by Cecilia Tan
Casey took all that in. “And the trip to Philly?”
“Oh, definitely still on,” he said. “It’s not like they’re sending me to Alabama for surgery or something.” He let out a long breath, like he was only just now coming to a stop after running around. “Hey, I thought you had a meeting in the morning or something.” He pulled Casey’s hands into his lap.
“I do. But you’re kind of more important than a meeting. Or sleep.”
He smiled. “Do you want to go upstairs? Or was this really just a ‘let’s make sure Tyler’s okay’ visit?”
She looked up at him. “I do want to go upstairs. But you should rest and I do have a meeting. So I should go.” And I want to prove to myself I didn’t just come here for the sex.
He pulled her into a hug. “I knew I love you for a reason. I’m going to totally crash right now then. But I’ll see you Friday night at the hotel, right?”
“Yes. Missy and I are flying together.”
“Oh, danger, Will Robinson! Don’t drink too many nips in first class.”
“First… ?”
He clucked his tongue. “You don’t think Missy booked you guys in coach, do you? I know it’s only an hour flight, but come on. Wait, too expensive? Case, you gotta quit thinking about that. A plane ticket to Philly, even a first-class one, is like lunch money to me.”
She frowned, but said, “Okay.”
“No, really, not to disrespect your job or career or anything. But just let me pay for it, all right? My mother’s like that, too. She still wants to change her own oil in her car. I’m like, ‘Ma, I bought you a car that cost more than your house, don’t screw with it.’ But she’d rather do it than pay a few bucks to Jiffy Lube.”
She’d never heard him talk about his parents before. Maybe his muscles weren’t the only thing loosened up by the shot they gave him. “Where does she live?”
“Oh, she and my dad still live in Kalamazoo. They’re separated now, but they only live like four miles apart— is that funny? She still has the house I grew up in and she doesn’t want to move. I put a new roof on it and a new driveway, and built her a tennis court in the back, though. She’s a big hit with her friends, has these Friday night tennis parties. It’s awesome.”
Casey smiled. “Will I get to meet her at some point, you think?”
“Oh, definitely, definitely. There’s no team in Kalamazoo, of course. Let’s think. We don’t play Detroit, wrong league… um… yeah. She’ll probably come here for a visit later in the summer, though. My dad, too, though they’ll probably come at different times. Although you can never tell with them.” He nearly slid off the stool, caught himself with a loud clack of the cast against the floor, then grimaced. “Okay, time for little Tyler to get in bed.”
“Do you want help?”
He looked at her for a long moment. “You know what? No. Because you know exactly what is going to happen, or try to happen, if we go into that bedroom together. And I’m going to pass out, and it just won’t be pretty. I’ll get Jerry or one of the other guys to help me and make sure I don’t fall down before I get there.” He kissed her softly on the forehead. “Friday?”
“Friday.”
He hobbled out, the broad-shouldered maitre d’ Casey had met last time helping him.
Hojo and she exchanged a look. “I guess I need my check,” she said.
He laughed. “Hammond’s already paid it. He’d kill me if I charged you.”
She shook her head, smiling. “All right. Let me at least leave a tip.” She dug a five out of her purse and left it on the bar, then took a last few sips of her soda water.
As she made her way down to the lobby, the maitre d’ caught up to her. “Casey?”
“Yeah, that’s me,” she said, surprised.
“I’m Jerry. Tyler was worried you’d missed the last train, so he sent me down with money for a cab for you.”
“This is getting ridiculous,” she said, even though Jerry didn’t necessarily know what she was talking about. “I’ve got a job. I can pay for my own cab.”
“Yeah, I’m sure you can,” Jerry said. “But I can’t just pocket this. You can give it back to him tomorrow if you want.” He handed her a hundred-dollar bill.
“Yeah, okay.”
Jerry put her into a cab and she paid the driver the whopping fifteen bucks that it took to get her to her apartment, and put the hundred into her jewelry box later, trying to decide if he had been serious when he’d said, “that’s why I love you.”
