Double Play (19 page)

“
What?
Why?”

“
I
didn’t ask. I haven’t said much at all.”

“
That’s good. Don’t.”

“
Do I
need a lawyer?”

“
Are
they questioning you?”

“
Not
really.”

“
Then
probably not.” She sighed, no longer concerned with the triviality
of the postgame conference. “What a mess. Is Quinn
there?”

“
No,
he left right after the game was over, conveniently ten minutes
before the thin blue line arrived.”

She had to admit
that it gave her pleasure to finally hear the annoyance in Benji’s
tone. It was about time he quit singing the
Brady Bunch
theme every time she complained about Quinn. Her satisfaction was
short-lived when she remembered Benji’s tune was about to change
channels to the
Cops
intro.

“
Do
you want me to call him? I can’t say that he’ll come back or even
pick up my call, but if the cops need to talk to him, I can
try.”

“
I
wouldn’t worry about it right now. An officer asked if he was here
and I told him no, then he wanted to know where he was, but I’m in
no mood to do the cops’ jobs for them. If they want Quinn, they can
go find him themselves.”

“
Benji, I don’t want you to get in trouble.” He wasn’t breaking
any laws per se, but if Kahn thought he was being jerked around, it
would only strengthen his resolve. The last thing she wanted on
either of their tails was a resentful cop. Her dad wasn’t the only
McDaniel who coined adages when it came to law
enforcement.

Cooperate or
become an inmate
.

“
Leave
your brother alone for now. If they’re going to take me in for
something, I’ll need him. Quinn’s the only person I know with
enough money to make bail. He made some serious change on your game
tonight.”

“
That
doesn’t make me feel better.” She gave it a second thought. “Wait.
How much money?”

“
I
don’t know, exactly. He didn’t just have money on the team losing;
he had money on a blown save and the underdogs coming back in the
ninth. That boy’s got some serious luck. I hope it runs in the
family.”

“
Trust
me, it doesn’t.” Lucky families don’t make the Fourth Amendment
into nursery rhymes. In fact, she doubted that lucky families gave
any consideration to arrests or unreasonable searches and
seizures.

“
Well,
something’s up. You don’t think he could have some insider
information, do you?”

“
Even
Quinn isn’t that dishonest.” She paused for a beat, giving that a
second thought, too. “Okay … he is, but there’s no way he could’ve
predicted a blown save, especially that blown save. Adam Alvarez
hasn’t—”

“
Hey,
I know that name. Wasn’t he one of the guys here the other night?
He goes by AA, right?”

“
Yes,
and he hasn’t blown a save all season. He’s practically the best
closer in baseball. Trust me, no one saw this coming.”

“
Maybe
he did it on purpose.” Benji was whispering and she didn’t know if
it was to keep cops crawling over their apartment from overhearing
or to emphasize his suspicions.

Cat scoffed. “And
what would be in for Adam? So, he could put money on the game
….”

“
Sure.”

“
He’s
a millionaire. I don’t think he needs to make a few grand on a
baseball game. Besides, these guys stand to make a hefty playoff
bonus if they win this series.”

“
Maybe
he gets off on the rush of it.”

Adam was the bad
boy of baseball, but his rushes came from glory. “Even if
that’s the case
, he’s a
relief pitcher. To take advantage of those odds, he’d have to be
psychic. Whether or not the team is in a save situation is
completely out of his control. He has no idea how many runs the
team would score, if they’d even be leading …. He doesn’t even
know if he’ll be coming in the game until that bullpen phone
rings.”

“
Not
really.”

“
Excuse me?” she asked, not bothering to mask her annoyance.
Sometimes Cat fantasized about sneaking into one of Benji’s
lectures and challenging his expertise on mitochondrion and
theories of evolution, or whatever else he was always yammering
about. For a guy who didn’t even watch baseball, he sure had
opinions on it. Of course, Benji had an opinion on everything. He
could spend hours debating the difference between dragonflies and
damselflies.

“
Your
playoff preview stated that in four of the six games these two
teams played each other earlier in the season, the game was decided
by one run. In that Chicago is the wildcard, the Soldiers had to be
the favorite to win and of course they’d bring AA in to clinch a
close game. Seems to me he had a pretty good idea he’d be pitching
today.”

“
That’s crazy.”

“
You
wrote it.”

“
No, I
mean, what you’re implying is crazy. There are
exactly
nine million reasons AA wouldn’t
tank on purpose
, one for
each dollar he makes. Losing isn’t profitable.”

“
Tell
that to Quinn.”

Cat’s heart sunk.
She was starting to enjoy the hypothetical debate, but at the
mention of Quinn’s name, she remembered this wasn’t just press box
fun. “What are the cops doing now?”

“
Still
taking pictures of the apartment. I’m warning you right now, if the
media gets a hold of a photo of my life-size Chewbacca, my students
are never going to let me live it down.”

Cat smiled. On
the plus side, that might motivate him to replace the furry
cardboard cutout with a ficus tree. It took up the entire corner
and, even after living with it for
eleven
months, she was startled every time she
walked into the living room.

Reporters began
to file out of the conference room and she awkwardly stayed clear
of their paths. “Benji, I’m really sorry to leave you hanging with
all of this to deal with, but I’m on a deadline.”

“
I
know you are, don’t worry about it. I just wanted to give you a
heads-up.”

“
I
appreciate it, but in this case, I think ignorance would’ve been
bliss.”

“
Actually, a recent reasoning-based analysis of whether or not
a lack of knowledge does lead to a discernible amount of
contentment concluded that—”

“
Stop.
I don’t need to know how a primate would assess my
situation.”

