Big Leagues (13 page)

Emphasis on the
gin
.

Erich König entered the flight last, busy
barking orders on his Bluetooth as he headed for the back of the
plane. Cat exhaled and reclined her seat.

* * *

Halfway through the flight, Eduardo removed his
headphones and leaned on their shared armrest.

“You’re the new reporter, right? Took over for
the tall white dude that, you know, offed himself?”

She nodded, and he stuck out his
hand.

“Eddie Lopez.”

I know.

She smiled and returned the handshake. “Cat
McDaniel.”

He slid his iPod into his pocket. “I’m in the
bullpen.”

I know, she thought. I also know you won’t be
for long if you don’t stop walking your leadoff batters.

“Everyone made a big stink about that reporter,
you know, what a surprise and all that, but I didn’t think it was
that much of a shock. Dude was hanging on by a thread.”

“What do you mean?”

“A couple of weeks ago, I came in early to lift
weights and he was in this shoving match with the doc. I had to
pull him off and it wasn’t easy, he was like a cracked-out
squirrel. I figure if he hadn’t done what he done, he would’ve been
fired. Maybe that’s why he did it.”

“Wow.” That sure didn’t fit every other
description of the mild-mannered reporter. Eddie looked like he was
waiting for a better response, but Cat decided to change the
subject. “So you’ve been in Vegas for a couple of years now,
right?”

“Longer than I was in the minors.”

“Got any advice for me?”

“Oh,
mami
, I don’t think this flight is
long enough.” He kicked his feet up on the back of the seat in
front of him. “You been to Orpheus yet?”

She shook her head from side to side. “The
Orpheus?”

“No, not the. Just Orpheus. You gotta get your
booty down there. They got the best VIP room in town.”

See? Nice to be really important.

“VIP, huh? One of the interns was trying to
drag me to the Strip the other day for Ladies Night.”

“Now a few of the joints on the Strip are
dives, but most can be hella bangin’ any night of the week. We’re
talking shorties galore, you know what I’m saying?”

Not really.

She nodded anyway.

“You gotta watch your shit, though, ’cause they
get packed in hard and a player can’t outrun the obsessed fans
looking for more than just an autograph, you know what I
mean?”

“Thanks for the warning,” Cat said, “but I
don’t have a whole lot of trouble with crazed fans. I'm sure you do
though.”

“They all have an assload of muscle on hand so
it usually ain’t no thing. You could come with me some time, see
what the fuss is all about.”

“Maybe.”

Something about the way he was talking piqued
her curiosity. His eyes almost glittered.

Maybe he’d just drunk too much
caffeine.

Despite the first three days of the road trip
being a short Metra ride to her hometown, Cat never traveled south
of the Dan Ryan Expressway. Not that she had plans to anyway. She
already knew the one trip the team would be taking to Chicago, at
least during the regular season, was going to conflict with Silver
Liners, her grandmother’s seniors-only Bahamian cruise. Ever since
Lynette’s phone call to set up the interview on that heavenly
Sunday afternoon, Cat had fantasized about taking in a game with
the woman who introduced her to baseball so many years ago, this
time from prime club seats. After Ailsa McDaniel met a retired
pilot whose pension package included free flights, her once
homebody grandmother now spent most weekends jet-setting to various
cities on the Eastern seaboard.

Shipping souvenir shot glasses.

Cat was glad her grandmother was happy, so
she’d hid her disappointment under a layer of false cheer. She
assured her grandmother the visit was no big deal and begged her
not to cancel her vacation plans.

Now that she was in the Windy City, Cat didn’t
know how she would have found the time to see her grandmother even
if she had stayed home. After checking into the team’s ritzy hotel
on Michigan Avenue last night, Cat had thrown her bags on the
convertible sofa, tore off her dress and flung it on the plasma TV.
She fell into the plush bed and wrapped the down duvet around her,
drifting off to sleep in minutes. Seven hours later, the front desk
plucked her out of the feather fantasyland, a paradise that
included a sandy beach and a blue-eyed neighbor, with a seven
o’clock wake-up call.

Cat stepped out of the hotel shower and sighed
at the spacious Jacuzzi tub, glaring down at the jets she knew she
wouldn’t have time to appreciate. She blow-dried her long hair
straight and sprayed on an anti-freeze serum to battle the late
July temperatures. Then she slipped into a sleeveless gray sheath
dress, stepped into her black mock-o-dile peep toes, grabbed her
laptop bag, and stumbled out the door. In the lobby she gave a
friendly wave to a couple of men drinking coffee; she recognized
them as the Chips’ fifth floor scouts she’d met on Erich’s
tour.

Cat hustled down the busy sidewalk to the El
station. After a ten-minute train ride, she rushed into the
ballpark to catch the team’s batting practice and snag a good seat
at the pregame conference. After the game and clubhouse interviews
concluded, she spent an hour trying to catch a cab back to the
hotel, where she wrote her postgame summary and researched the next
day’s matchups. Finally she fell back into bed. Her life was
quickly taking on a pattern.

* * *

Except for some takeout boxes from Giordano’s
and a stack of Navy Pier coupons being handed out in front of the
Hancock Building across from the hotel, Cat had nothing to show for
her three days in Chicago. The Chips were halfway to Milwaukee
before she had a chance to catch her breath on the team bus. Cat
followed that breath with a deep sigh and stared out the bus window
to the busy traffic below. She sunk into the bus seat’s scratchy
upholstery and laid her head against the backrest. Being a thousand
miles at sea hadn’t precluded her grandmother from leaving her a
nagging voice mail, stating that Chicago was only thirty minutes
from the Joliet State Prison and visiting hours were daily from
eight to two.

There wasn’t any time.