* * * *
Casey arrived at the airport slightly frazzled from the T getting stuck, but when she got there, she realized she didn’t have to wait to check a bag. All she had was her small rolling suitcase and a first-class ticket already printed out, so she went straight to security. In the gate area she didn’t see Missy anywhere though, so she picked up a magazine at the newsstand and sat down to read it by the windows.
She looked up as a familiar-looking woman sat down next to her. The woman saw her looking and stared back as if trying to place her, too.
“Lasagna,” Casey said suddenly. “Shayna, was it?”
“Oh! Yes,” the woman said, holding out her hand for a limp handshake. She looked like she still hadn’t quite placed Casey. “Shayna McDowell.”
“Casey Branigan.” For some reason, she felt reasonably sure that adding “Tyler’s girlfriend” wasn’t going to get her much of a reception, and if Shayna hadn’t remembered her connection to Missy, well, that was probably all right, too. “How’s the cookbook coming along?”
“Oh, it’s awful!” Shayna reached down into her tote bag and pulled out a somewhat dog-eared looking thing. “This is last year’s. Isn’t it cute? Pomona Wilks did the design and put it all together, but her husband just got traded to a West Coast team, so there you go. Now there’s no one.”
Casey looked at the “book” in her hands. It looked like it had been printed at a quick copy shop and spiral bound. Spiral bound was fine for a cookbook, but the cover was half falling off, and the drawing on the front wasn’t very good. “Where did you have this printed?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Someplace Pomona found. Michaela would know, since she wrote the check to them.”
“Well, I’m a production manager at a design firm in town. I could probably help… ” She was turning the thing over and over in her hands. They’d probably paid five bucks a pop to get it done at a Kinko’s or something. “How many of them do you make?”
“Oh, gosh, I think we sold about a thousand of them last year.”
“And the money’s all for charity, right?”
“Yes, the Wives’ Fund all goes to Children’s Hospital.”
“Can I ask how much you actually raised?”
“Oh, all total last year, about fifty grand, but the cookbook was only about ten thousand of that. A thousand at ten dollars each.”
“Hmm.” Casey did a quick calculation in her head. “I’m going to guess you sold the cookbook a few hundred at a time, so you got a few hundred printed at a time?”
“That’s right.”
“So you probably spend five thousand on printing alone. If you were selling the cookbook for ten bucks, but you paid five, then you only made five.”
Shayna frowned at her as if she didn’t like this news, or the messenger, much at all. “So what are you saying, that we should raise the price?”
“No, actually, if you’re going to do a thousand anyway, I can probably get you a price closer to two dollars a book, and have it printed like a real book, with a four-color cover and everything. A book book.”
Shayna brightened immediately. “A book book would be perfect! You can really do that?”
“You need a designer who can work with a professional printer. I can do that. What I’d need is for you to e-mail me all the actual recipes so I can do the layout. If we can get pictures from the team and stuff, I can have illustrations inside, all that kind of thing. And if it’s fancy like that, you can probably charge more lik
e fifteen dollars for the book. That’s what people would expect to pay for it in the bookstore, right? So your five-thousand-dollar donation becomes more like twelve or thirteen thousand right there.”
Casey didn’t expect Shayna McDowell to hug her, but she did, seizing her suddenly and nearly choking her with her fur coat. “You’re the best! You’re amazing! Oh, quick, let me put your e-mail address into my phone.”
They were just finishing exchanging contact information when Casey saw Missy hurrying toward them.
“Well, hello, gals,” Missy said as she plopped down in the seat on the other side of Casey. “Shayna, I didn’t know you were coming on this trip, too.”
“Oh, yes, I’m thinking I’ll try to make most of the weekend road trips this year.”
“Good for you,” Missy said, while Casey tried to figure out what she was missing in the conversation.
A little while later, Shayna went off to the ladies’ room, and Missy put a hand on Casey’s arm as she leaned a bit closer to say, “The reason she’s decided to go on all the weekend road trips is that she busted Jim with a mistress last year.”
