Page 105 of Highball Rush
Jonah’s hands gripped the bat hard, and he narrowed his eyes. The crowd kept chanting as the pitcher wound up and released.
A sudden silence filled the air as everyone stopped cheering and watched the ball fly toward home plate. Jonah swung and his bat connected with a metallic crack of aluminum.
The ball flew into the dark night sky, almost disappearing against the starry backdrop. I watched the arc, trying to judge the distance. Their outfielders tracked its path, backing up fast. One stumbled and hit the grass, rolling onto his stomach. The other kept his feet, running backward, his face tilted up, gloved hand ready to make the catch.
The ball kept right on going.
The outfielder backed into one of the moonshine stands as the ball sailed over his head. It came down with a hard thunk in what looked like the bed of Rhett Ginsler’s pickup truck.
“Home run,” June yelled.
The crowd went crazy. Jonah dropped the bat and jogged the bases, a contented smile on his face. All the Cock Spurs who weren’t too drunk to walk rushed out to meet him at home plate, shouting and jumping. George and Nash tried to hoist him up on their shoulders, but they were too unsteady after all the moonshine. They crumpled into a heap with Jonah laughing on top.
For a second, Jonah’s eyes met mine. I gave him a proud chin tip.
“Gibs.” Devlin jogged up beside me and his expression wiped the smile from my face. Something was wrong.
My eyes darted to Callie, but she was fine—still in the stands with Shelby. She had her arms around Cash, like she was trying to keep him from scrambling away.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Lee Williams,” he said, and my blood instantly ran cold. “He’s here. I ran to my car to get Scarlett’s hoodie and I saw him.”
“You sure? You sober?”
“Stone-cold sober. Never doing that again. And yes, I’m sure. I wouldn’t raise the alarm if I wasn’t.”
“Keep it quiet,” I said. “I don’t want a scene. I’ll get Maya out of here. I saw Darren in the stands. He still here?”
“I don’t think so, but I’ll check.”
“Thanks, Dev. Make sure everyone gets on the buses to go home. And don’t tell Scarlett until morning. She’ll just want to go after him.”
“Agreed.”
Without another word, I raced around the fence to the bleachers, dodging through my neighbors. Callie was at the bottom, wrestling with Cash, who was trying to break free of his leash to get to me.
“We gotta go.” I grabbed the leash from her and took her elbow to spin her around. “Now.”
“What’s going on?”
“Devlin spotted Lee Williams.”
She didn’t reply. I kept hold of her arm and led her around the bleachers. Despite my desire to get her the fuck out of here, I didn’t run. Didn’t want to call too much attention.
We walked to the edge of the field where I’d parked my truck. I opened her side first, casting a glance around to see if anyone had followed while she climbed in with Cash. It was too damn dark. I couldn’t see a thing.
The crowd had congregated on the field to celebrate. No one seemed to have noticed us leave. That was good. I went around and hopped in, slamming the door shut.
“Get down,” I said. “Just in case.”
Callie ducked down, leaning toward the center to stay out of sight. Cash seemed to sense things were serious. He hunkered down on the seat with her.
We high-tailed it out of there as fast as I dared, heading out of town. My eyes darted between the road and my rear-view mirror. No one followed that I could see, unless they were trailing pretty far back and weren’t using their headlights.
As soon as we were past the edge of town, I gunned it, tearing up the road to my house. I took the corners fast, leaning hard. If someone was behind us, I wanted to get to my private drive before they could see me turn. Then they’d drive right by and end up in the middle of nowhere.
“Hold on,” I said, my turn coming up. I cut my lights and downshifted instead of braking, flying around the corner just shy of fast enough to flip us over. Callie braced herself against the cab, one arm holding Cash around his middle.
