Sinners Football 01- Goals for a Sinner (25 page)

A break came when the Rev saved the Sinners’

bacon with an interception on the Pats thirty-yard line. The best his team was able to do was move within field goal range before the half ended.

Knowing the fans remembered his failed kick in last year’s bowl, Ancient Andy took his place behind the ball. Sinners’ crowd fell silent. Patriots’ backers created a ruckus to shake the kicker. Stevie knew Andy Mortenson had considered retirement and stayed on because Connor Riley asked him to stick around. “We’ll get ’em next year, Andy, I promise.” That, coming from a man flat on his back with a broken neck, made a quiet slip into obscurity seem like cowardice. This one would be for Connor Riley.

Stevie captured the perfect calm and equilibrium of the grizzled kicker as he addressed the ball.

The pigskin arched up and over the outstretched arms of the tallest defenders and cleared the bar with feet to spare. The signal for halftime sounded.

As the teams jogged back to their locker rooms, the players buffeted Ancient Andy with backslaps and pulled him along with handshakes. Stevie stood close enough to hear Connor say said in passing,

“Glad you stayed with us, Andy.” He might not have won the game, but the picture of that kick told a story of redemption.

While the teams rested and the coaches plotted the second half, men and women in black or white cowboy hats strutted on to the stage. Tight black T-shirts and jeans attired the men while the female performers wore lots of fringe barely covering their breasts and long sequined pants riding just above their pubic areas, country/western gone Britney Spears. Stevie, wishing the spectacle was over, wishing the entire game was over, drank from a water bottle and did her job.

Both teams came back with renewed energy and new strategies. The Pats slugged their way down the field and scored early in the third quarter.

Billodeaux tried to return the favor. He stood like a rock amid the crashing bodies falling around him, sighted on Connor and threw his long pass.

Connor rose up to receive the ball, connected, and was slammed down hard by one of the two backs covering him. Stevie froze. Connor got up and wiped his hands on the small red towel at his waist as he searched the sidelines. When he found her, he gave a slight wave telling her he was fine. The crowd took the wave as their own, applauded and started coursing it around the stadium, but Stevie knew he had thrown her a lifeline and they were holding each other steady on both ends of it.

The first half had been easy on Connor with Joe unable to deliver his passes. The Sinners’ halfback took much of the heat and Joe himself ran the ball a couple of times when no receivers came open.

Cameras in the locker room caught Coach Buck cautioning Joe Dean during the break, “Don’t get hurt, boy. Trust your line and get those passes out.” Good advice, Stevie thought, if only Joe could follow it. Billodeaux visibly tried to act on that advice, but his next pass to Deets was batted down. The next, also to Deets, intercepted and run back to the fifty-yard line. The defense held the Pats to a field goal, score 3-10.

Stevie wondered if Joe Dean was being soft on Connor or were the two backs stalking his favorite wide receiver really keeping him from passing in that direction? Billodeaux back-stepped, faked towards Deets, swiveled and shot the ball to Riley.

Connor moved toward the goal line, then reversed and plunged through a gap between the defenders to snatch the ball from the air. Both backs brought him down hard on his face but the ball rested on the twenty-yard line. Connor sat up, not rising immediately.

Coaches and medics pushed past Stevie on their way to the field. They helped Connor up and back to the bench, but his head turned in Stevie’s direction.

She saw his nod through the viewfinder of the camera she used to cover the two tears running down her face. She swabbed her face with the long sleeve of the red Sinners jersey, a souvenir item bearing Conner’s number eighty on the back, covered from sight by her photographer’s vest.

Coach replaced Riley with the young receiver, Forte, and the rookie got the honors as Billodeaux fired one into the end zone to tie the game, 10-10, going into the fourth quarter. The clock ran down.

Neither team scored. The Sinners held the ball with two minutes to play. Coach Buck sent Riley back in along with Deets and Forte to dilute the defense and give Joe Dean as many targets as possible. Acting as superstitious as Joe Dean, Stevie sucked in her breath and crossed her fingers Billodeaux completed two short passes to Deets, pulling the defense over to his side of the field, and called a last time out. After much conferring and shaking of heads, Joe came back to the line of play.

