“I hope you have some pictures. I can’t wait to meet him.”
“Do you have any animals?”
“I do, but don’t tell anyone, because she’s not allowed in California.” Mia whispers so it sounds like a secret.
My eyes go wide. “Do you have an exotic pet?”
“I guess some would think so, but she’s just a hedgehog. I call her Nuzzle.”
“That’s really cool. Is she friendly?”
“With me, yes. With newcomers less so. But she loves baths and enjoys being held.”
“Well, I hope to meet her.”
There’s so much more I want to ask Mia, but I’d rather do that over drinks. Instead, I confirm. “Okay, so you’re good to join me for the games in San Diego?”
“Hell yeah. I mean, the chance to be there when Jeremy breaks the record would be phenomenal.”
“Will you text me the address where you want me to pick you up?”
“Well, do you still have my card?”
“I do.” I can see the embossed cupid where I propped it on my desk.
“My office address is on there,” she says. “If you call when you’re downstairs, I can come meet you.”
“Perfect. I’ll confirm with Nate, but I’ll think see you tomorrow about noon?”
“Sure. Nate will probably have lunch on the plane for us.”
“Oh, okay. Sounds good.”
We hang up, and I text Nate immediately. This is for sure the craziest first date I’ve ever been part of.
Chapter 6
Mia
Midday on Thursday, as I’m finishing up my work day, which began at five a.m., my cell phone pings.
Axel: We’re five minutes away.
I do a little happy dance. We’re going to San Diego! If this guy’s a dud—which I’m almost positive he won’t be—at least I can hang with my friends. Plus, if Jeremy Hamilton manages to throw a baseball over a hundred and eight miles an hour during the game, it will be a celebration. I’m so glad Nate invited us.
I start wrapping up the last few things as I text Axel back.
Me: I’ll be right down.
I grab my overnight bag and wave goodbye to my staff. They know I’m going out on my own first Flirt date—unofficially, at least—and that we’re going to San Diego to see the baseball game.
“I hope you packed condoms,” Christie teases.
“They won’t be needed. A nice girl never gives it up before the third date.”
“Feel free to throw caution to the wind.” She winks.
I shake my head and laugh.
I made a deal with Nate so that Peter can join us on the trip without standing out as my security. I don’t want to keep things from Axel, but I’m not ready to put all my cards on the table just yet. It can be intimidating to have a huge security guy following you around all the time. This way, Peter will just seem like another friend on the trip. He was a good sport about it, even though he typically enjoys the break when I’m out of town for a short trip like this.
As I walk out the building, I spot Axel waiting in front of a Cadillac Escalade. He opens the door as I approach. I don’t know if I should just smile and get in, shake his hand, or kiss him on the cheek. Thankfully, he solves the dilemma by giving me a warm smile as he puts his hand on my lower back and takes my bag from me.
“Are you ready for some good baseball?” he asks.
“I can’t wait,” I reply.
Axel scoots in behind me and we’re off—skirting around Thursday lunch traffic and making our way to the private plane terminal at San Francisco’s airport.
Axel rubs his hands over his thighs. “I have to admit, I’m a little nervous.”
About the date? I panic for a moment before I realize he’s probably talking baseball. Still, I answer carefully. “We’re going to have a great time.”
He nods. “I know, and even if Jeremy doesn’t beat the record, this will be fun.”
Ah-ha. Got it. My shoulders relax. “Will his parents be there?”
Axel looks away for a moment. “No. I called them last night and offered to fly them and his brothers and sisters out. They’re so excited for him, but they can’t leave their farm on such short notice.”
“That’s really too bad,” I sympathize.
“Yep. They’ll watch it on TV, and I’ll make sure he connects with them later today. They talk after most games.”
“That’s a great way for them to be there in spirit,” I tell him.
He smiles. “Where is your family?”
“My parents are in New York City. They live in the same apartment I grew up in in Manhattan.”
“Wow, you really are a city girl. Are you a Yankee or Mets fan?”
