by Joanne Rock
If he had a topic, he could start tackling it. The sooner he could assuage her concerns, the sooner she’d be back in his arms where she belonged.
Lisa spun a combination lock and opened the metal box before withdrawing an extra T-shirt and a bottle of hand lotion.
“For starters, you never asked me about why I took such risks.” She pulled out a hikers’ guide to the Rockies and he wondered if she was going on a trip he didn’t know about.
Maybe talking wasn’t a bad idea.
“Did you lose someone close to you, too?” Could she have toyed with living on the edge for similar reasons as him?
“No. I did it for attention at first. My mother was an addict and it took a lot to get her attention. Later, I did it to feel alive since sometimes I felt damn invisible in my house.”
“Ah, damn, Lisa. I’m so sorry—”
“No.” She waved a rolled-up weightlifting guide under his nose. “I’ve made peace with all that. I just wanted you to know that’s why I’ve avoided thrill seeking for years. It felt too much like an addiction. But being with you made me realize I wasn’t always acting out. There was a lot of escape and genuine joy in pushing the limit. I’m athletic and coordinated, healthy and smart. Why shouldn’t I be as active as I want to be?”
Alarm pricked along his nerves.
“As long as you’re careful.” He couldn’t keep his hands off her anymore, needing to feel her against him. “Okay?”
He’d begun to appreciate how much he had to lose if he wasn’t more cautious in life, and he hoped she felt the same.
He rose to wrap her in his arms and thanked God that he had found her before he took one too many foolish chances with his life. He felt like he’d awoken from a long sleep since meeting her.
She nodded against his chest, her fingers smoothing the fabric of his T-shirt along his shoulders. Warmth filled him along with all that same fierce possessiveness he’d experienced that night in his hotel, only this time, he knew he wouldn’t succumb to wayward fears that she wasn’t as she seemed.
He knew better. His tough, Bond-girl trainer was a straight shooter. A sexy, vibrant woman. And she spent her free time planning hikes in the Rockies.
He couldn’t believe his good fortune.
“Javier?”
“Mmm?” He kissed the top of her head and wondered if he could talk her into making good use of that massage table.
“I heard something about you being in a hitting slump.”
It took a moment for the comment to sink in.
“Are you asking about this as my trainer or my girlfriend?”
“I’m not your trainer anymore, remember?”
“I hope to lobby for a few very private sessions.” Thoughts of the massage table returned. “But since it’s my girlfriend asking, I can tell you confidentially that I’m in a slump because I’ve been craving sexual satisfaction.”
He felt a shiver pulse over her skin and he smiled to think he had that effect on her. Heaven help him, he would not take it for granted.
“Don’t you dare try to play me, Velasquez. I think I’d better critique your swing before your game tomorrow. Shouldn’t you be with your team tonight, by the way?”
She blinked up at him, her eyes accusing even though her mouth remained soft and open, ready for his kiss.
He slipped his hands beneath her blouse to caress her bare skin.
“When the head trainer told me he thought he’d finally convinced you to come into the office tonight, I damn well wasn’t going to miss the chance to see you.”
The days he’d waited felt like weeks.
“How are you going to get to St. Louis in time for the game?”
“Depends how long it takes me to convince you to come with me.” He kissed her lips, tugging on the soft fullness of the lower one for a long moment before he released her. “If it’s soon, I’ll drive down. If you require a lot of persuading, I can try to pull together a charter flight.”
She swayed toward him, dropping her weight-lifting guide as she wrapped her arms about his neck.
“Hmm. How persuasive can you be?”
“You’re looking at the next Gold Glove winner, sweetheart, and they only give those things to guys with very good hands…”
THE LAST INNING
1
TO NIGHT, RICK WARREN wasn’t going to be leaving the locker room. Delaney Blair would make sure of it.
She stood just inside the empty administrative offices of the Atlanta Rebels’ clubhouse, a mere few yards from where Rick sat in the nearly vacant locker room. Her fingers shook a little as she tightened the tie on her sarong and then fluffed the silken tails of the knot to fall between her breasts. She’d dressed carefully—or rather, undressed—for this night when she could find him alone.
Rick was frequently the last to leave the locker room anyhow. A fact she knew because she’d been paying close attention to the Rebels’ first basemen since he’d joined the team her father owned. Delaney had never been all that interested in her father’s organization while she’d been growing up, her overriding idea of baseball players being that they were overpaid and thought highly of themselves. But since Rick had come to town, Delaney had to revise that opinion.
She peeked out through the blinds in the front office to watch Rick as he joked around with the cleaning crew. Six foot two with golden-brown eyes and longish dark hair that made him easy to pick out even in his ball cap, Rick was the quiet sort around his team. A loner. But he always had time to ask the woman who gathered the dirty uniforms about her two sons in college or razz the guy who ran the floor washer about being a die-hard New York Scrapers fan.
One of many things that made Rick Warren worthy of the risk she planned to take tonight.
Carefully closing the gap in the blinds before anyone noticed her spying, Delaney waited for the cleaners to vacate the locker room. Rick liked to avoid the press at all costs, so he always took his time leaving the clubhouse after a home game. The press had started paying more attention to him this season, speculating about what he’d do now that his two-year contract would be expiring with the Rebels.
