Harlan Coben - Play Dead

‘No, you wait a second. Tragedies happen, Miss Simmons. They are indiscriminate and cruel. I know that the death of a man as young and healthy as David Baskin is hard for everyone to accept. The press and fans can’t even accept it. They call me White Lightning II as if I were David reincarnated. I’m sick of it, do you hear me? Do yourself a favor. Accept the truth and help your family do the same. David Baskin is dead. I happened to replace him on the basketball court. That’s all.’

There was a long silence before Judy spoke again. ‘You don’t understand anything, do you?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean that you think you know what you’re doing, but you don’t. There are things about this whole situation that have been kept from you.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking – ’

‘Fine, Mr Seidman or whatever your name is. If you want to continue your strategy of feigning ignorance, I am truly left with no defense. But if you want to learn what really happened thirty years ago, if you ever want to save Laura from unspeakable cruelty, come up to Colgate tomorrow evening at seven. I’ll explain everything to you then. After you listen to what I have to say, I will live with whatever decision you make. I will never speak of this again. But if you do not come, I am left with no choice but to find another way of handling this. You may not like what I come up with.’

Mark swallowed hard. A tear came to his eye. ‘Tomorrow night, Mr Seidman. Seven p.m.’

She hung up. Mark quietly replaced the receiver and moved toward the car waiting for him outside. He opened the passenger door and got in. ‘I just got a call from Judy Simmons.’

T.C.’s reaction was swift and predictable. ‘What did she say?’

‘She thinks I’m David Baskin. She says Baskin was not told the whole truth.’

‘Not told the truth? What the hell does that mean?’

‘I’m not sure. She said it had to do with what happened thirty years ago.’

T.C. bit off the end of a cigar. ‘Interesting, no?’

Mark shrugged. ‘Depends on what she means.’

‘Could she be right?’ T.C. asked. ‘Could Baskin have been deceived?’

‘You’re the detective. You tell me. I mean, I guess it’s possible. But how? And more important, why? What would have been gained?’

‘I don’t know,’ T.C. agreed, ‘but she really has no idea what Baskin knew, does she?’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning she might think Baskin didn’t know the whole story when in fact he did.’

The car pulled out of the parking lot. Mark stared out the side window. ‘She also said that if I ever wanted to save Laura from what she called unspeakable cruelty, I should go to Colgate tomorrow night.’

‘What else did she say?’

‘That if I did not go, she would find another way of handling it.’

‘She said that?’

Mark nodded.

T.C. gripped the wheel firmly, his face tightening. ‘Well, we certainly can’t let her do that, now can we?’

Riiiiing. Riiiiing. Wake up, Stan! Time to call your daddy’s murderer!

‘Ooooooh, my fuckin’ head.’

Stan rolled over onto his back. What a goddamn hangover. Just like the good old days. His hand reached out, smacked the alarm clock and pulled it toward him.

One p.m.

He put the clock back onto the night-table. Breathing through his nose hurt like a son of a bitch. It was probably broken. He’d have to get it taken care of at the hospital. Later. He had things to do now.

He stood and walked over to the mirror. His face looked like shit. Both his eyes were black from the broken nose, and his complexion was white from vomiting up a storm last night. Bits and pieces of the incident in the bathroom came to him, but it was all so fuzzy. A man jumps him, dunks his head in a toilet bowl till he nearly drowns him, then knocks him out. Strange but true. And what had the guy said to him? Something about keeping away from ‘her.’ He assumed ‘her’ meant Laura.

Stan wondered if Laura could have hired the guy. Doubtful. The most obvious suspect was T.C., but that was not T.C.’s voice he heard whispering in his ear.

His mind replayed his conversation with Laura, wondering for the zillionth time how he could have been so stupid. Why create an adversary in a woman as powerful as Laura? Why not just forget about her and go on? He was happy with Gloria. He was going to have all the money he wanted. So why screw it all up? Why did he always need to mess up his life?

But, alas, that was his way. Stan always managed to keep one foot firmly placed in dung. He would try like hell to pull it out. He would pull and tug, straining with everything he had. His foot would slowly come loose from the filth, lift in the air, and then Stan would notice that his other foot was now firmly entrenched in another pile of dung.

Stan headed into the den and collapsed on the couch. That was enough life analysis for one morning, thank you. He sat down by the phone and rubbed his hands together nervously. A thin film of sweat coated his body.

It was time to place that little call.

For a brief moment, he felt repulsion at what he was about to do. How he could just let the murder of his father slide. How he could allow himself to be bought off by his father’s killer. His father had been one of the very few people in this world who truly loved him. Maybe the only one.

Stan reached for the bottle of vodka and poured himself a healthy shot. Better not to think about it like that. Better to consider the phone call a normal business transaction, a very profitable one. Yes, that was the best way to look at it.

He went back into the bathroom, shaved, showered, sprinkled on a few dabs of Old Spice and threw on a sweatsuit. After he finished a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice (with a touch of vodka for taste), he picked up the phone and called his father’s murderer.

Judy hung up the phone on Mark Seidman and renewed her pacing. What next? The answer was pretty clear: call the one person in the world who would not think she was crazy, the one person who would understand her suspicions. And it just so happened that that one person loved Laura more than life itself.

James.

She and James had spoken a few times once they had realized that David’s death had been no accident, that he had in all likelihood committed suicide. They had even considered the possibility that Mary was somehow responsible for the drowning. Now Judy realized that they had only skimmed the surface in their skepticism over David’s ‘accidental’ death. The rumblings underneath were just beginning to show. It scared Judy and it brought her hope. She knew that James would feel the same but the truth was that they both loved Laura and wanted what was best for her. James might even figure out a way of salvaging the situation without bringing back the past.

Maybe. But not likely.

‘Let me speak to Dr Ayars, please. This is his sister-in-law. ’

‘Please hold.’

A moment later, James’s voice came through. ‘Judy?’

So authoritative, so controlled – it had been part of the reason she had fallen for him all those years ago. Her heart had been brutally crushed when she lost him to Mary, though she never let it show. She stepped aside gracefully as poor, sweet Judy had always done, stepped out of her leading role as fiancée and into the bit part of Mary’s maid of honor. She met Sinclair Baskin a few months after losing James. He mended her heart to the stage where she was able to forget all about Mary’s husband.

A few months later, her heart was crushed again, never to recover.

‘I need to speak to you,’ she said. ‘Are you alone?’

‘Yes. What is it?’

She took a deep breath, not really sure how to begin. ‘Did you notice anything strange at the game last night?’