“Oh jeez.”
“Yeah. I don’t feel too sorry for her, because she was a bitch before that, too. But what a dog, you know? I can understand the guys lapsing once in a while. There are always Annies around, take a tumble with a groupie or something, but a full-blown mistress who met up with him in all different cities? That’s really shitty. And he couldn’t really keep it a secret. It was one of the other wives who ratted him out, of course.”
“Wow.” Casey tried to picture it. What kind of woman would let herself be used that way, too?
“It gets worse. Shayna and the kids lived in Cincinnati where he used to play, and this mistress was in Boston, so he was literally like almost living a double life. It was like, hello, did you forget you have a wife and kids in another city? Man. So Shayna’s put the kids in boarding school so she can be with Jimmy every day pretty much, trying to repair the marriage and all… that giant diamond on her choker? That was a big step in the repair process.”
“You sound kind of skeptical.”
“Yeah, well, it’s none of my business, but if Doggy did something like that to me, I could give a damn about some diamond or whatever. But no one likes to see someone go through that. I used to like Jimmy McDowell, too. I didn’t realize he was such a stupid fucker.” She sighed. “Yeah, so, what were you guys talking about when I showed up?”
“Oh, I, um… looks like I’m taking over the cookbook.”
“No way!” Missy turned in her seat to face Casey more directly. “What do you mean taking over?”
“Well, producing it. She said the woman who did it last year left because her husband got traded.”
“What? Wilks? When?”
Casey held up her hands. “I don’t know! That’s what she said when she came in.”
“Holy crap. It must have happened today. Damn, and Pomona was nice, too, if not particularly bright. So, you’re going to do it?”
“Yeah. I always wanted to be a designer, you know? But it’s so hard to break in. I do a little design in my current job, but most of what I do is herding cats. That is, making sure the actual designers and other people do what they are supposed to when they are supposed to.” She sighed.
“Oh, wow, hang on.” Missy whipped out her phone and dialed. Casey could hear the buzz of another line ringing briefly. “Damn, voice mail. Oh, wait, I know who’ll know. I’ve still got Ken’s number in here… ”
She dialed again and this time someone picked up right away. “Ken! Missy. What’s this about Wilks getting traded? We got who? Oh boy. Oh, this should be interesting. Yeah, we’re at the airport now. Thanks, Ken.”
She hung up and then looked at Casey. “You remember the big palooka that Tyler plunked in that first game you came to? Campbell? He’s a Robin now.”
Casey sat for a moment in stunned silence. “Wow.” Then she smiled. “I wonder if his wife can cook.”
* * * *
The trade was the talk of the team, of course. By the time Missy and Casey got checked in at the hotel, the game was nearly over, and they were sitting in the bar waiting for the guys for only perhaps an hour before the first bus pulled up.
Tyler came gamboling over like an excited puppy when he saw Casey. “Hey! You’re here!” He gave her a bear hug from behind while she was still on her bar stool. “Did you hear the news? Campbell’s on his way here!”
“I heard,” Casey said, turning in her stool so that she faced him. He put his hands on her knees. “But I thought you hated that guy.”
Tyler snorted. “When he’s on another team, yeah. But for us? He could be the missing piece. I’ll looooove it when he hits home runs for our team.”
“The missing piece?”
“Of the championship puzzle.” Tyler was positively beaming. “Oh, and slight change of plans. I’m starting tomorrow.”
“What? What about your ankle?”
“Well, it’s better, pretty much. And with Wilks gone, the rotation got shuffled… it’s me or call up some kid from Triple A.”
Casey turned to Missy. “I’m picturing a tow truck.”
“He means the minor leagues, hon,” Missy explained.
“So, it’s me,” Tyler said, drawing himself up taller. “I’ll be fine. They taped it up today in a way that made it feel good as new. But anyway, that shouldn’t keep us from meeting your parents or anything, but if I win, well, we might not get the nicest reception everywhere we go. Just warning you.”
