by Selena Kitt
“Wait, you—”
“Come on, Kit,” he said. “Don’t play this act. You graduated, like, fifth in your class, and I happen to know there were a hell of a lot more than five people in it. Maybe that act still works on some of the guys on the team, but I figured it out pretty fast.”
She furrowed her brow. “You never said anything.”
He shrugged and adjusted the position of his crutches under his arms. “Didn’t see the point.” He looked at Edy. “Pie. Gimmie.”
Edy bobbed her eyebrows at Kit and stepped through the open door, pausing in the entryway. She hadn’t spent much time in Al’s house up to that point, and while she probably knew the layout pretty well, she didn’t want to be presumptuous. She’d go where he led her.
Kit stood on the porch gawping, and Al closed the door and then locked it. Locking it probably was a bit of overkill, and if Kit had really graduated fifth in her class, there was no way she didn’t get the drift. Edy had certainly gotten it.
Bye-bye, Kit, and hello, Al. She should have known better than to have jumped to a conclusion that way, but Al somehow brought the viper out of her. Kit could go diddle Cameron or one of the other horndogs on the team.
Al hobbled over to Edy with his lips pursed. “Gimmie sugar.”
“You can have all the pie you’d like.”
“Not that kind. Give me a kiss. You owe me one.”
“I owe you? Why?”
“’Cause you haven’t come over.”
“You didn’t invite me.”
“I thought I’d made it clear that you had an open-door invitation. Does a guy have to beg for attention? I’m pitiful enough as it is.”
“Yeah, you’re pretty pitiful.” She leaned in and pressed her lips to his.
He leaned in and pressed his hand to her tit.
“Al.”
“Can you blame me?” He smiled against her lips and squeezed her breast. “You didn’t text me so much as a tit pic. A guy’s got needs. I had to use my imagination this morning while tending to them.”
“Poor baby. I’m not noticing an excess of dick pics on my phone, either.”
“If you want some, I’ll stand by that window over there so you can take them.” He canted his head toward the window next to the dusty fireplace. “Natural light. We can make it really creative and backlit.”
“Tempted. Really tempted.” She laughed and gave him one more kiss. “Unfortunately, you’re something of a public figure and a schoolteacher. If your phone gets hacked, or mine, I don’t really want a bunch of pictures of your very distinctive junk flooding the Internet.”
He wriggled his eyebrows. “You think my junk is distinctive?”
Edy grinned coyly. Al had a very memorable member, but the fact he was tattooed from hips to ankles would make identifying him from the waist down very easy. Edy imagined most folks hadn’t seen his tattoos very far above his knees, but it wouldn’t be hard to put two and two together. The art was comprised of connected images on both sides.
“Okay, no phone pics,” he conceded. “I have a Polaroid camera. Might even have some film in it.” His fingers tenderly stroked the underside of her breast. He looked so content playing with it—like a cat who’d finally conquered a ferocious piece of string.
“Again, tempting,” she said. “Really tempting.”
She moved in a little closer, being careful not to impede his balance on the crutches, and grazed her lips along the side of his neck, kissing every so often and drawing soft moans from him.
“I like looking at you,” he said quietly.
“You’re not so bad yourself, slugger.”
He groaned, backed away, and hobbled toward the kitchen. “Slugger. Had to go there, huh?”
“As far as I knew, that word doesn’t count as a slur. Did the dictionary change and I missed the memo?” She set the food on his cluttered tabletop and watched him plop onto one of the kitchen chairs.
He leaned his crutches against the side of the table and folded his arms over his chest. “I thought you knew.”
“Knew what? I get the sneaking suspicion we’re not talking about my vocabulary.”
“Of course your dad didn’t tell you. He probably thought you’d come straight over and talk me out of it. Hell, I worried that’s why you came at first.”
“Thought what was why I came? What happened?”
“Your dad made me a hell of an offer. He’s had half the damn team hounding me about it. And Kit.” Al rolled his eyes.
“An offer about what?” Edy asked through clenched teeth. Oh, God. Legs wobbling, she dropped into the seat across from him. God, not more baseball.
Al stared down at his hands and twiddled his thumbs. “Hybrid contract. Coaching for a year and then back on the team the next. Really good money. I think he dug deep and squeezed some sponsors really hard to get it.”
“And they think they’re going to make their money back because as a former Olympian, you have a brand.”
She hadn’t realized how sought-after that brand was until she’d got home and had the good sense to Google the man. He hadn’t been kidding when he said he had diverse income streams, but he did seem to be very discriminating about what he put his name on. He was well-regarded even if he didn’t put himself out there very much anymore.
