“Son of a bitch,” I muttered to myself when Simon’s wristwatch beeped with the time.
Marc trotted up next to me, his face flushed and shocked. “Did we lose?”
I nodded slowly, halfway in a stupor. “Yes.”
“How?” he asked. We never lost, especially not when he and I were on a team together.
“It was him,” I answered. There was no need to point. We both knew who I was referring to.
We both just looked at each other and silently went off to cower in our disappointment. I grabbed my bat, tucked my glove under my arm and stretched. Halfway through a body settled onto the ground next to me, and I knew it was Kulti.
Asshole.
When he didn’t say anything, I felt my frustration race up. When I didn’t find it in me to say anything either, my anger just ticked up a little higher. Eventually he looked over and kept his expression blank. “A coach of mine used to say that no one likes a sore loser.”
My eyebrows went into a straight line. “I find it hard to believe that you listened to him.”
His brown eyebrows went up and a hint of an angelic, serene look took over his features. “I didn’t. I’m only telling you what I have been told, Taquito.”
What a smart-ass.
We wereat the airport in Seattle on the way back to Houston, following our second game a few days later, when I spotted the crowd surrounding our sensation of a coach.
Not again.
I hadn’t said anything about the crowd around the Audi after the first game, and I hadn’t heard anyone else say anything about it either. To be honest, I hadn’t given it much thought. Since then, I’d played softball with the German and even joked around with him for a little bit, at least as much as his dry humor was capable of.
On the other hand, nothing had changed while we were on Pipers time. He still ripped me a new one each chance he had. I hadn’t given him another ride home, either. The black Audi was always there after practice, its tint so dark I’d bet a dollar it was illegal.
Everything seemed to run normally, not bringing any unwanted attention to this new buddy I had. No one had a clue, with the exception of Marc, who wasn’t speaking to me unless he had to because I’d brought Kulti to softball and hadn’t warned him. He’d get over it eventually.
Besides that, everything was fine. The Pipers played another game and won, and now we were heading home. I’d gotten a ride in the last van to the leave the hotel along with Jenny, my hotel-room buddy.
The chunk of the team that had arrived before or with the German, was scattered throughout the gate. Several airport security stood close by, while the people who recognized Kulti stood in front of him, staring. Oblivious to his audience or simply settling for pretending they weren’t there, Kulti was looking down at his iPad like he didn’t have people treating him as if he was in a fishbowl.
Why wasn’t he in the colonel’s lounge, or whatever it was called, like he’d been on the flight over?
Kulti looked up and around. His face was expressionless, but he caught me watching and something passed between us, something that only my gut understood. He was doing the same thing he had back during the preseason game when that fan had stopped him. So he knew that he was surrounded. He was looking for help.
I could have ignored him. I was well aware of how easy it would be to pretend I hadn’t seen him. Damn it.
“Jen, do you have your Uno cards with you?” I really hoped this didn’t backfire on me. I wasn’t sure my pride could handle it.
Standing right next to me, as she sipped on the Americano she’d purchased on the walk over, she nodded. “Always.”
“Are you ready to do your good deed of the day?” I asked her, knowing damn well what her answer would be.
“Sure. What are we doing?”
“We’re going to see if Kulti wants to play.”
Her almond-shaped eyes didn’t even blink once. “We are?”
“Yes.”
It took her a second to catch up when I made my way over to the lonely German, but she followed, without an argument. He looked up as I took the open seat on his left, his backpack was on the other seat, and Jenny took the open one on my other side. His eyebrows made a funny line, like he wasn’t sure what exactly was going on and was undecided about whether or not it was a good thing.
Jenny passed the deck of cards over to me—sneaky, sneaky, sneaky.