The San Francisco Blaze was the team I’d been signed to before I had to leave and take my place in the company. I loved the team, especially Matt Scanlon and J.T. Sawyer. Not only are they awesome catchers, but really great guys. I’ve kept in touch with the two of them, but I didn’t think I’d ever be pitching to them again. Well, I’ll pitch to Matt. J.T. just got a starting spot with the Padres.
“You’re kidding.”
“No, Miles. You shouldn’t have given up your dream. Now, with your dad out of the picture, you can have it again.”
“You’ll go on the road with me?”
“I can’t. I love this job and what we’re doing too much to just leave it. I’ll come to your weekend games, though.”
“And we’ll get your office stuff covered. The season’s almost over, so you won’t be gone long. You need to do this little brother.”
“Thanks, Matt. I still don’t know about leaving. We’re in such a good place, Xandy. I don’t want to lose you.”
“You won’t. Unless you act like the stupid baseball players who cheat on their girlfriends. Then you would lose me.”
“I would never do that to you. To us.”
“I know. I trust you. Go live your dream. Then come back to me, so I can finish living mine.”
“Ours, you mean. I love baseball and can’t wait to get out on the field, but you’re my dream. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Epilogue
Two months later
Miles
I’m so happy to be home. I loved playing professional baseball these last two months, but I love Alex more. Only seeing her a handful of times nearly killed me. That and the hot sex we had over the weekends when she came to visit. I’m surprised I could function well enough to walk onto the field.
I actually did pretty well in the games I played. I only started a few, but it was nice to have Alex, my brother, and Gram there. Quinn and Zane even brought Landon to a game, and he loved it. Especially when he got to meet the other players. It was great hanging out with Matt, and even Trey Gentry, too. Matt’s wife is really great and welcomed Alex into their group right away.
Despite all of that, I turned down the contract that I was offered. Being away made me realize how much everything I left behind means to me. I knew it would be hard to leave Alex, and it was, but I missed so much more. I missed Landon and the rest of the Little League kids, my Gram, Matt, and even the foundation girls. Or Society girls, as they refer to themselves. I also found that I missed my work. I had originally thought that I’d hate being chained to a desk. It didn’t end up feeling that way. I’m good at the job and knowing I bring in money that ends up helping the foundation missions, well, it’s pretty cool.
I got in an hour ago and called Ainsley to have her stall Alex at the office so I could get things ready. Faith made us an awesome dinner while Stella decorated with candles and flowers. I’ve changed into one of my actual jerseys, which I left unbuttoned, and my boxer briefs. I’m milking the sexy jock vibe for all it’s worth. I have no shame. I want to be attacked.
I hear her key in the door and get in position. I’m leaning against the dining room door, looking like it’s just a natural thing for me to welcome her home every night. It will be from now on, but she’s not expecting it tonight. She drops her keys and lets her purse slide from her arm as she takes me in.
“Hi honey, I’m home.”
“Hell yeah, you are.”
“Did you miss me?”
“Maybe.”
“Just maybe? I can work with that. Let’s have dinner.”
“What if I want you for dinner?” she asks as she walks up to me and pushes open the jersey with one hand while sliding her other one inside my briefs.
“Faith cooked and Stella decorated. I wouldn’t want them to have wasted their time,” I tell her as I involuntarily start to thrust into her hand.
She takes her hands off of me and walks into the dining room. “Okay let’s eat.” Damn. Maybe she didn’t miss me.
I’m surprised even more when she takes a seat next to me instead of across the table. She lifts an asparagus spear off the plate in front of her and takes a bite. Then she drops it down the front of her dress. “Oops. Can you get that for me, King?”
Oh yeah. She missed me, and now we’re going to play. I retrieve it, along with everything else she accidentally drops down her top, or between her legs. I finally throw her onto the table, and eat her for dinner. It’s good to be home.
Acknowledgements
As always, I need to thank my girls first. Dominique and Gabi, you are the best daughters a mother could have, and I love you both more than words.
A big shout out and thank you to Alison Packard, who let me borrow her fictional baseball team and players for Miles. If you haven’t read her books, you should-I LOVE them and her!
Thanks to Tera Lynn Childs for making me finish book one when I just wanted to stop and read it. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t have sent any of the books into the world. Your friendship means more to me than anything, and your dedication inspires me every day.
To all my friends in the Books…We Love Books book club, I love you all. Thanks for being such great friends.
Lots of people helped me with all the books. Authors, friends, readers, and co-workers have supported me through every step of my journey. I’ve thanked you all in one book or another. I just want you to know that I appreciate everything you’ve done to support me.
I can never thank Helen Williams enough for my book covers. We are so in synch (although she likes pastels, and I like bold colors). I want to write more books just to have her make me more covers!
Jesse Gordon has formatted all the books in the series, and I can’t say enough good things about him. Thank you for everything.
This may be the last official book in The Griffin Brothers series (or not), but you’ll see them all in Corrigan & Co. You’ve met some of the girls already in this book, and I can’t wait for you to see them in action!
Thanks again to the readers. I hope you’ll keep reaching out to my on Facebook, Goodreads, and email. I love to hear from you!
