Hog Heaven (4 page)

“Were you aware that the average wedding costs more than twenty-eight thousand dollars?” Billy Don asked. He gave a whistle of amazement. “Dadgum. Of course, that includes the reception, but still.”

“I could not possibly care any less than I do right now,” Red replied.

“And the average engagement ring is nearly six grand. Six thousand bucks. For a goddamn ring. I’ve never even paid that much for a vehicle.”

Red was glad that Billy Don had managed to persuade Betty Jean that it made sense for him to hunt the $50,000 pig—which was what they were doing. But the downside was that Billy Don had done a lot of research and “number-crunching” to see how much it would actually cost for him and Betty Jean to get married. Now he felt compelled to share that information with Red.

“You know how many couples get married every year in the U.S.?” Billy Don asked. “You ain’t gonna believe this.”

Red didn’t reply, but instead kept staring out the window of the deer blind—a box at the top of a 12-foot tower—waiting for even one pig to appear at the deer feeder one hundred yards away. True, pigs mostly came out at night, but sometimes they surprised you. You might see them in the morning, or even in mid-day if they were hungry enough. So far, however, nothing was moving. Not even a squirrel or a rabbit. Red was normally a patient hunter, but he was getting antsy, and he was starting to understand why. This wasn’t much of a plan. Not much chance for success, really, now that he’d thought about it some more.

“Go ahead, Red. Take a guess.”

Red took a long drink from the 16-ounce Keystone that was nestled between this thighs. “About what?”

“About how many couples get married in the U.S. every year.”

“If I had free and clear title to a rat’s hind end, I would not swap it for that information.”

“Two point three million. More than six thousand weddings every damn
day
. Does that sound right? Where
are
all these weddings? I don’t know about you, but that don’t sound accurate to me. Otherwise, you’d be seeing cars draggin’ tin cans all over the place.”

Red had tried to be logical about it. Grady Beech had tattooed a wild pig and then turned it loose. Okay, but where? Red knew for a fact that you couldn’t just trap and move a wild pig all over creation. There was a law against it, because government types were always sticking their noses into everything, making up random, senseless rules and regulations for no good reason. But in this case, it was actually helpful. Red figured that a smart guy like Grady would’ve been careful to keep his scheme legal, which meant he couldn’t turn the pig loose on someone else’s property. He had to have turned it loose on his own ranch. And not on the high-fenced part where they grew the grapes, either, because pigs loved grapes.

In fact, Red and Billy Don had once taken Grady’s foreman—Emmitt Greene—up on his offer to let them hunt pigs at night on the ranch, because the pigs were always getting into the vineyard. Only problem, Emmitt hadn’t made it clear that he didn’t want them using Red’s SKS. That didn’t make sense, because if you wanted to get rid of pigs, a semi-automatic with a 65-round banana clip could get the job done in a hurry. Just after midnight, with Red manning the spotlight, Billy Don had opened up on a herd of pigs. Five minutes later, Emmitt had driven up, grouchy as hell, saying it sounded like Da Nang down there. Then he said they’d have to leave. Show’s what you get when you try to do a favor for someone. Didn’t matter. There were plenty of pigs around. But where was the one special pig worth fifty thousand bucks?

“On the plus side,” Billy Don said, “the average wedding gift is worth about eighty bucks. Multiply that by, say, a hundred and fifty guests and that works out to... well, a lot. Think it’s tacky to ask for nothing but cash? Or, hey, gift cards!”

Red further deduced that, since the vineyard was on the west side of Grady’s property, fronting on McCall Creek Road, Grady had probably released the pig on the east side of his ranch, way in the back, in the hopes that the pig would be more likely to wander off his property. That was convenient for Red, because he happened to know that the landowner who shared a rear property line with Grady lived in Houston and never visited his place outside of deer season. Man named Kringelheimer. Never around. And that’s why Red hadn’t been worried about trespassing onto the ranch and taking up temporary residence in one of Kringelheimer’s deer blinds.

But even if some pigs showed, what were the odds that the tattooed pig would be in the herd? Slim, really, and to find out, Red and Billy Don would have to shoot as many pigs as possible. But since they technically didn’t have permission to hunt there, it would be wise to keep the shooting to a minimum, so they wouldn’t draw attention to themselves. Sure, Red could hear shotguns from all directions—dove hunters blasting away—but any idiot could tell the difference between a shotgun and a large-caliber rifle.

Red figured he was bound to start hearing rifle shots fairly soon. Maybe tonight. Maybe tomorrow. Other hunters would be out looking for the pig, which would suck, but once the rifle shots started coming from every direction, every few minutes, Red would be free to shoot as much as he wanted. The game warden couldn’t possibly keep up with it all. Until then, shooting more than once or twice would be risky, because some nosy neighbor might call it in.

If only there were some way to know what the tattooed pig looked like. Black, white, brown, or a combination thereof? Big, small, or medium? Sow or boar? Would be a lot easier if they knew which pigs
not
to shoot.

“Then there’s the wedding dress,” Billy Don said. “That’s another two grand, easy.”

Red opened his mouth, but didn’t say anything. So close. He’d just come so close to disaster by saying that Betty Jean’s dress would cost twice that, because it would take twice the material of an average dress. Which would’ve been downright suicidal.

Instead, he said, “Where did you learn all this crap, anyway?”

“Magazine.”

“Which magazine?”

“Don’t remember. Just some magazine.”

“Not exactly the kind of thing they mention in
Texas Fish & Game
.”

“How long we gonna hang out? What time is it?”

Billy Don was trying to change the subject.

“You got somewhere to be?”

“As a matter of fact I do. Meeting Armando at four.”

“Armando?”

“Guy I’m working with.”

“Damn, man. You got some work and didn’t tell me? Does he need another hand?” Red was irritated that Billy Don had been holding out on him. Times were tight, and friends should share leads on possible projects.

Billy Don said, “It ain’t that kind of work. Well, it is for him, but not for me. I’m his customer.”

“Wait a sec. What does Armando do exactly?”

“Florist. For the wedding. Coming down from Marble Falls.”

Red hung his head for a minute and took a deep breath. This was almost more than he could handle. “Let me get this straight. We have to stop hunting a fifty-thousand-dollar pig because you have to go talk to some guy about flowers?”

Colton Spillar sat on the weightlifting bench in his garage and used a towel to wipe the sweat from his forehead. His heart was absolutely thundering, as it usually did when he worked out.

Colton was eighteen years old, a high school senior, and he could bench-press 380 pounds. That was his personal best. He could complete 28 reps of 225 pounds. His biceps were larger than the average person’s thighs. His thighs were larger than the average person’s waist. He stood six-foot-three, weighed 303, and his shoulders brushed on both sides of an average doorway.

Still, he didn’t know if he had the strength—in the mental sense—to do what he was about to do. Push one little button. That’s all it would take. Send a tweet and change his future. He would let a few people down, yeah, and he didn’t like letting people down.

He’d made a verbal commitment, but players changed their minds sometimes. Was that something to be ashamed of? Sure, it was nice of UMT to offer him a full ride, but so had the University of Texas. And the way things were shaping up, UT was the place to be.

Adrian Lacy said so.

Adrian Lacy was going to UT, and he had managed to convince some major badasses to join him. On both offense and defense. Not just stars, either, but less visible players who were nonetheless critical for a team’s success. Nose guard. Blocking back. Punter.

Colton fit in that category. Not a star, because how often were offensive tackles stars? You didn’t see many newspaper articles about offensive tackles, and they didn’t win trophies that the average person had ever heard of. Offensive linemen didn’t score heroic game-winning touchdowns, but they sure as hell
allowed
those touchdowns to be scored. So the stars—guys like Adrian Lacy—knew how important players like Colton were.

And Adrian Lacy had been reaching out to Colton on Twitter and Facebook. Flattering him. Reasoning with him. Promising big things. A shot at a national championship. A better chance at a pro career. Tempting as hell, especially now that Sammy was gone. Sammy had been a true superstar, and when he had originally committed to UMT, it had made Colton’s choice all that much easier. But now...

Colton looked down at the screen of his cell phone. He tapped out a message.

Got nothing but love for UMT, but I’ve decided to be a Longhorn instead. Hook ’em!

His finger lingered over the button. Not yet.

Aleksandra Babikova made her way toward the boarding gate with a handful of her fellow first-class passengers, fully aware that she was the subject of intense scrutiny by virtually every person—man or woman—in her immediate vicinity. Some of her fellow travelers were ogling, others were glaring judgmentally. Some were simply in awe. Some were discreet, others were not.

It had been this way for all of Aleksandra’s adult life. She was, after all, a striking person to behold: Nearly six feet tall and ridiculously beautiful—even here in Dallas, where attractive women were as commonplace as cowboy boots. Many of these Texas women were blond, whereas Aleksandra’s hair was as black and shiny as a raven’s wing. Her eyes were a shade of turquoise normally only viewed from a beach in the Caribbean.

“Poarding bass, please,” the young man at the gate said. “Uh, boarding pass.”

