Perfect Season Page 16

  The team rose with a single roar and flooded toward the door.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

  AS THE CLOCK WOUND down for another victory Seth stood with Troy at the edge of the field while the second-string offense slogged across midfield.

  “Nice win,” Seth said.

  “I hope it counts.” Troy couldn’t keep the misery out of his voice.

  “I hope so, too. I don’t even know what we supposedly did wrong. They won’t tell Mr. Biondi. We’re probably going to have to get some lawyers involved, and that’s never good.”

  “Some perfect season . . .” Troy ground his teeth.

  “Yeah, well . . .” Seth looked down at him. “Hey, I don’t want to bring up another sore subject, but I was wondering about . . . you know . . . could you read their plays tonight?”

  Troy kept his eyes out on the field. “No. I couldn’t.”

  “You tried?” Seth asked. “I know we haven’t even talked about it.”

  “I didn’t try, but I didn’t feel it, either. It’s like I’ve tried to forget about it. You know, to focus on playing.”

  “No matter.” Seth slapped him on the back and walked over to Coach Sindoni to congratulate him.

  When Seth gathered the team in their end zone after the game, his voice cracked as he told them all how proud he was.

  “You played like champions tonight, boys.” Seth’s voice was hoarse from yelling and his words were raspy with emotion. “This thing with the league is not fair, and I will do everything I can to get it fixed. I promise that. But it’s also a good lesson, guys. That’s life. You can’t count on things being fair, so when someone cheats you or mistreats you, you have to remember to keep your head up and just plow forward. Don’t let them stop you. Never quit. That’s what winners do, they never quit.”

  Troy was exhausted from the game. Only two of the smaller, local papers had reporters there. People were used to Summit being a good team now, and the novelty of Troy working for the Jets—especially because he was a flop—had worn off. Troy spoke to the reporters after he changed. The coaching staff was going out to the Blue Water Grill for some nachos. Seth had invited Troy and his mom to join them, along with Tate.

  When he finished answering the handful of reporters’ questions, Troy accepted hugs from his mom and Tate and they all got into his mom’s VW Bug. Seth was nowhere to be seen, but the team room door was closed and all the coaches’ cars were there, so Troy knew the coaches were having a meeting. Most of the other cars were already gone when they pulled out of the lot and headed for Blue Water.

  “Did you hear what’s going on?” Troy asked her.

  She pinched her lips together and nodded. “Mr. Biondi was in the stands and told us. Everyone knows. The league is saying they have some information that could make the team forfeit some games, maybe all of them. Supposedly they have to verify the facts, but Mr. Biondi says he has a bad feeling.”

  “I bet it was that Grant Reed.” Troy clenched his teeth. “That jerk.”

  “Grant Reed?” Tate tilted her head. “Why?”

  Troy sighed. “One night during the summer workouts Seth was kidding with Chuku about earning his signing bonus. I know Reed heard him. He probably blabbed about it.”

  “Yeah, but why would he do that?” Tate asked. “Grant Reed is your top defensive player. He’s been puffed up like a peacock.”

  “Because he’s a jerk.” It was all Troy could think of.

  His mom shook her head. “Mr. Biondi says it isn’t. He said it’s an adult. He thinks someone in the school.”

  “That just doesn’t make sense,” Troy said.

  “I’m just telling you how it is, Troy. Try to be calm,” his mom said. “That isn’t even the worst part about the whole thing.”

  “Not the worst part?” Troy tilted his head. “They’re talking about us having to forfeit games, games we’ve already won, and that’s not the worst part? What are you talking about?”

  His mom held on to the steering wheel as if it was a bucking bronco. She waited until she pulled up to a red light before she looked over at him. “He said the school board is talking to the league about getting rid of Seth.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

  TROY’S MOM PULLED INTO the Blue Water Grill parking lot and shut off the motor. She didn’t get out.

  “But . . . we’re winning,” Troy said.

  “And in most places, that would matter.” Her laugh was bitter. “Not here. I don’t know why. Something’s going on. Something we don’t know about.”

  “It’s more than just winning,” Troy said. “Seth tells our team nonstop about doing good in school and being nice to people—I think some of the players are really doing it. They believe in him. They look up to him.”

  “Whoever is behind this doesn’t care about any of that. I know, it’s twisted, but they don’t, whoever they are. Come on, let’s get a table.” Troy’s mom got out of the car.

  Troy followed her inside. A hostess took them to a table big enough for twelve by the window. Troy’s mom accepted a menu and began to look it over. “Maybe I’ll get some steamed clams.”

  “Mom, what are you doing?” Troy asked.

  She peeked over the menu. “Getting something to eat. I worked all day, skipped lunch, and hurried to the game.”

  “You’re acting like it’s no big deal.”

  She set the menu down. “You can’t predict what’s going to happen with something like this, and you can’t control it. When some people get a little power, they go crazy.”

  “They need to be stopped!” Troy pounded a fist on the table, jangling the silverware. “It’s garbage!”

  “Right, but things happen. This is a high school football team. Exciting to you and me, but most people don’t really care. People are busy. Life goes on.” His mom ducked back behind the menu, leaving Troy to fume.

