Drive You Wild: A Love Between the Bases Novel (28 page)

Crush’s head swiveled around and he ripped off his sunglasses. “What the—”

“Where are Paige and Nina?” Trevor asked urgently. If anyone understood how important this was, it would be Crush.

A frown creased Crush’s forehead, but Trevor couldn’t tell what it meant. Duke appeared at Trevor’s
elbow, screaming. “You’re out. You hear me? I’m taking you out of this game.”

Trevor held him off with one hand. “I already took myself out. Crush, have you seen them here today?”

Slowly, Crush rose to his feet. “Haven’t seen them.”

“Call Paige.”

Holding his gaze, Crush dialed Paige’s number, then slowly shook his head. Panic flooded Trevor’s body, made the blood pound in his ears. “Something’s wrong, Crush. Alert security. Please.”

“Calling right now.” He pushed a button on his phone. “Meet me in the concourse, Trevor.” He bent to say something to Wendy Trent. She nodded and got to her feet.

“What’s going on? What’s happening?” Duke kept jabbering questions at him. The other Catfish poured out of the dugout to join the two of them beneath the owner’s box. Trevor needed to go in the opposite direction, toward the dugout, so he could reach the concourse. He tried to muscle through the throng of his teammates, but Dwight blocked his way.

“Tell us what’s happening, Trevor.”

“I have to get through.” He scrambled for his usual icy calm, but it was no use. Images of glinting knives and vicious men kept chasing through his head. His heart raced so fast he could barely draw a breath, let alone speak. His words came out in a stammer. “Paige is missing, and so is Nina. I can’t explain it all right now, but it’s bad. They could be in danger. I need to get through. Let me through.”

But instead of letting him through, they surrounded him and buoyed him toward the dugout. In his terrified state, Trevor barely understood what was happening. All he knew was that his teammates whisked him through the dugout and down the corridor and before
he knew it he was on the concourse. Crush strode toward him, trailed by the head of stadium security, who was issuing commands into his headpiece.

The owner paused at the sight of the throng of players. “What the hell? Who’s supposed to be batting right now?”

“Me, I guess,” said Ramirez. “Duke, you better replace me.”

“With who?” The manager rolled onto the concourse, rubbing his belly. “Ain’t no one in the dugout
to
replace you.”

Crush raised his hand for quiet. “Question for you all, since you’re here instead of where you’re supposed to be. Who’s up for a search party?”

A jumble of voices answered in a chaotic free-for-all. Finally Dwight’s deep voice cut through the chaos. “If Paige is in danger, none of us want to be on that field.”

“Fair enough. Bob, brief them on what we know so far while I make a call.” Crush turned aside to mutter into his phone, out of earshot of the players.

The security chief, a potbellied, nearly bald former cop, addressed the group of players. “According to the guards at the exits, no cars have left the lot in the past hour. Paige was seen entering in Crush’s Range Rover about forty-five minutes ago. What that means is that chances are good that she’s still somewhere in the stadium.”

“And my sister Nina? Small, blond?”

“There was someone in the Range Rover with Paige, but the guard didn’t get a good look at her. We’re going on the assumption it was her.”

Crush ended his call and rejoined them.

“Mr. Taylor, what do you want me to do with the people in the stands?” the security chief asked.

“I’ll handle that. You get these guys organized.”

“Yes, boss.”

“Trevor, come with me.” Crush beckoned him off to the side.

As Trevor followed, a TV mounted in the corridor caught his attention. Donna MacIntyre and Mayor Trent were at the pitcher’s mound, where a mic had been set up.

“Hello, Kilby Catfish fans, and welcome to our guests here from Omaha. I’m the mayor of Kilby, Wendy Trent, and I have an important announcement for y’all. The Kilby Catfish have decided to forfeit this game.”

The audience erupted into boos.

“I know, I know, they’re so sorry for the inconvenience to y’all. Unfortunately, we have a potentially dangerous situation happening here in the stadium, and we want all of y’all to be safe. The head of security has asked that you all stay right where you are until further notice. We don’t want anyone taking any risks with their safety. As soon as they feel it’s safe for you to leave, we’ll let you know. In the meantime, Ms. Donna MacIntyre has some games and contests to help keep you entertained. Thank you all so much for your patience and cooperation.”

Crush shook his head in admiration. “Hell of a woman, that mayor. Come on, Manning is waiting for us.”

