by Amy Faye
So did Jeff. Had to work the ball. Had to get his hands around it. The last words he'd gotten from Coach in college was that he could really do with a third pitch. Good advice.
His fingers still felt strange, spread out like that, and he needed to throw another hundred or so before he could start doing anything else for the night. After a few thousand pitches, it would feel as natural as anything.
There was something else, too. A thought nagging at the back of his mind. She was only a little thing, five-two maybe, and couldn't be more than a hundred pounds soaking wet.
And apparently, he added at the last minute as a faint smile spread across his face, she was flexible, too.
Chapter Five
The fundamental problem, the reason that she didn't try to go out more often, was that no matter how much she did the night before, no matter how much things seemed like they'd changed…
Well, the more things change, the more they stay the same. And every time that she seemed like she might really be throwing things off-track, the next morning showed up and then it was routine and schedule and she was focused on making sure that everything worked.
Sure as hell not focused on boys. Not focused on one boy in particular, who she couldn't help noticing hadn't texted her. Maybe he was just letting it go. If he was half as busy as she was, no doubt he didn't have much time to text her anything.
But even still, the shift seemed long. Longer than usual. Because every time that she left the register to go do anything actually useful—her 'real' job, the stuff that doesn't just keep happening all day—she just naturally checked her phone.
Every time, she realized that she was more disappointed than she'd thought she would be. After the first couple of hours, though, things got a little easier. After all, she could only afford to split her attention so much.
She couldn't get fired from this job. There were hundreds of other people out there hungry for work. They were there all the time, asking about applications. It was only because she was a hard worker that she could stay in the position.
Maybe it wasn't fair to them. Maybe she should let someone else have a shot at it, for a while. But that would mean giving up the income, and she relied on that. It was only by saving up that she could afford tuition at any of the schools that would actually ensure her career moving forward.
She wouldn't have time, never mind energy, to get a job in New York. Which ignored the very real possibility that, with her split schedule and limited time, she could struggle to find the work to be done.
No, she needed as much as she could to cover room and board. She'd force her way into as many scholarships—shit, the thought flashes through her head. She hasn't done her video submission for grant submissions. She makes a mental note. At evening home study she'd do that.
The work is mind-numbing. And after a while, it's easier not to think about him. After all, it's not that he's not texting her. It's that he's giving her space. He's busy and he's waiting a little while. Really, it's nothing weird.
Her phone buzzes, and she jumps, dropping a party-sized bag of M&Ms on the carpet. It lands with a plop right on her foot. Cathy picks it up and puts it on the shelf before she lets herself check her phone.
A little drum roll goes off in her head, preparing her for the text. Is it going to be flirty? Friendly? Professional? Distant? Is he going to jump straight on the sexting train?
Her teeth are almost chattering as she jabs the power button, and the screen jumps to life. The text itself is distant. But then again, Mom's texts always were.
She's on her own again for supper. There's a ten dollar bill on the fridge, if she needs it.
She won't, of course. There's no reason that she would. She can't go out. Where would she even go if she could? Where would she be able to guarantee that she's got the right calorie intake?
They're all crazy. Everything is too high, and she's already got food all ready. No reason to go out. So she isn't going to. Still, the ten dollars will go a long way, considering she didn't pay for it. It'll serve for a few days' worth of groceries, at least.
The door opens, and Cathy leans out to see who's come in. She jerks her head back behind the rack as soon as she does. He's not supposed to be here. He's supposed to text her. Or more likely, leave her alone. Never talk to her again.
She'll go back to being some nobody, back to never having any time for anything. It's easier than having to go out and find time and have fun. Relies less on her feeling good, which she never does and never will. Why would she feel good? Why would something good happen?
"Small world."
His voice is deep and rough and tired, and he looks as good as he ever did.
"Oh, hey," she says. She doesn't look up, just packs the M&Ms from the box onto the shelf without looking. Maybe if she doesn't look up, he won't see the deep red blush that she can feel spreading like a fire across her cheeks.
"How was morning practice?"
"Fine." Why won't he leave? She's not supposed to be here. She's supposed to be attractive and mysterious and cool. Now the hot guy she met at some bar, completely by coincidence when she shouldn't even have been there, is squatting down next to her. In her shit retail job.
"You want me to go? I was just getting a bottle of water."
"They're over—" she turns and loses her balance a little. She catches herself, but not before she tips right into him. His arms reflexively wrap around her shoulders.
"Watch out, Cathy. Lucky thing I was here to make sure you weren't hurt."
He lets his hands loose of her, and she's not sure whether to be disappointed or relieved. All the blood in her body is in her face now. It burns like a son of a gun and she wants nothing more than just to be left alone, to forget any of this ever happened.
"You going to be alright?"
"I'm fine," she says. She tries desperately to cling to the fake personality that she uses with customers, but all she can think about is how well they'd hit it off the night before. How she couldn't stop thinking about him all morning.
"Good."
She stands up and gets her balance again. "Water bottles are in a cooler in the corner."