  When Seth arrived with the other coaches, Troy felt a sense of relief. Seth didn’t look as if he was going to let anything slide. He wore a deep scowl, sat down, and slapped the table.

  “Can you believe this?” he asked Troy’s mom.

  She put the menu down and sipped her ice water. “I was just telling Troy that, yes, I do believe it.”

  “I can’t,” Seth said. “These guys can’t. You look so calm.”

  “There’s nothing we can do,” she said. “Do you guys want to order?”

  “Nothing? What do you mean, ‘nothing we can do’?” Seth asked.

  “It’s a sports league committee,” she said. “They answer to no one. It’s their game. They’ve been playing it long before we got here, and my bet is that they’ll be playing it a long time after we’re gone.”

  “I’ve played a few games,” Seth said. “I’m not going to just sit around and take it, that much I promise.”

  “And you’ll do what?” Troy’s mom asked.

  The waitress came and took their order. When she left, Seth said, “I called Thane’s agent on the way over here. He’s in Manhattan. Morty Wolkoff. He’s got this woman lawyer, Ellen Eagen—she used to be a federal prosecutor—and she’d going to take my case. I’m not messing around. They want to investigate my team, me? They better watch every move they make, because if this is about lawyers, I’ll outspend them ten to one.”

  Troy’s mom shook her head. The rest of the coaches said nothing.

  “What, Tessa?” Seth asked.

  “I hope you’re not making it worse, that’s all,” she said.

  “I got reporters asking me if I broke any rules. I got people talking about lies and rumors like it’s the truth,” Seth said. “I’ve got to protect myself, and I’m not going down without a fight.”

  They ordered food and tried to talk about the game, but no one could break through the dark cloud that had settled in.

  Troy turned to Tate as the waitress cleared their plates. “You’re pretty quiet. What are you thinking about? Your soccer game tomorrow?”

  “No.” Tate came out of her trance.
“I was thinking about a bunch of things, who’s behind this, why they’re doing it, and what they’ve got—you know, evidence.”

  “They have no evidence.” Troy spoke low so only Tate could hear. “Seth didn’t do anything wrong.”

  Tate looked around, making sure the adults were all talking to each other. “I know he didn’t, but what about those jerseys you got from Seth to give to Chuku?”

  “Tate,” Troy whispered, “no one knows about that but you, me, and Chuku.”

  Tate shook her head and kept her voice low, too. “There’s one other person, Troy. You know it. Stop trying to pretend it didn’t happen.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

  TROY MOVED SO CLOSE that Tate’s long dark hair tickled his lips. He tried to keep his words to a whisper. “You mean the UPS guy? How can he be connected to all this? You’re crazy.”

  Troy’s heart didn’t match his words. It was pounding with panic because he remembered now seeing the UPS man at the stadium with the tall man, and his instincts told him there was a connection.

  Tate narrowed her eyes. “People talk, Troy. It’s not like you’re not in the news or anything. That guy could have told anyone.”

  “Stop trying to blame me, Tate,” Troy growled.

  “I’m not blaming.” Tate raised her chin and spoke louder than Troy liked. “But if we’re going to figure out what’s going on here, we’ve got to look at all the facts.”

  Troy folded his arms tight across his chest, signaling an end to the discussion. No way was he getting into this mess with his mom and Seth and the other coaches sitting right there, so he clammed up.

  It wasn’t until later, when they were home and Troy lay alone in bed, staring at the ceiling and unable to sleep, that Troy realized Tate was right. If they were going to have a chance to stop all this nonsense, he didn’t want to leave it in the hands of some lawyers. He wanted to do something, and he would.

  Quietly he crept out of bed and slipped into the hallway.

  The question he had to have answered was whether Tate would help.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

  THE DOOR SQUEAKED, THEN let out a low groan as Troy eased it open. Moonlight fell in a thick beam across the dresser and the rug next to Tate’s four-post single bed.

  She bolted straight up. “Who’s there?”

  “Shh. It’s me.”

  Troy sat on the edge of her bed and told her what he was thinking.

  “Of course I’ll help,” she whispered. “Why do you think I’m lying here awake? I’ve got practice tomorrow at nine and I can’t even sleep.”

  Tate swung her legs out of the bed, put her feet on the floor, and rested her chin on one hand. “When I first got here, Troy, you said there were some people at the football field doing surveys or something.”

  “Yeah, because the stadium is falling apart, you know that. If we do good, though, they’re going to have to build a whole new one. Stands, a press box, hopefully a couple of twenty-five-second clocks in the end zones like they have in the NFL stadiums.”

  “But . . .” Tate scratched her ear. “What happens if the team doesn’t do well?”

  “Well, they were talking about shutting it down before Seth came. That much I know,” Troy said.

  Tate sat there nodding slowly to herself. “So if Seth wasn’t around, football might be finished in Summit?”

  “That’s the way it was looking.”

  Tate looked up sharply at him. “Troy, what if those surveyors weren’t measuring for a new stadium?”

  “What do you mean?” Troy wrinkled his nose.

