Love Bats Last (The Heart of the Game) (24 page)

The crowd roared with anger.

“That was intentional.” Gage huffed.

A burly man—Gage had called him the team manager—came charging out of the Giants’ dugout. Alex held a hand up and signaled to him, but the manager marched over to the umpire anyway, unswayed. The umpire kept a placid face as he stood in the face of the manager’s spitting ire. Then he made a rolling motion with his hands. The manager looked back at Alex and ambled to the dugout.

Alex tapped his bat against first one foot, then the other, and she watched as red dirt clumped to the ground from his cleats.

He shook out his shoulders, then took his stance in the batter’s box. The pitcher eyed him, then looked to the catcher. Even at a distance she could see a tendon in Alex’s neck twitch. He slitted his eyes. He looked like a gunslinger from movies when the good guy and the bad guy had a showdown at high noon, and the bad guy knew even before he drew his gun that he’d lost. She hoped Alex was the good guy.

The pitcher threw to first and the runner dove back to the base just in time. Gage moaned beside her, but she didn’t take her eyes off the field.

The pitcher looked in to the catcher, shook his head, shook it again, then nodded. What happened next felt like slow motion. The ball seemed to hang over the plate. Alex’s bat connected with a crack that shot through the noise of the stadium. The crowd roared and leapt to their feet. Jackie sprang up and held her breath as Alex sprinted toward first. She glanced at the ball as it arced over the center field wall and into the stands, then snapped her eyes right back to Alex. He pumped his hand into a fist and drew it into his chest in a universal sign that anyone would read as
yes
!

Gage screamed something at the field, at her, it didn’t matter. Then he grabbed her in a crushing bear hug. She wriggled out and watched as the other runner crossed home plate and the Giants leapt out of the dugout, shouting and celebrating. The pitcher stood on the mound as if stunned, watching it all unfold. She looked back at Alex and followed him with her eyes as he jogged the bases, grinning. She felt the lift of his elation in her own heart and cheered, her voice melding with the jubilation of the crowd.

Jackie and Gage passed through the security checkpoint and into a roped-off section of the stadium parking lot. The tailgate party for the Center was in full swing, and Gage aimed straight for the beer tent. Jackie watched as Alex signed a few programs and balls, admiring his ease with the fans. He grinned when he spotted her over the heads of a trio of excited boys.

He told them something that had them doubling over in laughter, and then he walked in her direction, stopping on the way to pull two beers from a cooler.

“Hi, boss.” He smiled and handed her a beer.

“I should say thanks,” she said. “I mean, I am saying thanks.”

“Planet definitely stopped moving,” he said with an easy laugh. “Did you feel it just then?”

What was it about the man that made her composure flee?

“It was great, what you did.” She gestured toward the stadium. “The kids and all.”

“Let’s hope it turns into some real money for your work.” He turned away, searching the crowd, and when he caught Scotty’s attention, he signaled with his hands and Scotty sidled toward them.

“Teach me how to do that.” Jackie laughed. “It’d be handy for corralling volunteers.”

“Dr. Brandon, this is Scotty Donovan. We wouldn’t be celebrating in such fine spirits if it weren’t for his pitching.”

“Loved the gala,” Scotty said with a tilt of his cap and a jaunty smile.

Though she’d seen Scotty in the crowd at the gala and on the mound pitching, seeing him up close, she immediately understood why
Charmer
was his nickname.

“Jackie will do,” she said, feeling awkward. “I find it hard to believe you can do what you do out there,” she added. It was true; the physical challenges of the game were beginning to amaze her.

“Sometimes I do too,” Scotty said.

Alex looked at his friend. “Take over for me, would you?”

“Making time with the lovely doctor?”

Alex slugged him.

“Ow, not the pitching arm! You’re gonna lose me my bonus, man.”

“Can the drama. Jackie sees right through that stuff.”

Scotty straightened, wiping the humor from his face. “Apologies, Doctor. No drama here.”

When Alex slitted his eyes, Scotty pretended to double-punch him in the stomach before backing away.

“I know, you want me to entertain the kids while
you
make time with the doctor. I can do that.” He grinned at Jackie, who felt she was watching a TV comedy sketch or a loony tennis match. “As long as I don’t have to kiss any babies.” Scotty smirked. “That
and
you give me a signed bat for my nephew—you’re his current favorite. The little rat likes hitters.” He threw up his hands in a do-you-believe-it gesture. “I have no idea why.”

Alex turned to her. “Have a beer with me. I know a truly classy place.” He looked over his shoulder when Scotty hollered and went running toward a group of young fans. “I need one.”

The classy place was an old bar near the waterfront. The scruffy owner lit up when Alex walked through the door.

“Beer’s on me,” the man said. “But you have to pay for the pool table.”

“Red, meet Dr. Brandon.”

“I heard about her and the show today.” He gave Jackie a calculating stare, but the corners of his mouth tipped up a bit. “I like sea lions just fine if they stay in the water,” he said, nodding at her, then looking at Alex. “Never like chasing them off my boat.”

“They know you have good beer on board.” Alex winked.

Jackie was grateful to Alex for stepping in, happy to leave work behind if only for a few hours. She liked fishermen, but they didn’t quite get the big picture.

Alex accepted the pints that Red drew from the tap and handed one to Jackie.

“Game of pool?” Alex asked. “Loser pays for dinner.”

