Big Leagues (37 page)

Last, he let his gaze wander to Erich. The
Chips’ owner sat on Cat’s desk and twirled a stapler in his hands.
It wasn’t the nonchalant pose or the stapler that kept Dustin from
announcing his presence. The reporter’s silence was the result of
the poison spewing from his employer’s wicked mouth. The venomous
gush abruptly stopped, the room fell quiet and Erich craned his
head around to the doorway. All six eyes were now upon
Dustin.

“What in the
hell
is going on here?”
Dustin demanded.

Otis’ gun remained pointed at Catriona, but his
one-eyed stare locked on the newest member of the group.

“Dustin, my boy,” Erich said. “Impeccable
timing. You actually bring me to the final stage of the plan.” He
waved the reporter in with gusto.

Dustin’s feet didn’t move, but his face, with
its hanging jaw, rotated toward Erich. He closed his mouth, gulped,
and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Plan? What plan? Look, I don’t
know what’s going on here but I’m not part of any plan.” He pointed
in Cat’s direction. “I heard what you said. You said you’re going
to kill her.”

Erich closed his eyes and threw up his hands in
exasperation. “Now, now, Dustin, this is not the moment to be
persnickety. After all, you sought the senior position all along,
no? Well, consider the title yours. All you have to do is something
your predecessors could not fathom.”

Curiosity bested the junior reporter. “That
would be?”

“Keep this shut.” Erich pressed a finger to his
own mouth.

Dustin stared first at Erich, then at Cat, then
turned to peer at Otis in the corner. After doing a double-take at
the guard’s bloody one-eyed glower, he decided to avoid the
horrific sight of him as much as possible. He faced Erich and said
in a halting voice, “If I refuse?”

Erich’s steely regard was full of menace. “That
would be … unexpected. This is a career break for you, Dustin.
Should you desire to foolishly discard my generous offer, then the
two of you vanish. Together. A few love notes and uncovered hotel
records would reveal an interoffice love affair.” Erich smiled
fondly, first at Cat, then back at Dustin. “Naturally, I found out
about the romance and called this meeting tonight. I told you both
a relationship is against policy and you must make a choice.
Tomorrow, I arrive to find your resignation letters on my
desk.”

He sighed mockingly. “Love really does conquer
all.” Erich set the stapler down and folded his hands once more in
his lap. His expression remained unreadable as he stared at Dustin
and awaited his answer.

Dustin took one last look at Cat’s teary eyes.
He dropped his head to the floor. “I’m sorry, McDaniel.”

* * *

Farewell, Grams.

So long, Benji.

Toodles, Tams.

This was truly the first time in her life Cat
had had a problem with goodbyes. She closed her eyes as the tears
rolled down her face.

Moments that felt like innings passed. Cat
heard nothing and saw nothing. She refused to open her eyes and
give Otis Snow the satisfaction of her fear. She waited for the
cock of the gun’s safety and the click of its trigger. She wondered
if she’d even have time to recognize the sounds before the bullet
penetrated her chest.

Or will he shoot me in the head?

Will it hurt?

Cat waited for her entire life to flash before
her eyes in a montage of misery and joy. The moments never came.
Not the police kicking down the trailer door to haul her dad out in
handcuffs, not Ron Santo flagging her down to hand her a souvenir.
Not walking home from school in the cold rain, not walking across
the stage for a hard-earned diploma. Not her mom leaving her behind
for Hollywood, not waving goodbye to Grams after
graduation.

The only moment of Cat’s history that flickered
through her mind was how she had left the comforts of the
Porterville ballpark and ended up here. She could still see the
back wall’s dry erase board where she marked the Bulldogs’ wins and
losses. She could still smell the mothballs wafting from every
corner of the old office. She could still hear Tamela’s laughter
bouncing from desk to desk. Her mind traveled back to the fateful
Sunday afternoon only a few weeks earlier. She squeezed her eyes
shut even harder. Maybe if she’d just followed König’s
recommendation and stayed home that day, she wouldn’t be here
waiting for him to give the order that would end her life. But she
hadn’t, and now here she was.

Wondering what was taking so long, she
fluttered her eyes open.

Figures I’d be impatient for my own
m-murder.

Hearing a loug BANG, Cat’s eyes instinctively
slammed shut again. She gasped, then realized she hadn’t been
hit.

The boom hadn’t come from Otis.

The noise wasn’t from a gun.

It was the stairwell’s steel door crashing
against the wall, followed by the rhythmic pounding of boots
hitting the ground. The thuds grew louder.

Her eyes flew open. Dustin, his back to her,
shouted, “Over here, he’s got a gun!” He then backed out of the
doorway and held his hands up against a cubicle wall. Otis had just
taken a leaping step after him when two uniformed police officers
rounded the corner, armed and ready.

“Drop your weapon! Hands where I can see
them!”

Cat was simply an observer until Erich lunged
across the desk and snagged her by the collar, pulling her from the
chair. She thrashed around in an effort to get away.

The police officers repeated their orders from
the hallway. Otis’ one good eye flitted over to the struggle on her
desk. Another yell snapped his attention back to the
police.

“I said, drop your weapon!”

He looked back toward Erich and hesitated for a
second. Then his gun fell to the floor.

“Put your hands in the air!”

Otis weakly raised his hands and glared at the
female officer as she picked up his discarded weapon.

“On your knees, now!”

Otis wasn’t even down to one knee before the
officer snapped the cold, familiar metal bracelets around his
bloodied wrists.

Meanwhile, Cat struggled against Erich’s grasp.
The man snatched a handful of her hair as Cat squirmed and flailed,
trying to make contact with her fists. The officer who’d grabbed
Otis’ gun was now alert to their struggle.