Trevor glanced back at the Catfish, who were now being joined by members of the security team to listen to the chief’s instructions. Dwight caught his eye and sent him a reassuring wink.

And just like that, he knew. Never again would he shut anyone out. Paige had melted all that ice away from his heart, leaving nothing but love and a desperate need to get her back in his arms and never let her go.

“W
HAT ARE YOU
talking about?” The kidnapper scowled at Nina as if she’d grown an extra head. His phone rang but he ignored it.

“I’m talking about the crime that my brother confessed to. That he went to juvie for,” Nina explained patiently. “He didn’t do it. I did.”

“When Dinar got his head smashed with a bat?”

Nina winced. “Yes. I didn’t mean to hurt him, I just wanted him to get off my father.”

“You’re telling me a little girl like you did him in?”

Paige rolled off Nina, since there seemed to be no point in getting her to stop talking now.

“Well . . . I’m not a little girl, although I guess I was back then, and I didn’t ‘do him in.’ He’s fine, right?”

“He’s alive. Never did get his killer instinct back. It’s like you messed something up in his brain.”

“Sorry,” Nina said in a small voice, dropping her head. “I really didn’t mean for that to happen. I didn’t mean any of it. Not what I did to Dinar, not what happened to Trevor afterward. I’m trying to make up for it.”

“How do you make up for a man’s brain not working right? Wait a minute.” The man used his phone to
scratch at his scraggly beard. “Is it you that’s been sending him packages? Books and music and so forth?”

Nina gasped. “How did you know about that?”

“It ain’t a secret. Wait’ll I tell him it was a girl that bashed his head in.” He grinned, revealing a flash of silver in his dental work.

Nina blew a wisp of blond hair out of her face. “You shouldn’t make fun of him. I always had a strong swing, just like my brother.”

The kidnapper just chortled, as if already composing the insults he was going to deliver.

Paige stared in amazement at the girl handcuffed to her. “You’ve been sending presents to that man? The one who attacked your father?”

Nina turned pink. “Well, yes. I just felt so bad about everything. I just wanted him to get off my dad, I didn’t mean to hurt him that much. I found out that he was still having some cognitive issues and I read that more mental stimulation can help repair the nerve synapses. I was just trying to help him get better.”

“Wow.” Paige rubbed her forehead, trying to get a grip on this crazy development. “Does Trevor know you tracked down the Wachowski gang member that you sent to the hospital?”

“Of course not! And I never put my address on my care packages. I always sent them anonymously. I never visited him in person because Trevor would have lost his mind if I did that. But I had to do something, especially because Trevor was the one who paid for my crime. Anyway . . .” Nina turned back to their kidnapper. “If you could inform the Wachowskis that they have no more reason to go after Trevor Leonov, I’d really appreciate it. I’m taking full responsibility for my actions. I no longer want someone else to pay for what I did. Can you just tell them that, do you think?”

“Leonov’s a marked man, little sister. No matter what you say.” The man’s phone rang again. He rolled his eyes. “Micromanaging dickface,” he muttered, then answered it. Then he flinched, all bravado vanishing. “You’re fucking kidding me. Not my fault, boss.”

Paige and Nina glanced at each other as the kidnapper took in a stream of ugly-sounding words, color leaching from his face.

“I followed instructions. That’s all I got to say. I told you we should’ve— Right. No excuses. Want me to bring the girl? Hostage, like?” A sharp response made him cringe and go slightly green. “Fine. Just get me out of here and no one’s the wiser.”

He hung up and stuck his phone into the inner jacket of his pocket, muttering to himself. “This ain’t my fucking fault. Shit. They pin this on me, I’m back to zero.” He looked at the women with a freaked-out expression that actually made Paige feel sorry for him. “I’m out. You girls owe me a pair of handcuffs.”

“What do you mean? What’s going on?” As nasty as the kidnapper was, getting left in a deserted storage room made Paige even more anxious. No one ever came up here until it was time to discard another couch.

“What’s going on is, they took a half-assed approach and now it’s backfired. They didn’t let me go after Leonov. Said it wasn’t the right time. This is just some frickin’ favor for someone. Now it’s all fucked up and I’m screwed unless—” Something occurred to him. “Unless Notswego still has a soft spot for you.”

She shook her head violently. “We’re through. Definitely through.”

