Love Bats Last (The Heart of the Game) (25 page)

He washed his hands at the sink, hoping she liked his place. Hoping bringing her was the right thing to do.

The apartment had the bones of a grand old building, but Sabrina had been clever to have it redone, to open the smaller rooms into a more modern, open floor plan and furnish it sparely. He only had to keep it neat for it to look good.

He dragged an onion and some basil from the crisper and set them on the counter next to a bowl of tomatoes.

Jackie leaned her elbows onto the massive granite counter and smiled. “I feel like I’m on one of those chef shows on the telly.”

“Don’t get your hopes up. I said cooking was a passion. I didn’t say I was any good at it.” He stared at the vegetables, checked the fridge again, and even pulled open the freezer to stare in it. “I know it’s a cliché, but all I have are the makings of a pasta sauce and some salad.”

“Sounds like heaven,” she said. “I missed lunch.” She tapped at the countertop, drawing his attention. “That is, it sounds heavenly if you’ve got pasta to go with that sauce.”

“Straight from the box. Bowties, I think.”

“My favorite.”

He drew a bottle of champagne from the wine fridge and popped it open. Jackie raised a brow as she read the label.

“There are still some things the French do better than we do,” he said. “Champagne is one of them.” He clinked his glass against hers. “To the Center.”

She took a long draw from her glass. Maybe she was as nervous as he was.

And damn, he felt foolish for feeling nervous.

“There’s a telescope in the corner; Scotty gave it to me. You can see Jupiter.”

He watched her walk to the telescope and peer into it. He loved the way she moved. She had a physical confidence that he more than admired. Like the best ballplayers, she had command of her body. But unlike ballplayers, she had a body that called out to his.

“It’s strange,” she said. “I’m used to looking at such small things under the microscope, and yet they look so much bigger than any stars or planets.”

“Can you see Jupiter’s moons?” Alex asked as he set two plates on his dining table.

She bumped the scope with her shoulder. “Ummm...” she said, catching her balance and looking over at him. “I might not be looking at the right thing now.”

He walked to the scope, and she stepped aside. He adjusted a knob and brought Jupiter into focus. “There, have a look now.”

She peered in and as she did, her hair tumbled across his sleeve. Her scent wafted up to him, a scent laced with the hint of tuberoses and lemon blossoms and... woman.

“Oh my,” she whispered. Then she swirled around abruptly, nearly knocking him off his feet. For a moment they stood there, breathing hard. Hardly breathing. All he knew was that he wanted to kiss her, just as he’d wanted to do as they’d strolled the waterfront. Wanted to feel her lips beneath his more than he’d wanted anything in a very long time.

He reached his hand to her face and then slowly, watching for any sign of objection, bent down and found her lips.

At first she didn’t move. Though her lips were warm against his, he didn’t want to force her. He started to pull away, but she lifted her hand to the nape of his neck and pressed her body close, opening her lips and welcoming his with a gentle tremor that went straight to his heart. And everywhere else. He felt himself go hard against her hip. She wrapped her free hand around his waist, and the tender pressure of her fingers lit an astonishing passion deep in him. He parted her lips, savoring the taste of her, lost in the pulsing energy and the heated tangle of their tongues. He tracked his hands up the curve of her back and pulled her tighter, wanting to feel her body against his. He’d wanted to feel her like this since the day he’d seen her step up out of the river.

The rush of heat as her breasts pressed against his chest, as her hands pulled him even closer, set off a primal roaring in him, a physical—an
emotional
—reaction beyond any he’d ever known. It was all he could do to contain the guttural moan that threatened to escape his chest. He pulled away and, as her eyes fluttered open, he looked into them, really looked. He saw arousal—that didn’t surprise him. But what he saw behind the arousal nearly stopped his heart. He saw fear. A fear that came from wanting, from wanting to be met, from wanting to feel strength against strength, passion meeting equal passion, and from imagining that such a meeting, such a match, would never be found. He knew that fear. God, he’d fought that dragon. And he’d stuffed any hope for finding his match deep so that the power of unrequited wanting wouldn’t swamp him. Suddenly she became more than he’d ever expected. They were cut from the same cloth.

She lifted her hand and traced her fingers along his jaw. Her unblinking stare told him that she was in as deep as he was.

“Don’t stop,” she said, brushing her lips against his. “Please don’t stop.” She flicked her tongue against the seam of his lips, teasing them apart.

The roar he’d leashed morphed into a crushing kiss as he backed her against the bookcase and pressed the ridge of his erection against her. He glided his hands down and cupped her in his palms, lifting her against his leg so she straddled his thigh.

She gasped against his lips. Her breath hitched and her kiss deepened with a fierceness that shot fire to his core. He brushed his hand across her budded nipple, and the shiver that answered made him mad with desire.

He lifted her and carried her to the couch, watching her face, reading her signals. He wanted her to want this, to want him, at every turn, with every move, every breath.

She tugged at his shirt, and he pulled it over his head. She ran her palms along his chest, and his muscles tingled under her touch. She smiled as she ran her hands along his ribs and pulled him down to her.

As he bent to kiss her, every cell of his body screamed for him to dive down, undress her, savor her, ravish her.

The ringing of his phone jolted him.

“The world beckons,” she whispered.

He shook his head ever so slightly, ignored the ringing and brought his lips back to hers.

“Hi, Alex, it’s Claire.”

Jackie froze at the sound of Claire’s voice. He should’ve switched the answering machine to mute. He’d meant to.

“I have
great
news for us,” Claire continued with a giggle of triumph. “Since you don’t have any days off until November”—her words were interrupted only by the crackling of a bad cell connection—“Dad was kind enough to rent the villa in Tuscany for the
entire
month.”

