot of money to have at once. My understanding is players are paid after the games they affect.”
“This was a few months ago . . . early in the season. I don’t think he could’ve done much for them by that point.”
I wondered if he got paid an advance. Someone fronted Calvin the money in exchange for him affecting the outcomes of a bunch of games later. This would probably prove an onerous thumb to escape from under. There were always more games, more bets, and more dollars. “Have you seen any strangers around him?”
“No. Until the phone call recently, I never saw or heard him have an argument with anyone.”
“I’ll need to know more about Calvin,” I said. “What can you tell me about him?”
“He has a daughter.”
I started to reply but stopped. This fact changed a lot. “Might as well lead off with the good stuff.”
“She’s terrific,” Denise said, beaming. “She just turned a year old a couple months ago. Iris is her name.”
“Is Calvin still with the mother?”
“They ain’t married, but they’re together.” Her eyes widened suddenly. “Do you think Iris is in danger?”
“I’ll put it this way,” I said. “If I’m right, Calvin’s cast his lot with at least one shady character. When people like this don’t get their way, they lash out. They can’t hurt Calvin because he’s the one who makes the scheme work. But if they need to exert a lot of pressure on him—”
“Iris,” she broke in.
“Or you.”
“Shit.” She stared at my desk for a moment. A tear slid down her cheek, so she snatched a tissue from the box. “What are we going to do?”
“I need to figure out what’s going on,” I said. “The conference tournament and March Madness would be the best time for people to make money.”
“What will you do when you know?”
“I’ll try to get Calvin out of whatever mess he’s landed in.”
“You think you can?”
“I’m pretty good at what I do.”
“You’ll need to be at your best . . . for Iris.”
I nodded my concurrence. “And for you.”
As dusk settled, I sat in my car, waiting for someone to return home. My first case, where I busted Vinnie Serrano, brought me into contact with one of his employees. Margaret Madison was a pretty woman in an ugly business, taking bets and roughing up the marks when the situation called for it.
I used the Baltimore Police Department to confirm she still worked in much the same job. During the aforementioned first case, my cousin Rich, then a uniformed sergeant, left me alone with his unattended computer. I quickly snagged his addressing information, used this to fingerprint the BPD’s network, and have enjoyed access ever since. Margaret Madison popped up in some vice investigations, but nothing ultimately came of them.
In the two years or so since Vinnie went down, Margaret moved up in the world. She basically took over Vinnie’s books, added some clients, and did well for herself. Living and working in the city, I knew she paid her tithe to Tony Rizzo. Vinnie would’ve taught her as much. In Canton, another historic Baltimore neighborhood, Margaret lived in an end-unit rowhouse. Gentrification came to Canton several years ago, bringing new construction, higher home prices, and younger buyers. I sat across the street about a hundred feet away.
While I waited for Margaret, I used my phone to open a secure connection back to my office computer. JHC would play a game tomorrow night, the first of their expected run through the conference tournament. The Presidents currently sat as a twelve-point favorite over Delaware. I wondered if Margaret set different lines than Vegas.
Still no sign of my quarry. I used the connection to my office PC to track her phone. It pinged a nearby cell tower, and as far as I could tell from one data point, she moved in this direction. I went back onto the BPD’s network and looked for other people who’d been arrested for offenses like bookmaking. There were a few, but they constituted small potatoes. Margaret ran a professional operation.
A few minutes later, she walked down the street from the opposite end. She wore jeans and boots coming halfway up her calf, and her hands were shoved into the pockets of a black overcoat. Margaret ascended the three steps to her front door, glanced in both directions, and went into her house.
I got out of my car and dashed across the street.
Chapter 4
I rapped on the door and moved off to the side. It had been a couple years since I was here last. Margaret wasn’t happy to see me then, and I doubted she’d be doing cartwheels upon finding me on her doorstep tonight. Two locks disengaged, and the door swung in. I moved to stand in line with the opening.
Margaret got a haircut since the last time I saw her, now wearing her blonde hair in a short bob. She remained a pretty woman by any measure with striking blue eyes and classic features. She looked at me for a second before recognition flashed in her eyes. Her brows pulled down.
“Hello, Margaret.”
Her answer came in the form of a quick right jab. I leaned away, but she pulled her arm back and shoved the door. Before it shut, I jammed my foot in at the bottom. Note to self: wear steel-toed shoes next time. My Nike cross-trainers were ill-suited to this task. Margaret leaned her weight into the door. My foot throbbed. I rocked back, then threw my body forward.
The door burst in. Margaret staggered rearward a couple steps. I crossed the threshold. She glared daggers at me. I put up my hands. “I came to talk.”
Miss Madison acted on a different idea. She fired off two quick punches, then snapped off a nice side kick. I turned all three aside. “Get out of my house!” I blunted a few more attacks. I didn’t want to fight Margaret, but I also couldn’t stand here and let her wail away at me until she grew tired. “Haven’t you done enough?”