“Tough luck for all of us. I gotta get out of here.” He loped toward the far end of the storage room, where a back stairway led to . . . Paige’s heart sank as she realized that it led to a delivery bay that wasn’t used
anymore. It would be easy for him to disappear over the chain-link fence back there. It wasn’t guarded or monitored.

“You can’t just leave us here!” Paige called after him. “What was the whole point of this, anyway?”

“The point is, it’s always the new guy who gets screwed, ever notice that? I’d go grab Leonov myself, but the boss didn’t want to hear about that.” With a rude gesture, the kidnapper yanked open the door that led to the stairway.

Paige yelled, “If you let us go, we’ll say you didn’t hurt us.”

The door slammed shut with a loud boom.

Paige and Nina looked at each other as quiet settled around them. Dust rose from the couch every time they shifted position. The air felt warm and stifling. “I get the feeling they didn’t exactly send their top guy down here.”

“Should we be insulted?” Nina let out a long sigh. “Thank you for getting kidnapped with me. If you weren’t here, I’d be pretty scared. And you know what? I’m actually not. Well, not terribly, anyway. I’m more scared of what they’re going to do to Trevor later on. They definitely know he’s here. Do you think that man will pass my message along to the Wachowskis?”

“I don’t know. He sure seemed to get a kick out of it.” Paige surveyed the couch. “Can we try dragging the couch to the elevator?”

“Do you think it would fit in there?” Nina glanced dubiously at the couch.

“I have no idea, but maybe we can set off the alarm in the elevator or something. On three, let’s try standing up.”

On the count of three, they both rose to their feet. Nina tried to step forward with the foot that was zip
-tied to the leg of the couch but didn’t even manage to budge it. “Should we sit on the floor and try to drag it?”

“Sure.” But that didn’t work either, since Nina had to face away from the couch and Paige was unable to twist around enough to get a grip on it.

“I know,” Nina finally said. “I’ll kind of hug the end of the couch and you can go all the way to the back. You can push from there, and I’ll pull with my leg.”

They managed to bump the couch forward a few feet before Nina fell backward on her butt.

“Are you okay?” Paige peered over the top of the couch. Nina curled on her back like a roly-poly bug, her whole body shaking.

“Ye-es,” she gasped, and Paige realized she was laughing. “It’s just . . . so . . . silly. All these years we’ve been so afraid of the Wachowskis and what they would do if they found us. Well, ta-da! Here I am. Handcuffed to a . . . a supercomfy couch. And look! I think I see some spare change under the cushions.” She laughed even harder, her face turning as pink as bubble gum.

“But . . .” Paige didn’t want to get swept into the gale of laughter overcoming Nina. “It’s not funny. This could be really bad. What if no one finds us up here? We aren’t planning any redecorating this year.”

That just made Nina laugh all the more. “Redecorating!” She pounded her free fist on the floor. “Redecorate . . . we got kidnapped and you’re talking about redecorating . . .” Tears of laughter flowed down her face.

“Wait! That’s it.” Paige scrambled to her feet, using her free hand to leverage herself against the back.

“What is? Redecorating?”

“No. Pounding. Let’s lift the couch up and drop it. Just a few inches, not enough to hurt your ankle. If we do it over and over, we should get someone’s attention.”

Nina’s face lit up. “You’re a genius! What’s underneath us?”

“I’m not sure exactly, but some part of the front office. Someone will hear.”

“Do you think they’re looking for us?”

“Absolutely.” She remembered Trevor making her promise to come to the games. “I guarantee that Trevor knows something’s wrong and that he notified someone.”

Nina rolled herself back into a sitting position and gave a wistful sigh. “What’s it like to have someone be so in love with you, like Trevor is? Especially someone as amazing as my big brother?”

Paige bit her lip. “He is pretty amazing, isn’t he?”

“Do you think all baseball players are like Trevor?”

“Nina.” Paige jerked her wrist to get the younger girl’s attention. “Can we address your not-so-secret crush another time? I don’t want Trevor or anyone else to worry longer than they have to.”

“I wonder if Jim Leiberman knows I’m missing. Do you think he’s worried too?”

“Nina!”

“Sorry. Okay, let’s try this.”

Paige came back to Nina’s side of the couch and sat tailor-style next to her. Together, they lifted the couch two inches off the floor and then dropped it. It made a very satisfying thud. They grinned at each other.

“Again.”