“I should know better than to play an aiming game with someone who’s been paid to aim for years,” she said. But she took the cue he offered and settled in to break.

Her break was good and she sank the first two balls. “I’m solids,” she said when she sank two more. Alex likely didn’t know that nearly every old manor house in England had a billiard table. He probably didn’t even know she’d grown up in an old manor house; they hadn’t talked too much about their pasts.

But that would be to her benefit here. She’d grown up with the game.

The look he gave her as she chalked her cue stick sent a ripple of heat through her. She sashayed over to the cone of compressed white hand talc that hung on a peg and ran her palms and fingers over the cool surface. It wasn’t the pool game that was making her palms sweat.

“I’m already wishing I could rescind my bet,” Alex chided. “You didn’t tell me you were a shark.”

“You didn’t ask.”

She leaned across the table to make a corner shot and felt his eyes rove over her. It was a different feeling than she normally had when men looked at her. Instead of wanting to flee, she wanted to curl up into the caress of his gaze. Her body heated.

She missed her shot.

“My turn.”

He chalked his stick, and she found herself spellbound by the muscles rippling in his arms. Only athletes and hardworking men had muscles like that, lean and powerful, made to move and to grab on to life. To distract herself from the warmth flooding her body, she began to recite the names of the muscles from her anatomy studies, but found she couldn’t remember more than five before the sound of balls clunking into the pockets brought her back.

“We didn’t say where that dinner was to take place,” she said. “Looks like I might be buying.”

“My place.” He grinned. “The price is right.”

He said it casually, almost offhand. She wasn’t sure which was more daunting, the practiced feel of his tone—a tone that told her he was accustomed to inviting women back to his place—or her nerves waking up in the face of what those words meant. She picked up the small square of blue chalk and began studiously grinding it into the tip of her pool cue.

It should’ve bothered her that he didn’t ask.

But she’d accepted the bet and wasn’t backing out.

And it didn’t bother her that he didn’t ask. She rather liked that he hadn’t.

He sank the rest of his balls before she had another shot.

“Just putting a little English on them,” Alex said with a triumphant glint.

The eight ball slid easily into the corner pocket after he banked it.

“I always make good on my bets,” she said, sounding more confident than she felt. “But don’t expect me to cook—you’d regret it.”

“Lucky for you cooking is one of my passions.”

This he said with a casual matter-of-factness. He was talking about cooking, for goodness sake, but the way he said the word
passion
sent her alarm bells ringing.

“Hey!” Red called from the bar. “Beer’s still on me.”

They slipped onto the worn bar seats and sipped the cold draughts that Red served up. The other patrons eyed them; Jackie was grateful they left Alex alone. He didn’t seem like the kind of man who craved living in the public eye.
She
couldn’t live like that.

Through the bar’s large windows, they watched the masts of boats gliding along the moonlit bay.

Alex tilted his head at the boats. “Hired for ambience,” he said, deadpan.

She laughed and ran her fingers through her hair, twisting a strand around and around.

“My turn,” he said, dabbing a white paper napkin into his beer and leaning toward her.

When he got close, she felt the room had warmed ten degrees. She blinked.

“You’ve got blue chalk streaked along your cheek,” he said as he reached closer.

Though he touched her through the beer-soaked napkin, she could feel the heat of his fingers. He didn’t pull his hand away, just stared into her eyes as his own softened and then crinkled with his slow smile. The smile lit his eyes, and she knew from the flutter in her heart that whether she went home with him or not, her heart had already thrown in its ante.

He dropped the napkin on the bar and took her hand in his, lacing his fingers through hers.

“Let’s walk,” he said, tugging her off the barstool.

She studied his hand. It still bore smudges of blue chalk. Hers looked tiny, unreal, in his. Though he held only her hand, she felt enveloped by unfamiliar power—raw, masculine, confident. She’d been such a loner, such a determined, independent woman. She wasn’t supposed to be susceptible to all that, not to strength and attraction that burrowed beyond the surface and aimed straight for her core. Apparently she was wrong. But she’d guarded her heart for so long, she wasn’t sure it was up for an adventure. Especially when she knew that the waters she’d be swimming in were dangerous.

They walked along the waterfront. Skaters rolled by and couples strolled hand in hand, savoring the balmy Indian summer night. He slipped his arm around her shoulders. She braced herself at first, then relaxed and let the rhythm of their footsteps carry her along.

A harbor seal telescoped its head above the water.

“He’s watching you,” Alex said. “I think he’s saying thanks.”

The sweetness of his remark charmed her. She smiled up at him and relaxed into the warmth of his body against her, enjoying the spell that held them in the still, warm night.

He gripped her shoulder and pulled her to the edge of the sidewalk. A skateboarder shot by them from between two wharf buildings.

She hadn’t heard him coming.

Alex gazed down at her, pushed her hair away from her face. They stared a long time, the sounds around them fading into the background. Jackie’s heart was talking, however. It was telling her to love this man.

She hadn’t seen that coming either.

Chapter Nineteen

When they reached his apartment, Alex settled
Jackie
on a stool at the granite counter in the kitchen.

“You have quite a view,” she said.

“We’ve had this place for years. Sabrina helped me fix it up. She had the walls knocked out to open it up and convinced me to put in the floor-to-ceiling windows. It’s my favorite thing about the place. I feel like I’m on a perch high above the city.”