"I know, but I saw you, and I thought I'd say hey."
"Hey yourself."
She leans over to pick up the next box and starts loading that onto the shelf. Maybe if she just ignores him, he'll go away. She hopes to hell so.
Then another customer comes through the door and she peeks her head out again, and the spell is broken because he's standing at the counter tapping on it with the side of his thumb, and she's got work to do.
"Excuse me, sir, can I help you?"
He wants a pack of cigarettes, and by the time that she's done dealing with him, the pitcher from the night before is gone. Evidently without his water bottle.
She lets out a breath that she's been holding since she first saw him, only able to get rid of half her air at any time for fear that the rest will be pushed out by the pressure of being around him.
The rest of the day is slow. He still doesn't text, which isn't very damn sensitive, she notes with no small amount of annoyance.
Which makes it a real surprise when she steps outside and hears his voice calling to her from the first spot in the lot.
"Cathy, you got somewhere to be?"
She leans into his window. "Why?"
"Because I've got a free evening and a bad idea."
Chapter Six
If there's one thing that baseball teaches a player—this goes double for pitchers—it's that sometimes, you swing and you miss, and there's no shame in it. If he allows a hit per inning—that's one in three—then he's not doing his job.
His WHIP is going to tank. Then in his next contract negotiation, he loses a hundred grand because now he's not some up-and-coming star.
So he can't exactly afford to be upset every time something doesn't go his way. Besides, he could see in her eyes. It wasn't that she wasn't interested.
He'd caught her
off-guard. He'd thrown a pitch she wasn't expecting and she'd swatted the ball off foul. But that was just the beginning of the game. They were still getting started.
Which meant that like he always did—he just had to try again. Get back up on the mound and throw another. The metaphor fell apart when he realized he was hoping to hit a home run—not strike out.
He should cut off the train of metaphors before it pulls into the station and—god damn it. His phone fit into his hand comfortably and the weight was a comfort in his hand. His arm felt good again, just barely too tired to really do his best work.
Just enough of a workout that he can keep that razor-honed edge. And now he's got time for something else. Her number is right there. The text from last night is still there, too.
'Hey, Sexy.'
He smiles. Yeah, that sounds about right. But he can't afford to leave it there, can he?
'What are you wearing?'
He clicks the button to send it, and an instant later, it pops up in the log. He sets the phone down. Maybe she'll bite. Maybe she won't. You don't get a hit by watching every pitch go by. Sometimes you have to be proactive.
All the time, really. He imagines her getting the text. Imagines her looking down at her clothes, deciding whether or not to go along with it, or to play it straight. She seems like the sort of girl who would think about it. There's charm in it that he can't deny.
His phone buzzes.
'Just about to get into the bath. ;)'
His heart rate jumps. She decided to play along, huh? Arousal spreads through his gut.
'Hot date tonight?'
'Wouldn't you like that.'
'You know I would. You'd like it, too, trust me.'
The churning in his stomach, the nagging thought of where the conversation is no doubt going to go, makes his jaw feel tight. He moves it from side to side, trying to loosen it up, but that just makes it feel tighter.
The phone buzzes in his hand before he's even put it down.
'Oh yeah? What would I like about it?'
Some part of him wants to treat her like a child. Is she ready for what he's dealing out? He knows that's a mistake almost as soon as the thought occurs to him. If she's not ready, then she'd better get ready. And she will get ready, like it or not.
'You'd love the way my tongue feels.'
He can feel the arousal spreading from his stomach to his cock, already stirring to hardness.
'I'm imagining it right now.'
'Are you touching yourself?'
His skin feels sensitive, his throat tight. The inability to do anything about any of it just drives him to stronger arousal.
'Do you want me to be?'
'Yes.'
'I'm all alone. I can afford to be as loud as I want.'
'God that sounds hot.'
'So tell me. What would you do for me that my fingers aren't doing for me right now?'
'I want to fuck your throat so bad.'
Jeff's hand pressed against his cock through the thick fabric of his jeans absent-mindedly. Don't do anything about the arousal. Just let it settle in. But Jesus did he want it.
'How soon could you make that happen?'
'Give me a place.'
She takes a minute to respond. Whether she's thinking it over or not, he's not clear. But then he gets his answer. An address, with a little line under it. One that says that it's as simple as clicking it and his phone will tell him how to drive the route.
'I can be there in 10 minutes.'
His stomach does a flip in his stomach and he pulls the keys off the counter and slips them into his pocket on the way out the door.
His cock is already hard to the point of forming a tent in his pants. His phone buzzes as he's slipping into the driver's seat and turning the ignition. There's only one word in the message and it makes his hardness throb:
'Hurry'
Chapter Seven
Whatever had gotten into her, it was wriggling around in her stomach. She must have shifted in her seat a dozen times in the first minute, and the tension only got worse from there.
Was she misunderstanding things? Maybe she was. She'd never really done anything like this before. She'd heard about it, on TV and stuff. Heard about girls at school doing stuff like this. But it wasn't really her, and it never had been. She didn't have time or inclination to find a guy to do it with.