“You’ve been quite successful these last couple years,” I said. Pointing this out did not improve her mood. Her foyer afforded barely enough room for our little scrum. She threw another hard right. This time, I evaded it and caught her wrist. When she tried to pull it back, I maintained my grip. “I might need your help.”
“Why would I help you?”
“Don’t do it for me,” I said. “Do it for the one-year-old girl and woman with cancer who might soon be in the crosshairs.”
Her arm went slack, so I released it. Margaret still glared at me, but the expression softened to one of mild distaste. I could live with it. “You want some decaf?” she said.
“Sure,” I said.
As unleaded coffee went, it wasn’t bad. I’d sampled plenty worse. We occupied two of the four chairs at Margaret’s dining room table. Nothing sat atop it except dust in a few spots, and the china cabinet in the corner held about four dishes. I got the distinct impression Margaret didn’t use this room often. We detectives often possess piercing insight. I congratulated myself for my smarts with another sip of hot java.
“You said you might need my help,” Margaret said.
&nb
sp; “Information more than anything.”
“I helped you with Vinnie.”
I nodded my acknowledgement. “He was off the rails. I get the fact your business is tough, and you need to be, too. I also get not wanting to go along with kidnapping and murder.”
“It was hard. It didn’t get any easier when he went away, either.”
“You seem to have landed on your feet,” I said.
A smile slowly spread across Margaret’s face. It was a good one. “It took me a little while. I was always smarter than Vinnie gave me credit for.”
“Now, I hope you’re smart enough to help again.”
“What do you need?”
“You know anyone involved in point shaving?”
Margaret’s smile turned into a laugh. “Seriously?”
“I have a theory,” I said, “but I think it’s pretty sound.”
“I have a theory, too. Anyone who’s shaving points is about a hundred years old.”
“I know no one’s heard of it being a thing for quite a while.” I raised my hand to preempt her objection. “Hear me out. In the old days, guys who were known to be gamblers or crime figures needed to place bets in person. Plenty of people could get eyes on them. Today, it’s different. They could do it online at some offshore casino. It could be local through someone like you. No one needs to go to Caesar’s anymore and get seen by half of Vegas placing a bet.”
Margaret sipped coffee and pondered what I said, her eyebrows raised. “That makes some sense,” she said after a moment. “It’s inevitable someone will see a pattern in big bets and game results. Visibility becomes the killer.”
“But when the process is anonymous, no one knows who’s doing it.”
“All right. I guess this could make sense. I can’t say I know anyone who’s involved in it, though. Like you say, there’s a lot of anonymity today. Way too many offline places taking bets.”
“You live and work in the city,” I said. “I know you’re giving Tony his percentage.” Margaret didn’t confirm this in any way, choosing to sit there and look at me over the rim of her cup. I pushed on. “Whoever’s doing this probably isn’t paying the tithe.”
“If Tony knows about it, he’d be pissed. I’m not sure how he could figure anything out, though.”
“True. This involves JHC.”
“Hanson?” said Margaret.
“Yes. I think one of their players is involved. He has a very young daughter and a sick mother whose treatment got paid for out of the blue.”
“Wow.” Margaret set her cup down and smirked at me. “You probably should’ve led off with that.”
“My lack of journalism classes is showing.”
“I’ve heard rumors of someone working in the county,” she said. “Don’t know who. He’s supposed to be running a book, though.”
“Nothing else? No loan sharking or anything?”
“Not that I’ve heard.”
“And you don’t know this guy’s name?”
She shook her head a little too quickly. “No.”
I let it go. Even if she knew, Margaret wasn’t going to tell me. Maybe she was still salty about the whole Vinnie thing, even though she ended up doing very well in the fallout of his arrest. “If you think of anything, let me know.” I dropped a business card on her table. “The player’s an adult, but I’m worried about the young daughter and his mother.”
“I’ll call you if I hear anything.”
I didn’t believe her but also didn’t see the point of arguing. It would only cement her decision to shut me out. I downed the rest of my now-tepid coffee in a single gulp. “Thanks for talking to me and for the coffee. You throw a pretty good side kick, too.”
Margaret grinned. “I bet you say that to all the girl bookies.”
I didn’t, but maybe I should start.
My office was closer than my house driving from Margaret’s, so I went there. She told me someone operated in the county. I flashed back to Alberto Esposito, one of my big early cases. He worked in the county, too, and he tried to amass an empire to usurp Tony Rizzo in Baltimore. His quest ended with a bullet to the head.
I’d been standing next to him when it happened.