“Definitely a Yankees fan, but really, I love all baseball. It’s math at so many levels: the shape of the field, the positioning of the players, the arc of a pitch, the ball’s design, the number of balls thrown, the difference between right-handed players and left-handed players… I also love the sensory part of baseball: the crack of a bat, the sound of the ball smacking into a leather glove, the crowd going crazy, and let’s not forget the smell of hotdogs, popcorn, and beer. My goal is to see a game in every stadium—both major and minor league,” I confess. “Does that make me sound really weird?”
I’m prepared for him to give me an awkward shrug or uncomfortable laugh, but his head tilts to the side and he smiles. “Not at all. I love it. Do you know who holds the current record for a fastball in regular play?”
“Nolan Ryan in 1974. I can also give you his stats, if you want.”
“You know his stats?”
“He’s Nolan Ryan. Of course, I know all his statistics. He’s an eight-time All Star player, the fourteenth overall best pitcher with three hundred and twenty-four wins, two hundred and ninety-two losses, and a three point one nine ERA. He struck out five thousand seven hundred and fourteen players, all of which put him in the Hall of Fame in nineteen ninety-nine.”
I hold my breath. I just vomited baseball garbage and statistics all over him. It looks like I’m trying too hard. Not many men want to be shown up in their baseball knowledge by a woman.
But Axel’s face lights up. “I’m thoroughly impressed. Did you and your dad go to a lot of games when you were growing up?”
“My dad is an investment banker. His company has box seats, but we never went. When I was in late elementary school, I was flipping channels and caught the announcers talking about a player’s statistics, and it was like music to my ears. Math has always been easy for me, so once I saw it in action, I was hooked.”
Axel shakes his head. “You’re beautiful and you love baseball.”
I look down at my sneakers and blush. “You’re handsome and you love baseball.”
“Sounds like a match made in heaven to me,” he murmurs.
My stomach tightens, and I have to concentrate so I don’t jump him. We pull up at the plane just as Nate and Lilly arrive. When we board, there’s another man already there, sitting front and center with a young woman hanging on him.
Nate kisses me on the cheek. “Mia, great to see you. Axel, welcome.” He turns to the other couple. The man seems to bristle when he sees Axel. “This is Thomas Luck and his girlfriend, Candace Kane. Thomas is Jonas Raymond’s manager.”
“Nice to meet you both.” I smile. Candy Kane? Please tell me her parents weren’t that cruel. That must be her porn star name—you know, her first pet’s name and her mom’s maiden name…
“Thomas, great day for baseball,” Axel says as we move toward two open seats.
The tension is a bit thick, but I see the flight attendant preparing to pass out drinks. Hopefully that will help.
“The team’s public relations group has gotten the word out that Jeremy has been clocking record-breaking fastballs this week,” Nate reports. “And the article in the San Francisco Chronicle hit the AP wire, so there should be a lot of media. The game may even be nationally televised.”
“Oh ma
n, that’s fantastic,” Axel says. “The only thing that might make it better is if Jeremy did this in front of a home crowd, but if he can keep this up, we’ll see it again.”
“I hear he’s icing down a lot and using some serious steroids,” Thomas snarks.
Nate shrugs. “Nothing out of the ordinary. The entire team has been drug tested this week, so if anyone says otherwise to the press, they’ll lose credibility with the Prospectors, and more importantly, with me.”
Thomas turns red. He’s trying to poison the win, and I can tell Nate sees right through him.
Candy turns to me. “Do you work?”
I nod. “I do. I recently started a small company. What about you?”
“Tommy just agreed to let me quit working. I’m so excited. I have an apartment in the Marina, and I’m so happy not to have to get up and do the daily grind, you know?”
“I get it. It’s hard.” I nod and decide to keep the fact that I also live in the Marina to myself. I can’t imagine not going to work. But I do something I love, so it’s not a grind—at least not most days.
“Totally. Plus, it can take all day to look this good, right?” She preens for me.
I smile and take in her appearance. I’m sure she’s right. She’s a pretty girl with an hourglass figure, wearing a seductive dress and four-inch stilettos. Her makeup is heavy but not ostentatious, and her nails are perfect claws painted a shiny red that matches her lips, belt, and shoes. She’s not exactly baseball game ready, but she’s definitely arm candy.
