Page 37 of Whiskey Chase
“Oh, are you all together?” Misty Lynn asked with interest. She batted her heavily mascaraed eyes at me. “Wonder how long that’ll last. Give me a call, tall, dark, and sexy, when you get tired of Miss Scarlett here.”
Misty Lynn pranced away on her impractical heeled sandals, and Scarlett growled under my arm.
“Ihatethat dick locker.”
“Come on, slugger. Let’s get our pregame on,” Bowie suggested, towing his sister toward the dugout.
The Eagler Lumberjacks looked every bit the part. They played in flannel, and I couldn’t be sure without a close up look, but it looked as though even the women had beards.
Between innings, shots of moonshine were handed out to both teams. “It evens the playing field,” Scarlett explained knocking back her third shot. “Doesn’t matter if you’re an all-star athlete if you can’t run in a straight line.”
Things were getting a little fuzzy in my vision, but I still managed to get my glove on the ball a couple of times. Everyone looked like they were slowing down a bit. Opal was one hell of a catcher, and she hit no less than a double every time she got up to bat. But by the fourth inning, she was listing to the side behind the Lumberjack batter.
Jameson and Jonah got tangled up going for a pop fly and had a hard time getting back on their feet. One of the Eagler players stumbled on his jog to third base and got tagged out while he was laying face down in the dirt.
The only one who didn’t seem to suffer any ill-effects from the moonshine was Scarlett. In the fifth, she hit a bases-loaded triple. And in the sixth, she scored a sweet double play when a bunt made it past Bowie on the pitcher’s mound. She moved like the booze made her more graceful, more athletic.
By the seventh inning, I was swilling water and dumping my moonshine on the ground. Jonah was trying to tell the very sober Gibson a story about a horse and a sweater. Opal and Buck broke into a clumsy but energetic two-step in the dugout until Buck smacked his head on the overhang.
Someone in the crowd thought to toss a couple of hot dogs our way. I mainlined two of them hoping they’d soak up some of the alcohol, but in my heart of hearts, I knew it was too late. I watched Scarlett guzzle water and wipe her mouth with the back of her hand.
Why was everything she did so sexy? I loved watching her. The way she moved. The way she laughed. The way her smile reached her eyes. Her dirty mouth.
“Ahem.” Jameson elbowed me in the gut. “You’re drooling.”
I wiped my mouth.
“Metaphorically. Stop staring at my sister.”
“He can stare at me all he wants,” Scarlett interjected. “I’m starin’ right back.”
“Ugh,” Gibson groaned. “Can you all just not climb on top of each other here in the dugout? That’s all I’m asking at this point.”
Scarlett grabbed a bat, winked at me, and gave her brother a kiss on his cheek. “Progress,” she called cheerfully over her shoulder.
Gibson eyed the other team’s dugout. “I think they’re about to call the game.” I stumbled over to him and closed one eye trying to focus on the Eaglers.
“Are they sleeping?”
“Passed out cold.” Gibson gave Scarlett a signal at the plate, and she nodded.
The pitcher threw out his pitch, and Scarlett had to take two big steps to the side to get to it, but damn did she get a piece of it. The bat connected with a clink of aluminum, and the ball soared into the air.
“Go! Go! Go!” Gibson yelled. Scarlett’s legs ate up the distance between home plate and first. She was already headed to second by the time the outfielder fumbled the ball.
“Keep goin’!” Bowie slurred next to me.
The crowd was on its feet, listing hard but still cheering. She danced over second by the time the outfielder got the ball under control and threw it.
It was a wild toss. The third basewoman had to leave the base and dive to get her glove on it. Scarlett charged past her without a glance in her direction. She picked up speed and put her head down. The Lumberjacks’ catcher was on his knees, unable to stay on his feet, when the third basewoman chucked the ball. I was out of the dugout with the rest of the team cheering as Scarlett threw herself headfirst into the dirt, sliding into the catcher and then June like a heat-seeking bowling ball attacking pins.
I couldn’t tell what everyone was cheering about until I saw the ball roll loose from the pile of limbs and drunken laughter.
“Safe!” June shouted.
15
Scarlett
