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  Kiss the Bricks

  A Kate Reilly Mystery

  Tammy Kaehler

  Poisoned Pen Press

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2017 by Tammy Kaehler

  First E-book Edition 2017

  ISBN: 9781464207327 ebook

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

  The historical characters and events portrayed in this book are inventions of the author or used fictitiously.

  Poisoned Pen Press

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  Scottsdale, AZ 85251

  www.poisonedpenpress.com

  [email protected]

  Contents

  Kiss the Bricks

  Copyright

  Contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Indianapolis Motor Speedway

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Chapter Forty-four

  Chapter Forty-five

  Chapter Forty-six

  Chapter Forty-seven

  Chapter Forty-eight

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-one

  Chapter Fifty-two

  Chapter Fifty-three

  More from this Author

  Contact Us

  Dedication

  To all the women who have been part of

  (and who love) the Indy 500, especially the nine women who have taken the green flag.

  Most of all, to Pippa Mann

  for her inspiration on and off the track.

  Acknowledgments

  At no time have I asked readers to suspend disbelief more than in this book where I ask you to believe an Indy 500 driver has time to solve a mystery in the month of May—trust me, they’re too busy! That aside, the rest of the description of a driver’s life during that time is as accurate as I can make it, thanks to a group of generous souls who I think of as “my Indy people” (whether or not you live there). Thank you to Meesh Beer, Tony DiZinno, Patti Edwards, Carolyn Meier, Jon Paulette, and Liz Wittich. Extra special thanks to Steve Wittich and Patsy White who got me better inside access and information than I ever dreamed of.

  One woman stands alone in the “I couldn’t have done it without you” category: Pippa Mann, five-time starter at the Indy 500, fierce competitor, crusader for breast cancer awareness, avid reader, and wonderful human being. She’s my primary source for what it’s like to be a participant in “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing,” and, I’m honored to say, she’s my friend. Thank you, Pippa, for your time and support. Any errors are mine!

  Thank you to those who let me use your names, particularly those who made donations to worthy causes for the purpose: Beth Thomas (for “Lead-Foot” Lyla Thomas), John Dale (for Vallorie Westleton), Rick Hunt (for Maria Febbo), Rick Ollie (for himself), and Carolyn Meier (for Diane Wittmeier). Special thanks to Barb and Mary’s real Uncle Stan for your stories and inspiration.

  For helping me tune a rough-running manuscript, thank you to my beta readers Christine Harvey, Carolyn Meier, Rochelle Staab, and Bill Zahren. For unwavering support and early feedback, thank you to my agent, Lucienne Diver of the Knight Agency. For always pinpointing exactly what can be improved (and also telling me what works), thank you to my incredible, incomparable Poisoned Pen Press editors, Barbara Peters and Annette Rogers. Also at Poisoned Pen Press, thank you to Rob, Raj, Diane, Beth, and everyone else who takes such good care of me.

  Finally, thank you to my family for understanding when I do and don’t want to talk about it, for letting me go AWOL for a few months last year while panic-writing, and for never failing to cheer me on. I love you guys. And to Chet, thank you for our life. Here’s to the fun that’s ahead of us.

  Indianapolis Motor Speedway

  Indianapolis, Indiana

  Chapter One

  Present Day

  Bald John looked giddy, which confused me as I pulled into the pits after our first practice for the Indy 500. He didn’t speak, but helped me out of the car with a wide, goofy grin and unusually fumbling fingers.

  Also confusing was my best friend, manager, and PR person, Holly Wilson, climbing over the low pit wall with a towel and a bottle of water—normally a crew member’s job. I saw the stern look on her face and fear clenched my insides.

  I shouted to be heard through my helmet. “What’s wrong?”

  She shook her head. “Everyone’s fine. No one’s hurt. I have good news and bad news. Bad news first.”

  Do we have to do this again? Now?

  I yanked off my gloves, helmet, balaclava, and earplugs. I wiped my face with the cold, wet towel she’d brought and looked up and down the Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s pit lane, seeing thirty-three other drivers talking with their engineers.

  Why am I not doing the same?

  I drank down half the water. As a babble of voices erupted from my Beermeier Racing team pit box, Holly glanced over her shoulder, worried.

  My sense of unease increased. “Tell me.”

  “The bad news.” She hesitated. “This is only the first practice. Where you are in the finishing order doesn’t matter, because teams are playing with car setup. Position doesn’t mean anything.”

