by Pippa Grant
All I can see of her is her ass in brown dress pants, and despite the fact that her pants match half my linoleum, the sight of that heart-shaped butt is definitely causing more blood to surge to Mr. Happy.
Fuck.
My hand and my dick are well-acquainted, and it’s probably good that I wouldn’t have a hair trigger if she decided to jump my boner right now, but I don’t know if I’d be able to finish the job after two rounds of choking the chicken.
Her ass wiggles, and never mind.
I would absolutely be able to finish the job.
Even if one of those candles she’s lit around my apartment was singeing my ass hair, I’d be able to get off with Mackenzie.
I clear my throat. “Morning, sexy pants.”
She squeaks and leaps up, sending her long hair flipping back over her head.
Her gaze goes down to my morning salute.
Snaps back up.
Pink floods her cheeks, matching the tones in her patterned blouse and the tips of her fingers, which are flying to her lips. She spins, turning her back on me, and fuck.
She’s in pink stilettos too.
Pink. Fucking. Stilettos.
I’m dead.
Pick me up off the floor and send my body back to New York.
Those stilettos killed me, and if my dick strains any harder to get close to this woman, it’s going to fall off.
Coach is right.
I need a fucking therapist.
“Morning,” she sputters. “I wanted to make sure you ate a good breakfast this morning, because champions should start the day on a good note. There’s bacon in the oven. How do you like your eggs? Coffee? Or tea? There’s not enough about your personal information on any of the sites I found for baseball groupies, and your cabinets are a little bare.”
I don’t bother asking how she got in. Crazy does what crazy does.
But I do make sure to brush against her as I head to my freezer for my protein pancakes.
She visibly shivers.
I yank open the freezer, grab the box, and turn to face her again. “Cold?”
She focuses her eyes on the ceiling. “Yes.”
“Want to cuddle?”
“No. I have to go to work. But since you’re wooing me, I thought I’d give you a few tips for getting into my pants. First things first, I like sleeping with winners. So if you want to bang me, you have to hit a home run.”
She says bang, and my nuts wind so tight I feel like I’ve been racked in the jewels. “Work? You have a job?”
“I’m a sanitation engineer for the city.”
I blink. “So you’re like…smart.”
“I can do math in my head, yes. And discuss the city’s program to reduce landfill emissions at length. And also handle being yelled at when people get mad that their trash wasn’t picked up on Christmas day, because my extension and the customer service extension are very similar.”
“Why don’t you work in baseball?”
“The restraining order.”
I snort. That’s easy enough to believe.
She scowls at me. “That was a joke.” Her gaze dips to my hard-on, and she jerks her head back up so she’s staring at the ceiling again. And then her eyes crinkle as she squints at one particular spot up there. “What…?”
“The dicks on the ceiling?” I study the artwork too. “Eloise said they were here when she and Rhett signed the contract for me, but I think she probably drew them herself. Especially the one with four heads. Speaking of, you planning on stealing the echidna next, or has Duggan Field security foiled you?”
“I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.” She turns to the oven while the timer still has two minutes on it, bends over—god, that ass—and pulls out a tray of perfectly crisped bacon, which, yeah, is also a complete and total turn-on.
It’s bacon.
She flaps a hand at me. “Stand back if you don’t want to get hot bacon grease on your pee-pee.”
“My pee-pee?”
“I mean, I see why your sister-in-law calls it that, but if you’re proud, then you do you.”
“You could give up the act anytime.”
Coco Puff yips in agreement, and his collar translates. “Shithead!”
He’s overexcited and probably needs to go for a walk.
Which means I probably need to get dressed, but I’m enjoying the hell out of making Mackenzie uncomfortable with my nudity.
And the more I think about it, I wouldn’t turn her down if she decided she wanted to ride the pony.
It’d be a memorable way to lose my virginity, and while she’s batshit crazy, she’s not unattractive, even if my original goal was, as she suspected, to make her think I was going to woo her so she’d leave me alone, since clearly, she’d never be able to resist the full Brooks Elliott wooing experience.
Which I’m still planning in my head, because I’ve spent the last dozen or so years of my life actively avoiding wooing women.
I need to call Knox. Get some advice. Guy’s read every romance novel ever written, and he knows that if he tells anyone I’m asking for help, I’ll use his nuts for batting practice.
Mackenzie goes digging in my cabinets. I should probably put a stop to this, but I like watching her stretch up on her tiptoes and reach for a plate like she lives here. There’s something innately graceful about her movements, and I’m charmed.
I don’t want to be, but I am.
She turns, catches me staring, and darts a quick glance at my very happy, very proud dick again before turning back to the bacon. “Do you know the Fireballs have never won a championship and have only gone to the post-season three times? And even then, they’ve never won a pennant either?”
“Yep.”
“Wouldn’t it be amazing to be the guy who helped push them there?”
Right. We’re the fucking Bad News Bears. “Why does this team matter so much to you? You don’t play. You couldn’t even talk to any of us on the team without having a stroke a month ago.”
She turns and faces me head-on. “You seriously have no idea?”
