The Winning Season

by Alison Packard

  “Then what the hell are you...” Her cheeks started to burn. “I wasn’t expecting to see anyone,” she paused, “but there you were, practically having sex with my roommate in the kitchen.”

  “We weren’t having sex.”

  “You would have if I hadn’t walked in.” Her voice sounded shrill and, to her chagrin, jealous. She pressed her lips together to keep any more idiotic words from coming out of her mouth.

  She wasn’t jealous. Not in the slightest.

  “But you did walk in.” He moved toward her. “And we didn’t have sex.”

  “You didn’t stay?” she asked, surprised. He halted in front of her. Thank God she was almost as tall as him. If she was any shorter she’d feel at a distinct disadvantage, and he was one man she didn’t want to feel at a disadvantage with.

  “No.”

  “Why?” Something was off. He and Stacia had been hot and heavy when she’d walked in, and Stacia was more than willing. That was an undisputed fact.

  Matt shrugged. “I remembered I had to get up early.” He held up the DVD. “Hitters to study and all that.”

  “Oh.”

  Oh? That was all she had?

  Pathetic.

  Meeting his gaze, she was suddenly aware of his cologne. It was a warm spicy scent that made her light-headed. This was so not good.

  “Trevor Jackson, the sportscaster from KGO, has requested an interview,” she said and resisted the urge to step back. The sheer male power he exuded was doing things to her body that she hadn’t felt in a really long time. “I told him it was a go.”

  Matt’s eyes flickered with annoyance. “I’m not doing it.”

  “Pretty soon it won’t be me asking. It’ll be Doug. And it won’t be a request.” That she had to resort to using the general manager to get him to capitulate pissed her off. It made her sound ineffectual and weak—two things she couldn’t afford to be in the male-dominated environment she worked in.

  “I can handle the GM.” Matt scowled. “And I’ll start doing interviews when I’m damn well ready to.”

  “You really are an ass, you know that?” So much for changing tactics; he was basically forcing her to be rude.

  “Maybe, but I’m not doing any interviews.” He brushed past her before she could think of a suitable retort and left her standing in the conference room alone.

  Damn him.

  * * *

  An hour later, Matt was in the Blaze’s state-of-the-art gym using one of the many elliptical machines. He preferred to run to get his cardio in but he’d come straight to the ballpark this morning to study film and had forgone it.

  Next to him, J.T. was sweating profusely on a similar elliptical and staring at the big-screen television mounted on the wall opposite them. It was tuned to the sports channel. Matt was watching it too, but he wasn’t paying much attention to it. He had his headphones on, listening to his favorite playlist and thinking, for some ungodly reason, about Kelly Maxwell.

  For a few minutes in the conference room she’d actually been civil. But then she’d gotten her panties in a twist—again—when he’d refused to do the interview she’d set up. The woman was tenacious, he’d give her that. She was just doing her job—a job coveted by many and one she wouldn’t want to lose. He was under no illusion that she was going to stop breathing down his neck about the media anytime soon.

  At some point he’d have to give in. Part of every ballplayer’s job was dealing with reporters. Hell, these days most of the teams gave classes on how to handle the media. He’d been dealing with them for eight years and until last year he’d gotten pretty good press. Now all he wanted to do was keep a low profile and try to fix the mess he’d made of his life.

  He couldn’t tell Kelly his reasons for laying low. Only his best friend knew why he’d gone off the deep end and sabotaged his career. He never wanted the press to know anything about the hell he’d been through. He’d lived through it once, he didn’t want to relive it over and over and have everybody and their damn brother talking about it.

  A slap on his arm jolted him from his thoughts. He looked over at J.T. and pulled off his headphones so they rested on his neck.

  “What did Maxwell want with you?” J.T. asked, wiping his sweaty brow with the back of his hand.

  Matt hit the incline button on his machine to move it to the next level and kept up his pace. Getting back into shape was his top priority. Too much partying for the past year had taken its toll. He was still as fit as most of the guys on the team but that wasn’t good enough. He wanted to play for as long as he could and that meant being in the best shape possible.