In comparison, I’m in jeans and a Prospectors T-shirt with my hair in a ponytail ready for a baseball cap. Though I am wearing pair of trendy sneakers.
She leans in close. “Plus, it’s nice to have a rich guy paying some of your bills. I mean, if I’d met Nate Lancaster when I was single, I could have had him eating out of my hand.” She smiles.
Nate met his first wife in elementary school, and they were together for over thirty years, if you include all the years they dated, as well as were married, before she was killed. Nate was single for almost three years before he fell for his fiancée. Many women tried, but no one came close to distracting him. And this woman doesn’t hold a candle to Lilly, Nate’s fiancée.
“How do you know his fiancée?” Candy asks.
“I met her through Nate.”
Her eyes grow wide. “How did you—”
“Hey,” Lilly comes up and sits with us. “Are you excited about today?”
I nod. “If Jeremy does this, it’s going to be incredible. I’m so grateful that you guys included Axel and me.”
“You’re the biggest baseball fan Nate knows. He wants to celebrate with you.”
“You know baseball?” Candy asks.
Lilly turns to her. “This girl can recite the statistics of every player and every game going back to the beginning of baseball. Do you like baseball?”
Candy purses her lips like she just took a big bite out of a lemon. “Why would you want to do that when there are so many other things you could learn?”
Lilly’s eyes grow wide. “Maybe, but she knows those things, too.”
I put my hand on Lilly’s leg, and she shrugs. Sorry, she mouths.
“I mean, isn’t it fun to go shopping and find the perfect pair of shoes or a dress you know will look fabulous on you?” Candy says.
“Without a doubt,” I say. “Who’s your favorite designer?”
Candy wiggles in her seat and her eyes glimmer. I’ve found her hot button. I spend the remainder of the ninety-minute flight listening to her drone on about her fascination with Gucci, Prada, Yves St Laurent, and other big names. I smile and nod. She may be a bit catty, but she seems happy, and that’s all any of us can hope for.
As we exit the plane, I feel Axel’s hand on my back. “Thank you for coming today.”
I lean in and kiss him on the cheek. “Thank you for sharing this with me.”
He holds my hand as we get in the car with Nate and Lilly. In the front seat are Nate’s security—I recognize Trevor, one of his usual guys—and Peter. We race off to the stadium.
“Sir,” Trevor says. “The press is at the back entrance. Would you prefer to be dropped elsewhere?”
Nate looks between Lilly and me. “It’s Jeremy Hamilton excitement. Are you all okay with that? We can have the guys drop us off and we walk in like anyone else?”
“The energy from the crowd would be great. What do you think?” Lilly asks.
“Peter and Trevor will be with us?” I ask, both terrified and excited by the idea. No one knows who I am, but Nate’s pretty popular.
Nate nods. “Are you okay with walking in, Axel?”
“I always walk in a regular door. I’m fine either way.”
So, the car lets us out at the edge of the crowd, and we make our way in. We look like any other group of people going to the game. The driver is going to take our luggage to the hotel and get it all taken care of.
As we approach the entrance, Nate turns to us. “I know you have seats, but you’re welcome to come up to the visitors’ VIP box and join us.”
“Thanks,” Axel says as we weave our way through security and into the stadium. “We’ll be up shortly.”
Once we’re inside, I can see the crowd is pretty decent for a Thursday evening. The Killers’ “Mr. Brightside” blares through the speakers, and I know Jeremy’s warming up. That’s his song. The crowd roars, and it seems they don’t care that he’s not a Tarantula.
Thomas Luck and Candy Kane materialize behind us as we survey the scene from the top of the stairway into the seats. “A lot of pitchers can beat the record at practice but crumble with the crowds,” Thomas notes. “He’ll be lucky if he lasts past the third inning.”
“We’ll have to see,” Axel says with a knowing smirk.