I lift my brows. “Oh, you mailed me a Mackenzie manual? Security must’ve thought it was a threat and trashed it. I’ll have a talk with them.”
Fuck, she gives good glare. It’s calling to my hard-on, coaxing it to the breaking point.
“Do you even love the game anymore? Or is it all the paycheck for you now? Baseball is life. It’s a place where people aren’t trash engineers or bullied kids or weirdos. We’re all equal when we’re cheering on the same team, and some players still remember that. But apparently not you.”
It’s been a long time since anyone called me a shit to my face.
I don’t like it.
More, I don’t like that I probably deserve it, because she’s right.
I don’t love the game anymore. Not the way I did before it became a paycheck.
Mr. Happy is turning into Mr. Sappy, and one glance south, and she’ll know she’s getting to me.
But the weirdest thing is happening.
Amidst all the shame slashing through my chest, there’s something else welling up.
I want to know who bullied her. And why.
And then I want to make them pay.
She pokes me in the chest. “Duggan Field is my home. We almost lost it last year, and I will not stop until I know it’s not in danger anymore.”
I ball my hand into a fist to keep from touching her, which is all I want to do. All I need to do.
A person doesn’t get as fanatical as Mackenzie about a friggin’ game if they’re not running away from something else. “You really think the new owners will let anything happen to the team?”
“They traded for you, didn’t they?”
Ouch.
She squeezes her eyes shut, then turns away. “I have to go to work. If you don’t get a hit today, I’m calling a guy my dads know who knows how to motivate people. And don’t freaking fumble an easy line drive again.”
> She leaves me standing there buck naked in the kitchen, my hard-on drooping, while Coco Puff squats and pees on the brown and yellow floral linoleum, barks, gets translated to “Twatwaffle,” and I realize something has to change.
Unfortunately, that something is me.
14
Mackenzie
Night games in March are freaking cold, but the weather won’t stop me from hitting the ballpark tonight.
I have season tickets on the third base line, and Sarah’s with me, and we’re going to win.
Dammit.
We have to.
We have to.
“Totally naked?” she asks over a bag of caramel corn while we watch the guys warm up.
“Not even a sock.”
“And?”
“And what?”
Her dark eyes sparkle with mischief. “And did you like it?”
“It doesn’t matter if I liked it. It matters that he keeps his pants zipped so he can hit the ball. We need every single player doing every damn thing they can to win. Every. Single. One.”
My seats this year are four rows back from the field, right on the aisle, halfway between third base and left field. Most years, I’ve resisted season tickets, because the Fireballs win more when Sarah and I watch the game at her house.
But she sold the house recently since she’s living full-time with Beck now, who not only renovated the terrace of his penthouse to make it friendly for Sarah’s beehives, but also convinced the city to set aside part of Reynolds Park for an apiary—with funding for the necessary staff coming from his pocket, naturally, because that’s what Beck does.
So between Sarah’s house being unavailable, because even though I have a key still, I don’t want to get arrested by the new owners if I randomly show up for baseball games, and also this year being about trying new habits and patterns to help my team, here we are.
Darren Greene’s in left, tossing the ball with Luca Rossi, the Fireballs’ new center fielder who’s played for like half the teams in the league, while we wait for the first pitch and national anthem. At third, Brooks is out there fielding balls and warming up with the rest of the infielders.
The guys are in their thermal shirts under their uniforms. Tripp and Lila are out on the field talking to the team manager, wrapped up in Fireballs jackets, with Lila in a stocking cap too.
My loaded fries are already cold, which is fine, because I’m ready to pull on my Fireballs gloves and I don’t want to get cheese all over them.
The three mascots suddenly run out of the dugout. Glow the Firefly grabs Lila’s hat and makes a mad dash for the opposite dugout, his giant glowing butt swishing, while Firequacker the Duck steals Tripp’s phone from his hand and darts and weaves, acting like he’s going to throw the device into the stands.
And while both team owners take off chasing the first two mascots, Spike the Echidna puts a big claw to his mouth—the universal symbol for shh—and tiptoes to third base.
None of the players are paying any attention to the mascots, until Lopez, who’s playing shortstop, starts to grin as he tosses Brooks the ball.
I can’t see Brooks’s face.
I don’t have to.
Because suddenly I realize what’s coming.
I bolt to my feet before I realize I’ve moved. “Bad echidna!” I yell. “Bad!”
I’m thundering down the steps to the edge of the field, hollering, “Bring back Fiery! Bring back Fiery!” when Spike snags Brooks’s hat.
Brooks spins around. He points at Spike, who’s rapidly retreating as the crowd takes up my chant and I realize Spike wasn’t going to yank Brooks’s pants down.
Heat floods my face at my overreaction, and then heat floods my chest when the weirdest thing happens.
He smiles.
Brooks is actually smiling at the mascot contender stealing his hat.
Spike acts out giggling, which is hilarious for a terrifying creature with claws that could put someone’s eye out.
Brooks tucks his glove under his arm and gestures the echidna back to third.
Spike shakes his head, holding Brooks’s hat high in the air.
