by Lulu Wright
Before I can ask what she means, Mark bounds into the studio. On instinct, I smile at him, but then remember I’m mad, dammit. I exit the booth and try to scowl, but it feels more like a pout. “What was that meeting with the Doc about?” Double damn. I sound like I’m accusing him of something. That’s not fair. I check my tone. “I mean, was it anything important?”
He shakes his head and shrugs. “He wants to know if I’d be interested in extending my time with the show. Through spring training and beyond. By remote when I’m on the road and with guest spots and stuff, you know, other people filling in for me when I can’t.”
I feel a roll of uneasy tension in my belly. “Do you want to do that?”
He shrugs his big shoulders again. “I dunno. It’s never been done before with an active player. Stanley mentioned this might happen. I guess we’re all going to talk about it next week. But you know, I’ve got spring training in three weeks…”
I hunch my shoulders. I know he’s leaving. I knew that all along. I was glad for it at the start. So why does it hurt to be reminded that he’s stepping back out of my life in just three weeks?
“Right. I mean. You need to concentrate on your game.” My voice sounds thick with hurt, no matter how I try to disguise it.
He reads my despair and rests his hand on my shoulder gently. “Look, we’re in this together, Rose. Remember? I’m a team player. If this show goes national…”
“National?” I don’t know if I exhaled the word or inhaled it, but whatever I did it was loud. Me. Running a national radio show.
Being on a national radio show.
More fans in the parking lot, more fans tuning into every show. Tons of exposure. Piles of money.
A guaranteed career for as long as I want it, on a national radio station. My head spins. It’s everything I ever wanted from my career, and yet, confusingly, it’s coming from a partnership I don’t think I should delve too deeply into. Being with Mark makes me worry that I’ll lose focus, forget about my career and lose myself in his…
Mark is shrugging again like it’s no big deal. “Right, national. It would be cool.” But a drop in the bucket for him, fame and money wise.
I look around the studio. Cheap wood panels, smelly carpet and wires held together with duct tape. Could a national show be my future? In a state-of-the-art studio?
Doing sports talk?
Is that what I want?
I would be hella stupid to walk away from an opportunity like that. The money alone could fund the ever-living shit out of me and Geo’s podcast. I could get a national syndicate. Make music on the real big-league waves.
But for all its decay, I do love W-ALT’s charm. What would happen to this station? Could I bring it national with me, or would I need to leave it in the dust?
“Spring training is in Florida,” Mark says and my head snaps back to him. I heard the words, but can’t respond. My tongue is frozen in my mouth.
I knew this all along. I knew the training wasn’t here. I knew he was leaving. I repeat those words like a mantra in my head.
Then Mark cocks an eyebrow. “You got a bikini? You’ve always had a smokin’ bod.”
Now my mouth drops open, but it still takes a second to unfreeze my tongue. “But…”
Night Vixen vacates the DJ booth, and I get a moment to recover as Mark snaps on his headphones and sets up.
“My job is here,” I sputter.
He shrugs. “Unless we’re recording the show from training camp,” he points out.
Oh.
Oh. Stunned, I plop down on my chair in the production booth and cue up his intro.
Florida. A few short weeks ago, the Sunshine State didn’t cross my mind unless I stared at its logo while drinking orange juice. Now it’s morphed into an impossibly sudden possibility, and I can’t process what it means to my career, my plans, my life. But there’s no time now. Mark’s intro is ending.
It’s show time.
The first caller is Frankie, a diehard baseball fan from Bayonne. She’s a new one for me, but Mark greets her like they’ve hated each other since childhood. As I listen in to their argument, head swimming from all the statistics chat, one thing becomes clear: if this thing is going to move forward, if I am going to produce a national baseball show, I have to learn about baseball and I need to learn it fast.
Especially if I’m going to move to Florida to chase spring training camp.
At the first break I get on Mark’s headphones. “Hey, can I ask a favor?”
10
Rose
“Where are we going?” I shout over Muse’s Absolution. Mark’s truck crossed the George Washington Bridge five minutes ago and we are deep in the Bronx, a dark, scary place I have only been once in daylight. He’s been quiet for the ride except to repeat that where we’re going is a surprise. He’s been teasing me all day about it, ever since I asked him—as a favor—to teach me about baseball. Something about the request put a permanent smile on his face and he’s been smirking every time I look at him.
As he drives us through an inner city warzone, I steal glances at him and smile at the things I notice. Sometime between leaving the station and picking me up at 9, he’s showered and shaved again. Fresh as a daisy, he is. Though considerably more manly. Also he smells better. Like the piney cologne he wears, layered beneath his own unique, heady scent. I couldn’t get enough of that smell when we dated in high school, and it still intoxicates me now. But my nose is a little distracted from him by the faint lemon scent in the truck. My eyes catch the glossy glow of his dashboard in the moonlight.
Someone had their truck detailed after his shift this morning.
So, I get that he’s sexually interested. That’s always been obvious. But equally obvious is the fact that he would probably bang any female. But all this extra effort tells me he especially wants to bang me. I can’t figure out why exactly, if his normal type is more supermodel than super-DJ, but for some reason, he wants me bad. Part of me is thinking that’s enough.
Maybe.
On the other hand, I could wind up just like last time. Alone, rejected, skipping out on prom because he settled on a hotter model, nursing another broken heart.
“There she is,” he interrupts my thoughts with a nod forward. I look out and see Yankee Stadium in the near distance. All the lights are on and it’s lighting up the night.
“Is there a game tonight?” I thought it was off season and there were no games, but what do I know?
“Yes,” he says with a grin. “A big one.”
“Who’s playing?”
He laughs softly and he pulls into the empty stadium parking lot. “Me and you.”
I blink in his general direction. “What?”
He pulls in front of a gate and switches off the engine. Tossing and catching his keys, he wiggles his eyebrows at me. “The best way to learn baseball,” he says, “is to play baseball.”
At the entrance gate, I turn my face away, but peek as Mark palms a few security guys some cash and shakes their hands. I’m guessing the cash was a courtesy on Mark’s part, because the guys are staring at him with popping eyes and toothy smiles. He is their god.
Mark takes my hand and pulls me down a long hallway until we reach a door marked LOCKER ROOM. He pushes open the door and the smell of a thousand sporty guys hits me in the face. It’s not a bad smell by a long shot, just a really overpowering masculine smell and my body instinctively responds with a rush of sex hormones to my brain. Suddenly all I can think about is the tight shirt Mark is wearing, the way it outlines every muscle in his body. That, and how badly I want to rip that shirt off him and run my fingers over every inch of said muscles.
We stop in front of a locker and I see a plaque reading CARRINGTON at the top. He pops it open and pulls out two well-oiled mitts and a bat. Then he hands me his jersey and settles his official cap on my head. His scent settles around my shoulders along with the jersey, faint, since he’s washed the thing, but somehow he couldn’t hide t
he fact that this jersey belongs to him. Now, wearing it, I almost feel as though I do, too.
Dangerous line of thought to allow. I shake my head to clear it.
“Today you are a Yankee,” he tells me, grinning from ear to ear, and I smile back, even as my stomach twists in warning. All I can remember is that searing kiss last night.
I’m in trouble.
Of course I know Yankee Stadium is bigger than a breadbox, but I have no idea how immense it is until Mark leads me through a gateway and onto the field. Feeling a little dizzy in the vast emptiness, I almost trip over my own feet staring up at the stands.
“Whoa.” Mark catches my elbow, steadying me. “I know how you feel. But this is nothing. You should see what it’s like with the crowd roaring and the cameras following every move you make.”
“I can’t imagine.” But in a weird way, I can sense what it must be like for him. When we stop at home plate I scan the stadium and picture the pressure of performance he faces every time he walks onto the field. I can’t even keep track of my own two feet in an empty stadium, and yet he bats home runs with thousands—no, millions—of eyes on him.
