Uncovered (Dev and Lee Book 4) (22 page)

I glance at Dev, whose bulk overwhelms us two foxes. He looks back at me and puts a paw down to brush my tail on the plastic bench. “Seems like you thought it might and she didn’t.”

“I’d rather talk about the championship,” he says, and forces his ears and smile up. “You guys kicked some ass in Boliat. Great interception there.”

Dev beams, and I sit back. After Hal promises that he won’t write any of this up without Dev’s permission, Dev talks about the team through the delivery and eating of our sandwiches, while I chime in every now and then with how things looked from the stands. Hal asks about Fisher, and Dev says Fisher sounded and felt fine after his injury and is hoping to play in the championship.

We both notice Hal’s reaction to that. “Hal’s writing,” I start to say, and the swift fox cuts me off.

“I’m just thinkin’ about writing a profile on the Firebirds,” he says.

“Come on,” I say. “I’m not going to
not
tell Dev what you’re working on.”

He glares at me, scowling. “Fine. But you can’t spread it around too much. I can’t afford to scare people off.”

“Scare people off? Of what?” Dev looks from him to me.

“Hal’s writing a story on football injuries,” I say. “That’s why he’s interested in Fisher.”

“Head injuries in particular,” Hal says, “but all kinds of things. Basically the long-term effects.”

“I know there’s some players who can’t really walk,” Dev says slowly. “But we have better pads now. I mean, they played back in the seventies when you just had a sheet of plastic between your joints and the uniform. And they played with ’em cracked all the time, too. I’ve seen some of that old equipment, it’s beat all to hell.”

“That’s part of it,” Hal says.

“You’re writing this by yourself?”

“Actually workin’ with a couple other guys.”

I sit up, ears perked. “You didn’t tell me that.”

He grins at me. “I don’t tell you everything, sweetheart.”

Dev turns to me with one eyebrow raised. I pat his thigh. “Remember, I was a lady for the first few weeks I knew Hal.”

“Anyway, Fisher just got his bell rung,” Dev says, turning back to Hal. “Wasn’t that serious.”

I lean in. “You haven’t noticed any changes in him since he was injured?”

“He’s been fine,” Dev says.

“He was fine during the bye week,” I say. “Well…” I hesitate, because Gena didn’t want me to talk to Dev about this at all, and because this is only tangentially related to the injury. “No, I mean, that was fine. He was fine. It’s just that he’s seemed more irritable lately.”

“Of course.” Dev looks at me like I’m crazy. “He wants to be playing. Of course he’s irritable.”

Hal’s looking at me and I feel cornered. I lay my ears back and in that second, I have to decide whether to back down and leave it unresolved, or press forward with it. If it were just Hal, I might go ahead. “Okay,” I say. “It’s just something I thought I noticed. But you know him better.”

Dev relaxes, but Hal’s eyes narrow. I look away from the swift fox, and after a moment, he goes back to asking Dev about the game. After a few minutes, I’m able to let myself relax and appreciate reliving the memory of what was really a pretty special game. I chip in some comments and get a little emotional, and long after our sandwich papers have been collected by the sheep, we’re still talking about it.

And then Hal says, “So did they taunt you at all about being gay?”

Dev exhales and shakes his head. “No.”

“Hellentown did,” I put in.

Hal looks my way and Dev slumps back against the booth seat. “They were just trying to get in my head,” he says. “They didn’t mean it.”

“That’s not what you told me after the last regular season game.”

He turns and meets my eyes. “They talked to me after.”

“Okay, okay.” I subside into the corner of the booth.

“So it’s not an issue any more,” Hal says.

“No.” Dev delivers that one word like a fist to the table. “And that’s the way I want it. I want to be judged on my performance on the field, not on what I do off it.”

“That’s what every athlete wants,” Hal says, but from his look I know he can see what I’m thinking. I feel like he’s trying to tell me something, but I don’t know what it would be. I don’t say anything, and we move on to other matters and eventually wrap up the conversation.

“He’s nice,” Dev says after we’ve said good-bye to Hal and are in the truck heading back home. “He really cares about the game.”

