Free Hanging Curve by Dani Amore Page B

the subject was an old-fashioned still camera. The huge kind used by old portrait photographers, where the camera operator ducked under a black velvet shroud.
    What DeVoss had, though, was a double-barreled shotgun set up inside the contraption. A thin plate of mirrored glass prevented the models from seeing the working end of the double-barreled shotgun.
    DeVoss would no doubt tell the subject to remain still, then blow their heads off, splattering the canvas in the process.
    A one-take shot.
    •
    Despite my reputation as being somewhat cold, a rational man driven by logic, I felt the fury building inside me.
    So I did what I’ve always done best.
    I thought about it.
    The crux of the problem was that for the police, the victims of DeVoss were pretty much the same. They were drunks, drug addicts, homeless people, or some combination of the three.
    My brother fit perfectly into the victim profile DeVoss had followed.
    The cops thought so.
    And I did, too.
    Or, at least, I had initially.
    But then I thought about it. And thought some more.
    Eventually, I reached a decision.
    It came down to the blackballing. That was the thing that really set Joe back. It hadn’t just been his own torrid demise, as thorough and impressive as that had been. In addition to himself, he’d also practically brought down the entire organization. The owner’s daughter, Victoria Kuchin, wound up in drug rehab, having narrowly escaped death. Nicholas Kuchin, at the end of Joe’s sophomore season, had a massive brain aneurysm, some claimed brought on by the stress of his daughter’s problems. The team had their worst season in twenty years, and nearly everyone blamed Joe. It was hard enough trying to find a new team when you had botched your own season as a player. But when you’d practically brought down a franchise single-handedly, well, no one wanted you. Period.
    That summer I bought Joe a first-class ticket to the West Coast, and after I had badgered him enough, he finally relented and came to see me. And to get out of Detroit.
    I’ll never forget the look on his haggard face when we toured my headquarters, which at the time, was easily half the size it is now. But Joe was genuinely happy about his little brother’s success. And everyone at my place loved Joe, his easy humor, and graceful presence even apparent away from a baseball field. They didn’t see him as I did. To me, he was a drink and drug-addled shell of his former self. Even at half power, though, his personality and spirit were enough to win people over.
    That night, over broiled lobster and a few bottles of white wine on the balcony of my flat overlooking the Pacific, he let me get a glimpse.
    “I’m finished,” he said. “I let down the wrong people.”
    It was maybe the third time in my life I’d heard him say something negative.
    “Baseball is a huge community,” I said. “Even you couldn’t piss everyone off.”
    He took a deep drink of his wine.
    “No, not all of them,” he said. “Just the ones that matter.”
    •
    The more I thought about it, the more it came down to that suitcase of cash. My expertise had to do with computers. But that suitcase made me think. I went back to the police reports and read them front to back, back to front, and back again. I set the papers down and went to the wing chair in the corner of my hotel room, turned it toward the window and stared until the last of the sun began to fade behind the wall of brownish green suburban sprawl. When the truth hit me, it did so as it often does; like a fist to the belly accompanied by a streak of white-hot exquisite pain.
    •
    I was up early the next morning. The freeway was packed but I eventually made way to the hallowed ground known as Grosse Pointe. I swung my rental car onto Lakeshore Drive, and when I got to the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club, turned left and cruised north along Lakeshore Drive. I caught flashes of the lake in between the pine trees, circular drives and mansions with their