That damn contract had forced her to brash action tonight. Well, that and a recent bit of news that had inspired her to take life by the horns.
She’d wanted to catch Rick’s eye for months. His habit of keeping his head down and his MP3 player cranked up around the clubhouse made that difficult, however. Add to that her own natural shyness and she figured the two of them would never move past the occasional lingering glances across a crowd.
That would change tonight. As she peered out once more between the gap in the blinds, she noticed the big bins of dirty uniforms were gone and Rick was alone. He sat on a bench between his locker and Dwight Wrigley’s, his baseball cap on backward as he clicked the controls on the MP3 player.
Luckily, it didn’t matter how loud he had the tunes cranked in his ears. Taking a deep breath, Delaney checked the knot on her bright green silk sarong and slipped into her fuchsia high-heel mules. The vivid colors made her feel a little more strong and confident when she was scared inside. She’d never done anything drastic to make a man notice her. Never put herself on the line so completely.
But a cancer scare could light a fire under anyone. And after waiting for tests on a lump that had turned out benign, Delaney didn’t plan to wait anymore. Starting tonight, she was going after what she wanted.
Drawing open the door of the administrative offices that led into the locker room, Delaney eyed the man who’d captured her attention with his head-down, plow-through-anything work ethic.
“Rick?”
She said his name even though she knew he wouldn’t hear her with the ear buds in. Still, he must have sensed someone else in the room because he looked up.
Their eyes met. Locked. And reaching for the knot of silk just above her breasts, she loosened the tie.
Her sarong fluttered to the floor like a drowsy butterfly as Delaney bared the new, bolder w
oman who wouldn’t take no for an answer.
THERE WERE SOME THINGS in life a man couldn’t tune out.
The roar of thirty-thousand fans during the playoffs. The flash of police lights in the rearview mirror. And a nearly naked woman prancing purposely into his line of vision.
Somewhere in Rick Warren’s head, a voice told him to run and get a towel for her to cover up with. To throw his team jacket around her shoulders. But since he’d seen her untie her little scarf dress with his own eyes, clearly she’d intended for this show to happen. A show involving no clothes except for sheer lace and satin panties that matched her strapless bra.
“Ms. Blair.”
He might have stammered when he said it. God knew, his thoughts were stammered. Stumbling.
Could a player be released prematurely from his contract for seeing the owner’s daughter naked? Maybe he’d be sent to the minors. Hell, an ultraconservative owner like Daniel Blair III would set up a Single A team in Siberia just to punish Rick for an offense like this.
That kind of penalty had crossed his mind in the past any time Rick had thought about acting on his attraction to the quiet beauty he’d had his eye on ever since setting foot in Atlanta.
Her lips moved, but Rick couldn’t hear what she was saying, calling to mind the ear buds he still wore. He tugged them out with one hand and chucked the electronic device into his open locker behind him, his eyes never leaving the golden skin of the goddess strutting his way.
A fantasy come true.
“Call me Delaney.” She smiled at him with a Mona Lisa lift of her full lips.
He’d heard Delaney Blair was adopted, her features Eurasian exotic. The long sheet of straight, dark hair gleamed with good health. Her eyes tilted up at the corners, but her generous height and bronze skin suggested a wide range of ethnic forbears. No matter her origins, she was a sight to behold even with her clothes on.
And now… He sucked in a long breath in an effort to drag in enough oxygen to clear his head. No dice.
“Ms.—ah—Delaney. I shouldn’t have stayed so late.” He thought about standing and realized his veins might not have enough blood flow available to fuel his legs for that kind of movement.
The wholly unexpected striptease had had immediate physical consequences.
“I’ve been trying to capture your attention all season.” The smoldering temptress paused in front of him, hooking her thumb in the waist band of her barely there underwear. “Every other time I’ve attempted to get to know you better, you’ve found an excuse to bail.”
His gaze went to her thumb as it tracked the band of white ribbon threading through the panties.
Through the erotic fog that enveloped his brain, he recalled Delaney looking his way a few times at a meet and greet early last season. At the time, he’d been too new to the club to know the lay of the land and he hadn’t wanted to start off his tenure with the Rebels as the guy who tried to schmooze the owner’s daughter.
And then, the longer he’d been with the club, the more convinced he became that dating one of the Rebels’ most prominent team attorneys was a bad idea. She worked for the organization he played for. Hell, she was the one who’d signed his damn contract. Rick had always walked the straight and narrow and he didn’t think now was the time to start veering from the path, especially when he’d finally landed on a team that could reward his years of loyal service with a championship.
“I’m no good at small talk,” he hedged, a little shell-shocked that this woman would be in here with him alone right now, peeling off her clothes.
As Daniel Blair’s daughter, Delaney was strictly off-limits. Cool and aloof, she was always at the fringes of every team gathering with the top brass. Which, perhaps, accounted for why he’d crossed her path at the occasional party. He tended to hang out on the sidelines a good deal himself.
