“Bill Bandy didn’t
die,
Mrs. Speakman. He was murdered.”
“You were a suspect.”
“I was questioned.”
“You were arrested.”
“But never charged.”
“Neither was anyone else.”
“So?”
“So the murder remains unsolved.”
“Not my problem.”
“I hope not.”
“What the hell—”
“Did you do it?”
“No!”
Their exchange was heated and rapid, followed by a tense silence that Griff refused to break. He’d said what he had to say. He didn’t kill Bill Bandy. Period. The end.
“However,” Speakman said in the soft and conciliatory tone of an undertaker, “the shadow of suspicion
was
cast on you, Griff. You were eventually released for lack of evidence, but that doesn’t vindicate you.”
“Look, if you think I killed Bandy, then what the hell am I doing here?” He flung his arms wide to encompass the room, the house. “Why would you want me to father your kid?”
“We don’t think you committed murder,” Speakman said. “Absolutely not.”
Griff shifted his angry gaze over to Laura to see if she shared her husband’s belief in his innocence. Her expression remained impassive, not accusatory, but sure as hell not exonerating.
Then why was she hiring him to go to bed with her? Did he really need this kind of abuse?
Yeah, unfortunately he did. He needed the money. He had to get back on his feet, and six hundred grand was a better than fair shot at doing so. To hell with them, with her, if she thought he’d clobbered Bandy. They must not have felt too ambiguous about it, either way, or he wouldn’t be here. On top of being crazy, they were hypocrites.
“The matter of Bandy’s homicide as well as the federal crimes for which you were convicted remain black marks against your name, Griff,” Speakman said.
“I’m aware of that.”
“So how realistic is it that someone around here will hire you? How realistic is it that someone will hire you for any amount, much less for what Laura and I are offering?”
The answer was obvious. When Griff declined to waste his breath on it, Speakman continued. “Your prospects are bleak. You can’t play football. You can’t coach football. You can’t write about or talk about football, because none of the media outlets will hire you to do so. You admitted having to liquidate all your assets to pay your debts, indicating to me that you didn’t save for a rainy day.”
Speakman seemed to enjoy highlighting his shortcomings. Maybe, Griff thought, he should challenge him to a footrace. See who was better at that. “I made three million a year from the Cowboys, plus endorsements,” he said tightly. “Everybody got a chunk of it, starting with my agent and the IRS, but what I got to keep, I spent, and had a whale of a great time doing it. What’s your point?”
“My point is that you seem to have no head for business or you would have appropriated your income differently. It also appears you had no talent for larceny, or you wouldn’t have got caught.”
“A trap was laid for me. I walked into it.”
“Nevertheless.” After a beat, Speakman said, “I’m not trying to insult you, Griff.”
“Really?”
Again Speakman ignored his caustic tone. “You asked why you were chosen.”
“I’d almost forgotten the question.”
“It required a long explanation. And I wanted to be brutally honest about our reasons for extending you this offer. Primarily, you have the genetic makeup to create the child we desire. Second, for reasons just discussed, you’re in urgent need of the money we’re offering to pay. Last, you’re totally independent.
“You have no family, no real friends, no attachments, no one to whom you must account, and that is a tremendous benefit to us. We’ve emphasized the confidentiality this arrangement demands. We’re the only three people who will ever know that I didn’t sire the child Laura will conceive.”
Griff was somewhat placated. Besides, he couldn’t afford to get huffy. Especially over the bald truth. He moved to the desk, picked up a crystal paperweight, weighed it in his palm. “You’re putting a lot of trust in me to keep my mouth shut.”
Speakman chuckled. “Actually, we’re not. We’re putting a lot of trust in greed.”
“Six hundred thousand?” Griff set down the paperweight and grinned at Speakman. “Not all that much when you think about it. Not what I’d call greedy.”
Laura looked at her husband. “You haven’t told him the rest?”
“We hadn’t got that far,” Speakman replied.
Griff said, “The rest?”
Speakman rolled his chair over to the desk and picked up the paperweight. Taking a handkerchief from his pants pocket, he used it to polish the crystal as he smiled up at Griff. “It’s not that we question your integrity.”
“Bullshit. You’d be fools not to question it.”