Jackie scooted herself upright on the couch. She tugged the neck of her blouse into place and wrapped her arms around herself. No suit of armor could’ve sent any clearer message. Alex rose from the couch and strode toward the answering machine.

“He thinks we just need more time together,” Claire continued. “And I thought about it and, well, he’s usually right about most things. I think we could—”

Alex clicked the mute button and watched as Jackie rose from the couch and headed for the kitchen.

Claire’s father knew one thing well, and that one thing had nothing to do with human relationships. He was a venture capitalist and if something didn’t have dollars or numbers attached, it didn’t matter to him. He probably thought that if he threw enough money at Claire and him, they’d conform to a perfect match. But he couldn’t be more wrong. He and Claire had known one another since they were young. They’d been friends, but they didn’t fit. She wasn’t his match, didn’t want what he wanted. Not what the man inside him wanted and needed. And
he
wasn’t what she needed.

Alex made a mental note to ask Sabrina to find a nice, reliable, loyal guy for Claire. But Claire’s future wasn’t foremost in his mind.

The evening he’d hoped for was rapidly disintegrating.

The pained look in Jackie’s eyes as he walked into his kitchen didn’t make the moment any easier. Her posture told him she was trying to hide her feelings, but he’d seen the look in her eyes before she turned away.

“I apologize,” he said. There was no tone he could conjure that would help. “That was a childhood friend,” he added.

“You don’t owe me an explanation,” she said.

There were some things he was sure an English accent was perfect for, and subtly putting a man in his place was evidently one of them. She took a sip from the champagne glass she’d left on the counter, set it down and stared at it for a moment.

When she looked up and met his gaze, he saw the fire that burned at her core, a fire he’d noted right from the start. She held her eyes to his, steady, almost challenging.

“There is one thing you should know before you invite me anywhere again.”

Only the flutter of her pulse in her throat betrayed her distress. It skewered into him deeper than any words could.

“I’m not interested in being one of your many women.”

And he knew in that moment that he didn’t want her to be one of his women. He wanted her to be
the
woman, his woman, the only woman. He’d wanted few things in his life with the intensity he felt now—to be the best baseball player he could be, to keep Trovare running to the standard his father had set, to see to the welfare of his family and crew—and he’d worked to achieve all of them. But he’d never wanted anything like he wanted Jackie.

The images of her with Bradley shot through him. He didn’t want to be one of her men either. And though he wanted to know what the guy meant to her, after Claire’s call it’d be worse than bad timing to ask.

He busied his hands with draining the pasta, knowing there was nothing he could say. The pasta was way past al dente and the tomato sauce had simmered far too long. He scooped the thickened sauce onto the pasta. The fact that she hadn’t said outright that she never wanted to see him again gave him some hope, but not much.

“Hungry?” he said, breaking the awkward silence.

“Starving.” Her forced cheerfulness made him feel worse. “Garlic fries do not constitute a meal.”

“Some people think they’re one of the primary food groups.” 

To his surprise, she laughed. She scooped a huge portion of pasta onto her plate, then forked a mound of pasta and blew on it. The steam rose in tendrils toward her face. She studied the steam and then looked over at him.

“The rescue crew is throwing a party tomorrow afternoon. They made me promise to invite you.”

He took a long draw of breath. Though he couldn’t read the emotion on her face, he felt as though a door had cracked open, a door that just moments before he’d feared had been shut to him forever.

“I have a day game,” he said, not hiding his disappointment. “But I’d love a rain check.”

“You’ve got one.”

She put her fork down and leaned her elbows on the table. “Why baseball, Alex?”

He’d been asked plenty of questions about the game, but it had been a long time since someone asked why. “Sometimes I think it chose me.” He didn’t feel like talking about baseball.

She smiled then, a half smile, but the look in her eyes told him she understood.

“Why science?” he asked, diverting the conversation back to her.

“My dad was a scientist.” She chased her bowties around her plate. “I grew up with it. Science suited me; I love the big story, the development of life, the intrigue of the universe. I love the facts and the details.”

From what he’d seen, she pulled facts tight around her like a fortress. He knew more than he wanted to about that feeling.

“But it was animals that called to me most strongly. I’ve wanted to be a vet since I was six. Pestered my parents almost every day; it’s a wonder they didn’t lose their patience. I was forever dragging strays home. If I couldn’t doctor them from the medicine cabinet, my parents had to foot the vet bills.”

She chuckled and the light returned to her eyes.

“I finished my postdoc work in the Okavango Delta. Botswana. I fell in love with the animals there, especially the cheetahs. But after doing some fieldwork in Alaska, marine mammals got under my skin.”

She nodded yes to the salad he offered.

“Not exactly garden fresh,” he said.

“It’s food, Alex.” She nailed him with her gaze. “You don’t need to apologize.”

She wasn’t talking about the salad. His shoulders eased.

“How’s the floor holding up in the lab?”

“God! I meant to thank you for that,” she said between bites.

He waved off her thanks. “Tell me more about the research you’ve been conducting. Michael Albright said you’re onto something big in the North Bay.”

Her fork stopped in midair. And she hesitated for the briefest second. He’d hit a nerve he hadn’t been aiming at.

“It’s going well,” she said, evading the topic by taking another forkful of salad.

Jackie didn’t say much as Alex drove her home. He’d managed to skim over the rough spot he’d hit when he’d asked about her work, but a lingering guardedness infused the evening. Oddly, she seemed more disturbed by his question about her work than she’d been by Claire’s call. He knew scientists could be tetchy about their investigations, but her reaction told him something about it scared her. He’d also thought it odd that she’d been nearly as evasive about her life growing up in England. But there were plenty of subjects he didn’t like talking about either.