She handed it to him, noticing that he was becoming flustered, as many men did in her presence. Their cheeks would flush bright red. They would become tongue-tied—even more so when she was dressed in a manner they found pleasing. Today’s ensemble included a form-fitting pencil skirt that reached mid-thigh, four-inch heels, and a sleeveless silk blouse unbuttoned just far enough to catch the eye.

“Thank you for flying American, Miss, uh, Babe...”

“Babikova.”

He grinned sheepishly. “I have to say that I really like your accent.”

A woman behind Aleksandra released a small sigh of impatience.

“Ah, but you are the one with the accent,” Aleksandra said.

“Ha. I hadn’t thought of it that way. Enjoy your flight to Houston. San Antonio. I mean Austin.”

She continued down the ramp, to the airplane door, past the female flight attendant who gave her a quick up-and-down appraisal and showed the smallest frown of disapproval. Aleksandra did not care in the least. She took her seat in the first row, beside the window. A man across the aisle stole a glance at her. Then, a few seconds later, he glanced again.

It was possible some of the oglers recognized her. It wasn’t that long ago that she had made a career for herself as a volleyball player. It began with an Olympic silver medal and a starting position with the elite team Dinamo Moscow. Then came modeling contracts, mostly in eastern Europe, then in western Europe, and eventually here in the States, including one for a leading lingerie company. That led to a small part in an American big-budget spy thriller and appearances on various reality shows, followed by a tastefully done nude pictorial in one of the more discriminating gentlemen’s magazines.

It had been a whirlwind, but it was all behind her now. She had suffered a career-ending knee injury, and then, for reasons her American agent could not fully explain, the offers and opportunities slowly came to an end, despite the fact that she was every bit as stunning as she had been at eighteen.

“Your fifteen minutes of fame are up,” the agent had said with a shrug. “Remember Darva Conger? Carrie Prejean? Rebecca Loos? Those names ring a bell? Probably not. That’s how it works sometimes. Not much we can do about it. Be glad it lasted as long as it did.”

So that was it. She was washed up, as they say, at the age of twenty-three. Then, to add insult to injury, she’d discovered that her pig-dog of an ex-husband had not only been sleeping with her longtime volleyball teammate, he had squandered the bulk of the modest fortune she had managed to amass. So she had decided it was time for a divorce, and a new start. She had immigrated to the U.S. two years earlier and begun a new chapter in her life.

For a brief time, she worked as a reporter and commentator for a now-defunct cable sports channel. It was during this stage of her career, while researching a story about the recruitment of college football players, that she recognized a way to carve out a unique and extremely lucrative career for herself in the world of athletics. Too bad it was a serious violation of NCAA rules.

Of course, that hadn’t stopped her.

Kurt Milstead fit the bill for a Texas football coach. Ruggedly handsome, with blue eyes and some gray around his temples. Not overly talkative or loud, but charismatic nonetheless. Friendly. Likeable. Courteous. His players routinely said he was the kind of coach who made you feel good about yourself, so you didn’t want to let him down. You wanted to earn his approval and respect. He had a way of bringing out the best in the people around him—players and staff.

More important than Milstead’s personality was the success he’d brought to the Blanco County High School football program since he’d arrived in town four years earlier. Turned them from a mediocre team into a contender that had gone twelve and one the previous season, ending the year with a narrow loss in the state semifinals.

“Next year’s team will be even better,” Milstead had promised in the post-game interview at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, unaware at the time that Sammy Beech—the core of the team—would no longer be around to carry the ball. “I hate to see my seniors go, but the rest of these kids have heart like you wouldn’t believe, and I guarantee we’ll be right back here next year, and this time we’ll be taking the trophy home.”

So far this season, that prediction did not look promising. The team had opened with two losses, followed by two narrow victories over teams they’d crushed last year. It was plain that the offense didn’t have anywhere near the same potency without Sammy in the backfield.

That wasn’t good news for Milstead, and Marlin was about to make his Sunday afternoon even worse. The coach was washing his white Chevrolet truck when Marlin pulled into his driveway in Rancher’s Estates. Marlin didn’t beat around the bush, but instead got right to it and told Milstead the reason for his visit.

The coach was visibly shaken. “You’re saying someone chased Sammy to his death?”

Sometimes, during an investigation, it could prove useful to keep key details secret. But Marlin and Garza had agreed in the sheriff’s office that morning that it would likely be beneficial to publicly share what they had learned from the video on Sammy’s phone.

“I’m afraid so,” Marlin said.

“Who would do something like that?”

“We don’t know.”

“And why? That’s just so crazy.”

“We’re working to find that out.”

Milstead shook his head, obviously at a loss for words. Finally, he said, “It’s just... tragic.”

Marlin said, “You mind if we go inside and talk for a few minutes?”

