Page 49 of Moonshot

Behind me, there was the loud pop of a champagne bottle, and I flinched.

74

After those minutes with Chase, I suddenly couldn’t stand Tobey’s touch. I didn’t feel worthy, not with his loving gaze already clawing through my skin. That night, when he pulled me to him, I winced, the brush of his fingers across my stomach prickly, my hand unable to stop in pushing him away.

“Not tonight.”

“Do you feel okay?” He was worried, after my rush to the bathroom during the game. I’d had nausea during my first pregnancy. So maybe … always the maybe, floating out there. He didn’t know about the birth control implant I had put in. I’d done it after the miscarriage, terrified of the chance of another baby, one that might chain us together forever. Now, four years later, our marriage was in a different, stronger place, one where love had grown from the seeds of friendship and circumstance. But even after the love, I didn’t remove the implant. I told myself that I couldn’t handle another loss. And I didn’t tell Tobey. I’m not sure why, except that I didn’t know how to discuss my motivations. How do you tell your husband that you don’t want to carry his child?

“Just something I ate.” I could feel the disappointment in his silence. He kissed the back of my neck, our bodies connected, torso to toes, and I closed my eyes, trying to relax against his touch. The love of a man who had stayed. It should have felt wonderful. Instead, it felt empty.

Funny how much things could change in four years. In the beginning, when we were first pushed into the engagement, Tobey didn’t care about the team. It was my thing. Mine and his father’s. Tobey was an occasional participant in team meetings, sometimes at games, his schedule as sporadic as our affection, our common ground being our impending parenthood. After we lost the baby, we were two strangers in a big, new house, avoiding the nursery, avoiding each other, neither sure why we were still in the union. The team was what pushed us back together, Tobey’s father having his first stroke, stepping down from his role in the organization, and pushing Tobey to take the reins. I think the old man knew what he was doing; I think he saw our marriage falter and wrapped pinstripes around the two of us, binding us. Whether by design or fate, we stepped into Thomas Grant’s shoes as one, splitting duties and decision-making, our stiff dinners becoming more of business meetings, everything focused on the team and its success. And success did come, both for the team and for us. We moved on from the baby. Had sex more, awkward conversation less. We became friends, grew to respect each other’s opinions, trust each other’s decisions. Tobey grew up from a spoiled rich kid, and I grew up from a tomboy. And from our friendship, grew a love. A love that I thought would carry us, and the team, until our deaths.

“I love you,” he whispered against my hair.

“I love you too.”

I loved him. I did. Anything that I had once had with Chase … it had to stay in the past. What had happened in that powder room—it could never happen again.

SEPTEMBER

“Julie Gavin … she died on September 29, 2013. A date that will live in Yankee history. Her death left the clues that everyone needed to start tying the girls together. For starters, she was wearing a Chase Stern jersey, one from the 2011 season. Add the fact that she was left at the stadium, and a giant red arrow couldn’t have been any clearer. That was when the press started calling it The Curse of Chase Stern. That was when the detectives started looking at dates and for Yankee connections with each of the blondes. Julie Gavin, bless her soul, was the tie they all needed. Her blood’s still there, on the pavement outside the west gate. They tried to hide it, poured fresh concrete over it, but it’s there, a mark that will never leave that stadium.”

Dan Velacruz, New York Times

75

My entire life, I’d known security. The team, whether it was the Pirates or the Yankees, always had security, men in black uniforms that flanked the players as we traveled, local cops closing roads, opening pathways, and holding fans at bay. After a while, they faded into the background, just one more bit of wallpaper in my life.

As a Grant, our security was completely different. Our home was a fortress, a trusted team of security everywhere. It was stifling, when I moved in, the feeling of constant monitoring. It was why I loved our weekends at the Hampton estate, the security protocol there almost non-existent. We had only one guard, James. He sat at the front gate, three hundred pounds of muscle that discouraged gawkers. And inside the house, we were free. Free to wander down to the beach, swimsuits optional. Free to fall asleep on the couch, the windows open, the scent of the ocean strong. Everything about that house was an escape, away from the city, away from the team, away from the murders.

Until Tiffany Wharton tainted it.

After that, there was no escape. After that, there was no more running. After that, everything in our world narrowed into one focus: Winning. Our world became a prison, the World Series our key to escape. And my nights on the field? That was my prison time spent in the yard. A big yard, one where gods played. A yard with thousands of steps and halls, plastic and grass and clay. It was the most secure compound in the Bronx, and it was, at times, the only thing that held my sanity in check.

The parking garage was quiet, my Range Rover the only car present, the sound of the door echoing through the empty space. I stepped to the back of it, opening the hatch, Titan jumping to the ground beside me, his nails clicking along the concrete. When I shut the hatch, I set the alarm, dropping my keys in my bag. It might be a fortress, but this was still New York, still the Bronx. I hit the button for the elevator, glancing at Titan as he sat, facing out, at full alert. We got him from Germany, completely trained, his journey to the US accompanied by a handler, a short man who lived with us for two weeks and yelled at me a lot. Apparently I had needed a lot more training than Titan. But now, three years later, Titan and I worked together just fine. He protected me, and I snuck him table scraps when Tobey wasn’t looking.

The elevator opened, and I stepped on, pressing the button for the ground level. As it descended, I picked up the elevator’s phone, listening to the automatic ring. Somewhere, making rounds, were more security guards, four of them. When my miss of the field had become too great, when I decided to move my midnight workouts here, Tobey had worried. Not worried enough to accompany me, his early mornings putting him on a different sleep schedule than me. Initially, he’d had one of the house team escort me. But in the quiet of the night, the extra person had seemed invasive, as if I were being caged more than protected. So we had made an agreement. I’d bring Titan, and I’d check in with security when I arrived and departed. The arrangement allowed Tobey to sleep well at night, and I didn’t feel smothered. Didn’t feel as smothered. At some point in my life, I’d find the ability to live a life without pressure. At some point, I wanted a lack of expectations, and appearances, and decisions that affected lives.

Security answered and I cleared my throat, speaking into the phone. “It’s Ty.”

“Good evening, Mrs. Grant. How long will you be with us this evening?”

“About an hour. On the field and in the stands.”

“Wonderful. Will you need us to open the locker facilities?”

“No, not tonight.” The elevator shuddered, the doors opening on the ground level. “Thank you.”

“Certainly.”

I hung up the phone and stepped out, Titan beside me. All was dim, emergency lights bathing the halls in a soft, red light, and I flipped switches as we walked, bringing the hallway to life, my steps quickening as I got closer to the place where I was happiest.

I’d heard that cutters enjoyed the pain of their activity because it caused them to feel. I’d never understood that until the first night I’d stepped back out on this field, almost two years after Chase left. I didn’t know why I first did it. Part of it was because I had ordered myself to stop mourning his loss, and was ready to take the first step. Part of it was because I’d thought I was ready, ready to reenter the world which my pregnancy, which my dad’s retirement, which my marriage—had all taken away. The nights afforded me privacy, the late hours insuring no party to my pain. Each visit, the scent of the grass, the dig of cleats into the dirt … each sensation brought back a flood of memories. Sometimes I cried, most nights I didn’t. But I always felt.

At some point, I’d be able to replace his memories with new ones of my own—my midnight workouts with Titan an attempt to paint over the past. An attempt that hadn’t happened yet. And now that he was back … that goal stretched even further into improbability.

I grabbed a bucket of balls and pushed through the double doors, stepping from the hall and out into the night. I was climbing the steps to the field when Titan’s body knocked against me, his body jumping the final two steps and planting, four feet in the dirt, his hair raised, a loud snarl spitting out.