Turn the page for a peek at Fielding Her Secret, the first book in the Corrigan & Co. series. It will be released on January 12, 2015.
There will be ten books total in the series which combines Charlie’s Angels with a secret society of women. Watch for the Griffins to pop up from time to time!
Publicly, The Corrigan & Co. Foundation has been supporting women for years. Secretly, five powerful women led by Jane Corrigan have recruited ten agents, sending them to rescue women and children in need, and take down those who exploit the weak. This secret society of women all have unique skills they’ve brought to the foundation. Additionally, they’ve all had training in weapons, etiquette, martial arts, technology and languages. Helping out friends and family of their five mentors from time to time is something they were told to expect. What they didn’t plan for is falling in love.
Chapter 1
Ainsley
I just got called into the conference room. I know what this means—I’m being assigned to a mission. I’ve done a few over the past four years, but not as many as the other women. My expertise is computers, so I usually just support everyone else while working in my office downstairs, and overseeing my team. I’m not girly or glamorous at all, which limits what I can do on the outside.
As I head upstairs in the elevator, I think about how I ended up here at Corrigan & Company. I was a tomboy growing up. I have four older brothers and I followed them everywhere and wanted to do everything they did. So I played every sport imaginable, asking for Legos and video games instead of Barbies and dresses for my birthdays. I took the dance classes my mom wanted me to, but only because I love her and I know it was hard for her to see her little girl wanting to be a boy.
When I got to junior high, I started noticing boys instead of just wanting to beat them on a sports field. It was too late, though.
I was just Ainsley, the person picked first for sports teams and the last person any of them would ever think of asking out. I dealt with the disappointment at never being kissed or asked out by getting lost in my video games, which lead to me taking a kids programming class at a local center. I was apparently good at it, because they offered me the chance to take the college level classes the next session. I fell in love with programming and coding and that’s all I wanted to do.
My parents supported me, although I know they were worried about my not having a social life. I still played sports, but I never hung out with anyone from the teams—male or female—because when you get to a certain age, if you’re not trying to be a girl off the field, you just don’t fit in. At least not in my schools. So I kept to myself, wearing glasses to hide my pain, and baggy clothes to hide my developing curves. I got a scholarship to one of the Chicago universities and was soon tutoring other students. I still kept to myself, but it was okay then. I was accepted because being smart was cool, especially when the hottest guy on campus was a computer nerd as well.
Scott Griffin is the human equivalent of a Greek god. If the god was covered in tattoos and a couple of piercings. Every girl on campus wanted him. I wanted him. His bed was occupied by almost every woman on campus. Not me, of course. To him, I was just another person who could code. It was just like when I was younger, only now I was just one of the computer guys instead of the sports ones. Scott was always nice to me, and I got the respect that the other girls on campus didn’t get from him, so I guess that’s something.
It was Scott who brought me here. He asked me to meet him downtown at the C&C Chicago headquarters a couple of weeks before graduation. I’d heard of the company, but I wasn’t sure what I was doing there. They don’t specialize in computers. I went because, well, he is Scott Griffin, and I wasn’t going to say no.
Scott introduced to me to his mom, Maggie, and her friend, Jane Corrigan. They talked to me in the C&C Foundation offices. Jane is in charge of the foundation, which focuses on helping women. They help people put their lives back together after they suffer something traumatic or survive domestic violence. I soon learned that they also help in the rescue of many of those women.
They didn’t tell me that at first, of course. They talked to me about my work and told me they knew I had a good job lined up. I listened as they described the foundation and told me they’d like me to work there instead. Scott said he thought I’d be a great fit for the company. I said I’d think about it, and I did. I weighed the pros and cons and decided that I wanted to make a difference and not just hide behind a computer screen. Little did I know how much of a difference I’d really be making.
Scott met me again at the foundation offices. This time, there were three other women besides Maggie and Jane in the conference room. I was introduced to Cyndi Evans, Mallory Daniels, and Helen Wilson. I’d seen pictures of all the women at events around town, but I wasn’t sure what they were doing here. Jane started by telling me how glad they were to have me working for the foundation. She then asked me to sign a simple document, which stated that everything I was about to be told was confidential and that I had to pay ten million dollars to the foundation if I disclosed anything that went on there. It was a little weird to be doing that for a job at a foundation, but I signed. I can keep a secret.
It was then that I found out what the foundation really does. Ten years ago, Jane and Cyndi decided to do something more than just be socialites. They saw Maggie at functions frequently, although they didn’t fit in as much as it looked like they did. They’d gravitated to each other as women who weren’t just looking for good husbands. They wanted to make a difference and Maggie suggested bringing her friends, Helen and Mallory, on as well.
Jane convinced her husband, one of the richest men in the world, to start a foundation for her. He agreed to give a significant amount of the profits from his company every year to help women in need. Jane and her friends agreed that they needed to actually assist in getting women out of bad situations and not just help them afterwards. The first women who worked for them were policewomen and military women who were tired of dealing with the discrimination they had to face in their jobs. They had the skill set to help rescue people and the secret part of the foundation was started.
