Perfect Catch(68)
“Oh, so you can hear me.”
Alex moved another foot off the plate. If this was a tactic to make him slip up for an easy out, Matt would be sorely disappointed because Alex never took his eye off the Mets pitcher. It was unusual for a pitcher to try tagging out a runner on third—the chances of missing and allowing the run to come home were too high—but Alex wasn’t taking any stupid chances. He still felt like he was on thin ice with the team, and an error that lost them a potential run wouldn’t be overlooked.
“Tell me,” Matt continued, ignoring Alex’s discomfort, or more likely feeding off it. “Does she still look good naked? She used to be a wildcat in bed. I remember she used to do this thing with her mouth—”
“I said fuck off.” Alex was crouched, prepared to run home at a moment’s notice. Hoping he’d get a good chance to get the hell away from Matt Hernandez and his flapping jaw. If things kept up as they were, Alex wouldn’t be able to help himself from throwing punches.
Alice might not be on speaking terms with him, but he’d be damned if he let a motherfucker like Matt talk about her behind her back. He’d hope any good man would do the same for one of his sisters. Or any woman for that matter.
“Hope you used protection, man, that’s all I’m saying. Otherwise you might get eighteen years of bullshit, like I did.”
Alex’s right eyelid twitched, and his hands balled into fists. His vision started to cloud over with a red hue, and he remembered the way it had felt to clobber the Twins batter who had lipped off to Alice and elbowed her. That guy was some random asshole. Alex was willing to bet punching Matt would feel ten times better.
As luck—good or bad depending on the perspective—had it, Chet Appleton bashed a solid hit to left field that hit the ground, giving Alex the opening he needed. He bolted for home and slid in a foot ahead of the throw.
Safe.
And so was Matt, at least for the time being.
Chapter Thirty
Carmello’s Diner wasn’t exactly a happening family venue on Friday nights, so Alice’s Spidey-sense started tingling when the group of five women, two of them with children in tow, showed up and asked for a table.
Varying in age from early twenties to mid-thirties, the women bore a passing resemblance to one another, in such a way even a casual observer would assume they were sisters. They also nattered and squabbled with each other in the familiar way only family members could.
Things went from peculiar to downright strange when the women asked the hostess to seat them in Alice’s section. Since Alice had never laid eyes on the women before, she had no idea why they’d want to be in her section. No immediate notions sprang to mind, which left her feeling uneasy.
“Ladies.” She smiled as she approached their table in the diner’s one big family-sized booth. “Can I start you out with anything to drink?” Holding her order pad at the ready, she let her gaze drift over them. Three of the five had dark, curly hair, while the remaining two were blonde. All five of them were pretty, but in an inoffensive, girl-next-door way that seemed designed by nature to put other women at ease.
“That’s her,” whispered the youngest-looking one, jabbing her neighbor with an elbow. “Oh she’s much prettier in person.”
Alice wasn’t sure if the whisper was meant to be so audible, but she blushed.
“Vi, hush. She’s not deaf, you know.” This sister—for Alice was now convinced they must be sisters—smiled brightly and placed her menu on the table. “We’ll have a round of waters, if you don’t mind. And two glasses of milk for the kids.”
An order that simple didn’t need to be written down, so Alice simply tucked the pad back into her apron, gave the women a strange glance and returned to the kitchen.
“Bev.” She waved down the hostess as she filled up the water glasses. “Did those ladies say anything to you? About why they wanted to sit with me?”
Beverly, all of sixteen, shrugged and snapped her gum. “I dunno. I didn’t ask. Why?”
Alice sighed. “Never mind.”
“Hope they tip good,” Bev added. “Middle-aged ladies tip for shit.”
That Bev thought they were remotely middle-aged made Alice feel ancient in comparison. Some of the women at her table were barely older than she was, and their kids were all much younger than hers. If that was over-the-hill, Bev must have thought Alice herself was ready for a nursing home.
She snapped plastic lids onto the kids’ milk cups to prevent the inevitable spills, and returned to the table with the drinks, distributing them among the family. All five women watched her with wide, interested eyes, the way visitors to a zoo might observe a captive panda.