W
ith the audience confined to their seats and the press box in a frenzy, the Catfish players and security team divided into teams assigned to search different quadrants of the stadium. Even the Storm Chasers volunteered to help, after word reached them that the game had been forfeited and there might be a criminal at large in the ballpark. The Kilby police were already on their way.

As the searchers split up, Trevor followed Crush upstairs to the management wing, now virtually deserted. They hurried down the aisle to Crush’s office, where a man in casual business attire tapped at his smartphone. Trevor hadn’t met him before, only spoken to him on the phone.

“Special Agent Manning.” Crush shut the door behind him. “This is Trevor Stark.”

Trevor wanted to clock the man in the jaw but restrained himself. “You said nothing would happen,” he growled at the agent.

“No, I didn’t. I said they weren’t planning anything big. It doesn’t look like this is big. We’re thinking one guy, two max.”

The man had a cool and cynical air about him that rubbed Trevor all wrong. “Screw you. How many does it take?”

Crush gripped his forearm. “We’ll find them, Trevor.”

“Not standing here, we won’t.” Trevor turned his back on the two and stalked toward the door.

“Hang on,” the agent called after him. “I have a few more questions for you about what Dean Wade said to you.”

“
Now?
How can you guys waste time like this when Paige and Nina are in danger?”

“We don’t think they’re in any real danger,” said the agent, much too casually for Trevor’s taste. “The Wades are probably using the girls to get to you. Or maybe simply to be disruptive. They won’t inflict any harm, there’s no margin in it.”

Sharp fury coursing through his veins, Trevor stormed back to the agent and went nose-to-nose with him. “Do you know that for sure? Can you guarantee one hundred percent that Nina and Paige aren’t experiencing even one millisecond of pain or suffering?”

“Back off, buddy.”

A strong arm wrapped around his chest from behind and dragged him away from the agent. “Do you really want to add attacking a federal officer to all the other missteps in your history?” Crush growled in his ear.

“I don’t fucking care. I need to find Nina and Paige.” A desperate need for action ripped at him. “I can’t just stand here and do nothing.”

“You already did the most important thing. You told me what was going on. We can nail the bastards.”

“You think I care about that?” He rammed his elbow into Crush’s gut and felt the man’s grip relax. “I care about Paige. That’s all that matters now. And if you don’t see it that way, you’re even more of a fuckhead than I thought. Leave me be, or you can both forget about my testimony.” He was out of the office before anyone could even try to stop him.

“Trevor!”

In the hallway, Trevor turned to see Crush burst out of the office. He braced himself for battle, legs apart, poised to respond to whatever came next. “Bring it on, Crush. I don’t want to hurt Paige’s father, but I’ll do whatever it takes.”

Crush stopped a few feet away, just out of swinging distance. “Every inch of this stadium is being searched. We’ll find them. Answer me this. Do you love Paige?”

The question threw him even more than a punch would have. “That’s not your business.”

“I’m making it my business. I screwed up last time. I thought I could hardline it, make her back down from her plan to marry that asshole. Instead I drove her away and didn’t see her for three years. Then she hooked up with you and I had to learn my lesson all over again. She’s a grown woman who knows her own mind. But I’m asking you as a father, just tell me. Do you love her?”

Trevor straightened, his hands falling to his sides. He’d never imagined seeing that much raw vulnerability written across Crush’s cynical face. It disarmed him. He could imagine the torment of losing three years of Paige in your life. He didn’t want to lose three minutes. “I love her,” he said quietly. “And I will never let her down. I’ll never hurt her. Her happiness is everything to me.”

Crush narrowed his eyes as if he could bore right into Trevor’s soul. “You’re starting to convince me.”

“I’m not aiming to convince you. I love Paige, and I believe she loves me. What we do about it is our business.”

Crush nodded thoughtfully. “That might be true. But there’s a part of Paige that knows I was right about Hudson. Do you want to make her defy her father all over again?”

“No, I don’t want that.” Trevor ran his hand across the back of his head, every nerve ending screaming in frustration. Someone was pounding on a door somewhere and it was making him nuts. “I know I’m not what any parent would want for their daughter. I’ve been to some dark places. But I’ve tried to do my best. I have plenty of money, and I’ll have even more if the Friars call me up.”

“What was that book you were reading back in Lansing?”

The question was so far out of left field that it made Trevor dizzy.
“What?”