  “The usual. She wants me to do some interviews.” He drew in a deep breath, then exhaled. “What’s the deal with her? How long has she worked for the team?”

  “About a year,” J.T. said. “You know who her sister is, right?”

  “Kayla Maxwell. The actress.” He didn’t tell J.T. that he’d met Kayla, or that his best friend, Sean Barrett, was involved with her. A lot of ballplayers watched the soap opera they were on and he’d learned a long time ago that if he mentioned Sean was his friend they all wanted to know what was going to happen on the show.

  “They look nothing alike.” J.T. reached for his water bottle and squirted the liquid into his mouth.

  “There’s a bit of a resemblance.”

  They both had dark hair, a heart-shaped face and a voluptuous mouth. Unlike Kayla, Kelly had blond highlights in her hair. Although why he’d noticed was beyond him. At work, her long, thick mane was usually pulled back in a ponytail. The only time he’d seen it down was last night when she’d interrupted him and Stacia in the kitchen. He’d seen a lot more of her last night than he’d ever seen before and it was disconcerting—to say the least—that he couldn’t seem to get the image of her standing in the kitchen doorway wearing almost nothing out of his head.

  “Resemblance?” J.T.’s expression was incredulous. “Kayla Maxwell is hotter than hell. I wonder if one of them is adopted.”

  “I doubt it.” Matt reached for the towel hanging on the rack in front of him and wiped his face.

  “Dude, they’re as different as night and day. Kelly is huge compared to her sister.”

  “She’s athletic.”

  “She’s freakishly tall,” J.T. countered. “And she has no shape. She looks like a box.”

  Matt had thought the same thing—until he’d seen her almost naked last night. The clothes she wore to work did nothing to accentuate her statuesque body. Still, while she wasn’t overweight, she wasn’t the type of woman he usually went for. His type was blonde and petite.

  “I think you’re pissed because she’s taller than you.” Matt grinned when J.T. snorted and gave him a pained look. “What are you, like, five-eight?”

  “Five-ten,” J.T. shot back with a scowl. “And she’s not taller than me.”

  “She’s almost as tall as I am and I’m six-one.”

  “Catchers don’t need to be tall,” J.T. pointed out. “In fact, the taller you are the worse it is on your knees.”

  “Yeah, that’s what all the short catchers say.”

  “Bite me, Scanlon,” J.T. said with a good-natured grin and then turned his attention back to the television.

  Matt laughed. Maybe things wouldn’t be so bad in San Francisco after all. At least one guy on the team didn’t seem to think he was a fuckup.

  Now he just had to prove it to everyone else. Including himself.

  Chapter Three

  July in San Francisco was unpredictable. One day it could be gloriously warm, and the next, so cold a person could be forgiven for believing they were in Alaska.

  Unfortunately, tonight was one of those Alaskan-like nights. Hunkered down in her seat, Kelly hugged her Blaze sweatshirt to her body in an effort to keep warm. As a front office employee she had access to one of the ballpark’s luxury boxes but she rarely took advantage of the perk. She preferred to watch a ball game as close to the action as possible.

 
; The reason for that was sitting next to her. Her father, John Maxwell.

  Her dad was a sports enthusiast. He loved all sports, but baseball was his passion. He’d grown up in San Francisco and while he now called the East Bay home, he would forevermore be a Blaze fan. He’d passed on his love of sports to both her and her sister. Some of her best times had been spent with her dad watching baseball games. There was nothing like the smell of peanuts and cotton candy, or the sweet sound of the crowd cheering when one of the Blaze players hit a dinger into the cove.

  They sat in the first row, right behind the Blaze dugout where they had an excellent view of the diamond and the Blaze players as they trotted on and off the field each inning.

  Usually Kelly didn’t pay that much attention to them. After all, she saw them nearly every day when the Blaze played at home, and she often traveled with them on the road. But tonight her attention was riveted on Matt. Each time he left the dugout she couldn’t help but watch him.