Over the years, they’ve expanded and we now always have ten women who take part in missions. Each founding woman has two recruits working at any time. We’re paid well and can leave whenever we want. Not all of us have a police or military background. We have a language expert, fashion stylist and even a former professional chef on the team. Every one of us had something that one of the five women, or in my case their son, saw in me and decided to cultivate. Scott actually helped recruit me for Jane, who knew she’d need someone to oversee the computer systems daily.
No matter what we specialize in, all of us are given weapons and martial arts training as well as computers, languages, hair and makeup and etiquette. It is over a year of training before they even think about putting you in charge of a team. The instructors are current and former team members and I don’t think any company or government anywhere could rival the expertise we are given. I did well at languages, weapons, and martial arts. Not surprisingly, I barely passed the girly lessons. I did pass, though, because you can’t be here if you fail any of them.
So now I work behind the scenes on many missions, offering computer support which includes hacking into security systems and banking sites. It’s not as glamorous as some of the missions the other women go on, but I know I’m making a difference. I can’t even begin to count the number of women we’ve saved. We cover it all from domestic violence to human trafficking. We mostly find leads from trusted law enforcement contacts or even from watching the news. We can’t save everyone, but we do our best.
One of the most important things I’ve gotten from the foundation is friends. You can’t go through the training and missions without becoming tight with the other women. I even let them dress me up and take me out to bars and clubs sometimes. Since meeting them, I’ve had my first kiss and my first sexual experience—neither was very exciting, but at least I won’t die a spinster. They’ve brought me out of my shell and I would do anything for any of them.
I get off the elevator and walk into the conference room, expecting to just see people from our team. I’m not expecting to see Lindsey Rivers, the wife of the owner of the Las Vegas Legions football team, sitting at the table. We take on private jobs occasionally that don’t have to do with women’s issues. Usually it’s for a friend of one of the women or a referral from someone we’ve helped before. We obviously keep “The Society” as we jokingly call it, secret. The agents can tell one family member if we want—I told my mom—and if we get married, or are close to that point, we can reveal ourselves to the man, or woman, we’re involved with once we get permission. The founders can tell the females in their family and one male relative. That’s how Scott helped recruit me. He knows, and actually created the software we currently use. I don’t know where Mrs. Rivers fits in, but as a football junkie, I’m more than a little excited.
“Thank you for joining us, Ainsley,” Jane says with a smile. I know she knows I’m freaking out since I told her last week that I can’t wait for the regular season and that I have season tickets.
“You can sit down,” Reina tells me with a chuckle. She’s the most senior of all of us, and pretty much runs things. Jane’s still the one in charge, but Reins is her second in command and has authority over everything.
“Oh yeah.” I go to sit next to Stella, who is looking like she just walked off a runway. She was a fashion major when she was recruited and she sighs as she takes in my baggy sweatshirt and jeans.
“Ladies, this is Lindsey Rivers. We helped one of her friends several years ago and she needs our help now. The other women and I have agreed to take on her case. There is someone who is trying to sabotage the football team her husband owns. They’re going to have their first regular sea
son home game in six weeks. This is important to Las Vegas as well as Lindsey and her husband. The city has been trying to get a professional sports team for years. My husband wanted a team for his hometown and was instrumental in the creation of the Legions before he passed away.” Jane pauses for a moment to collect herself. “Lindsey, can you let us know what’s been going on and where you think we can get someone in under cover?”
“Yes. Of course. Thank you again for agreeing to help. Over the past two months, things have been happening that I can longer brush off as coincidences. There have been damaged cleats, medicines switched out, parts of our playbook ending up in the hands of other teams, and then this week, a rack of equipment was pushed at one of our running backs, Zack Taylor. He managed to jump out of the way, but it was close.”
Zack Taylor almost got crushed? That would have been devastating for the team. And him of course. Plus, the few women in the city he hasn’t slept with would have missed out on that hot body of his. I’m lost in thoughts of his dark hair and sexy eyes and almost miss the rest of the conversation.
“Yes. There’s seems to be too much going on for it to be a coincidence,” Reina says.
“I need your help and I think the easiest way is to have someone date a player. I was thinking of Kevin Donaldson. He’s our quarterback and a complete sweetheart. I think if I told him I had a nice woman for him to meet, he’d take her out. Once they were dating, she’d have access to the players and staff. It has to be someone on the inside doing these things.”
“We’re not a dating service, Mrs. Rivers, but I think your idea has merit. Are you okay with that, Ainsley?”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. You know more about football than most men. You’re the perfect choice.”
I look at Jane and then to Lindsey Rivers. She looks a little horrified at the thought of it being me. I can understand why. I’m not exactly looking like someone a quarterback would date. Now I know why Stella’s here. She’s going to transform me. The thought scares me, but excites me at the same time. I’ll never admit it out loud, but I kind of liked it when I let the other women dress me up to go out. I felt powerful when I saw guys actually looking at me as something more than a teammate. A mission that involves football and being a girl—yeah, I’m totally into this one.
Working On Love (The Griffin Brothers Book 6) Page 11