Cat closed her eyes until an image of her dad
in his prison-orange jumpsuit forced them open. She leaned her
forehead up against the window and blinked the tears from her eyes
as she focused on the chaotic roadway.

* * *

The second series consisted of three seven
o’clock games. Cat had vowed she was going to make time during the
days for the Milwaukee Art Museum and a brewery tour, but the
closest she got to either was fresh graffiti on Canal Street and a
Miller Lite at the ballpark.

Each evening Cat left the ballpark at one a.m.;
each morning she ignored the wake-up call, slept ’til noon and
headed back to the press box by three. She whistled to herself as
she bounced back through the press box doors on the fifth day;
she’d made it halfway through the hectic road trip. Her whistling
stopped when she saw Dustin’s chair blocking the aisle.

“Excuse me, Dustin.”

He scooted forward an inch. Cat raised an
eyebrow. “Gee, thanks.”

She wiggled past the back of his chair and
peeked at the stats on his computer screen. She leaned over his
narrow shoulders and saw his back stiffen.

“Whoa, have you even proofed this write-up?”
She squinted and tapped his monitor with her fingernail. “I know I
don’t have to tell you Derrek is spelled with two Rs?”

Dustin toggled the mouse to the document and
slammed the R key on his laptop. “There.”

She looked over his matted hair once again.
“That wasn’t a stolen base in the ninth. It was a defensive
indifference.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking
about.”

“Uh, yeah I do,” she said. “The Chips didn’t
even pay attention to that runner. They completely ignored him and
focused on the star at the plate.”

Dustin stood up, glaring at her.

“Fine,” she said, “ask someone
else.”

Dustin looked over at a local reporter from
Milwaukee. The older man had been watching their squabble with more
apparent interest than he had expressed during the previous nine
innings.

“Sorry, Carlyle, they scored it a DI all
right.” He offered a shrug for consolation.

Dustin threw his chair back and sat down,
thumping the backspace key on his laptop. Cat pretended to
proofread her own article as she watched his lips move in a silent
mutter.

This beats sightseeing any day.

* * *

The next day didn’t end so gleefully. The Chips
arrived in Pittsburgh an hour after a demoralizing extra-innings
loss in Wisconsin. The players’ sulking poisoned the already stale
air of the plane, and Cat couldn’t wait for the glum flight to end.
The team staggered off the plane, only to trudge back onto another
bus. A ten-minute ride brought them to the third lavish hotel of
the road trip. As everyone filed into the lobby of the Hotel Coeur,
Cat admired the marbled floors that led over to a grand piano.
Gazing up at the crystal chandelier, she inhaled the welcoming
aroma of fresh lilac and felt calmed by the soft trickling of a
fountain coming from the atrium. A parade of bellhops in black
uniforms and chin-strapped hats greeted them and began taking their
luggage.

While the press boxes on the road trips
couldn’t compare to the amenities at Hohenschwangau, the glamorous
hotels more than made up for each park’s lack of free food and
airheaded waitresses.

* * *

The next morning Cat rolled out of the
four-poster bed, brushed her hair into a messy bun and debated
whether to order room service or brave the fancy hotel bistro in
her ratty velour sweat suit. One look at the old spaghetti stain on
her knee and room service won out. She reached for the phone, but
before she got there, the ringer sang from its perch on the
nightstand.

“Hello?”

“Good morning, Cat.” She recognized the deep,
velvety voice of Erich.

Er, Mr. König.

“Guten Morgen
!” The phrase jumped out of
her throat.

He chuckled appreciatively. “Tell me, have you
visited the dining room yet?”

“N-no, not yet, Mr. König. I was actually
getting ready to.”

“Ah, wonderful. Would you care to join me for
breakfast instead?”

“S-sure. That’d be great.”

“Delightful. I have quite the spread here in
the presidential suite. Please come up whenever you are
ready.”

Presidential suite.

Cat gulped. “Okay. I guess I’ll see you in a
few minutes, Mr. König.”

Cat scrutinized the image looking back at her
in the hotel closet door’s full-length mirror and crinkled her nose
at her chosen outfit. Once again she muttered a wish for Tamela’s
input. Cat had no idea if khakis and a striped polo were
appropriate for a morning meeting in your boss’ hotel room, but she
knew of nothing that didn’t fall into Tamela’s realm of fashion
expertise.

Boss’ hotel room.

Her stomach growling and nerves rattling, she
decided the outfit would have to do. Besides, it was five a.m. in
Porterville and, unless her apartment was doused with flames and
firefighters delivered Starbucks, Tamela Lewis would be fast
asleep. Cat took one last doubtful look at the mirror before
exiting her room.

Two minutes later, she found herself in front
of another ivory hotel door. It swung open and Erich König stood in
the frame, looking as well-coiffed and tailored as ever, even at
eight o’clock in the morning. Cat didn’t know why she expected to
find Erich in anything other than one of his custom
suits.

“Catriona, welcome. Please have a
seat.”

Cat nervously sat down at the large table,
already set with Waterford china and enough food to feed the entire
Chips team. As Erich made his way to the other side of the table,
she looked around the breakfast nook and into the next
room.

Just how big is this place?

She could see that the suite continued into a
sitting area. To confirm if anyone else was expected, she made note
of the place settings at the table.

“Tea for two,” she mumbled to
herself.

“Pardon?”

Cat turned to him, surprised. “Oh, uh, I was
just remarking to myself that this looks delicious.”

“That it does. Please, join me.” He sat down,
placed a linen napkin on his lap, and passed her a basket of
English muffins and croissants.

“So tell me, how have you found the fourth
floor of Hohenschwangau?”

“It’s been just amazing, Mr. König. I truly
love coming to work every day.”

She poured a glass of orange juice and offered
him the carafe.