Paul Levine: Paydirt

A moment of dead silence sucked all the air from the room. Kingsley looked at Bobby as if he were speaking some strange, foreign language.

"Cut Nightlife Jackson? Is that what you're saying?"

"We'll be setting an example for the league and for all the kids who look up to athletes. We'll let the whole country know you've got to be a good citizen to play for the Mustangs."

Kingsley swung his boots to the floor and leaned across his desk toward Bobby, fixing him with a look as vicious as a pit bull guarding a bone. "Nightlife would be signed by another team in an instant. We'd face him in the playoffs, for Christ's sake!"

"No one will sign him because he'll be in jail. I plan on pleading him guilty."

"The hell you will! What's gotten into you?"

Bobby wasn't sure what to say. His seduction and corruption had occurred slowly, the drip from a faucet that eventually overflows the sink. After a moment, he said, "I took an oath, Martin, but I never heard the words."

"What the hell does that mean?"

"Last summer, we took Scott to Washington," Bobby said. "We did the Smithsonian, the White House, all the tourist things. I went to the Supreme Court. Hell, I'll never argue a case there, but I wanted to see it. On the front steps are these two marble statues, one representing justice the other law. I started to believe the words carved in the marble."

"What words!"

"'Equal Justice Under Law.' The blindfolded lady with the scales, the whole nine yards."

Kingsley ground his teeth and his craggy face knotted up like burled oak. When he spoke again, his voice cut the air with the hiss of a swinging scythe. "Lady Justice is a whore who can be bought and sold. A good lawyer bends Lady Justice over his desk and fucks her up the ass."

"That's pretty much what Nightlife Jackson did to Janet Petty."

"Just get down off your high horse and fix this thing. Christ, by now, you should know your job."

"Nightlife's a menace. He raped that perfume clerk two years ago, and now he's done it again. It's our fault, Martin. Yours and mine. We're as guilty as he is."

Kingsley stared a long, hard moment at his son-in-law, his eyes dead and cold as stones in a mountain creek. "My fault?" Disbelief in his voice.

"We could have put a stop to it. We could have helped put him away."

"This woman the other night, this barmaid, went back to the hotel room with him, didn't she?" Kingsley asked in a cross examination tone.

"Yes, but she didn't consent to having sex. He beat her up."

"Maybe she liked it rough," Kingsley suggested. "Women these days…"

"He raped her!" Bobby shouted. It was the first time he'd ever raised his voice to his father-in-law, and he felt his hands tremble. "He told me so! He laughed about it. You want to hear about the drugs, the young girls he gets to his hotel room half blitzed, how he humiliates them, dirties them."

Kingsley's ice-blue eyes narrowed and he thrust his chin upward at a pugnacious angle. "For Christ's sake, Robert, get your priorities straight. Your job is to protect the good name of this franchise."

"Not any more." Bobby shook his head. "It's time to do what's right, Martin. He's got to own up to what he's done, and so do we."

"We?"

"Both of us, Martin."

"Why, you piss ant!" You want to start looking for a real job in this economy?"

"No matter what happens to me, I'll make sure the truth gets out."

"Let me give you some Texas advice, young man." Kingsley's voice was low, his features as hard as granite. "When you're standing chin-deep in manure, you're best to keep your mouth shut."

Kingsley's rage sizzled from every pore, like cold butter dropped on a hot skillet. "I have a dossier on you, fellow. I could get you disbarred, tarred, feathered, and strung up like a nine-point buck on the first day of hunting season. And don't think just because you're married to my daughter I won't do it. She's my blood, not you. You're the hired help."

A delicious feeling coursed through Bobby's veins. He no longer felt fear. Now, he was indestructible. With each insult, he grew stronger, with each threat, braver. "Do what you want to me, Martin, but you mess with the justice system, I'll bring you down."

Kingsley stared hard at him, the fury burning like coal in his eyes. "You ungrateful piece of shit. I made you what you are today."

A derisive laugh exploded out of Bobby. "Right, Martin. You made me a cheap carbon copy of yourself. But I'm a lousy you. I can't lie, cheat, and steal and still smile all the way to the bank. I can't be the biggest phony in town and still sleep at night."

Kingsley moved quickly for a man his age. He was out of his chair and around the desk before Bobby could stand. He grabbed Bobby by the shirt collar and yanked him to his feet. Their faces were jammed together, and Bobby could smell the coffee on his breath. "You've got ten seconds to apologize and get the hell back to your office or I'll thrash your hide before firing you."

Bobby felt lightheaded and giddy. He laughed, which seemed to infuriate Kingsley even more. "What's so damn funny, you jackass!"

"You are, Martin. You're a bully and a blowhard, and you don't scare me."

"You self-righteous son-of-a-bitch!" Kingsley shoved Bobby into a shelving unit. Trophies tumbled to the floor, and a football-shaped crystal ornament shattered on its first bounce.

Bobby rebounded from the shelves, his knees buckling. When he regained his balance, his vision was filled with the sight of Kingsley's fist coming toward his chin. He slipped his head to the right, and the punch grazed his temple. Instinctively, Bobby threw a punch of his own, but it was a looping right hand with too little power behind it.

"You swing like a girl!" Kingsley taunted him, assuming a boxer's pose with a left hand lead, standing straight up like some bare knuckled-champion from the Nineteenth Century. "C'mon girlie. Let's see what you've got."

All the pent-up frustrations ignited a fire inside Bobby. He wanted to hit Kingsley, wanted to scar him, wanted him to feel the pain of Janet Petty. He snapped out a left jab that caught Kingsley on the cheekbone and rocked him backwards. Kingsley responded with a left hand of his own, but Bobby blocked it. They bobbed and weaved a moment in imitation of countless prizefighters, and then Bobby flicked a straight left that glanced off Kingsley's forehead.

Before he could follow up, Kingsley dug a short right hook into Bobby's gut. Bobby gagged and stepped back, bending at the waist, sucking for air.

"You're soft!" Kingsley ranted. "You've got the belly of a sow."

Bobby hunched his shoulders, lowered his head and barreled into the older man. He knocked Kingsley backwards, and they toppled onto the desk, then slid to the floor amidst overturned files and fluttering papers. Bobby bear-hugged Kingsley who flailed away at him, unable to get any power into the short punches, but finally loosening Bobby's grip by gouging both thumbs into his eyes.

Pain shot through Bobby's skull as he scrambled to get to his feet. Blinking furiously, he turned toward Kingsley, afraid he was about to be sucker punched. Instead, Kingsley was reaching into a desk drawer. A second later, he pointed an ancient long-barreled Colt. 45 at Bobby. The gun looked like a cannon and was shaking visibly in Kingsley's hand. If Kingsley's trigger finger twitched, Bobby feared he'd have a hole the size of a fist in his chest.

"You're not going to shoot me, Martin."

"Not today, maybe. Today, I'm just gonna-"

"You can't," Bobby said. "I quit."

Bobby stormed out, making one stop on his way to the parking lot, liberating a bottle of Jack Daniel's from the antique sideboard in his own office. He got into the Lexus, drove to a donut shop, and then to the stadium, empty except for three workers repairing the artificial turf. Bobby carried his bottle of bourbon and bag of cream-filled donuts into the stands and climbed to the upper deck, shaded by the partial roof.