The Prophet

42

GAME DAY.

Kent had slept deeply the night before; he knew this because Beth told him so in the morning.

“You’re usually so restless on Thursday nights,” she said. “Last night, you slept like Lisa. Only with additional snoring.”

“I gather you did not sleep as well?”

“As I said, there was the snoring.”

They could afford to be light again, afford to joke. The front page carried news of the murder of Clayton Sipes, a recently paroled felon from Cleveland. There was no mention of Rachel Bond yet, but he hoped there soon would be. Stan Salter and Robert Dean would do their jobs. Until then, he would be grateful for the comfort of his private knowledge.

“Bad football weather,” Beth said. The sun that had set the previous day seemed to have chosen not to rise; the sky was a deep gray and rain splattered in nickel-colored drops on the driveway.

“There is no such thing,” Kent said, “as bad football weather.”

Rodney Bova came by that afternoon, and Adam knew instantly that it wasn’t good. The man’s eyes were red-rimmed and he was humming with tension. The first words out of his mouth were “Did you help them?”

Adam said, “Help who?”

“The police. Did you help them?”

Behind him, Chelsea stirred, and while Bova didn’t turn, Adam saw her hand going under her desk, down to where she kept a snub-nose .38 Special. He’d insisted that she keep the weapon there, but she never paid attention to it. Something about Bova was already putting her in a state of high alert.

“If there is one thing I am not right now,” Adam said, “it is a friend of the police, Rodney.”

“Why did you put the tracking bracelet on me?”

Now Chelsea’s eyes rose from the pistol and found Adam’s. He looked away fast, and got to his feet.

“Let’s go outside,” he said. “I’ll hear you out, Rodney, but I will not allow you to shout in my office. I’ve got a business to run.”

He moved for the door without waiting for Bova’s agreement. And without meeting Chelsea’s eyes. They went out into the rain that had replaced the beautiful Indian summer weather in less than twenty-four hours. Adam stopped walking under the overhang of his building, where the rain didn’t reach, and took a cigarette out and lit it. They were standing in front of the dust-filmed plate glass window of what had once been an insurance office and bond business rival. It had been empty for three years. Adam lifted the cigarette, drew in smoke, and held it for a few seconds before letting the cold wind peel it away from his lips.

“Why did you put the tracking bracelet on me?” Bova repeated.

“I told you the reasons. It was better for you. I could not have been clearer about that.”

Bova looked torn, and Adam took the opportunity to keep talking, to keep the pressure on him, force him not to dictate the situation but to react.

“You told me the police set you up,” Adam said. “You never told me why. You don’t have to. But if there’s one thing I can assure you, Rodney, hell, that I can assure anyone, it’s that I didn’t share your information with the police.”

Bova was silent. Adam was thinking about the tracking bracelet and knowing its risk, and he said, “You want it off, we’ll take it off. I’ve got a reputation to worry about here. I can’t have you talking like this.”

“Take it off, then.”

“I will. But first tell me why?”

“My brother was killed. They were looking for him and now he’s dead. And I… I saw him. I went to see him before he was killed, I mean. I didn’t know what they thought he’d done, but now that I do, then—”

“What did your brother do? Why did the police want him so bad?”

Bova looked away. “That’s personal.”

“You’re the one who came to me.”

“I knew they were looking for him,” Rodney Bova repeated softly. “But I didn’t know why. It’s bad. But they don’t understand him. He was a lot of things, he was a lot of trouble, but he wouldn’t have done this. Not what they’re going to say he did.”

“Were you close with him?”

“We didn’t talk often. But he was my brother. We went through a lot together, a long time ago. I got my feet under myself a little faster. He took a different road. But I know what he was, and who he was, and—”

“I get all that,” Adam said. “Just tell me this: Did you lie to the police about him at any point? They ask where he was and you said you didn’t know, that sort of thing?”

“Yes. He was on parole violation. That’s all I knew. But I wasn’t going to turn him in.”

“Did you tell them where he was staying after they came to you with the news?”

“No. I haven’t said anything yet.”

“Why not?”

“Because I want to understand what happened. Not from them. I want to know what happened myself.”

“And then?”

Bova wet his lips, looked away, didn’t speak.

“I haven’t told them anything,” Adam said. “And I won’t. But they can get a warrant for those tracking logs. Do they know about the bracelet?”

“No.”

“Then we’ll take it off now, and you should be careful how much you tell them. Don’t get yourself into trouble.”

“I’m not worried about that. Not now.”

“You should be,” Adam said. “Because if they’re ready to accuse him of something as heavy as this sounds, dead or alive, and you were involved with him, they’ll try to drag you into it. You’ve got to realize that. The heavier it was, the more they’ll want somebody living to take the fall. So whatever it is you’re talking about, are you prepared to become involved in it?”

Bova didn’t answer.

“Whatever your brother did,” Adam said, “be careful not to let it pull you down, too.”

Chelsea watched in silence as Adam removed the tracking bracelet from Bova’s ankle, but as soon as the man was gone, she wanted to know what it was about.

“We posted bond for a guy who’s being looked at in a murder case,” Adam said. It was not a lie. It was disturbing how much that was starting to matter to him lately, how often he was struggling not to lie while still not saying anything close to the truth, as if there was some honor in that.