After he tosses our gloves to the side, he directs my gaze to the ball throwing machine on the pitcher’s mound. “I’m going to turn that on and you’re going to hit a couple of balls.”
“Me?” I exclaim, but he doesn’t hear me. He’s already jogging toward the machine. With a flick of his wrist, he jogs back to home plate.
He takes the bat and motions for me to stand out of the way. “Let me show you how it’s done.”
He positions his body and his eyes squint into laser focus. He looks like a statue, legs bent, elbows out, every muscle tensed, his eyes tight on the mound. There’s a crank from the machine and a ball spits out, flying at what looks to me like the speed of light. I instinctively cower back and shield my head as Mark swings the bat.
CRACK!
My eyes follow the ball up, up, up….and out, out, out, until it fades into the night way past the nearest stands. I mouth the word WOW, but Mark doesn’t see me. He’s licking his lips, shuffling his feet and choking up on the bat. His gaze once again hones in on the machine. He looks like he’s gonna fuck it up. It spits out another ball…
CRACK!
This one I didn’t even see. It’s just a bullet-like blur. It’s probably in Japan by the time he turns around to curve his finger, beckoning me.
“Batter up!”
I tiptoe to him like I’m about to get a spanking, torn between nerves and excitement. My sports experience is pretty much limited to drunken beach volleyball and watching Superbowl for the commercials, but come on. I’m in Yankee Stadium for a private lesson with a famous baseball player who is handsome as hell. I’ll take a swing or two.
He hands me the bat, handle side first, and steps out of the way. I quickly get into position, mimicking his stance. My elbows feel all wrong, not to mention it seems like I’m sticking my butt out in his face.
Sure enough, a second later he touches my elbow, lightly, to nudge it higher. I try to ignore the rush of adrenaline that shoots up my arm from his touch.
“Heads up,” he murmurs, his voice warm in my ear. With a start, I look up at the machine to realize it’s firing.
There’s a hum of the motor and a swoosh of air. I swing as hard as I can…and whirl around in a circle, nearly toppling over.
Miss.
He claps anyway. “Good effort.”
I roll my eyes, but he’s already shaking his head, pushing me back into position.
“Try again. Lean into it.”
I reposition the bat in my hands and glare at the machine. I’m ready. I’m going to do this. This machine has nothing on me.
Hum…clink…pop, and the ball sails toward me.
SWOOSH.
It sounds like a missile just flew by my head, but I’ve got nothing to show for it but a wide swing. I scowl, pissed that I missed it. Dammit. “This thing is cheating!” I glare at it.
Mark laughs and steps up behind me again. He puts his strong hands on my hips and pulls me away from the plate by about six inches. Then he wraps his arms around mine and I’m engulfed in hot man muscle. Nice.
“OK,” he whispers, his breath tickling my neck. “Bend your knees. Not that much,” he amends when my knees almost buckle from lust. “Lean over.” I stick my ass out, and collide with his crotch.
What’s that I feel, pressing hard against my ass? I wriggle my hips, resisting the urge to grin. Fuck he feels even better than I remember.
“Not that much,” he repeats, though I’m gratified to notice his voice sounds thicker this time. “Arms up higher, too.”
I hear him sigh and then feel his entire body at my back as a ball buzzes by us. It’s like he’s spooning me standing up and I can feel his tight muscles on my thighs, ass and back. His heat envelops me and I’m loving it. He tightens his hands over mine on the bat, and it takes every ounce of concentration I have to keep my eye on the ball.
“Watch and wait.”
Another ball explodes out of the machine. I feel like it’s coming right at me and grind back on Mark, nervous. That will hurt if it hits me. But he holds me firm…um, really firm. His big, powerful arms force mine to swing and I feel the energy of the ball cracking against the bat. It hits so hard my arms feel like wet noodles. My teeth chatter. It’s like firing a rifle with a fuck of a kickback.
The ball sails into the stands to the left.