  Used to seeing her sitting with her dad in his season ticket seats, several of the players had acknowledged her with nods throughout the game. But if Matt had seen her he hadn’t let on. In fact, he’d barely looked at the crowd—he seemed wholly focused on the game. It was his first start since he’d been traded to the Blaze, and every fan in the ballpark was, no doubt, wondering the same thing she was. Would he continue the same bad-boy behavior that had gotten him traded from the Dodgers?

  The Blaze led by three runs in the top of the eighth inning and, so far, he’d kept his cool. There had been no outbursts, no challenging the umpire, and when a pitch came within a hair of hitting him, his only reaction was a long hard stare directed toward the Brewers pitcher.

  But the game wasn’t over yet. A few weeks before he’d been traded, he’d erupted in the ninth inning over a bad call and was ejected with only one out left in the game.

  “Scanlon’s calling a good game,” her father commented. He cracked a peanut shell between his fingers and popped the nut into his mouth.

  “He’s been working with the pitchers since he got here.” Glancing at her dad, she had to smile at the picture he made. With his black Blaze cap turned backward on his head and his baggy Blaze sweatshirt zipped up to his chin, he resembled an overgrown kid. “And he’s been in the league long enough to know the hitters.”

  “He’s a helluva catcher. Or at least he was until last year.” John shook his head. “For the life of me, I can’t understand why he went off the deep end.”

  Kelly had been pondering that herself. “I don’t know, Dad. It’s a mystery to everyone.”

  A mystery the media and baseball fans had been speculating about for a year now. It was as if one day, out of the blue, Matt Scanlon, the poster boy for model behavior on and off the field, had done a complete one-eighty. There was no apparent reason for it—at least no reason that had ever come to light.

  “Is he still giving you a hard time about the interviews?”

  She grimaced. “He won’t budge.”

  John reached into the red-and-white-striped bag nestled on his lap and pulled out another handful of peanuts. “The GM is probably giving him time to get settled in before he forces the issue. After all, he’s been a star since his rookie year. That’s garnering him a little leniency.”

  “Perhaps. But I’m not giving up.” Kelly turned her attention to the field. She fixed her gaze on Matt. He was crouched behind the plate waiting for the pitch from Rizzo. She’d noticed that each at bat was taking quite a bit of time. Matt had trotted to the mound several times since the first inning, more than likely to address the fact that Rizzo was shaking off a lot of his pitch calls.

  The position of catcher was—arguably—the toughest in baseball. A Major League catcher, much like an NFL quarterback, had to know what was going on at all times. Besides calling plays, he also had to do everything in his power to keep hitters off balance. The latter included knowing a hitter’s weaknesses. Did he always swing at the first pitch? Was he fooled by a hanging curve ball? Was he rattled by trash talk, complete silence or the stink eye? Each player was different; the mark of a great catcher was the ability to know and exploit each hitter’s vulnerabilities.

  Despite his recent behavior, Matt was a great catcher. Granted, his stats were lower this year than in previous years. But if he got his shit together there was no reason he couldn’t return to his former glory. For the sake of the team, Kelly hoped he would concentrate on baseball and not pick up in San Francisco where he’d left off in L.A.

  The vibrating of her phone startled her. She reached into the pocket of her sweatshirt to pull it out and glanced at the caller ID. Why would Jill Taylor, the wife of the Blaze’s injured rookie catcher, be calling her this late? It was two hours later in Texas, which meant it was almost ten-thirty there.

  “Hey, Jill.” She put a finger in her other ear to drown out the noise of the fans around her. “What’s up?”

  “I need a favor,” Jill said in her soft Texas twang.

  “Name it.” Jill probably needed a ride from the airport tomorrow afternoon. She was flying in to compete in the wives’ charity game. She’d committed to it before Rick had been injured and was still planning on participating even though Rick was recuperating in the small town near Austin where he and Jill lived during the off season.

  “I need you to get a sub for me in the charity game on Thursday.”

  “A sub?” Kelly watched the Brewers outfielder take a cut at Rizzo’s slider. He missed it and the crowd roared. “Why?”

  “I found out today that I’m pregnant.”

  “That’s great. Congratulations,” she said, genuinely happy for her.

  “I hate doin’ this to y’all and I know I’m probably worrying for nothing, but I can’t help it. My mama had a few miscarriages before she had me and, well, I don’t want to take any chances.”