“Yeah.” I lean against the window and wonder how many things I can hold back for two weeks. The stuff about the Whalers guy, some of the things about my mother, and now the stuff about Fisher. I already didn’t want to talk to him about the fight, and that kind of hangs awkwardly around us, with both of us ignoring that it happened. Do I think that if he were more vocal about being gay, that would stop a couple drunken pissed-off fans from picking on the faggot fox? No. But it’s impossible to tease that thread out from the rest of the conversation.

Dev, with that kind of instinct that we’ve developed over the last couple years, reads my thoughts, and despite the awkwardness, forges ahead. “You were gonna say something about Fisher.”

“No,” I say, and then, “it can wait two weeks.”

He pauses. “If you say so.” There’s steel and edge in his voice.

I squirm, but even if I wanted to give him something to worry about, it’s not my secret. “We’re going to have a lot to talk about on that plane to Disneyworld,” I say, and his steel dissolves into a laugh. I relax back into the truck seat, feeling like I just cut the right wire on a ticking bomb. Today.

We both have calls to make, so we separate when we get home: he sits on the couch while I sit on the bed, the bedroom door closed. Peter gave me Jocko’s number and said it would be okay to call him if I didn’t hear by three today. It’s two-fifty-five, so I download a game for my phone and play it, and about ten minutes later, I call the number.

“Jack Brucker.” He’s got a voice deep as a truck engine and about as loud. I know he’s a bear, but the image of the wolf from Boliat swims into my head.

I identify myself. He pauses for a minute, then says, “Oh yeah, the scouting guy. Sorry, time got away from me.”

“You on vacation?”

“Golfing,” he said.

“I can wait ’til you’re done.”

“Nah, I finished a while ago. Get in first thing, you still got the rest of the day.” He talks short and punchy, every sentence almost a challenge. “Just catchin’ up with some old friends, but work comes first.”

Then he pauses, and even though I’m interviewing with him, I decide to jump in and get things started. “You want to hear a little about my history?”

“Sure.”

So I tell him how I got my start, watching college games. He breaks in. “So you watched ’em for the plays, right? Or the players?”

I bite my tongue—he’s not supposed to ask me shit like that—and swallow the first two answers. “I watched how the players executed the plays.”

He grunts, and I go on. I talk about the Dragons, some of our few successes and our many busts, and why I thought they were busts. “So,” he interrupts again, “y’ever bump someone up the board ’cause you thought he was hot?”

“Um.” I stare around the bedroom. The naked picture of me on the bureau doesn’t help. “No. Never. I mean, I was dating Dev by then, and—”

“Sure, yeah, I’m married. Don’t mean I don’t tip a waitress a little more if she’s smokin’.”

“Of course. No, strictly business,” I say. “The guys don’t get paid for being good-looking.”

He laughs. “They do, but not by us.”

“Right.” I pause, but he doesn’t go on, so I tell him more about the Dragons, and eventually we come to the sticky question.

“So why’d they let you go?”

I take a breath. “Because I didn’t disclose my relationship with a player.”

“Miski.”

In the silence, I hear the murmur of Dev’s voice in the other room. “Right.”

“You got any relationships with any other players we don’t know about?”

“What? No.”

“That’s the only reason you were fired?”

“As far as I know. That’s what they told me.” I pause. “You hear different?”

He whuffs a short laugh. “Heh. No. Seems kinda unfair. You lose your job, he gets a big spotlight.” He considers. “Do we gotta worry about you tellin’ Miski what we’re doin’ here?”

“No. I asked him and he’s willing to sign a non-disclosure agreement if required.”

“Huh.” He grunts again. “So whatcha been doin’ since they let you go?”

“I moved to Chevali, and—”

He cuts me off. “You’d move up here if you get the job.”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

I tell him about how I’ve been watching college games. He grills me on some players, then asks me about the Whalers and the game they played against the Firebirds. I think I acquit myself pretty well, but every moment, I’m aware of my heartbeat, like I’m walking a tightrope.

Finally he says, “Okay, look, the guys are heading out to dinner. I think I got what I need.”

“Thanks for taking the time out of your day,” I say.

“No sweat,” he says. “Tell Miski good luck and we hope they knock the fuck outta C.C.”

“I’ll tell him.” I hang up and exhale, and even grin a little. I think it went okay. I hope. His comment about me picking players based on their appearance was a little worrying, especially for someone who might be my boss. Maybe he was just making a joke, though. I can’t tell and I shouldn’t be paranoid. Not everyone who doesn’t understand gay people is a homophobe.