“Freeze, now!”

They both froze. Then Erich snuck in one last
blow across her forehead. On the way down, Cat smacked the side of
her head on the corner of her desk. As she lay in a daze on the
rough carpet, she could hear a man’s voice speaking on a two way
radio while the female officer rattled off Miranda
rights.

“We’ve got a four-thirteen in progress
…”

“If you cannot afford an attorney, you have the
right to have an attorney appointed to you prior to questioning
...”

“I need backup and paramedics to Hohenschwangau
Stadium, Fourth Floor. I repeat …”

A hairy arm stretched out in front of Cat and
helped her stagger to her feet. She leaned against her desk and
blinked at the lanky figure.

“Dustin?”

He slipped his jacket off his shoulders, wadded
the coat into a ball and pressed it on the bloodied cut on her
head.

“Don’t worry. That doesn’t look too
deep.”

She still couldn’t believe her eyes.
“Dustin?”

He only smiled and kept the pressure on her
wound.

“You saved my life. I don’t know what to say.
Thank you.”

“Don’t.”

She steadied herself against the desk. “But
you—the police. How’d you know?”

Dustin hung his head. “I didn’t.” His guilty
brown eyes peeped out over the matching frames. “I called them. On
you.”

Her shoulders slumped as she relaxed against
her desk. “On me? But why …”

“I caught you tonight. Coming out of Goodall’s
office with a handful of documents. I snapped a video of it on my
cell as you ran out of the building. I was going to tell König
tomorrow, but then I overheard Otis on the phone with him and knew
he’d be here.” He cleared his throat and broke her stare. “So I
decided to drag you here and call the cops instead. I thought that
if the incident made a big enough show, you’d get fired before you
had a chance to snitch about the whole … um, coffee
deal.”

She pushed his hand away from her head and held
the jacket to her wound.

He leaned against her desk next to her. “I’m
sorry. I thought you were snooping for information to sell to the
tabloids.” He looked away in shame.

She was silent for a few seconds before
bursting out in a bellowing laugh that bounced off the walls of the
small office. The police officers turned their heads from the
ongoing arrests and surveyed the two of them with curiosity before
returning to the business at hand.

Dustin raised his head, his eyes clouded with
confusion.

Her laughter trailed off. “Oh, Dustin, you know
what? This job’s all yours. I think you were right the whole time.
I’m not cut out for this place.”

His mouth stretched into a knowing smile. “Oh
sure, now you give it to me. I don’t want this job,
either.”

“How about we duke it out over coffee? I could
really go for a cup right now. How about you?”

“Hell yes. I’ll go get us some.”

She placed her hand on his forearm. “Umm … I’ll
get my own, okay?”

Cat grinned as Dustin’s face flushed
crimson.

“I’m probably never going to live that down,
huh?”

“Well, if it makes you feel better, that’s not
even the worst thing that’s happened to me this week.”

“Great, I’m one step above attempted
murder.”

The female police officer approached them.
“Ma’am? We’re gonna need a statement whenever you’re
ready.”

Cat spied the grisly syringe wedged against
the desk leg. She bent down and grabbed it.

“
I think this might explain a few
things.”

Three days had passed since the ordeal in her
office. Cat had met with the Las Vegas Police four times, sat in
one interview with the District Attorney’s office and spent twelve
hours in a closed conference room with Commissioner Ramirez’s vast
legal department. The former Las Vegas playboy and his number one
goon were being held without bail at the city jail, while Dr. Kevin
Goodall was still being sought for questioning. Hohenschwangau
Stadium was sealed off with police tape, and Colin Castillo had
reported the night before that the best forensic chemist in the
country had been drafted to the case. The Chips’ winning season was
forfeited, and now the other five teams in the division would
battle each other for the postseason spot. The Porterville Bulldogs
and the rest of the Chips’ minor league system remained active, but
orphaned, with the commissioner vowing to find a parent club for
each team. Cat signed every document the league’s lawyers put in
front of her, from a confidentiality agreement to a release of
liability contract, in exchange for a glowing recommendation from
Commissioner Ramirez.

High Stakes
had gone viral hours after
the commissioner had let her submit the article, and—as is common
in the wild west of the Internet—so had alternate accounts of the
evening’s event. The latest version to hit her inbox purported to
be an eyewitness account of Catriona McDaniel, clad in only a camo
miniskirt, an ammunition belt strapped across her breasts,
rapelling through the fifth floor skylights and aiming a machine
gun at Erich König while she demanded the truth. Tammy had attached
a note:

This is the best one yet. Just remember, when
Hollywood buys the story rights, the role of Tamela Lewis better be
played by Beyoncé or no deal, got it? Call me when the smoke
clears. Love ya!

It seemed most people would rather fill in the
blanks themselves than hear the boring truth. Except for Ailsa
McDaniel, who’d just received the real story from her granddaughter
for the third time that morning. Cat switched the warm cell phone
to her other ear.

“Ignore anything else you read in the papers,
Grams. It really wasn’t that big of a deal.”

A soft tapping sounded from the front door. Cat
peeked through the newly installed peephole and saw the
unmistakable blue of Benji’s eye spying back at her. She opened the
door and pointed at her cell phone with a smile.

“Grams, I have to go. My friend Benji’s
here.”

“Benji?”

“Yes, Benji.”

“Benji’s a boy?”

“A man.”

“A boyfriend?”

“No, he’s just a friend.”

Benji shot her a look of mock indignation. She
stuck her tongue out at him.

“Is he a local?”

“Yeah, he’s a native Vegasian.”

“You can’t have just friends when they’re boys.
Why, do you remember that young man down the street? The one with
that sports car he was always washing?”