Page 85 of Renegade Rift
Her door was closed when I left for morning work and as of the first inning, I hadn’t gotten a response to my text asking how it went chatting with her boss about quitting.
I know it was going to be hard on her. The cleaning gig was her first real step toward independence after Tyler died. But there’s not a single part of me that is upset she'll be safe in a kitchen, with all her clothes on, for the foreseeable future.
“Hey, Race Day,” Townes teases from behind me as we wait for his teammate to step into the box.
The two of us played together for a time on the Blues. Which means he knows damn well what my name is. It’s one thing for Ford and my agent to use the nickname—Ford, First On Race Day—but he knows I hate it when anyone else does.
Unlike Mercer,I wouldn’t say Townes and I were the closest. Not like I am with the guys on the Renegades. But I didn’t hate the guy either. Sometimes you just have those teammates who you hit it off with and sometimes you don’t. That doesn’t mean you don’t fight to win and take the losses together.
He drifts off the bag, toeing the baseline with his cleat. “I see you’re still committed to the words.”
I glance down at my chicken scratch handwriting in the dirt.
The word isplease. As in:Please, Ford, teach me.Please, Ford, help me come. Please, Ford, don’t stop.
Okay she didn't say the last one, but I definitely pictured her doing so and a hell of a lot more during the shower I took after we hung up.
“What’s it mean?” Townes asks.
“Can’t tell ya,” I say, beating my fist into my glove, eyes trained on home plate where out number three just stepped into the batter's box.
He’s toying with me. Trying to break my concentration. It wouldn’t be such a dick move if they weren’t up by five, and it wasn’t the top of the ninth.
Could we come back from this deficit? Sure. Have I seen it happen before? Absolutely. Is it probable? Not even a little. But don’t tell the rest of the team I had that thought. Carson is probably in the bull pen right now, trying to use some voodoo goosfrabah bullshit meditation to help us pull a win out of our asses. But me…I just want to get home to Juliet and see how her day went.
God, who am I? I’ve never been this distracted by a woman. Not even when my mom was sick. Baseball was the only time I could tune out all the happenings of my day and just focus on the game. It’s always been my safe place, with the stadium as my temple and the third base line my altar.
“What if I guess?” Townes taunts playfully. “Please….let me catch this ball? Please…let my team score at least one run?”
My jaw ticks. “You know how it works, Towney. If I tell you, it’s seven games bad luck, and if you hadn’t noticed, we need all the help we can get right now.”
“Fine. Keep your wordy secrets.” He leads off the bag, waiting for Espinoza to throw his next pitch. “I actually was hoping I’d get stuck on third with you. I wanted to tell you that you need to get Willow and the commissioner to get the gag order lifted if you want any of us to back Mercer.”
That catches my attention. Enough that I take my eye off the batter and swing my head toward Townes. “What are you talking about?”
“Strike,” the umpire yells.
“Look forward, man. I don’t need anyone knowing it was me who tipped you off. But it’s not just the Blues with a gag order. Every team in the league is pressuring their players to keep quiet. Not because they don’t want Mercer back in the league, but because they just don’t want to be dragged through it if it gets messy.”
“But he’s all but reinstated. The testimonies are just a formality for the boards to cover their asses.”
Espinoza throws another strike, and even though I want this half of the inning to be over, I’m now invested in keeping Townes on third a little longer.
“We all know that. And we all want him back. It’s bullshit what happened to him. But without the commissioner getting involved, you’ll never see those testimonies.”
Strike three.
Townes pulls his helmet off and pats me on the shoulder. “Good game, bud.”
I tip my head toward him. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“You know where to find me.”
Bishop meets me just before I enter the dugout, his glove tucked under his arm and his catcher's mask pulled up. “What was that about? You planning a night to bake cookies and swap rookie stories with Towney?”
“If only,” I huff. “He let me know there’s still an unofficial gag order in place where Mercer’s concerned. None of the other teams want to get their hands dirty while the dust settles from his return.”
“Fuck,” he growls, taking the steps two at a time beside me into the dugout. “That’s why the testimonies have been scarce.”