Deets seemed to be his chosen receiver again, but Joe Dean lobbed one instead to Forte in the center of the field. Goal defenders surged towards Forte, two from his right, one from his left. He hesitated instead of running, then threw a lateral to Connor Riley who had moved up stealthily a few yards from Forte. His guard, caught facing Forte, failed to intercept as Connor connected, surged forward, deflected a last minute tackle with a strong back kick and crossed the goal line.

Time ran out and stood still as Connor Riley, holding the ball high, passed beneath the goal posts and kept on running. He spiked the football, but did not stop. Stevie Dowd stood beyond the end zone letting Connor fill the frame of her camera. She caught his triumphant spring under the goal post, his spike of the ball, the golden hair on his shoulders, the determined look on the face beneath the helmet he tore off as he kept coming. He reached forward, seized Stevie by the waist, and swung her around and around.

Her camera flew back across her shoulder on its strap. Her feet left the ground and even her ponytail could not keep the black Sinners cap on her head.

Laughing, she said, “Connor Riley, you are a thing of beauty. Now put me down before you get fined for excessive celebration.”

“They won’t fine me tonight. Stevie Dowd, I love you. Are you willing to marry a Super Bowl winner?”

“I would marry Connor Riley, any time, any place, in any condition and without any reservations.”

The long, long kiss went largely unnoticed among the people in the celebrating crowd on the field, but was caught on national television and by Dexter Sykes who always got good shots when his ex-girlfriend was involved. Dex snapped away while Connor and Stevie ignored him. These pics might be too mushy and sentimental for
 
Sports Illustrated
, but the tabloids or even
People
 
magazine would love to have it on their covers. Stevie had truly set him on the road to a new career.

Dex followed the sports reporters as they advanced into the fray, microphones held before them like lances. They captured Coach Buck up on the big screen with his arm around Joe Dean Billodeaux.

“I can only say this boy has grown up right before my eyes. He has changed from a cocky, woman-chasing sonofabitch to one of the best quarterbacks in the league, a real leader who cares about his team and led them to this victory in the Super Bowl.” The five-second delay omitted the questionable words and the mike moved towards Joe Dean.

“It’s a privilege to play with great men like Connor Riley and Rev Bullock, old-timers like Andy Mortenson and new talent like DeVon Deets and Jared Forte. We’ve got the best linemen in the league, the best team in the league, and we just proved it! But ladies, I’m still a woman-chasing sonofabitch and I start again tonight.” The networks deleted all of Joe’s last remark.

On the edge of the crowd surrounding Joe Dean and the coach, Margaret Stutes lurked. She pointed a finger at the quarterback.

With Connor now standing next to him, Stevie in tow, Joe whispered, “Did you see that? I hope they got a whole case of champagne in the locker room with my name on it because that’s how much I need to keep my word to Margaret.” The reporters homed in on Connor Riley like heat-seeking missiles. He pulled Stevie against his side when they surrounded him. “Think you will be voted Most Valuable Player, Connor?”

“I don’t deserve the honor. You can’t achieve a victory like this without a great friend and quarterback like Joe Dean Billodeaux, a fantastic team that gave me a second chance to come back, and the support of the ones you love the best.” He smiled down on Stevie Dowd.

“When’s the wedding, Stevie?” Rita Fortunado shouted out.

“Any time, any place, anywhere without any conditions,” she answered.

****

Up in the press box, Al Harney said to Hank Wilkes, “Well, this is the end of a story that started last season. Connor Riley gets my vote for MVP.”

“Not Joe Dean Billodeaux who had a fantastic season and undoubtedly argued for that last winning play?” questioned Hank.