  “I totally understand.” She mentally reviewed the list of wives who’d taken a pass on the game. Although they didn’t want to play, they still participated by doing interviews with the local media to help promote the charity they’d chosen for this year’s game. It was a long shot, but maybe she could cajole one of them into playing. “Don’t worry about it, we’ll find someone.”

  Jill breathed a sigh of relief. “You’re a sweetheart. Thank you so much.”

  “You’re welcome.” Kelly wasn’t used to being referred to as a sweetheart and wasn’t sure she liked it. The last thing she wanted to be perceived as was soft. “Take care of yourself. I’m sure we’ll be in touch as Rick’s rehab progresses.”

  After she and Jill had said their goodbyes, she shoved her phone into her pocket just as Rizzo started his windup. The pitch was a fastball. The batter swung and connected with a loud crack. The ball popped up high in the sky. Immediately, Matt tore off his catcher’s mask and sprinted toward the Blaze dugout while looking up to track the ball. He’d almost reached the dugout and, for a second, Kelly thought he might actually dive into it trying to make the catch. Instead he stopped short, reached out with his glove and effortlessly caught the ball. The crowd cheered loudly, eager for the team to end their losing streak. They were one inning away from getting their wish.

  Matt lowered his glove, pulled the ball from it and tossed it to a young girl sitting a few seats to Kelly’s right. The youngster caught it and squealed excitedly as she showed it to her parents. Glancing from the girl to Matt, she was surprised to see a smile on his face. It wasn’t the infuriating grin he’d given her when she’d interrupted him and Stacia in the kitchen. It was the megawatt smile that had graced the cover of People magazine when he’d been voted the sexiest athlete on the planet. An honor bestowed on him on more than one occasion.

  The planet thing was a stretch. She’d give him sexiest athlete in Major League Baseball, though. She didn’t like the jerk one bit, but she had to admit, he was gorgeous. Not that she went for guys like him, because she didn’t. He probably spent more time in front of the mirror than she did.

 
; The out ended the top half of the inning and as the rest of the team trotted toward the dugout, Matt turned his head and their eyes met with a force that sent a lick of heat through her body. Stunned at her reaction, she tried to look away but couldn’t. It wasn’t until the bat boy handed him his catcher’s mask that he finally broke eye contact and then disappeared into the dugout with the rest of the team.

  Blinking, she glanced up at the huge electronic screen high above centerfield and watched as they replayed Matt’s catch. The picture froze on that dazzling smile of his. Somewhere behind her a woman yelled, “I’d do him.” The fans around her laughed, and then another woman yelled, “Get in line, honey.” That sexy grin had just won over half the stadium.

  Damn him.

  * * *

  Matt pulled his batting helmet from the bat cubbyhole near the dugout steps and shot a glance at Dave Rizzo. The asshole had a towel draped over his bald head and was talking with Trey Gentry, another starting pitcher. They were probably talking about how Rizzo had been shaking off his pitch calls all night. Slapping the helmet on his head, Matt grabbed his bat and followed Marquis Lopes, the team’s shortstop, out of the dugout. While Lopes went straight to the batter’s box, Matt headed for the on-deck circle. He exhaled, surprised he couldn’t see his breath—it was a damn cold night.

  Securing the bat under his arm, he pulled on his batting glove and scanned the field. He had to admit, Blaze Field was a premiere ballpark. For one thing, the outfield was real grass, not that fake shit some ballparks had that looked like the tacky carpet in his uncle’s basement.

  The stadium wasn’t huge, but it did seat approximately fifty thousand fans, and because of the intimacy of the design, even the fans in the bleacher seats had a great view of the game. The brick walls in the outfield gave it an old-fashioned feel, and there were two iconic San Francisco cable cars parked on the mezzanine occupied by food vendors.

  The vibe of the ballpark was much different than Dodger Stadium. The fans were a lot less rowdy, and so far, no fights had broken out—at least none he’d seen anyway. Less rowdy didn’t mean less passionate though. The fans loved the Blaze and although the team had been on a losing streak, the game was sold out.