“Why’d you have a tracking device on him?”

“High bond.”

“You didn’t mention that to me.”

“My mind’s not really been on business, Chelsea. You know that.”

She was watching him skeptically.

“Are you in more trouble, Adam?”

“I intend to leave all my troubles behind me. You know this.”

She didn’t pursue the question any further. He looked at the clock.

“You about ready to head out?” he asked.

“To the game? It’s four hours away. We’re going to stand in the rain for three hours waiting on a football game?”

“We’ll grab an early dinner. I’d like to get over to Murray Hill, hit one of those little Italian places. Haven’t been there in a while.”

“It’s four hours away,” she repeated.

“When I played, the buses left at three thirty. That’s my tradition. Humor me?”

“My mission in life,” she said, and slipped on her jacket.

The game was a sellout, more than ten thousand tickets claimed by Friday morning, and the weather would not scare them away. Not in northeastern Ohio. Plenty of people would travel from Chambers, but the crowd would be largely hostile, and loud. Saint Anthony’s fans were used to seeing wins, particularly against Chambers. They would feel blood lust watching the Cardinals take their field with an undefeated record and a number-one ranking.

Kent intended to give the team the standard fare in the locker room. To keep things balanced and steady. Head down, head down, head down. It felt wrong tonight, though. So in the final moments before they took the field, after he gave them his usual reminder—Know how lucky you are right now, about to play the best game ever invented with the best friends you’ll ever have— he challenged his seniors.

“You’re going to take your uniforms off at some point this season for the last time,” he said. “You’ll never wear them again. Realize that. Every autumn has its end. Now let’s make sure you leave a trophy in the case before this one does.”

The team roared.

Chambers won the coin toss and Kent elected to defer the kickoff. Ordinarily he preferred to take it. He liked to put points on the board early, forcing the opponent to play from behind, but he expected this to be a close game and that extra second-half possession might be valuable.

Also, truth be told, he was worried about Colin botching the return.

Kent paced the sidelines, nodding at his players and slapping helmets and telling them they had to play fast and smart. Opposite him, on the Saint Anthony’s sideline, Scott Bless conferred with Rob Sonnefeld, his quarterback, and Kent couldn’t help but glance at them, thinking, Let’s get this started, let’s see what you’ve got.

It was raining steadily, the wind coming in gusts, the temperature in the forties. Weather that was better suited for the power game of Saint Anthony’s, but that was fine, Kent wasn’t in the business of making excuses. His team was prepared to win in any conditions, and should.

Five snaps later, the confidence was already ebbing. Sonnefeld had passed four times, completed three of them, and the ball was at the Chambers twenty-five. So much for the power game. Kent had expected Bless to use two tight ends and test the Chambers front line, so instead Bless had spent the whole week spreading the field and preparing to test their secondary.

On the sixth snap Sonnefeld went with a play-action fake and Ritter, Damon-the-best-linebacker-Kent-had-ever-coached Ritter, bit on it, jumped away from the number-two receiver, his coverage responsibility, who promptly caught the ball behind him and then six points were on the board, Chambers losing already.

“What are you doing?” Kent shouted as Damon came off the field, head down. “Where were your eyes? You’re looking in the backfield! Don’t you ever look at Sonnefeld! You know better than that. We don’t make that mistake!”

Ritter said “Yes, sir,” retreated, and Kent shook his head in disgust and paced away as the extra point sailed in: 7–0. He’d never held a lead against Saint Anthony’s. Not even a lead.

“We’ve still got this ballgame,” he said into the headset, and his assistants nodded, but nobody was looking at him. It was a bad start and they all knew it.

The offense gained one first down on three straight carries by Justin Payne, all part of the script, designed to settle things down, force Saint Anthony’s to respect the running game. When Lorell took his first snap out of the shotgun, he pump-faked, and there was Colin on a hitch route, the ball coming in high and soft and right in stride.

He caught it.

Then bobbled it. Kent had a fist raised already, wild with excitement both for the kid and for the knowledge that this was about to be a tie ballgame, because they would not catch Colin from behind.

But they did. He was juggling the ball, fighting for possession, and his feet went unsteady on the wet turf, and then the cornerback caught him with a sweeping right hand and the ball was out and bouncing free and as Saint Anthony’s scooped it up Kent thought, Please tell me he dropped that one, too, please rule it incomplete.

They ruled it complete. Fumble recovered by the defense on the forty.

Kent went out onto the field to meet Colin, grabbed his helmet, and forced his face up. “You’ll have that play all night long,” he said. “You’re going to make it every other time. You believe that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you believe that?”

“Yes, sir!”

Kent slapped the side of his helmet and returned to the sidelines and watched Sonnefeld direct a precise, balanced drive that chewed seven minutes off the clock and featured another effective fake, this time on a reverse, and again Chambers chased the ball and forgot their gaps. They held them to a field goal, but it was already 10–0.

“We’re going to get fucking beat,” Kent said through clenched teeth. It was too soft for the players to hear, but his headset microphone was on, and every assistant heard it. He saw their heads snap up, the Kent Austin profanity-free-football-field myth having officially crumbled, and he thought about apologizing but decided against it. Wiped the rain off his face with the back of his hand and walked to the farthest end of the sideline, shaking his head.