I gasp out a breath, but before I can congratulate myself he says, “We can do better.” He repositions his body against mine, deep in the zone now, and I don’t think he even feels my ass pressing against his hard dick anymore. I relax against him again and savor the powerful feeling of his body wrapped around mine. I am in no way a weakling of a woman, but in his arms I feel this intense sense of strength and power and it makes me want to just rely on his muscles.
What was that Neneh Cherry song? I am strong enough to be weak in his arms.
We—no, he—swings the bat again. If this was a real game it would be a home run. It sails high into the stands, out of reach. “I’ll meet you at first base,” he says suddenly, slapping my ass. I startle, and before I know it, he’s jogging toward the machine. I take off as fast as I can run, but even pausing to switch off the machine, he still beats me to first.
I slide across the plate, and he tags me as I do, a spare ball in his fist.
“Am I out?” I purr up at him after I collide with his chest. His arms wrap around me, almost automatic. Unfortunately, I haven’t run that far for a long time, so I sound out of breath like I just ran a marathon uphill.
He keeps his hands on my hips, leans in, and I finally snap back to my senses and slip out of his reach. He senses my mood, and shifts his hands to his own hips instead, surveying the stadium.
“My first time at bat here, I hit a home run.” He points to the back of the stadium. “It went that way and bounced off the back wall.” He takes a breath. “I’ve hit tons since, but nothing will ever feel like that first time, you know?”
I nod.
Not that I understand hitting a run home, of course. But I do know what it’s like to listen to that new record from your favorite band for the first time. Sure, the songs become old friends after you wear out the tracks with nonstop plays. But you will never again feel that first tickle of the riffs of the guitar in your ear or the bass line fucking with your heartbeat.
His attention snaps back to me and I must be wearing some sensual expression because he does that dazzling eye thing, his gaze all over me, eating me alive, and he steps closer again, closing the gap between us once more. “You know…” He grins. “You are not officially safe until you put your foot on the base.”
I glance down and see my feet aren’t on the base. I quickly correct it. “Am I safe now?”
He takes another step closer. “Oh, not quite yet. Don’t you remember how to get to first base?”
I laugh. “I guess you have to
show me.”
“With pleasure, ma’am.”
He walks up to me and stops, his face inches from mine. It feels like a dare for a second and in my head all my hesitation is silenced by my inner voice screaming kiss me kiss me kiss me. Finally he cups my face in his hands and I feel like swooning. Not to be cliché, but my knees don’t want to work when his hands are on me. They want to rebel and drop me down to the dirt, pull him on top of me right here… His eyes stare me down and he leans in closer, closer, closer…and then, he…
Kisses my forehead.
As my mouth drops open, he sprints away in the direction of second base. “Come on!” he shouts over his shoulder. I can hear the laughter in his voice.
What a tease.
Two can play this game.
I run hard again, faster this time, spurred on by adrenaline (and, okay, motivated by the urgent need firing in my lady bits). He lets me beat him to the next base and even saunters the last ten paces with a smirk on his face. “According to baseball rules,” he says in an official announcer voice. “Second base means tits.”
I fold my arms across my chest. “Oh, is that so?”
“Yep.” He fold his arms across his own chest and taps his foot on the base. “My house, my rules.”
Pressing my lips tight, I glance around the stadium, then back at him just in time to catch that eyebrow wiggle. Naughtiness washes over me and my face heats up. I grab the bottom hem of my shirt and tug it away from my body, locking eyes with him.
His eyes widen and his mouth parts. I don’t think he actually expected me to take him up on this. “Yes…”
All in one motion, I lift my shirt and flash him, arching my back to show off my bare breasts. Then I tug my shirt down again, lightning fast.
He frowns. “Hey, wait. That was too quick.”
“Your turn,” I counter.
With his smile intact and his eyes trained on me, he peels off his shirt and tosses it behind him. Under the stadium lights, well, let’s just say my eyes are feasting on the glistening perfection of his naked chest. He takes a step toward me, but I’m already sprinting toward third.