“Billodeaux has come a long way this season, no doubt about it, but he is going to be with this team for many years. Riley came back from a horrendous accident last season and pulled out of a career damaging slump this season to make a major difference in this game. He exemplifies the best in football. As I said, he gets my vote.”

“And the hero gets the girl, Al.”

“A happy ending all around, Hank.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

New Age music on zithers or dulcimers or sitars twanged in Stevie’s ears driving her slightly nuts.

She raised one of the herbal teabags the facial technician had plunked on her eyes like pennies on a corpse right after placing a trowel full of goop called
 
cucumber moisturizing lotion
 
on Stevie’s face.

Scented candles flickered all around her in the dim room.

She looked down the row of five women stretched out flat to her left: Mintay, her two sisters, Sharlette Dobbs, and the mound of Precious Armitage on the very end. All wore thick, white terry robes, pale green facial masks, teabags and turbans to keep the stuff out of their hair. Paper flip-flops protected their fresh pedicures. Stevie had already blotched her freshly painted nails when she tried to get the restroom door open after too many cups of green tea. Oh well, fooling with her cameras would have done the same. She was supposed to be relaxing or meditating or something, but the whole scenario said “funeral” to her.

She sure hoped the team wives wouldn’t give
 
her
 
a bachelorette party like this one with a morning at the spa, a three martini lunch to follow, then shopping, an evening at the House of Blues and maybe some time at the casino. Tick off the things Stevie Dowd did not enjoy and the only activity left would be the House of Blues. Still, she’d enjoyed the pedicure. Foot rubs stepped high up on the rungs of her pleasures. A second group of wives took theirs now while a third set went in for massages. Stevie’s stomach growled. Lunch with or without the martinis would be welcome.

“I heard that,” Precious Armitage said. “I’m rumbling, too. I could eat this stuff we got on our faces.”

“No clocks in here. That German babe who gives the rough massages seized my watch on the way in, but I think we are almost done.”

“Not enjoying yourself, Stevie? This is a real treat for me and I want to thank you, ladies,” Mintay said. Like the Rev, she was always gracious. “Sorry I couldn’t ask you to be in the wedding, but the Bullocks and the Greens have huge families full of girls who want to play dress up.”

“That’s okay. I never was much of a princess.”

“But you are marrying a handsome prince of a man in June.”

“Amen to that,” Sharlette Dobbs, so often neglected by her own husband, said.

“I do have a special favor I’d like to ask of you.” Mintay removed her teabags and turned her head slightly in Stevie’s direction.

“I owe you for standing by me. What can I do for you?”

“Neutralize Joe Dean Billodeaux at my wedding.”

“Ah, I don’t think Connor would like that.

Besides, Joe won’t go off alone with the girlfriends or relatives of other players, married women or under-aged chicks. Virgins are also outside his limits, and still his little black book is full. Are you worried he will hit on the bridesmaids? None of them qualify for Joe.” “Now that’s a damned shame,” Mintay’s older sister said.

“Kind of makes me wish I hadn’t gotten married two years ago. Who knew my sister, the doctor, would marry a Sinner and open up a whole new field for me. Guess I will just have to be content with Zack and my new baby,” the bride’s younger sister added.

“Zack is a fine man and your baby is precious.

Be thankful for what you have as my fiancée would say. I didn’t mean sleep with him, Stevie.”

“Well, I can’t castrate the guy either, much as I’d like to sometimes. Though, maybe Coach Buck would thank me. Joe’s mind would be entirely on the game then.”

“Stevie, you are awful yourself sometimes. No. I meant fix him up with a woman who will hold his attention, someone who won’t fall into bed with him easily. Like the Wish Lady, the one who volunteers for the Louisiana Wish Kidz. Rev and I went to the funeral for little Willie Jones, and she was there.

The Rev introduced me to her as the only woman who ever made Joe Dean go slack-jawed. He brought along a copy of that picture you took. Almost made us laugh at a very solemn occasion. Nell is small but she does have substance. I invited her to our wedding. How about her for Joe Dean? I think she could handle him since she’s a child psychologist.”