  “What if they were measuring for something else?” Tate’s voice was a mixture of excitement as well as danger. “Something that would go there if they knocked it all down?”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  “YOU KNOW WHAT, TATE? There’s this guy. I don’t know who he is, but I see him around all the time. I saw him with the surveyors. I see him at our football games. I saw him with Mr. Biondi before he told Seth the news about the league and . . .” Troy looked down at his guilty hands. “I saw him with the UPS guy before a game pointing out Chuku.”

  “What? Who?”

  “That’s what I’m saying. I don’t know who. He’s tall, though, like NBA tall, six eight or six nine. Huge. He’s always wearing a suit.”

  “I think I have seen that guy,” Tate said, “but I have no idea who he is or what he does. Maybe there’s a connection.”

  “There has to be. I know it.”

  “Know it like you know what plays a team runs?” she asked.

  Troy looked at her and saw she was serious. “Yes. Like how I used to know. This guy is behind it all. I’m sure. But what is it? What could it be?”

  “I have no idea, but there’s that big empty field next to the stadium,” Tate said. “What if he wants the stadium torn down so they can use the land? What if they were planning on the football team being its usually crummy self, hardly enough kids to field a team, losing all the time, no one showing up for the games, so the program gets folded? The stadium comes down, and they get the land to use for . . . I don’t know, whatever it is they want it for.”

  “Tate, why would anyone want that land?”

  “I have no idea,” Tate said, “but I think I know how we might be able to find out.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

  THE NEXT DAY, TROY and his mom dropped Tate off at the back of the school for soccer practice before he headed for the football meeting rooms. The football team watched film, lifted weights, then went out onto the field for a brief walk-through practice where the players didn’t even have to change clothes, but merely to walk to the spot on the field where they had to be when certain plays were called. Seth said every college and NFL team did this to correct the big mistakes they made during a game.

  “But Coach?” Chuku had said the first time they did it. “We didn’t make any mistakes. We won.”

  Seth had laughed at that. “Even when you win, you make mistakes, Chuku. Trust me, you always need to improve.”

  Halfway through their walk-through, Troy saw a flash of gold from Tate’s jersey through the fence. He looked just in time to see her wading into the tall grass on the empty lot next to the field in her soccer uniform.

  As the practice slogged on, Troy lost sight of her, but when the team wrapped up their session, Tate was waiting at Seth’s truck for a ride home. Her cleats and long soccer socks were soaking wet. Troy could see the streaks of mud on her shoes, even though she seemed to have wiped most of it away. When he started to ask what she was doing, Tate put a finger to her lips to quiet him.

  When Seth pulled into Troy’s driveway, he didn’t even get out, but texted Troy’s mom instead. Troy and Tate climbed out and thanked him for the ride. Troy’s mom burst out of the house and gave him and Tate kisses before she swung open the truck door.

  “I left you two some raviolis you can heat up,” Troy’s mom said as she climbed in. “There’re two plates in the fridge, just put the microwave on three minutes and pop them in.”

  “What’s your hurry?” Troy asked.

  His mom glanced at her watch. “One of the lawyers gave me tickets for a two o’clock show at the Museum of Modern Art and the tunnel is down to one lane. Love you. Bye!”

  Off they went, with tires spitting stones.

  Troy shook his head. “Jackson Pollock. I swear, I could do one of those paintings. Give me a couple of cans of paint and a spoon.”

  Tate rolled her eyes. “Really? First you tell us about Chagall at the Guggenheim, and now you think you could paint a Pollock? Don’t pretend you know what you’re even talking about.”

  “What? Have you seen what one of those paintings looks like? They’re a mess.”

  Tate got dreamy-eyed and looked to the sky. “They make you feel things. They’re not supposed to look like anything.”

  “Come on, you need a soda or something.” Troy marched into the house. “Give your brain some sugar. What were you doing in the
weeds, anyway?”

  Troy got two sodas, put them down at the kitchen table, then slid one of the ravioli plates into the microwave. He noticed the peas next to each mound of ravioli and wondered why his mom never mentioned the vegetables. Did she think he wouldn’t notice a pile of peas and would just eat them by mistake? When he turned, Tate was already at his mom’s computer.

  “Well?” Troy asked.

  With her fingers dancing on the keyboard and her eyes on the screen, Tate said, “Checking it out.”

  “Checking what out?”

  Tate huffed. “The lot next to the football field. There’re new orange markers all over the place. They go for a ways, but when I got to a certain point the plastic flags were faded, like they were old.”

  “I see markers like that all over the place.” Troy took the first plate out of the microwave and popped the other one in. “Are you gonna eat?”

  “Don’t you get it?” Tate looked up from the computer.

  “Uhhhh.” Troy tilted his head. “I guess not.”

  Tate huffed again. “Look, those markers are for when you’re going to build something or dig something. You have to get permits to do that kind of stuff. You can’t just build anything—not even a shed—without permission from the town. And towns keep records of everything. I think it’s like a law or something. So if I can find the records . . .”

  “You think you can find out who’s trying to build something there?” Troy asked, seeing the value in that.

  Tate scratched her ear and nodded toward the computer. “I don’t know if I can get it off the computer. But trust me. I’m on it. If the information is out there, I’m gonna find it.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT