Mark Gimenez - Accused

Gabe Petrocelli had curly black hair, a barrel chest, and the hairiest arms Scott had ever seen on a man. He appeared to be in his late forties. He had grown up in the bookmaking business and had taken over the family franchise. His bar-"Gabe's"-was located in a renovated Victorian-style building on Strand Avenue in the entertainment district near the harbor. The bar was not yet open for business that day, but Scott's business card had gained him an audience with Gabe. His two goons had required Louis to remain outside then had patted Scott down for guns and wires. Scott and Gabe now sat in a booth in the back while his goons watched The Sopranos on the TV over the bar.

"They love that show," Gabe said.

He chuckled and sipped his espresso.

"Lawyer with a bodyguard. I like that. Shows some style."

"I try." Scott gestured around at the bar. "Classy place."

"Used to be a high-class whorehouse. All these old buildings on the Strand, they got history. And that's all Galveston's got now… history. Everyone wishing this piece of sand was still important, like it was before the Great Storm. Those were the glory days."

"So you're a bookie?"

"Italians, we been running the bookmaking business on the Island since Prohibition. It ain't what it was back in the day, but it's a living."

"Gabe, you ever been arrested?"

He nodded. "Charges were dropped."

His prints were in the system, so the prints at the house didn't belong to him.

"How long had you known Trey?"

"Since he was a boy. Not personally back then, I'm twenty years older than him, but everyone on the Island knew of him. Then I'd see him out at the club. Nice boy."

"He liked to gamble?"

"Trey was addicted to the thrill. High stakes. We get a lot of athletes."

"What'd he bet on?"

"Football, mostly. At least with me. But only a few hundred grand. The big debts, he ran those up at the casinos."

"In Vegas?"

"Everywhere. Trey knew the exact driving distance from every tour event to the nearest Indian reservation."

"Indian reservation?"

"Casinos. Congress gave the Indians free rein to operate casinos on their reservations-which are like sovereign nations-but they don't know shit about craps or blackjack, so the big casinos made deals with the tribes to operate them, split the profits. Hundreds of Indian casinos now, they take in twenty-six billion a year. Shit, every Indian in America's a goddamned millionaire now." Gabe smiled. "White man took their land, now they're taking the white man's money."

"How much did Trey owe the casinos?"

"Fifteen million."

" Fifteen million? How?"

"How not? Five-thousand-dollar slots, craps, blackjack-you name it, he lost at it."

"Did the mob kill him?"

Gabe didn't blink. "I don't think so."

"Why not?"

"First, I would've heard about it. His death, that came as a big shock to me. And he was a good customer, he had the ability to repay, so the boys would've given him time to make good on what he owed. Plus interest, of course."

"And the second reason?"

"If the mob had killed him, they wouldn't have stabbed him with a kitchen knife in his own bedroom where they might leave DNA or a print behind. They would've snatched him, taken him out on a shrimp boat, and cut him up for shark bait. That didn't happen. Ergo, I don't figure we did it."

" Ergo? "

Gabe shrugged. "I watch Law and Order on TV."

"Noncustodial mothers are more common now," Boo said.

Karen and the girls were sitting under the umbrella at the table on the back deck. She'd been telling them-because Bobby had been telling her-about the Karankawas, Indians who had lived out on the West End before it was the West End. But they didn't want to talk about the past; they wanted to talk about the future.

"Meredith did a segment this morning about mothers who leave their children," Boo said. "I bet she's a really good mother. Meredith. You could tell she'd never leave her children. But two million mothers have. Mother's not the only one."

"She's the only mother who left you," Karen said, then she caught herself. "I'm sorry, Boo. I shouldn't have said that."

"That's okay. You've been like a mother to us. And you've always been honest with us." Boo glanced at Pajamae, who nodded. "Karen, will you be honest now?"

"Yes."

"Do you think Mother murdered Trey?"

"No."

"Do you think she'd be a good mother to me and Pajamae?"

Karen Douglas had first met Rebecca Fenney seventeen days before, so she could be objective about her as an accused murderer. But Karen was carrying a baby inside her; she could not be objective about Rebecca Fenney as a mother.

"No. She's neither a murderer nor a mother."

At the time of his death, Trey Rawlins was the fifth-ranked professional golfer in the world. In less than two years on tour, he had won four tournaments and $9 million in prize money. He had earned $11 million more in endorsements and $4 million more from corporate outings and appearance fees. After commissions, caddie fees, and taxes, he had $12 million in disposable income-and he had disposed of it. He had a beach house in Galveston, a condo in California, and a ski lodge in Colorado. He had a Bentley, a Hummer, a BMW racing bike, and a yacht. He had an expensive cocaine habit and a $500,000 debt to his dealer. And he had a $15-million debt to the mob.

"We were gonna cut him loose."

Twenty-one days before trial, Nick Madden was ready to confess.

"Why?"

"The bad Trey."

"Explain."

"There was the good Trey-the way he played golf, the commercials, the charity appearances, the chocolate milk… When he was good, he was very good. But when he was the bad Trey… He had a dark side. A lot of athletes do."

"Why?"

Nick rubbed his face. He seemed genuinely upset even though Pete Puckett had won the San Antonio Open, the first back-to-back wins in his long career. Two and a half million dollars in winnings in two weeks. Scott was back in Nick's Houston office the Monday after the tournament.

"I don't know, Scott. I was reading a golf magazine, they had an interview with Trevino, asked him what his prized possession was. He said his Ford Mustang. They asked a young tour player the same thing. He said his hundred-foot yacht, but he was whining because Tiger's yacht is fifty feet longer. It ain't the ball and the big drivers that changed the golf tour, it's the players' attitudes. Same with all athletes now. Like Goose said, they think they're entitled. Course, you tell a kid every day he's special from the time he's ten 'cause he can play ball, time he's twenty he's gonna believe it, figure the rules don't apply to him, that he doesn't have to live like everyone else. One time Trey sat right there and said to me, 'Nick, the only rules I follow are the Rules of Golf.' What makes a guy think like that?"

He shook his head.

"Now you know the bad Trey-cocaine and porn, gals and gambling."

"Hard to believe he could lose fifteen million gambling," Scott said.

"You read Daly's book? He said he lost fifty million gambling, had to send his endorsement checks straight to the casinos."

"So why were you dropping Trey? You were still making money off him."

"There was more to it."

"What?"

Nick picked up the remote and pointed it at the big TV on the wall. The screen flashed on to a menu. Nick scrolled down the menu then clicked.

"This."

Trey Rawlins' image filled the screen. He was young, he was handsome, and he was putting.

"Eighteenth hole, Bay Classic in California, early March. He makes this putt, he wins the tournament and one million bucks. A fucking three-foot putt."

Trey missed the putt.

"He didn't miss three-foot putts," Nick said.

Nick clicked through to another tournament and another putt to win.