Or as high as a man in an echidna costume can, anyway.
Brooks taps his fist against his palm.
Spike tilts his head.
“C’mon,” Brooks calls, loud enough for his voice to carry over into the stands. “You a chicken?”
The Bring Back Fiery chant has died as quickly as it started while everyone watches the Fireballs’ newest acquisition and its current third-place mascot option have a stare down.
Brooks taps his fist on his palm again.
Spike tucks Brooks’s hat into his back pocket, then does the same.
And the two of them launch into a rock-paper-scissors battle while Trevor Stafford sneaks out of the dugout behind the echidna.
Not that it’s much of a battle.
Spike can’t bend his fingers, so he’s playing paper every time.
Brooks still plays rock twice, and yeah, my heart is melting a little at knowing that he’s letting the mascot win a couple rounds.
“Is Trevor going to de-pants Spike?” Sarah whispers beside me.
She’s barely gotten the words out before Stafford yanks on Spike’s pants, and the mascot’s furry bottom flashes for all the world to see.
Brooks flashes Stafford a thumbs-up. Stafford grabs Brooks’s hat and jogs it out to third.
And when he turns back to continue warming up, he’s smiling.
Smiling.
Like he’s happy to be here.
It’s more potent than seeing him in all of his birthday suit glory, and confirming for myself that yes, the Elliott brothers are all blessed in the penis department.
“Sarah?” I whisper.
“Yes?”
“He’s really cute when he’s happy to be playing for the Fireballs.”
“Are you saying that because he’s a baseball god, or are you saying that because you’d go to dinner with him if he asked?”
“I am not having dinner with Brooks Elliott.”
“You made him bacon.”
“I’m guarding his innocence and making sure he didn’t have a woman in his apartment. Plus, if he falls in love with me, he won’t want another woman. This is psychological warfare for the greater good of winning.”
She lifts a brow.
She knows he crashed Periwinkles last night. She knows I’m hypersensitive about people being dicks to my dads, and I don’t know if he knows who my dads are, or if he knew why I was there, but I know I didn’t want him there in that drag club.
And that, more than anything, is why I won’t be going on a dinner date with Brooks Elliott.
Go to dinner with him to keep him from taking anyone else?
Yes.
But it won’t be a date.
Because I am not sleeping with Brooks Elliott.
Period.
15
Brooks
I hit a home run in the third game of the season.
It’s barely a homer, but it’s a homer, and it puts us in the lead in the bottom of the fifth.
Two outs later, I’m heading to third with my glove when a new video of Meaty flashes on the jumbotron. I pause to watch, because what the hell?
Meaty’s walking into a damn Italian restaurant.
Where they serve meatballs.
The crowd gasps.
Rossi pauses on his way out to center field and looks up at the screen. “That’ll solve the Meaty problem,” he mutters.
Just as Meaty’s opening the door, two massive, very familiar dudes come running. “No! Meaty! Don’t do it!”
Rossi barks out a laugh.
I squeeze my eyes shut and mutter a curse.
What the fuck is Mackenzie doing hanging out with hockey players? Some of those guys are assholes. And single.
Not the massive twin tanks lifting her—I mean, Meaty—onto their shoulders and dashing her down the street, away from the chef chasing
after her with a meat cleaver. I know those two personally. They’re married. They’re also obnoxious, but they won’t hurt her.
But other hockey players? The single ones?
I don’t trust them.
Rossi’s still laughing. “I love those guys.”
He can love the hockey players all he wants. I’m gonna have a talk with them. Mackenzie’s too much of a nut to be trusted not to get herself into trouble.
“Dude. Elliott. What’s with the scowl?”
I shake my head. “Don’t want the meatball to win.”
He hoots again and jogs away.
And three innings, one mascot dance-off, and four rounds of the wave later, the game ends with us up by one.
First win of the season, and it’s because of my bat.
Jesus.
No pressure, Elliott. No fucking pressure at all.
After the game, we all have a quick dinner, and then it’s time to load up for a trip out west. We’re boarding the plane when Cooper thrusts his phone at me. “Dude. Is that really your bedroom?”
I glance down at the picture of Coco Puff on my bed, beneath the gaudy pink unicorn chandelier with the giant blue dildo horn that I swear Eloise had installed, even if she denies it. “Jealous?”
“Fuck, yeah. You must have master sleeping skills to not worry that’s gonna crash down on you in the middle of the night. Like, you’ll be the guy whose body’s found half-decomposed and impaled by a dildo. You’ll make the baseball hall of fame for sure for most ignominious death ever.”
“Did you just say most ignominious death?”
Darren snorts and rolls his eyes while he drops into a seat. “His sister got him a word-a-day calendar for Christmas, and he’s been insufferably intolerable ever since.”
“Only on days the words are good. Like when they’re nincompoop or recreant.”
“What the fuck’s a recreant?”
“A dick.”
He looks at me pointedly.
Like he’s calling me a dick.
Probably is.
If he’s not, he should be.
And it makes me smile, because the thing about realizing you’re being a dick, and then deciding not to be a dick anymore, is that now, I have something to prove.
