“HEY, YOU can’t park there!”
That was the first cop chasing me after I sprinted from my bike. The second was the one who saw me hurdle the turnstile into the stadium without breaking stride. Neither was fighting in his desired weight class, to put it mildly, but they were able to stay close on my heels because the people crowding the walkways, still making their way to their seats, were blocking my path. I was back to weaving in and out of traffic again, only now on foot.
Tick-tock…
I didn’t need to check the time because I could hear the public-address announcer asking everyone to stand for the national anthem. I had two minutes at most to get to the mayor. Every year, you can bet the over-under in Vegas on the length of the national anthem performed at the Super Bowl. The average for the past ten years has been a minute and fifty-seven seconds.
As a Mets fan, I knew Citi Field pretty well. Even if I didn’t, I’d still know where I was heading. Deacon would be coming out of the home dugout, along the first-base line, immediately after the anthem. Right up until then he’d probably still be taking his practice throws in the batting cages near the clubhouse.
President George W. Bush ruined it for every other politician, especially in New York, when he threw a perfect strike at Yankee Stadium before game 3 of the World Series after 9/11. He threw it from the mound and didn’t cheat it by a foot.
There was no way Deacon would attempt anything different. He’d throw it from the mound, too.
“The bombs bursting in air…”
Whoever was singing the anthem was getting close to the end. I kept running and weaving, stealing glances at every section opening to see where I was in relation to the field. I had to time the turn just right.
Damn!
Up ahead, I could see two cops running toward me. Word was out—there was a crazy Mets fan on the loose. What they didn’t know was that I was a New York Knicks fan as well.
Time for the pick and roll.
Slashing toward a concession stand, I drew the cops toward me, waiting until the last possible moment to spin around them, a condiments table running interference for me. Thank you mustard, ketchup, and sauerkraut.
“Stop him!” I kept hearing.
No one could, though, not yet. I passed another section opening, spying the end of the Mets dugout down by the field. On a dime I turned, blowing past the guy in charge of checking tickets to race down the steps.
“O’er the land of the free…”
I had a clean shot over the railing, catapulting myself over it and onto the field. No less than half a dozen police and security guards were on my tail down the aisle, with more coming at me from every angle.
The one who finally got me, though, was the cop in the dugout the second I tried to reach the tunnel to the clubhouse. He was definitely fighting in his weight class; there was no evading him.
“Gotcha, you son of a bitch,” he said, slamming me down.
Chapter 108
“GET THE mayor!” I said. “Tell him it’s Dylan Reinhart!”
The crowd roar drowned me out, though. The anthem had just ended.
I’d been all over the news, but no one was about to recognize me with my face smooshed hard against the concrete floor of the dugout. I was surrounded by arms and elbows, all of them angry and eager to keep me down. There was a heel digging into the back of my neck.
“The mayor!” I tried again. “He can’t go out to the mound!”
The crowd was still too loud. The only voice that rose above it belonged to one of the cops hovering over me, who instructed the rest. “Get him the hell out of here!” he barked.
I got scooped up into a headlock, my feet barely touching the ground as they carried me through the tunnel leading into the bowels of the stadium. The crowd noise dimmed, overtaken by the echoing voice of the public-address announcer asking everyone to welcome a special guest to throw out the ceremonial first pitch.
Immediately to my left, a door burst open. The mayor, surrounded by a posse of guards and staff, came walking out in a shiny blue Mets jacket as I passed by. I tried to call out to him only to get a thick, heavy hand from one of the cops slapped over my mouth.
From the corner of my eye, I saw my last chance. Livingston was bringing up the rear, busy looking at a folder. No way he was going to see me unless…
“Fuck!” the cop cried out, pulling away his hand in pain. I’d bitten the hell out of his finger.
“Livingston, it’s Reinhart!” I yelled as loud as I could.
He couldn’t see me, but he heard me. “Wait!” he said. “Stop!”
The cops stopped as Livingston walked over, confused. He knew enough, though, to tell them to let go of me so I could explain.
Only there was no time.
The crowd roared again—albeit with a smattering of boos mixed in—as Deacon exited the dugout. I could see over Livingston’s shoulder as the mayor stopped for a moment to turn and wave, holding up a baseball in his other hand. Then he was gone…heading to the mound.
That made two of us.
Without a word of warning I shoved my way past Livingston, bolting back toward the dugout. I could hear the snapping sounds of hands on leather as the cops reached for their holsters, but there were too many people still lingering in the tunnel for a clean shot.
Springing into the dugout, I launched myself up the steps and onto the field, the mayor about to step over the chalk of the first-base line. I could hear the crowd gasp as I lunged in the air, tackling Deacon hard to the ground. He didn’t know what had hit him—or who—as he rolled under my grasp, his first instinct being to get the hell away.
I wouldn’t let him.
Every cop with every gun, every photographer with every lens—they all ran toward us.
Deacon was livid. “Reinhart, what the—”
“Give me your phone, Mr. Mayor,” I said.
“My what?”
“Your phone. Give me your phone!”
Deacon hesitated, and the cops began to close in. Call it faith or call it curiosity, but he raised a hand for them to stand down. With his other hand he reached into his pants pocket, giving me his cell phone.
Assault and battery on the mayor of New York City in front of more than forty thousand people would normally require some explaining. But in the words of Mark Twain, actions speak louder than words.
Tonight, ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Death is throwing out the first pitch…
I turned and heaved the mayor’s phone toward the pitcher’s mound, directly at the rubber. It was a bit high and outside, but close enough to make my point.
Boom!
The mound exploded with the force of a grenade, everyone on the field taking cover. All they got on them, though, was some flying dirt.
Elijah Timitz, the man who would forever be known as the Dealer, had figured out a way to remotely detonate a bomb while being nowhere close to his intended target—in his case, as far away as hell.
“With GPS, your cell number can trigger anything,” said Julian.