Page 10 of The Devil In Denim
She allowed herself to smile briefly at Tom and then followed him out to the car where his driver was waiting. As she folded herself into the seat opposite Tom and Veronica, she couldn’t help feeling that they were all going to an execution.
Chapter Three
At least the weather gods were cooperating. Alex stared out the window, down at the field, where the press were assembling. This early in the year Staten Island was cold but it wasn’t snowing or raining, and the reporters, cameramen, and sound people were well wrapped up and apparently enjoying the coffee and food he’d laid on to keep them entertained.
There were a lot of curious expressions on their faces as they looked around and clustered around the small podium that had been set up near the pitcher’s mound. Normally he wouldn’t let several hundred people trample the grass, but right now he needed the visual of him and Mal and Lucas in the ballpark, and the grounds staff had several months to get the turf back under control.
Lucas joined him by the window. “The sharks are gathering, I see.”
“Nothing to worry about.” Alex adjusted his cuffs, mentally rehearsing his remarks for the hundredth time. “They’re going to love us.”
“Today, maybe,” Lucas said. “But if we don’t pull this off, there’s going to be blood in the water. And we’ll be the ones being dragged under and chewed into little pieces.”
“There’s that optimism I know and love,” Alex said.
“Plan for the worst, expect the?—”
“The unexpected. Tell me something I don’t know.” If the three of them had a mantra, that would be it. Drummed into their heads by Coach Paulson at college and then all too apt after the bombing. They’d all taken different lessons from what they’d gone through that day but the unofficial motto was one they all shared. Maybe it was the secret of their respective successes. They all tried their best to be at least ten steps ahead of the game in any given scenario.
Which begged the question as to what the hell they were doing here today. Because professional sports had an element of unpredictability that no one could control. The best team in the world could tank for no good reason and the underdogs could fight back from impossible situations to take all the glory. You could plan and train and strategize, but you couldn’t manage the essential … alchemy?… no, chemistry that made a team gel into a run-making, win-taking machine.
Though they were going to try to do exactly that.
There was a quiet knock on the door. Alex and Lucas swung around and Mal lifted his head from where he’d been half reclining in one of the chairs, apparently asleep.
“Come in,” Alex said, and Gardner Rothman, his company lawyer and de facto right-hand man, entered. Like the three of them, he wore a Saints tie with his suit. He looked, as always, as though he didn’t have a care in the world, even though he’d been wrangling press demands all morning while juggling phone calls from the Saints players’ irate agents and managers and personal assistants, not to mention the Saints management team. It took a lot to knock Gardner off his stride. Alex had never managed it, which was why they’d worked together for so long.
“The Jamesons are here,” Gardener announced.
“Which ones?” Mal drawled.
“Mr. Jameson and Veronica Maxwell. And Ms. Jameson.”
“Maggie’s here?” Alex said.
Gardner nodded. “Yes. Were you not expecting her?” He narrowed his eyes as he pulled out his phone, no doubt about to check the details in his calendar.
Alex took the expression to mean something like “what did you do to screw this up, boss?” He ignored it. Maggie was here.
Interesting.
He would have bet that there wasn’t enough money in the world to bribe her to darken his door after last night. Which probably meant she was here for one reason only. Her father.
Still, it might be wise to take her temperature before they went downstairs to face the baseball press. The last thing they needed was the Saints’ favorite daughter throwing a shit fit on national TV.
“Gardner, why don’t you bring Ms. Jameson in here?” Gardner nodded and turned to do just that. Alex bounced on his toes, trying to figure out what he was going to say to Maggie.
“Mal, Lucas, you go out and make nice with Tom and Veronica.” He’d only met Veronica Maxwell once, but he’d quickly formed the impression she would probably throw a party to celebrate the fact that Tom was selling the Saints. She was not fond of the sport but she was seemingly fond of Tom, and he got the feeling that she wouldn’t hesitate to express her views if she didn’t like how Tom was being treated during the transition. To anyone who might want to listen. Including ESPN, Fox Sports, the New York Times, and the commissioner of baseball. Having Lucas and Mal charm her couldn’t hurt.
Lucas shot him a suspicious look. “Why do you get to talk to Maggie?”
“Yeah, maybe we’d like to meet the famous Maggie Jameson,” Mal added with a twinkle in his eye.
“And so you will,” Alex said, ignoring the urge to grit his teeth. “But not right now. Right now, I need to talk to her. Alone.”
Lucas nodded and cocked his head at Mal. “C’mon, Coulter, let’s let Alex work his magic. We get the older generation.”
“Hardly seems fair. Particularly when it doesn’t sound like his magic worked too well on her last night.”