Missy waved her hand. “I’m sure it’ll be fine. They’re not going to throw a cigarette in your soup at Morimoto.”
Tyler blinked. “Where are we going?”
“A place my foodie parents picked out,” Casey said. “Japanese fusion cuisine. The chef’s very famous.”
“Cool.” Tyler grinned at her. “So did you guys eat already tonight? Or… ?”
Casey grinned back. “Or what?”
He nuzzled her ear. “Or do you want to go upstairs and do it?”
She put her arms around his neck. “We can always call room service later.”
“You have the best ideas.” He slipped a hand under her knees and the next thing she knew, Casey had been literally swept off her feet. “Bye, Doggy, Missy! See you in the morning.” And he carried Casey right out of the bar to the elevator.
There he set her down and just held her hand. She couldn’t help grinning like a kid. It wasn’t just the sex. It was the feeling that Tyler simply couldn’t wait to see her, couldn’t wait to be with her, every time she saw him. And the fact that she felt exactly the same way.
They stripped quickly once they were in the room, and he kissed her up against the wall, rutting against her hip until he was completely hard. She then took his cock in hand and led him to the bed, pulling him along by it.
She lay down next to him, pressing her body along his length and stroking him with her hand.
“So what’s your pleasure? Top, bottom, from behind?” he asked, brushing her hair back behind her ear.
“Let’s talk,” she said, looking into his eyes. She was trying not to sound too serious, but she was failing. “Just a little.”
“Okay, sure,” he said, propping himself on one elbow and pulling another pillow behind his head.
She kept stroking him. She wanted to just climb on and ride him until she came, but she knew she’d be thinking about some things that Missy had said the entire time if she didn’t ask him about them now. “So what’s the deal with ‘Annies’?” she asked.
“Baseball groupies, you mean? Did Missy point them out to you in the lobby or something?”
“Yeah.”
He shrugged. “They’re, you know, just like groupies for rock stars and stuff. You’re in a totally different class from them, you know.”
“I know, but… ” How to ask this? “But do you ever take them up on their offers? I mean, some of them have to be kind of cute. And you
know they’re willing.”
He winced. “Yeah, I hear what you’re saying. But no, I don’t do Annies, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Not even once in a while?”
“Phew. You ask the tough questions,” he joked, arching into her hand, which was still caressing up and down his shaft. “You should get a job at ESPN. But seriously, no. I did once or twice when I was a rookie, but they’re just not worth the trouble. Some of the guys really enjoy them, but some of them carry two cell phones, one with the number they give out to the Annies and one for their real wife or girlfriend.”
“Holy crap, that’s really… wow.”
“Shitty, yeah, but… but men are dogs, you know that.”
“Well, that’s why I’m asking. Seriously, Tyler. I just want to know what to expect.”
He took her hand in his then, removing it from his cock and holding it between his. “Casey. Since I met you, I haven’t been interested in anyone else. I haven’t had sex with anyone else, and I haven’t even wanted to. I haven’t even flirted with anyone else except maybe a waitress or two, but only to try to get better service, you know? And I know that’s not my reputation and that this is going to sound like a line, but… but it’s so true. I’m all about you right now, and I want it to stay that way, too.”
She squeezed his fingers. “So when you get lonely on the road, you aren’t tempted?”
He squeezed back. “It just makes me wish you were there more. If I’m horny, I’ve got a pretty strong right hand, you know.”
She looked into his eyes. “Is that a promise, then?”
“Absolutely! No Annies, no sex with anybody but you, Casey. That’s… ” His eyes were a little misty-looking, she thought. “That’s easy to promise because it’s what I want. You. Just you.”
She nodded. “Pretty easy for me to promise, too,” she said. “Though it’s not like I’m beating off offers like you are.”
He kissed her fingertips. “It’s still nice to hear.”
“Okay, then. I promise it’s you, only you, Tyler. In fact, since I know you’re jealous of vibrators, too… ” She moved their hands back down to their crotches. “How about I promise nothing goes inside me that you don’t put there yourself?”