Dev’s still on the phone when I peek out, so I call Hal. The swift fox picks up with a chuckle. “Figured I’d be hearing from you.”

“Yeah,” I say. “So I’ll talk to you about Fisher if you talk to me about Pol.”

“Wow.” He laughs again. “I dunno, can I think about it?”

“Dev’s in the other room. Felt like you didn’t want to talk about it with him around.”

“About right.” He takes a breath. “Okay. You first.”

“Oh, no,” I say. “You’ll make some excuse to put off the conversation.”

“But,” he points out, “I’ve already told you a little bit. And this isn’t something that’s gonna go away.”

I sigh. “Well, the thing with Fisher isn’t anything you couldn’t guess.”

“Getting more irritable while recuperating from an injury. Sounds like anabolic steroids. Muscle growth?”

“Not sure. And there’s…there’s no hard evidence.” Only the growth hormone, and that just indicates probable steroid use, not definite.

“But if it smells like a muscular duck and quacks like a muscular duck…”

“It’s probably a duck on…” I lower my voice and turn up the music on the iPod. The bedroom door’s closed and I can hear Dev talking. I know his ears aren’t quite as sharp as mine, but you can never be too sure. “On steroids, yeah.”

“You think there’s any way he’d talk to me?”

“After the championship, maybe.” Gena would talk to Hal, I’m almost sure, once the game is over, and definitely once Fisher’s career is over. But I can’t volunteer her.

“Well, this is taking a while to write, so I think that’s okay. We want to put it out in the off-season anyway so it doesn’t get eclipsed by other big football news.” He pauses. “Like your boyfriend’s announcement.”

“Right.” I sit on the edge of the bed and curl my tail over my lap, flicking the white tip up and down.

“Didn’t seem to sit too well with you, him just putting it on the back burner.”

“It’s best for him. If he can just play the game and win the championship, it’ll be a lot easier to be a spokesperson for advocacy groups.”

“Unless he falls into the habit of not being a spokesperson.”

“You know, that thought had not occurred to me at all.”

Hal laughs shortly. “Okay, okay. You got your fox ears on it.”

“Yeah. So tell me, what happened with Pol?”

He’s quiet for a moment, then he says, “Oh, dang, I got a call coming in on the other line. You know, I really oughta take this.”

“Hal.”

“Seriously.”

“You know I can hear when your line clicks with another call, right? And when it doesn’t?”

“Ah, crap. What good is technology if it can’t get you out of uncomfortable conversations?” He makes kind of a stretching noise. “Pol’s a sweet girl and she liked the idea of being with a reporter.”

“Better than the reality?”

“Ayup.”

“What did she expect?”

He exhales across the phone, a slow hiss of escaping air. “Damned if I know. I think she thought we’d be working on stuff together. But when I’m on a story, you know, I got to keep things confidential and I can’t really talk about it. And when a guy calls me with the information I was looking for, I have to take the call, even if I’m out at a nice dinner.”

“That’s all? She broke up with you because you ditched her for ten minutes at dinner to take a call?”

“We-ell.” A long pause. “It was more like fifty-five minutes. And it was a double date with one of her work friends.”

“That is kinda rude.”

“It was an important call.”

“And it couldn’t have waited? Not like you have a deadline on this story.”

He snorts. “I’d been trying to reach this doctor for four days and I was pretty sure he didn’t want to talk to me, so when he called, I had to get in all the questions I wanted to ask him.”

“While Pol and her two friends waited and waited.”

“Heh. Well, they didn’t exactly wait. They sat there for about twenty minutes and then they ordered. And got their food. And finished it. She broke up with me on the way out of the restaurant.”

“Oh, come on,” I say. “That’s not a breakup. It won’t stick. She was mad. You just have to let her cool off and call her back in a day or two, tell her you’re sorry. Send her flowers—isn’t that what you straight guys do? Chocolates maybe?”

“Maybe,” he says. “I dunno.”

“She’s a coyote,” I remind him. “It’s probably just a scheme to make you want her more. She wants you to call her.”

He’s silent for a good long while, enough that I start to compose a sentence about how she’s not just a coyote, she’s also a lady whose feelings were probably hurt, but before I can get it out, he says, “Anyway, speaking of reporting, did you find a lawyer for your thing?”