“Right,” Speakman said, laughing softly. “We would.” With the handkerchief still wrapped around the paperweight, he replaced it on the desk, moved it an eighth of an inch to the left, then slowly withdrew the handkerchief, which he refolded into a perfect square before returning it to his pocket.
“So, for my and Laura’s peace of mind, and to ensure your silence, you’ll be paid one million dollars upon the birth of our child. Additionally, you’ll receive one million dollars each year on his birthday. And all you have to do in return is forget you ever knew us.”
G
RIFF TOSSED THE HONDA’S KEYS TO THE VALET PARKING
attendant and walked briskly into the sleek lobby of the upscale building. A swank hotel occupied the lower twelve floors, condos the top twelve.
The lobby bar was relatively quiet on this midweek evening. A pianist was playing Sinatra-type standards on a white baby grand. Most of the tables were occupied by businessmen, nursing cocktails while they played one-upmanship.
The bar accessed a lighted patio where seating was available, but Griff chose to stay indoors, where he could enjoy the air-conditioning while keeping an eye on the entrance. He claimed a free table, signaled the waitress, and ordered a bourbon.
“House or label?”
“House is fine.”
“Water?”
“Rocks.”
“Want to start a tab?”
“Please.”
“Will anyone be joining you?”
“No.”
“I’ll be right back.”
Although the occasion—getting out of prison—and the day he’d had—his bizarre meeting with the Speakmans—seemed to call for a highball or two, Griff didn’t really like to drink. Since he’d had to mop up regurgitated booze so often as a kid, he’d never really developed a taste for it.
But the drink the waitress delivered to him looked and smelled good. The first sip went down smoothly, although he could tell by the instant fire it ignited in his belly that it had been over five years since he’d had spirits of any kind. He cautioned himself to go slowly. He wasn’t sure how long he’d have to wait.
A million dollars.
“You’ll be paid in cash,” Speakman had told him. “It will be placed in the safe-deposit box, and only you, I, and Laura will be signatories. There will be no records kept, no paperwork of any kind. Once Laura conceives, absolutely no connection can ever be made between you and us. If our paths happen to cross, which will be unlikely, you won’t recognize us. We’ll be meeting for the first time. Understood?”
“Understood.”
Conversation was suspended when Manuelo came in to deliver a phone message to Mrs. Speakman. She read it, then excused herself, saying she would be back shortly. She left, Manuelo trailing her.
Speakman noticed Griff watching the manservant as he silently closed the double doors behind himself. “Don’t worry about Manuelo,” he said. “He speaks only a few words of English. I told him that you were an old school chum who was passing through. He wouldn’t have recognized you from your football days. By the time he reached the U.S., you were in Big Spring.”
Laura Speakman returned almost immediately. Her husband asked, “Anything important?”
“Joe McDonald with a quick question that he didn’t think could wait till morning.”
Foster laughed. “That’s Joe. Always in a hurry.”
While they were chatting about the impatient Joe, Griff thought of another problem. “Cash will be hard to spend,” he said abruptly.
After a slight hesitation, Foster said, “Yes, I’m afraid that will present some difficulties. I imagine that you’ll be under close scrutiny by the IRS and the FBI, since there was some speculation about your empty bank accounts at the time of your arrest.”
“It was assumed you had money tucked away somewhere.”
Beneath Laura Speakman’s cool statement, he heard an implied question mark. “Just like it was assumed I knocked off Bandy,” he said tightly. “I didn’t, and I didn’t.”
She held his stare for several moments, then said, “All right.”
But she said it like she was only half convinced, and that pissed him off. Even though he was going to bed her, he didn’t think he would ever like her. She was good to look at, but he’d never been attracted to the ball-breaker type. And why was she busting his when they were vital to what she needed him for? He considered bringing this irony to her attention, then decided not to. He doubted she would see the humor in it.
He said, “I need the money, Mrs. Speakman. The money is the only reason I would even consider doing this. At least I’ve been honest about it.”
His implication was clear—that they were being less than honest about their reasons. She was about to take issue when her husband intervened. “You haven’t asked me for financial advice, Griff, but I’ll offer some. Get a job that earns you a paycheck. Have a checking account, credit cards. Normal things. If you do get audited, how you’ll explain your millionaire’s lifestyle will be up to you. Probably for the rest of your life, they’ll be looking for a source of your income.”