  “I get it. I was last in this practice last year, but finished seventeenth in the race.” I relived the overwhelmed feeling I’d had the year before, my first time driving at IMS and my first time attempting to qualify for one of the biggest races in the world. I’d nearly stopped breathing during the rookie test, when I proved I could handle speeds over 220 mph around the two-and-a-half-mile oval. The first full practice had been equally stunning, as I learned to deal with other cars on the massive track. In contrast, the practice a year later had felt good. I’d felt relatively comfortable with a car on the edge. I’d had fun.

  “What’s the problem?” I asked.

  “Keep the bad news in mind.”

 
I waved Holly on, bored of whatever this was. I wanted to talk to my engineer, though I saw he was busy with a small crowd of people—press?

  Holly put a hand on my shoulder. “The good news.” She broke into a smile. “Kate, you were the fastest in that session.”

  Her words didn’t register. “What?”

  She pointed at the scoring pylon, the tall, electronic tower that soared over the track displaying the running or finishing order. Sure enough, my number was at the top.

  I blinked twice, but the digits didn’t change. I sank down on the pit wall, unable to feel my legs. “Holy shit,” I whispered.

  “It’s a damn good start.” She laughed, then sobered. “But don’t let it go to your head. Stay calm when you talk with the media.”

  I glanced at the group in the pits again and finally understood what was happening.

  “You can be pleased,” she went on, “but don’t get cocky. The other teams—”

  I grinned at her. “It doesn’t mean anything for qualifying or the race. But it’s sure as hell a better way to start than last place.”

  I turned back to the scoring pylon and the start/finish line of the legendary track. Position one: the number 82 car. Me.

  Maybe this will be my year at the 500…

  I had ten seconds to fantasize about drinking the traditional milk in the victory lane before my crew descended on me with back-slaps and hugs. After a few minutes of answering questions for the reporters going live on the PA or radio, I spent time talking with Nolan Oshiro, the genius engineer who made decisions about race strategy and technical details for me. But before we were done, a rep for the IndyCar Series, which I was driving in full-time that year, arrived to take me to the media center to talk with the press.

  I hadn’t ever been called to the ground-floor interview room of the media building—a shorter, longer structure next to the Speedway’s famous pagoda tower—so I hadn’t known the drill. As a result, the other top finishers had come and gone, and I faced a couple dozen journalists alone.

  The bottle of cold water I clutched—my second—helped me rehydrate after losing about five pounds in sweat over the course of the practice session, but it didn’t help me feel warm. Though I’d been overheated in the car, I already felt clammy from wearing a soaking-wet firesuit in the air-conditioned room. Plus I felt anxious, nervous.

  The price of success.

  At first, reporters asked the normal questions about how the car felt, if we had what it would take to win this year, and if I’d known I was that fast.

  Then a voice spoke from my left. “I have two questions. What does this mean for you? And do you think it’ll make more people take you seriously?”

  “Is someone not taking me seriously? My name’s on the car. What’s not serious about that?”

  The male reporter dug himself deeper. “There haven’t been many women running the 500, and none of them have come close to winning.”

  “Third isn’t close to winning?” I shot back.

  Be nice, Kate. Educate, I reminded myself.

  I tried again. “People take me seriously. Will this get me more exposure in the rest of the world? I hope so. I’d love to bring more attention to this great race, to the Beermeier Racing team, and to my sponsors, Frame Savings and Beauté.”

  “And to women drivers?” he persisted.

  “Absolutely. Women can be fast and win anywhere men can.”

  A different man spoke. “Were you thinking about beating the other woman in the field today? And how’s your relationship with Sofia Montalvo?”

  Don’t say she’s a bitch. Don’t say she’s a bitch.

  “Sofia and I are friendly, but I wasn’t thinking of her or anyone else. I was trying to get the most out of the car.”

  The other female reporter wagged a finger in the air and winked. “You weren’t out there focused on the statement you were making for women?”

  I barely caught my snort of amusement. “I was thinking about hanging on, making adjustments with the anti-roll bars and weight jacker, and giving my team feedback to make the car better. That’s all I should think about at more than two-twenty.”

  The questions returned to more standard lines—what did my speed today mean for the race and what would my team change on the car before the next session. Then someone suggested I was the first woman in the 106-year history of the Indy 500 to ever top the speed charts.

  “Am I? Some of you know more race history than I do.”

  The reporters debated the question and the volume in the room escalated until one voice broke through.

  “No, she wasn’t,” drawled a small, wiry man in his early fifties. He leaned against the doorframe, holding what looked like a change of clothes for me.

  Everyone turned to him, and some reporters looked a question at me.