Once he’d noticed her that first time, he’d looked for her at every team function, admiring the way she carried herself. Of course, he’d never seen her carry herself quite this way.
“Me neither,” she agreed readily, taking two steps closer. Putting one creamy thigh within touching distance. “Which is why I opted for a more obvious overture.”
“Maybe we should talk about this with your clothes back on?” He turned to check the door, needing to be sure there were no witnesses. “I’m pretty sure I could get traded for this. Or worse.”
He needed to get her dressed and out of here before his career imploded.
Her mouth compressed into a flat line and he wondered how often the beautiful owner’s daughter had encountered obstacles in her life.
“Is a scantily clad woman throwing herself at you such a common occurrence that you don’t think twice about ending the moment?” She fisted a hand and planted it on her hip.
Damn. He didn’t want to offend her any more than he wanted to be caught in a compromising position. Forcing himself to stand, he reached behind him to retrieve a clean jersey from his locker.
“Hardly.” He tossed the jersey around her shoulders, his number 11 curving around her breasts. “Is having your own way a common occurrence for you?”
After draping the shirt from his road uniform over her shoulders, he found himself trapped within man-snaring range of her perfume.
“I’ve rarely thought about what it means to have my own way, let alone gone after it, actually.” She tilted her head sideways, considering. That long, dark sheet of her hair slipped down her arm with the movement, baring the side of her neck.
She made the admission so softly, her words so full of honesty, that he regretted giving her a hard time. He knew damn well she was the most unselfish woman in the world. She spent her weekends at charity functions, using the team’s name and visibility to rake in donations for good causes. She had gone to work for her old man at the Rebels’ front office at an early age and probably made only half as much dough as she could if she’d taken a gig in finance and international law, both of which she had degrees in.
Ah, damn. He knew way too much about her.
The sudden flood of pink in her cheeks made him curse his total lack of manners. Why embarrass the hell out of her when she’d only been making a brave bid for his attention? God knew, he didn’t look up from his own path in life very often to notice what the rest of the world was doing. What right did he have to judge her motives?
She turned. “If you’d rather I go—”
“Wait.” He took her shoulders in his hands, putting her right back where she’d been. He wasn’t sure what else to say now that he had her attention.
But just about then, his brain started broadcasting updates on all the ways his body wished to capitalize on this moment. She’d taken a huge risk to grab what she wanted. And he couldn’t deny that he wanted her, too. So how could he possibly ignore her sweetly perfumed skin, her long lean limbs that his shirt did nothing to cover? The swell of cleavage that distorted the number on his jersey lured his attention back to her breasts.
And hell, yeah, he knew he was making excuses to follow his libido, but he was also quickly losing the will to give a damn.
“Nobody’s twisting your arm,” she said, her voice little more than a whisper as he tried to make sense of what was happening.
He’d seen her, noticed her in the way a man notices a woman, and yet he hadn’t acted on that in the year and a half he’d been here because he’d tried to throw all his focus on his job.
No more. A shot at a championship wasn’t worth throwing away the chance to touch her.
Delaney Blair had bared more than her body to him just now. She’d bared her desires. Her hopes. And she was—without a doubt—the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.
Bracketing her hips, he quit thinking and drew her close. Her gasp of surprise fanned the latent heat in his chest.
And he kissed her.
Gently, he brushed his mouth over hers, savoring the soft swell of her plump lips. She tasted like cinnamon—hot and sweet at the same time. Intrigued, he cau
ght her jaw in one hand and held her steady as he conducted further investigation. Her lips were coated with something slick and sweet. But as good as she tasted, her lips weren’t enough a moment later. Heat flared all over his skin, firing his blood and igniting his hunger. Her body brushed up against his as she shifted position—a knee here, a thigh there—communicating tantalizing hints about how good it would feel to have all of her pressed tight to him.
He forgot who started this, forgot anything but the need to have more of her. Anchoring her with a hand splayed against the small of her narrow back, he teased her lips apart for a deeper exploration. She opened to him on a sweet, audible sigh of pleasure, an enticing sound he made it his mission in life to hear again.
Driven by a rush of hot desire, he backed her up a step and then reversed their positions. Guiding her through the break in the benches, he situated her against his locker, needing his hands free.
Heat crawled up the back of his neck, making his freshly showered skin itch with impatience to have more of her. His fingers speared beneath the jersey he’d covered her with, greedy to map every inch of unfamiliar terrain even though he knew every second he touched her was bringing him closer to the point of no return.
“You should stop me,” he warned her, certain he could rein it in on her command, but not entirely sure that he could still accomplish the feat on his own.
He’d had himself on a tight leash for the last two years, determined to finally achieve the elusive career goal of a series title in Atlanta. What if he’d used up all the restraint he possessed in those two years and he didn’t have enough to let go of Delaney?
“I don’t want to stop,” she assured him, her fingers working the buttons on his shirt with slow precision.
His thumb brushed the underside of her breast and she made that sweet sound again, the one he’d hear in his dreams tonight and every other night.
“You deserve more. Better.” He knew that in his rational mind, but that didn’t stop his one hand going to work on the clasp of her bra while the other slipped beneath the underwire to cup the soft, full weight.