He raised an eyebrow, adding, “Perhaps some of your former business associates can assist you with the matter. I’m sure that on occasion they use banking facilities abroad that don’t question the source of great sums of cash.”
“I wouldn’t know,” Griff said. “But even if they do, I won’t be associating with them anymore.” He looked over at Laura and added, “Ever.” He emphasized it with a curt bob of his head.
Speakman asked Griff if he had any more questions. They cleared up some minor points. And then Griff raised one that turned out to be major. It concerned a potential problem with the long-term payout. Ten, fifteen, twenty years down the road, he didn’t want to encounter a dilemma for which a solution hadn’t been worked out ahead of time.
A heated discussion ensued. No solution was reached, but Speakman promised to think hard on it and get back to Griff with a resolution as soon as possible. Could Griff live with that? he asked. Grudgingly, Griff said he could. That settled, Speakman suggested they seal their deal with a handshake, which they did.
Speakman then invited him to stay for dinner.
Before Griff could accept or decline, Mrs. Speakman said, “Oh, darling, I’m sorry, but I didn’t notify Mrs. Dobbins that we’d have a guest and she’s already left for the day. I thought the idea was to keep Mr. Burkett’s visit here a secret. Manuelo is one thing, but…”
Looking flustered for the first time since she joined them, she searched for excuses not to sit at the table with him. Apparently she had no qualms over having carnal knowledge of him, so long as she didn’t have to eat with him. “Besides,” she added lamely, “I’ve got a massive amount of work waiting for me upstairs.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Griff said. “I’ve got plans. In fact, I’m already late.”
“Then don’t let us keep you any longer,” Speakman said.
Laura Speakman stood up. She seemed relieved that he was leaving, and possibly just a bit ashamed over her inhospitality. “You should be hearing from me in about two weeks, Mr. Burkett. How can I reach you?”
He gave her his phone number, the one Turner had connected in the shabby apartment. She wrote it down on a slip of paper. “I’ll call and tell you where to meet me.”
“In two weeks?”
“Thereabouts. It could vary a day or two either way. I’ll be using an ovulation predictor kit to test for an LH surge.”
“LH…?”
“Luteinizing hormone.”
“Ah.” As in “I see,” when actually he didn’t have a clue.
“Hopefully I’ll be able to predict the day, but it might be short notice.”
“Fine. Whatever.”
Her eyes skittered away from his, and that was when Griff figured her out. She could play hardball with the big boys up to a point. She could have her menstrual cycle, and ovulation, and his sperm count talked about freely in technical and practical terms. But when it came down to the nitty-gritty, to actually climbing into bed with a stranger, she turned pure female. Which to him was reassuring.
She said good-bye and excused herself. Speakman offered to escort him to the front door. When they reached it, he said, “I’m curious, Griff.”
“About?”
“What you’ll be thinking about as you leave here. Will you be considering what to buy first?”
Actually, what he’d thought as he’d driven away from the gray stone mansion was that, even though they looked like reasonable and intelligent people, it was probably a good thing that Foster and Laura Speakman couldn’t reproduce, because both of them were fucking nuts.
Who would do this? Nobody, that’s who. Not when there were scientific methods of fertilization available. Not when you had the money to pay for those methods. Maybe in Bible days this was the way to go when you couldn’t have a kid. But not today, when there were options.
By the time he’d reached his destination, he’d almost convinced himself that he would never hear from the couple again.
Almost.
“Another?”
He glanced up. The cocktail waitress had returned. He was surprised to find the glass of bourbon empty. “No thanks. A Perrier, please.”
“Sure. I’ll be right back.”
I’ll be right back.
She had used that expression twice, not knowing that the seemingly harmless phrase was like salt on an open wound to him.
His mother had said those words to him the night she left. For good that time.
She’d often stayed away for days at a stretch, leaving without so much as a “so long,” returning without explanation or excuse for her absence. He never got too upset or worried when she wasn’t around. He knew that when she got tired of the current boyfriend or vice versa, and the guy either kicked her out or simply moved on, she would come home.
When she did, she never asked how he’d been, or what he’d been doing while she was away. Was he okay? Had he gone to school? Had he eaten? Had he been frightened by the storm? Had he been sick?
