“What’re you looking for?”

“We won’t know until we find it.”

“If you’re insinuating that a member of our organization had something to do with it—”

“I’m not insinuating anything. I’m investigating a murder, starting with the last place Mr. Vasquez was seen alive. When was the last time you saw him?”

Bixby blew out a deep breath. “Believe it or not, it was when he missed the ball. After that, I was extremely busy getting my people ready for exactly what happened.”

“Have you been here all night?”

Nodding, he said, “I never left.” He glanced at Avery. “So why’s the FBI involved in this?”

“We offered our assistance to the Metro PD, and they accepted. It’s a big job to catch a murderer when an entire city has motive.”

“I bet it is. Do you need me for anything else? I have to go brief my staff about what’s happened.”

“Not at this time, but I’d appreciate if you’d remain available for the duration of the investigation.” Avery handed him a business card. “Call me if you think of anything that might be relevant.”

“I will.” He studied the business card for a moment. After taking a look around to make sure no one could overhear them, he glanced at Avery. “If I tell you something I heard, it won’t come back to bite me in the ass, will it?”

“I’ll do everything I can to keep that from happening, but I can’t make any promises.”

Bixby pondered that, seeming somewhat tormented. “Last night,” he began slowly, “after the dust settled, I overheard some of my guys talking about Lind.”

“What about him?”

“He was pissed at Vasquez. Seriously pissed. Apparently, he was ranting about how he’d done his job and Vasquez should’ve closed the deal for them. The loss and the blown save got charged to Lind when they should’ve been charged to Vasquez. That kind of thing.” He gestured to overturned chairs in the far corner of the room, including one that looked like it had been smashed against the cinder block wall. “Supposedly Lind made firewood out of that chair among other things.”

Avery looked up from his notebook. “What other things?”

“I didn’t hear everything they said.”

“Could you ask the people you heard talking about it to come down here?”

“That could lead to me getting bitten in the ass.”

“I’m sorry, but this is a murder investigation. All bets are off.”

Sighing, Bixby reached for the radio that was attached to his belt and summoned several people to the locker room with orders to drop what they were doing and come. “They’ll be here momentarily.”