Andrew Bourelle’s 'Shot Clock' fires from both barrels

Andrew Bourelle’s “Shot Clock” is a double-barreled thriller.

Shooting out of one barrel is professional basketball player Garrett Streeter. He’s a star guard for the fictional Cincinnati Sabretooths, one of the teams in the National Basketball Association Finals.

But Garrett has a dilemma that he reveals only to Caitlin Glass, his former college girlfriend and now a sheriff’s deputy in Ohio: His brother Jake has been kidnapped and he, Garrett, is being blackmailed to fix games.

Shooting out of the other barrel is Caitlin. Garrett practically begs her to find the kidnappers and save Jake’s life.

Caitlin initially tells Garrett to do the right thing — inform the feds. But the kidnappers say they’ll kill Jake if he goes to authorities.

Caitlin reluctantly accepts Garrett’s plea for help and keeps secret her one-woman investigation to free Jake.

The author said in a phone interview that he liked the idea of Garrett having to ask for help from someone — i.e. Caitlin — who had the same pro basketball dreams as he did but didn’t get to live them because of an injury.

Bourelle said that scenario seemed ripe for creating tension, and it does.

Caitlin takes a leave of absence from her job — and from her family — to work undercover. She heads to Las Vegas, Nevada, where Jake is believed to be held.

In fast-paced scenes, the star guard helps his team win games, yet at the same time deals with the demands of Jake’s kidnappers. They want him to alter game point totals.

One lead Caitlin pursues is with Levi Grayson, a Nevada gaming control official, who steers her to a Las Vegas-based Russian mafioso peddling drugs and selling harvested human organs on the black market.

Caitlin goes after the mobster at the risk of losing her life, and Grayson rescues her.

He isn’t shy about showing Caitlin, and readers, his chronic drug addiction. Grayson unexpectedly reappears in a critical role late in the novel.

Another meet-up Caitlin has is with a prostitute, work name Amethyst.

She resides at a brothel just outside Las Vegas. Caitlin hopes Amethyst could bring her a step closer to Jake’s kidnappers.

The novel touches on a number of other intriguing subplots tied to the two main protagonists.

Among them are Caitlin’s husband’s jealousy of his wife’s current relationship with Garrett; Garrett’s current girlfriend, Summer, and the couple’s efforts to have a baby; Caitlin being passed over for an open detective position; Garrett’s mercurial behavior while trying to show that he’s a team leader on and off the court.

The author has a knack for sustaining the thrill of many chases, usually involving Caitlin’s drive.

In one scene, Caitlin is sitting in the stands at an NBA Finals game with Summer and wonders why a man might have been staring at her.

It’s a flimsy reason to follow him out of the stands, but who knows.

Here’s part of the chase scene: “She heard shoes squeaking below. She hurried down, taking the steps three at a time. She spun around the corner, hanging onto the railing to seep her momentum. When she approached the bottom, she heard a door opening. It latched closed before she got there.”

The chase continues for two — yes, two — more pages, ending with a confrontation in an elevator. Caitlin falls down, holding a handful of the man’s hair — a brown wig — in her hand. The man is later revealed as the right-hand man of the brothel’s owner.

Bourelle also writes a thrilling on-court scene in which Garrett is driving to the basket for a lay-up. “Luca’s big hand, nowhere near the ball, smashed in Garrett’s face, exploding bolts of pain from his nose through his skull. Garrett landed on his feet, but the collision sent him staggering toward the baseline. … Garrett stepped on (a cameraman’s) leg, lost what remained of his balance, and fell to the ground … His eyes burned with tears. Through the blur, he saw red droplets on the hardwood. Warm liquid dripped from his nose.”

Bourelle makes the characters three-dimensional, though at times they seem like action figures.

Don’t think that Bourelle’s novel is ripped from recent newspaper headlines about allegations concerning NBA figures and illegal game betting and poker schemes. “Shot Clock” preceded the indictments. The audio version of the book was released last winter, followed by the cloth edition, which came out last May. The paperback edition is scheduled for release on Nov. 18.

Bourelle grew up near Dayton, Ohio, and basketball was the professional sport he followed closely.

He is a professor of English and the director of the Creative Writing Program at the University of New Mexico.

Bourelle’s two previous novels are “Heavy Metal” and “48 Hours to Kill.” He also co-authored three books in the “Texas Ranger” series with James Patterson.

Andrew Bourelle’s 'Shot Clock' fires from both barrels