  “Uncle—er, Stan Wright, from Beermeier Racing. Expert mechanic.” I wasn’t sure why he was there, but I’d found that Stan—who everyone on the team called “Uncle Stan,” regardless of age or relation—always turned up exactly when he was most needed.

  Uncle Stan smiled. “Just plain mechanic and sometime errand boy—checking up on you for Alexa.” The last was directed at me, referencing Alexa Wittmeier, co-owner of Beermeier Racing, the team I drove for.

  “You said Kate wasn’t the first?” one of the youngest reporters asked.

  Uncle Stan nodded. “Couple decades ago, PJ Rodriguez was the first.”

  Chapter Two

  May 1987

  The checkered flag flew to mark the end of the first practice for the 1987 Indianapolis 500, and the number 23 car’s crew slapped each other’s backs in disbelief. Noise from the small crowd on hand was drowned out by the roar of thirty-seven snarling V-6 and V-8 engines entering pit lane—but not before the crew heard boos mixed in with cheering.

  At the front of the pit space, a crew member waved his arm up and down, and PJ pulled the car in. As she shut down the engine, the crew member approached, but PJ waved him off. He turned back to the pits, relief evident in the slump of his shoulders.

  PJ unbuckled her belts and muscled herself out, perching on the rim of the cockpit, her feet on the seat. She pulled her helmet and balaclava off, shaking out thick, black hair, and wiped her forehead with a sleeve.

  In contrast to other pit spaces, where crew members clustered around each car and driver, PJ sat alone. Her lips tightened briefly and she squared her shoulders before climbing the rest of the way out of the car, helmet in hand. Only then did she turn to look at the scoring pylon, frowning as she searched for her car number at the bottom of the list. Her first practice that year, only her second time attempting to make the race…she knew she’d be at the bottom of the speed chart. She looked again. Nothing.

  Finally understanding, she looked higher on the pylon, her mouth dropping open as she followed the list of numbers all the way to the top.

  Position 1: 23.

  She froze, shocked. Certain there’d been some mistake. After a long minute, she turned her head and met the eyes of her race engineer, Jerry Watson. “Really? How?”

  He shrugged and stepped closer to the pit wall, gesturing for a crew member to take PJ’s helmet. “A fluke.” He looked sternly at the joy spreading over PJ’s face. “You did good—your fastest lap was 210.772 miles per hour. But don’t get ahead of yourself. We’ve got three weeks of on-track sessions before the race itself. Anything can happen. Some of the favorites didn’t even get out there today.”

  PJ waved an arm at the pylon, her enthusiasm undimmed. “But they cannot say I can’t drive if I did this.”

  “They’re gonna say whatever they want, kid. But you keep on believing.” He glanced over his shoulder. “And brace yourself, because here comes the press.”

  Within seconds, PJ was surrounded. Men with notebooks in hand tumbled over the pit wall and swarmed the pi
t space, pressing in on her.

  “PJ, did you know you were fastest while you were out there?”

  “How did the car feel?”

  “Did you really think a girl could go that fast?”

  “Do you think you can do it again?”

  She heard a guffaw, and a low voice. “Of course she can’t. She’ll probably collapse from the strain of this session.”

  “Do you think people will say you’re too masculine if you go too fast?”

  As the men invaded her personal space and their questions continued to rain down, PJ felt her breaths grow more shallow and panicky. She let the sound wash over her and focused on slow, smooth breathing. A moment later, she threw up her hands, bumping three notebooks out of the way.

  “Enough,” she shouted.

  In the brief, shocked silence that followed, she spoke again. “One at a time. No, I did not know my speed while I was in the car. Still, I don’t believe it. The car felt touchy and not so great in a couple of corners. Of course I thought I could go that fast. Being a girl—a woman—it has nothing to do with driving a racecar.”

  “Now you’re getting all feminist on us—you one of those women’s libbers, PJ?” one reporter asked.

  “If you mean do I think women can do anything they want to do? Then yes. But that does not mean I don’t appreciate men or want to—what is it? Burn my bra. Not that.”

  Another reporter eyed her chest. “I’ll say. It looks plenty good where it is.”

  PJ crossed her arms and flicked a glance at the man’s crotch before giving him a pitying look.

  “Aren’t you afraid of being seen as too manly?” That was from a different voice, on her other side.

  She turned to face him. “You tell me, am I ever going to look like a man?”

  He inspected her curves and grinned. “No, ma’am, but behavior ain’t looks.”

  “I do not understand why, if I am a good, fast driver, anyone else is less of a man.” She shrugged. “Maybe they need their manhood checked.”

  Some of the men muttered disapproving responses, but didn’t say anything loud enough for her to hear.