Page 29 of 40-Yard Line

“This is crazy,” said Angel. “There is nothing protecting this place. Nothing.”

“Lockers,” said Trak, nodding at the next door. Pushing the door open, they both scrunched their noses at the stench.

“Jesus, does no one clean this place or disinfect? That’s some serious man-funk. I’ve been in close quarters with guys my entire career, and if things started stinking like this, we’d force someone to clean that shit. It’s like body sweat, ball sweat, and feet.”

“I might be sick,” frowned Trak. “I’m never sick.”

“Here,” said Angel, handing him a mask. “Put this on.”

“What made you bring these?” Angel shrugged, securing his own mask on his face.

“I don’t know. I think my thought was there could be blood or something that we would want to protect ourselves from. I never thought about body funk.”

The locks on the lockers could have been picked by a middle-schooler. They were simple combination locks that required one tool to open them all. Some, they wish they hadn’t opened.

“God, does this guy ever wash his shit? I thought they had someone doing laundry for them?”

“Apparently not,” frowned Trak. “This guy has a serious obsession with porn. Look. Magazines, videos, posters, all of it. I’m not touching those socks.”

“I think we were right. This is just a pretend league, and some of these younger guys don’t even know it yet,” said Angel.

“Look,” said Trak. “These two lockers both have bottles of pills for migraines.”

“Damn. Well, that’s not suspicious at all, is it?” Angel shuffled some papers on one of the locker shelves and stopped. “Hey. Look. A copy of a contract proposal for Petey Rossi. Wasn’t he on Trevon’s list?”

“Yep.”

“Hey, guys – we heard some noise and realized it was inside the stadium. We climbed the fire ladders on the outside and can see that someone is on the field digging a hole. It looks like a woman.”

“We’ll head that way once they’re gone. Keep an eye out,” said Angel.

After finding a few more interesting items in the lockers, they found the training room and started looking inside the tubs.

“I think this one has mold in it,” frowned Angel.

Trak looked down inside the tub and shook his head in disgust. Moving to the next one, he knew it was where Butch had died. The position of it matched the one that had been shown in the police reports and coroner photos. Shining his flashlight into the tub, he stopped, seeing something stuck in the metal seam along the edge.

“Did you find something?” asked Angel.

“I think I just found our murder weapon.” Using his own knife, he pried the piece of steel from the tub. It was a single razor blade.

“Maybe he pushed it back in there after he sliced his wrists,” said Angel.

“Or, whoever slit his wrists dropped it and didn’t want to dig for it. If Butch had done it, the tub would have been full of his blood, and since it was an ice bath, it would have slowed the blood flow, not increased it. Remember, there was water and ice on the floor when the coach came in and found him. If he had tried to dig for that blade, he could have splashed everywhere. I’m guessing someone else tried, and he fought them.”

“Let’s take it with us and see if we can find any prints.”

“Female just left. We’re headed down to the field. See you there.”

When Trak and Angel stepped out onto the field, they walked toward the two dark figures standing at the 40-yard line. There was a terrible attempt at placing the turf back where it should have been, dirt all over the grass.

Using their own tools, they reopened the hole and weren’t surprised to find two manila folders filled with correspondence, including medical tests. Trak looked at the first sheet of paper and then looked up at his teammates.

“I think we have a problem.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“Whatever is going on there has so many layers to it, you can’t even begin to uncover them all,” said Trak, tossing the folders on the table. “The stadium itself was built on the grounds of an old chemical plant. Inside the lockers, treatment rooms, and coaching offices, there was asbestos found three years ago.”

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