Al turned his hands over and shrugged. “I don’t know what to say, Edy. It’d be fast money, and I didn’t have anything else lined up this summer, anyway.”
“Nothing else, huh?” Just fixing his house and hanging out with his so-called girlfriend.
“Come on, darlin’, don’t be like that.”
“You said you don’t want to play baseball.”
“I don’t. I finally realized that and I made my peace with it.”
“But what you’re talking about is playing baseball. You do understand that, right?”
“I know how you feel about it, Edy.”
“And I know how you feel about it, so why are you doing it?”
“It’s just about the money. And it’s just two seasons. I’m tired of…this project.” He waved a hand, indicating the house. “It’s dragging on and on, and it’s starting to become too big a chore. It’d be different if I didn’t have to take it all on alone, but nobody else in my family is up for it. I don’t see where I have a choice.”
“What about the grants I offered to help you get?”
“Those aren’t guaranteed, and it could take months or even years for that cash to get disbursed. The money the Roosters are offering me right now is enough for me to hire a contractor to take care of the big stuff all at once.”
“I see.” Edy stared down at her entwined fingers and chewed the inside of her cheek.
“Come on, darlin’,” he said softly. “When you take that tone with me, I know what you’re thinking.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah. You’re thinking I’m a sellout, and maybe I am for considering it, but would it be any different from what you’re doing?”
She snapped her head up. “What are you talking about?”
“You work sales. You said yourself it’s not your calling.”
“That’s hardly the same thing.”
“But it is, isn’t it? You don’t want to be a headhunter, and I don’t want to be a baseball player. You’re doing what you have to do to seed future ventures, and I think I have to do the same thing.”
“So, I guess you’ve already made your decision, huh?” It seemed pointless to ask, and she thought she already knew his answer, but she wanted to hear the words from his mouth—wanted nothing left unsaid.
“I don’t know what else I can do, Edy.”
“There are always choices.”
“Tell me what they are, and I’ll do them. I’m tired of this.” He swept a hand in the general direction of the rest of the house. “And everyone’s counting on me to fix it up and make it what it was. It’s a burden, but it’s mine, and I have to swallow it the only way I know how. Two seasons, and I’l
l just suck it up.”
“And be miserable, right? And to give up everything you said you wanted to do with your free time, huh? You said you wanted fewer commitments. You wanted freedom to shape your own days and to leave room for spontaneity.”
“Maybe I said that, but sometimes, plans change and adults have to do adult things. I don’t want to be on the road all summer, but it’s something that has to be done.”
“I see.” Has to be done.
She’d heard that before—lots of times, in fact, and out of her own father’s mouth. She’d believed it for a long time when she was a child, and then she got older and wiser and learned that people always had choices. Whether or not they exercised those choices was up to them.
She backed toward the door and waved at him.
“Edy, where are you going?”
“I’m not doing this, Al.”
“What this?”
“Us. I’m not going through what my mother did. I refuse to put myself through that.”
“What do you think I’m going to do you? It’s just work, Edy.” He struggled to stand, but having just one strong leg, he couldn’t catch up to her before she slammed the front door shut and walked to her car.
“Right. Just work.” She shoved her key into the ignition and pushed down the accelerator right as Al got his front door open.
She didn’t let her gaze linger at him standing pathetically on the porch with his broken leg and sad face. He didn’t deserve her pity.
He’d made his choice, and she’d made hers. She wasn’t going to let another man pick baseball over her.
Chapter 12
Edy hadn’t gone to a single Roosters game all summer, but that didn’t stop Al from looking into the stands behind the dugout where she usually sat, hoping she’d change her mind and show up.
He didn’t know why he thought she would. She wouldn’t take his calls. Wouldn’t answer the door when he went to her house. He’d even tried calling her at work a couple of times, and didn’t try after the second because the secretary at her office had told him—very kindly—to go fuck himself.
He didn’t know what else to do, but he knew for damn sure Edy wasn’t the kind of girl who’d be won over by a big bouquet of roses. Any asshole could give her that.
He leaned on the half wall at the front of the dugout and flexed the ankle of his stiff, left leg. He’d been sloppy with rehab, and the atrophied muscles demanded some care, but he’d been too busy to give it much thought. When he wasn’t coaching first base, he was playing chaperone to the immature jerks on the team who either couldn’t tell time well enough to get themselves back to their motel rooms by curfew or else didn’t respect the coaches and management enough to follow the rules.
He’d gotten a few workouts in on hotel treadmills, but that was hardly the same thing as showing up for physical therapy. He needed to get back onto the field, but had needed just a moment to stretch out the kinks in his leg without the folks in the bleachers seeing him.