That Luck guy is ridiculous. Unlike many pitchers in the majors these days, Jeremy Hamilton almost always lasts way past the third inning. He’s old school—no middle relievers necessary. That’s another way he’s like Nolan Ryan.
We walk down to find our seats, which are four rows up from the field and halfway between home plate and first base.
I look over at Axel, and he seems pretty relaxed. The young boy sitting on the other side of him, however, is bouncing in his seat.
“Did you know Nolan Ryan has the record for the fastest pitch, and he got it before my dad was born?” the little boy asks Axel.
“Really? Do you like baseball?” Axel asks.
He nods. “My dad let me leave school early so we could see if Jeremy Hamilton breaks the record.”
“Are you a fan of the Prospectors or the Tarantulas?”
“We usually go to Dodger games, but I’m totally a Jeremy Hamilton fan. I want to be just like him. Who’s your favorite team?”
Axel gestures down the row. “We live in San Francisco, so we’re big Prospector fans.”
“They have some good, young players, but they need more strength in their catcher and a deeper pitching bench,” the boy counters. “Hamilton can’t be the only one to carry the team.”
“Wow, you really do know baseball.” Axel nods. “Do you hope to play in the big leagues one day?”
“Maybe coaching.”
“That’s a good job.” Axel gives him a thumbs up.
“Oliver, leave the man alone,” the boy’s dad admonishes.
Axel gives them a smile, and the boy turns to point something out to his dad. A few minutes later, the national anthem plays, and the game begins. We’re the visiting team, so we hit first and the Tarantulas are in the field. We manage to get a run in, and the score is one to zero.
In the bottom of the first inning, Jeremy is on the mound. I reach for Axel’s hand as he winds up. There’s a camera on the radar gun behind the fence, which broadcasts to the jumbotron. The crowd is nearly silent—all watching, waiting, and hoping to see a record-breaking fastball.
When the batter is ready, Jeremy throws a curveball and gets his first strike. The batter
steps out of the batter’s box and does an easy practice swing, rolling his head to the side. He steps back into the box and digs his feet in the dirt. The catcher gets in his crouch. This guy’s looking for a home run off the fastball.
Jeremy throws, and it looks like a fastball, but it’s a splitter—moving inside at the last minute. It’s the kind of ball that shaves the hair off your chin, as they like to say.
The batter swings, and it’s the second strike. Axel and I have white knuckles as we hold hands in anticipation.
The crowd wants to see a fastball, but Jeremy is focused on the batter. The jumbotron shows his last pitch was eighty-eight miles an hour.
Jeremy winds up and throws a change-up, which looks like a fastball but arcs and drops into the catcher’s glove with a giant smack.
The umpire yells, “Strike three.”
The energy in the stadium is electric. The crowd’s getting anxious.
Jeremy manages to strike out the next two batters without ever throwing a fastball.
At the top of the second inning, the Prospectors leave two men on base and score no runs. When they take the field for the bottom of the second, Jeremy is back on the mound. Once again, the first two batters seem to be hoping for the fastball, but they don’t get it, and they strike out. The stadium crowd is losing focus.
Oliver turns to Axel. “Do you think he’s saving his fastball for a home crowd?”
“No, I just think he’s smart. A fastball can be easy to hit a homer off. He wants to make sure he clears out the heavy hitters. I think we’ll see it today.”
The boy nods. “I hope so.”
Michael Cobb, the third Tarantula batter, enters the batting box. He’s a homerun master. I pray Jeremy doesn’t get his fastball out now. He winds up and throws a splitter, followed by a slider right down the middle. Cobb swings for the fences and misses both times.
The batter returns to the box, and in my gut I know Jeremy’s going to throw his fastball this time.
He winds up, and the pitch is so fast that Cobb’s swing starts as we hear the ball smack inside the glove, and it finishes well after the ball is caught. The catcher stands and drops his glove, shaking the sting away as we all look up at the jumbotron: 110.4 miles per hour. The crowd roars, and it’s pandemonium. No one hears the umpire call the batter out.
Champagne Brunch: The Stiletto Sisters Series Page 7