“You are a smart young man,” Aleksandra said to the dumb young man across from her. His name was Colton Spillar. They were seated at a small dinette table in a kitchen that had last been updated in the early 1970s, judging from the wallpaper.

She said, “You must weigh all options carefully. I understand that. But I am obligated to be honest with you. I believe the proper choice is transparent. OTU is the right place for yourself.”

An hour and a half earlier, she had landed in Austin and driven the rental car—a black Cadillac DTS—west to Blanco County, to this boy’s home in the country. She knew that his father lived in California and that his mother worked on weekends at the Wal-Mart thirty minutes away. The mother had not taken time off to attend this informal meeting, which was not at all unusual. Aleksandra was no longer amazed by parents who did not participate in the recruitment process. To them, it was just football. But this boy’s future—his career—was at stake. And here he was, navigating these treacherous waters by himself, which was fortunate for Aleksandra, because it meant she would not have to create an excuse to meet with him again later, alone.

Was this young man qualified to handle their upcoming conversation? Of course not. He was full of hormones that made it difficult for him to concentrate or even maintain a normal conversation. In many ways, he was still a boy, with braces and a face full of pimples, but he was in the process of becoming a man. He was as tall as Aleksandra, and he outweighed her by at least sixty kilograms. He was also sneaking looks at her cleavage at every opportunity.

She said, “Seven times OTU wins the national championship. These other schools you are considering—can any of them assert the same success? Perhaps best of all, OTU needs a lineman such as yourself. I have seen the game tapes. You are enormously strong like ox. You have quick feet and accomplished hands. Also, you are gifted with intelligence. You have... instinct.”

He was smiling self-consciously, enjoying the flattery and attention.

Aleksandra said, “You will almost certainly start in your freshman season. You will be seen nationwide on the television. And what about your future, after college? The OTU staff is best in country. Surely this is acknowledged. You will learn and grow. By the time of your graduation, you will be prepared for a career in the National Football League.”

Of course, she didn’t mention that his scholarship could be dropped after the first season if he didn’t perform, or even if the staff simply found another player to replace him. It was business. The school would feel no more allegiance to this boy than they did to the crew that cleaned the stadium after games.

“The thing is, I already made a verbal commitment to—”

“We all know that carries small meaning.”

“I, uh, well, even so, I’ve really been thinking about Texas. They’ve been rebuilding the last couple of years.”

She said immediately, “Have you not been aware that the Texas assistant coaches are receiving offers that cannot be resisted?”

She knew no such thing to be true.

“Which coaches?”

“Offensive coordinator,” she said. “Offensive line coach.” She shrugged. “Perhaps they remain, or perhaps not. Timing is key. Do you want to participate in a program that is...” She struggled to find an appropriate phrase in English. “... descending from a peak like a rollercoaster?”

“Couldn’t that happen at OTU?”

“We have endless history of success. Why would any coach leave program of that caliber? Our head coach understands the value of planning for the long term. That is why he is attentive about you.”

She said “we” and “our head coach” to give Colton the impression that she was an employee of some sort within the Oklahoma Tech University athletics department. She was not. She was a freelancer. A specialist. What some people might call a hired gun. But no actual universities were on her list of clients. As far as she knew, nobody at OTU even knew she existed, and they would almost certainly condemn the tactics she used.

She herself did not know who her client was in this case, because that was the way she had set up her business. The client could remain anonymous. It could be an OTU booster skirting the NCAA rules. It could be an independent recruiting scout who had recommended this young man to the OTU coaches. There were many different types of people who had a vested interest in college football recruiting. They didn’t know what tactics Aleksandra Babikova used. They only knew she got results. Nothing else mattered. They also knew she could not control what happened in the weeks and months that followed one of her visits. The young man might change his mind once again. That was out of Aleksandra’s control. But it was a risk her clients were willing to take.

Unfortunately, this particular young man did not yet appear convinced. He was not making eye contact. She waited. And then he said, “I need to think about this some more. Talk to my mom.”

It was not acceptable to allow him to think. She would not earn her fee if she allowed the boy to think.

So she nodded, then gave him a large smile—the one that said,
It is obvious that you are a wise young man
. She said, “It is obvious that you are a wise young man. You understand how these things happen in the real world, no? I believe you do.”

She briefly glanced around the kitchen—at the ancient avocado-green refrigerator that was making strange noises, and at the peeling vinyl flooring—subtly reminding him of his living conditions. Reminding him that his mother made minimum wage and they lived in a rat hole.

She lowered her voice, to give it an air of intimacy and confidentiality, and she gave him her most engaging smile. “We make special deal, okay? You make the verbal commitment today to OTU—I give you five thousand dollars. In cash, of course.”