A shudder ran down my spine as I searched for someone who might end up being the next Esposito. While I enjoyed unfettered access to the Baltimore Police Department’s records, I’d never tapped into their county counterpart’s network. Rich gave me an easy way in. My usual contact with the BCPD, Detective Sergeant Gonzalez, hadn’t committed such a technological faux pas yet. I could probably get in anyway without them being any the wiser. It would take time, however, and I could spend those minutes—and potentially hours—doing research.
I opted for the less invasive track. News articles made little mention of any organized gambling in the county, and no one talked up point shaving. Maybe Margaret was right: it was an old-fashioned notion in today’s era of placing bets with random offshore companies. I still thought this made it ripe for exploiting today. So far, I couldn’t find anyone who shared my sentiment.
Searching Baltimore County-focused Facebook groups, forums, and subreddits didn’t unearth a lot more. The occasional person complained about a couple of JHC’s close wins when they were sizable favorites, but no one connected the games to anything sinister. It took quite a few more minutes of searching and unscrambling coded language, but I finally found two mentions of locals placing a bet with someone.
They referred to the mystery person only as Eddie. It was a common enough name to yield tons of results whenever I executed a broad search and no results when I narrowed the focus to gambling. Pairing the name with sports turned up too many athletes named Eddie, none of whom would be bookmakers in Baltimore County. I used my Google-fu until I became convinced I wouldn’t find anything else.
When I first began doing this job, I told my parents I could solve most of my cases while sitting behind my keyboard. Most of my work pointed out how wrong this sentiment had been. I called Gonzalez to get a line on what the BCPD knew. “What now?” he said.
“Hard at work again.”
He snorted. “I know you better. Sometimes, I wish I didn’t, but I do.”
“Remind me not to use you as a character reference,” I said.
“My shift’s about over. What can I do for you?”
“I have an idea and a couple questions.”
“Christ, now I know I’m in trouble,” he said.
“Buy you a beer?”
“I might need something stronger.” We agreed on a place, and Gonzalez hung up.
Depending on what he could tell me, I might wind up needing something stronger, too.
I parked my Audi S4 in the lot of Glory Days Grill in Towson. The old Bruce Springsteen song played in my head—I figured they gave everyone this earworm on purpose—as I walked in. Glory Days sat on East Joppa Road a short drive from BCPD headquarters. There were plenty of closer places to grab a brew, and I guessed Gonzalez picked this one so his coworkers wouldn’t see him slumming with a PI.
The interior, like many sports bars, consisted of wood to the max. It looked like someone felled a forest of trees, and this place was the result. From the floors to the walls to the bar and the paneling, wood covered basically every surface. I wondered if the men’s room would feature urinals carved from old cedars. It might improve the smell.
Gonzalez sat at a two-top table not far from the bar. He was about forty and wore his black hair short enough to do a good job masking the bits of gray. A beer sat on the table in front of him as did a basket of onion rings. I slid onto the chair and snagged a ring. Nonplussed by my thievery, Gonzalez enjoyed a drink of his amber brew.
A college-aged waiter walked up a moment later. I requested a draft IPA, and Gonzalez ordered dinner in the form of a cheeseburger and fries. When the waiter went away, I said, “You and I define getting a beer differently.”
“A humble public servant like me has to take free meals when he can.”
I responded by helping myself to more of his appetizer. I was paying for it, anyway. The waiter dropped off my beer, which was much darker than Gonzalez’s. I sampled it and approved of the flavor and bitterness. “You working at headquarters?”
“I was today,” he said.
“Didn’t want to be seen so close to base with someone like me?”
He raised his glass. “You got it.”
“I could only improve your reputation. Especially with the ladies.”
Gonzalez rolled his eyes. “I presume we’re not here so you can dispense dating advice.”
“I need some information,” I said. “I have a theory, and I’m trying to confirm it.”
“I thought you were good at getting information.”
“Leave me alone with your computer for a few minutes, and my success rate will go up.”
A snort served as the only reply. Gonzalez munched on a breaded onion before saying anything. “What do you wanna know?”
“Anyone running any big sports books in the county?”
He frowned. “Gambling?”
“I can see why you’re a detective sergeant.”
He ignored the barb. “Probably a few pricks here and there,” he said. “No one jumps out at me right now.”
“Can you ask around?”
“Can you tell me why I should?”
I laid out my theory. I told Gonzalez what I knew, what I suspected, and why I reached the conclusion I did. For extra credit, I mentioned my conversation with Margaret Madison, though I kept her name out of it. The chat with Margaret left me feeling pretty good about my supposition.
Gonzalez laughed when I finished talking. Feeling now: less good. “What?” I said when his amusement died down to a mere chortle.
“Point shaving? What is this, nineteen eighty-nine?”
“It’a a valid theory.”
“Sure . . . as long as the perp is about eighty years old. Tell you what—we’ll start asking around the old-age homes and see if anyone’s running a cutthroat tournament pool.”