Hurts.
The opposing team’s batter struck out, marking the end of the inning, and the Roosters on the field headed toward the dugout.
Wallace hopped down along with them, passing Al on his way out.
“Are we having a good time, Felton?” Wallace called after him.
Al rolled his eyes, adjusted the brim of his hat, and leaned out to glance into the bleachers again.
He scanned the rows twice, just to be sure. There was no Edy there, but of course a lady like her would beg off driving out to the fucking boonies for an away game if she wasn’t expressly ordered to be there. She would have been miserable. But since she wasn’t there, Al was the one suffering.
He didn’t think he’d made the wrong choice. He’d toiled over the decision to return to the team on the two-year deal and, though he’d tried, he hadn’t been able to come up with any other way to grab interest-free cash except to beg his grandma, and he sure as hell didn’t want to risk her retirement funds.
His house was being fixed, but the Rooster money had felt dirty as hell.
Feeling like a prostitute. Might as well bend over and take it.
He got into place near first base, and crouched, feeling the tendons of his shin burn dully. This fuckin’ game…
At home plate, the green rookie, Carter, swung at the pitch and missed.
Al stood and paced, watching home plate and pondering his lot in life.
“Strike two,” the ump called.
“Come on, Carter,” Al shouted. “That was a foul. Don’t swing at freakin’ foul balls.”
Carter put up a hand and nodded in a, “Yeah, yeah,” fashion.
“If you got it, then hit the damn ball and make sure they can’t catch it.” Good luck.
Carter was one of the weakest batters on the team, but he had an okay arm and was a strong outfielder. Most of the guys on the team weren’t all-around good players, and most were too cocky to want to do anything to change that.
“No wonder our track record was garbage for so long,” Al muttered as Carter’s bat notched the ball and sent it flying toward third base.
Short, but wild enough to get Carter onto first base, and for Al to get upright to do his job.
“Paranoid pitcher and a very observant catcher,” he muttered. “They’re not gonna let you steal, so don’t even try until that ball is about to leave his hand.”
“Got it.”
Cameron was up at bat next and Al hated himself for hoping the guy struck out. He just wasn’t in the mood to deal with him, and Cameron had been needling him pretty much non-stop since Al returned to the team.
Apparently, Kit had run her mouth and told Cameron that Al was seeing Edy. Or had been, rather. Cameron had thoughts about that. Lascivious ones that made Al threaten to maul the guy with either a bat or one of his crutches—victim’s choice.
Cameron smacked the ball hard and it went sailing into the goddamned stratosphere.
Carter ran. Cameron approached the base wearing a damnable grin, and said as he passed, “Where’s your girl?”
“None of your business,” Al called after him.
Cameron stopped at second and saluted him as the ball sailed over his head toward then pitcher. “Get bored already?” he shouted.
Al squatted and fixed his gaze on first plate. Yep. Real bored.
* * *
“I’m out, Wallace.” Al tipped his hat to the team manager and slung his duffel bag up to his shoulder.
Wallace, standing outside the team bus doors with his phone in hand—trying to find an overflow motel for the team—furrowed his forehead. “What are you talking about? We’ve got a game on Thursday.”
“I know. And we’re off tomorrow, so I’m going home.”
“You can’t just go home.”
“Why not?”
The guy delivering Al’s rental car approached with keys and clipboard. “You Al Felton?”
“Yep. Thanks for helping me out on such short-notice.”
“Anytime. You got all that credit banked up, you might as well use it, right?”
“True.”
Al had been a spokesman for the company during his stint in the Olympics and had received years of free rental car service along with it. He’d never had a reason to use it before, and he figured it was a good enough time to start.
“You can’t just go,” Wallace repeated.
Al scribbled his signature onto the forms and handed the guy back his clipboard. “You’re starting to sound like a broken record. And actually? I can go. I re-read the contract on my phone when we were waiting in the dugout during that rain delay. I’m staff. I don’t have to be here. That chaperoning shit ain’t in my contract. You didn’t actually ink into it that I needed to do overnights as a coach, only as a player.”
Wallace’s cheek twitched. Usually, that was a portent of an upcoming shit storm, but Al was shit-proof at the moment. He was all out of fucks to give.
Al grinned. “So, while you might have my ass nex
t year, right now—I’m free.” He gave Wallace’s bicep a gentle cuff. “Might want to tighten that up next time you issue a contract.”
“We’re four hours from Baton Rouge. Did you forget that?” The manager grinned in that gotcha way that some people did when they’d made a really good point.
But, he hadn’t.
Al glanced at his watch. “That’ll put me home at around eight or nine, if I don’t stop to admire the scenery.”