But now one had fallen into her lap and her skin felt like it was on fire with the idea that he was going to come over, and show her all of the things she'd missed out on all these years.
She stood up and checked out the window. If she stood and stared, though, she'd seem desperate, wouldn't she? No, she doesn't want to seem desperate.
Even the texts themselves had been… Jeez, that was hard. Her fingers had been trembling. Did she sound like some kind of awful slut or something? Was she being too easy?
What did it matter if she was being slutty? It wasn't like she'd ever see him again. And even if she did see him again, which was unlikely, what did it matter if she had a little reputation with one guy?
Who wouldn't sleep with a pro baseball player, anyways? Having sex with sports stars was some kind of dream. Anyone would kill to do it. But that didn't mean she could afford to let herself go, either.
God. She's getting all turned around. The sound of a car pulling up outside told her that either Mom was home early—something she'd very specifically said not to expect—or he was here. Ten minutes almost exactly. Nine.
Her phone buzzed. 'I'm outside.'
She doesn't answer it. She'll give him his answer when he gets inside. A minute later, shoes on the paving stones outside. A knock on the door. Her heart was pounding so hard that she could feel it in neck as she reached toward the door handle, and then when she opened it…
"Hey." He's better-looking today. Which seems almost impossible, but he's managing it somehow. A black t-shirt fits tight around his ribs, showing off his figure better than he had shown it off the day before. He looks exactly as good as she'd expected. Maybe better.
"Hey." She stepped back from the door. He stayed outside.
"Come on," he says. He doesn't say it like it's an order, but he doesn't look like she's got the option of refusing, either.
"What's going on?"
"You haven't eaten, have you?"
She hadn't. "What's that got to do with anything?"
"Come on. I'm taking you to dinner."
"I thought we were going to—"
"I know what you thought. But I'm not going to just come over and—dessert comes after dinner, don't you think?"
She took the spare key from the peg by the door and stepped outside, only half-certain about his logic.
"Oh, wait—" She turned and fit the key into the lock in a hurry. "I left my money inside."
His hand on hers set her skin on fire. "Don't worry about it."
"Are you sure?"
"Of course I'm sure."
She takes a deep breath. Okay. She can do this. She slips the key into the pocket of her dress. It's not a large key ring, but it barely fits into the pocket. Damn girl pockets.
It's easy to step up into the truck. It's a little high off the ground, but she's had to use her legs for much more strenuous activities before, in much worse positions. Even in a dress, it's not so bad.
Physically, that is. Because getting into the truck is one of the hardest things she's had to do. Her heart thumps loud in her chest, so loud that she's amazed that Jeff can't hear it sitting in the driver's seat.
He's smiling as she slides in, though, even as she pushes down the hem of her dress to cover her thighs a little better. Maybe the modesty is pointless. For a minute she'd considered just cutting to the chase and answering the door with nothing on at all, but…
Then it had seemed a little forward. So she put clothes on. And now she was getting into a truck and heading out, so clothes were definitely the right call. Go Cathy.
"So how was work?" The question is too strange.
Too banal. Too much about her. It was so completely out of left field that she must have misheard him.
"What?"
"Work. How was it?"
"It was fine, I guess." She'd seen him after work. How did she look to him, after all that? Couldn't have been that good. No way. She probably looked like all hell. Which was how she always looked. "How was your thing this morning?"
"It was fine. Just wanted to get home through the whole thing."
"Little did you know that only a few hours later, you'd be wanting to get out of the house again."
"I finished with practice. So I mean…" Jeff shrugged. "Whatever, right?"
"Sure. Where are we going anyways?"
He smiled. "That's a good question."
Then he jumped on the freeway, and before she knew it, she had just as little idea where he was going as he must have had. In town for what must have been less than a week, and he was already going to mystery restaurants? A bold decision.
She climbed out and looked up at the place, then looked down at her clothes. It seemed too nice. And beyond too expensive. No, there was no chance in hell that—
His arm wrapped around her shoulder and he led her toward the door. Cathy was too shell-shocked to think of any way out of it. So she let him guide her inside. She'd never had Japanese food before. And she'd sure as hell never been to any fancy Japanese grill.
Was a twenty-dollar dress from the clearance rack really going to let her fit in? Not that she had much of a choice at this point. Jeff put one hand on the door handle confidently and pushed it open, held it as he guided her inside.
"Table for two, please."
"Can I have a name?"
"Jeff."
"Thank you, sir. It'll be just a few minutes."
By the time they brought her to the table—which was really a large, wide flat surrounded by a bar—she realized she was leaning in, laughing at his jokes, and the only question that she had was how soon they could get to 'dessert' after all.
Chapter Eight
His food wasn't getting cold any more, because he'd finished it. So there was nothing wrong with sitting there, watching her. Well, nothing except that Jeff could see that she hated it. But that didn't stop him from doing it. Not much was going to, because he wasn't going to just not look at such a pretty girl.