Big Leagues

by Jen Estes

  Otis shook his head. The blood was beginning to coagulate around his swollen eye in hard, dry clumps. “Uh … I don’t know, Boss.”

  Erich snapped his fingers. “Ah yes. Einem geschenkten Gaul schaut man nicht ins Maul. Do you know what that means?”

  “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Her translation was barely audible.

  Erich stomped his foot on the carpet and threw up his hands in Otis’ direction. “Now, see, that is exactly what makes this entire matter so heartrending. I really do fancy you, Catriona. Do you know I have had Mr. Snow in my pocket for the last six years and the only German he speaks is der Wienerschnitzel?”

  Sprawling over her desk so that they remained eye-to-eye, he went on, “While Mr. Snow may not speak German, he did get one important concept through his thick head: Beiß nicht die Hand, die dich füttert.” He turned to Otis and translated, “Don’t bite the hand that feeds you.”

  Cat’s eyes flashed. “Does that hand feed him a designer stimulant, too … or is that only for your on-field employees?”

  Erich’s facial muscles tightened, making him appear much older than his rumored early forties. “My, my, my. We have been diligent. I do not recall your résumé including credentials in chemistry.”

  “What can I say?” she improvised. “Everyone needs a hobby, right?”

  “I really wish you had not told me that, Catriona. You have entirely eliminated the option of negotiation.” He hung his head. “Otis?”

  Otis’ sole eye blazed with blood lust.

  Cat’s heart jumped to her throat at its gleam. “Are you gonna k-kill me?”

  Erich looked back at Otis and gave him a one-shouldered shrug. “I know. It is lacking in originality. For all your keen work, you really do deserve a more poetic demise. I am afraid we cannot spare the time.”

  Her eyes from Erich to Otis and back again. “You won’t get away with this. I’ve already alerted the commissioner.”

  “Ah, that is correct. I appreciate the reminder.” Erich reached over the desk and punched the speakerphone on her cell phone, followed by the send button. He tapped his fingers on the desk while he waited for the extension prompt. Four rings sounded and the recording picked up. Cat watched with a sickening disgust as his skinny finger struck the pound sign, followed by a four digits.

  “One, eight, seventy-two.” He tilted his head at her and added, “His wife’s birthday. Lovely woman. Great cook. Not a scholar, however. Of course, sometimes a mind can get one in trouble.”

  The cell phone blared the messages through the silent office, finally coming to hers after a jarring beep.

  “Hi um, th-this is Catriona McDaniel, the senior r-reporter—”

  Erich winked at her. He hit another button.

  “Message deleted.”

  Cat’s heart sank with the robotic operator’s confirmation.

  He grinned. “Ah, technology.” He threw the cell phone behind him, and it hit the carpet with a soft thump. Erich wiped his palms against each other with loud smacks.

  “See? Away with it.”

  “W-well …” Cat scoured her mind for something to say. When a starting pitcher found himself out of juice and down in the count, his last resort was to stall. Meetings on the mound, throwing over to first base, faking an injury, all tactics to give the bullpen time to warm up.

  Benji.

  Her own relief man. Benji was still waiting for her, probably perusing the sports websites for the alleged trade news. He’d be worried when he didn’t find anything. Maybe it wouldn’t be too late for her.

  “Brad Derhoff. You killed him.”

  Erich chuckled. “Ah yes, in the American action film, this is the denouement where I am expected to divulge die Leiche im Keller.” He made a condescending tsk-tsk with this tongue. “Again, Catriona, we are on a tight schedule. Those skeletons will remain in the closet.”

  “So what, you’re just gonna shoot me right here?”

  Erich adopted a look of surprise. “No, of course not!”

  Cat watched him warily.

  “I would never shoot you.”

  Her shoulders relaxed.

  “Otis will.”

  She flashed over to a grinning Otis. His finger rubbed the trigger of the gun.

  “Then he will dispose of your corpse in the desert.” Erich paused to consider it. “When you do not arrive at work for a few days, I will be immensely concerned and phone the police.”

  A lone tear spilled down her cheek.

  “After we show them your excessive hours, the late nights, the mugging, we will sadly arrive at the conclusion you simply could not handle the demands of this position. You must have run away. Maybe back to Porterville, perhaps Chicago.” Erich tilted his head thoughtfully. “I will regret the loss, of course, and in retrospect I will deduce I am to blame, for I should not have taken a gamble on someone as inexperienced and unqualified as the young Catriona McDaniel.”

  Erich was so occupied with bragging about his plan that he didn’t notice Cat’s tears had dried, and that both she and Otis were now focused on the fourth person to join the late night conference.

  42

  Dustin Carlyle closed his eyes and took a deep breath, but the unchanged scene was still there when he reopened them. Otis Snow was the first to draw his attention. It was impossible to miss the menacing guard, with his bloody left eye and crimson-soaked uniform. Otis had been Erich’s right-hand man for as long as Dustin had worked at Hohenschwangau. He didn’t know much about the guard, but since Dustin’s first day as junior reporter, he’d had a feeling Otis was the kind of guy who’d be more at home in a prison yard than a baseball park. Eying the guard’s bloody hands wrapped around a handgun, he felt fully vindicated.

  Dustin then shifted his gaze to Catriona. She was trembling in her desk chair, and her green eyes pleaded with him for aid. He was too overwhelmed by confusion to scoff at the irony of the situation. He had spent every waking hour plotting the demise of her career, and now here the senior reporter sat, begging him to be her savior.

  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.

  43

  “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.”

  Epilogue

  Three days had passed since the ordeal in her office. Cat had met with the Las Vegas Police four times, sat i
n 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.”