He laughed. “I’ll
have you know the test subjects were human.”

“
Either way.”

“
Tomorrow’s game is on at seven, my time. Is the team coming
back home afterwards?”

“
That’s the plan. Unless the game goes too late; then we’ll
stay another night.”

“
I’ll
wait up for you.”

This was usually
the part where she would tell him not to, but as Cat looked out to
the hallway of her assembled colleagues—each making a point to
avoid her stares as they murmured to one another—she looked forward
to his welcoming arms. She just hoped Detective Kahn wouldn’t be
waiting with him.

“
See
you then.”

Spencer stepped
out the conference room doorway, his arms overloaded with two
bags.

“
So
Adam Alvarez finally does a press conference and you step out for a
phone call?”

“
I
know.” She took her laptop bag from his hands. “What’d I
miss?”

“
For
starters, he cried.”

Cat waited for
the punch line. “You’re joking.”

“
I’m
funnier than that, I hope.”

“
You
mean like, his eyes got watery? Maybe some sniffles?”

“
No.
Big fat man tears streaming down his face.” He wrinkled his nose.
“It was awful. He started sobbing about Damien and how he was his
best friend and he thought he was handling it well, but when he got
on the mound, it hit him. Between you and me, I think someone could
stand to take an improv class. His performance seemed a little
forced.”

“
What’d everybody else think?”

“
Oh,
of course they ate it up with a spoon. It was nauseating to
watch.”

“
Great. Now he’s a martyr.” She didn’t want to admit it, but
she had hoped Adam’s epic fail would take the heat off her for a
bit. Instead, he’d managed to deflect the backlash right back to
her. It seemed like she’d be to blame for every bad thing that
happened to the Soldiers from this point forward.

“
Debbie from B-TV actually gave him a hug, and he ended by
asking everyone to pray that God helps Damien find his way home.
Just be glad you missed the whole scene.”

“
Sounds like it.”

“
I was
hoping you were called away concerning news about St.
Damien.”

“
I
wish, but it was just Benji.”

“
Complaining about the game?”

She smiled, as if
Spencer should’ve known better than that. “Um, no. I doubt he even
watched it.”

“
Don’t
take this the wrong way, but what the hell is wrong with
him?”

“
He’s
not into baseball, you know this.”

“
I
knew that during regular season, but this is the playoffs, doesn’t
he get how important it is?”

“
Not
really.” She shrugged. “He knows it matters to me, so he usually
checks the score and attempts to make small talk but it’s just not
his thing.”

Spencer’s mouth
hung open to a comic degree. She half-expected his tongue to come
stair-stepping out of it. “I don’t get why that doesn’t bother you
more. I won’t even go on a date with a girl who doesn’t like
baseball, let alone marry her. Doesn’t it feel like he might not
respect your job?”

“
He
respects my job.” She considered it for a minute and broke into a
genuine smile of amusement. “He just doesn’t respect Adam Alvarez’s
job, but who does?”

Spencer’s face
was scrunched in deep contemplation. “You’re really going to spend
the rest of your life with a guy who doesn’t even watch your
favorite thing in the whole world?”

“
Baseball’s not my favorite thing in the whole world. Benji
is.”

Spencer mimed
jabbing his finger down his throat. “Tell me I didn’t just hear
that.”

He grabbed her
hand and started poking at her wrist.

“
What
are you doing?”

“
Checking for wires. I suspect you’ve morphed into a Stepford
Fiancée and it’s only a matter of time before your transition to
becoming an obedient, sycophantic housewife android is
complete.”

She jerked her
wrist back. “First of all, it’d be gynoid. Androids are males.”
Upon seeing Spencer’s curious amusement, she closed her eyes and
cringed.

Benji-ism strikes
again.

“
Besides,
those
women are replaced by gynoid versions of themselves; they don’t
morph. Anyway, there’s more to a relationship than
baseball.”

“
Don’t
tell me he’s like a sex machine in the sack? Or is sexbot the
correct term?”

“
No. I
mean, yes—I mean, no, I won’t tell you that, and I don’t know the
correct term.” She could feel the heat spreading down her cheeks
and neck. Why was she wasting so much energy defending Benji to
Spencer? She started walking down the hallway and Spencer trailed
along.

“
Good,
I don’t think I could’ve handled that.”

“
What’s with the third degree? I’m getting enough of this from
the fans.”

“
I’m
sorry, it’s just curiosity. I was wondering what you guys have in
common, since it’s obviously not baseball.”

“
I
don’t know.” Cat paused as she thought about it. “Other stuff. We
both like eighties movies and animals. And he’s really sweet. There
aren’t many guys who are.”

“
Yeah,
well, if he’s so sweet, how come you’ve been engaged for eleven
months and he still hasn’t set a date?”

“
He
isn’t the reason we haven’t. I am. I mean, I just … I don’t know.
I’ve been busy.” It was a lame excuse and she knew it. Worse yet,
Spencer knew it. He was studying her again
,
curious brown eyes
behind his black-framed glasses
.

“
You’re one of the smartest people I know. Could it be your
subconscious is trying to tell you something?”

“
Yes,”
she said, solemnly. “It’s trying to tell me that my friend Spencer
is very nosy.”

“
I’m a
journalist, that’s my job.”

“
Yeah,
well, there’s no story here. Trust me. I’m just not in a hurry to
get married. What’s wrong with enjoying your
engagement?”

Spencer sighed
and shook his head with a small smile. “Nothing, I suppose. More
people probably should. I bet we’d have fewer
marriages.”

She gave him a
pointed look and he laughed.

“
I
only meant—”

“
I
know what you meant.”