One time, he had been. Sick. He got food poisoning from eating an opened can of beef stew that had been left out too long. He puked till he passed out, then came to on the bathroom floor, lying faceup in diarrhea and vomit, a knot as big as his fist on the back of his head from the fall.
He was eight years old.
After that, he took more notice of what he ate when his mother was gone. He learned to fend pretty well for himself until she reappeared.
On the night she left for good, he knew she wasn’t coming back. All day, she’d been sneaking things from the house when she thought he wasn’t looking. Clothes. Shoes. A satin pillow a guy had won for her at the state fair. She slept on it every night because she said it preserved her hairdo. When he saw her stuff that pillow into a paper grocery sack and take it out to her present boyfriend’s car, he knew this absence would be permanent.
The last time Griff saw his father, he’d been in handcuffs, being shoved into the back of a police car. A neighbor had called the cops, reporting the domestic dispute.
Dispute. A polite name for his father beating the shit out of his mother after coming home and finding her in bed with a guy she’d met the night before.
His mother went to the hospital. His daddy went to jail. He was placed with a foster family until his mother had recovered from her injuries. When the case came to trial, the DA explained to the six-year-old Griff that maybe he would be called on to tell the judge what had happened that night because he’d witnessed the assault. He lived in dread of that. If his old man got off, he would make Griff pay for tattling on him. The retribution would include a beating with his belt. It wouldn’t be the first, but it promised to be the worst.
And he honestly couldn’t say he blamed his dad. Griff knew words like
whore, slut,
and
cunt
meant ugly things about his mom, and he figured she deserved to be called those bad names.
As it turned out, there was no trial. His father entered a guilty plea to a lesser charge and was sentenced. Griff never knew when he got out of jail. Whenever it was, he didn’t contact them. Griff never saw him again.
From then on, it was just his mother and him.
And the men she brought home. Some moved in for extended periods of time, a week, maybe two. Others were guests who hit the door as soon as they got their pants back on.
Griff remembered, not long after his dad had been put in jail, crying because his mom had locked the door to his bedroom and he couldn’t get out, couldn’t get away from the spider that had crawled onto his bed. The guy she was with that night had finally come into his room, killed the spider, patted him on his towhead, and told him it was all right, he could go back to sleep now.
When he was old enough to be sent outside to play, some of his mother’s men friends had looked at him with apology, even guilt. Especially if the weather was bad. Others didn’t like having him around at all. That was when his mother told him to get lost and stay lost for a few hours. Sometimes he was given money so he could go to a movie. Most often when banished from the house, he would wander the neighborhood alone, looking for something to occupy him, later looking for mischief.
Some of his mother’s friends had given him no more notice than they would a seam in the faded wallpaper. Not many, but a few, were actually nice to him. Like the guy who’d killed the spider. But, unfortunately, he’d never come back. One guy, Neal something, had stayed a month or so. Griff got along with him okay. He could do a couple of magic tricks with cards and showed Griff how they were done. He came into the house one day with a shopping bag and handed it to Griff saying, “Here, kid. This is for you.”
Inside the bag was a football.
Years later, Griff wondered if Neal had recognized him when he got to be a pro player. Did he remember giving him his first football? Probably not. He probably didn’t remember Griff or his mother at all.
Men came and went. Years passed. His mother would leave. But she would always return.
And then that day came when she was covertly packing the car that belonged to a guy who’d shown up with her a few weeks before and had stayed. His name was Ray, and he’d taken an instant dislike to Griff, who would snort skeptically whenever Ray launched into a story about his phenomenal record as a rodeo cowboy before a bronco stepped on his back and ruined him for the arena. Apparently the bronco ruined him for everything else, too, because as far as Griff could tell, Ray had no visible means of support.
Ray didn’t like Griff, and he made no bones about it. But Griff wasn’t very likable, either. By the time Ray appeared on the scene, Griff was fifteen, full of himself, full of anger and rebellion. He’d been busted for shoplifting and for vandalizing a car, but mercifully got probation both times. He’d been suspended from school twice for fighting. He carried a chip on his shoulder that begged to be knocked off. Over the years, his hair had darkened, and so had his outlook on life.