“Who exactly are we talking about?” Tuck asked. Like me, our second basemen, Johnathan “Tuck” Tucker, had seen his fair share of the minor leagues. The only difference was the Roasters marked Tuck’s first time in the big leagues. I had been given a shot at the majors before. Twice.
“Our new social media girl,” Pink told them. He was a worse tattletale than my two sisters.
“She has a name,” I snapped, immediately regretting it when Pink smiled. The kid was a pro at pressing my buttons.
“Is this the stacked blonde or the tattooed pixie?” Tuck asked.
“Blonde,” Pink and I answered at the same time.
“So, the tattooed chick is free, then?”
Before anybody could respond, a dark cloud settled over the gym. One much heavier than any of the weights we’d been lifting. “If you can talk this much, then you’re not pushing hard enough.”
None of us needed to look up to know it was Coach Ward grumbling from the doorway. That man needed to come with a warning, or at least a bell around his neck.
We resumed our respective workouts. We’d long since ditched the uniforms after team photos this morning, swapping them out for casual gym clothes, or in Pink’s case, a lavender pair of mesh shorts. The kid was either extremely proud of his massive cock or more secure in his sexuality than any man I’d met before. Knowing Pink, it was probably both.
Mondays during the preseason were reserved for strength training exercises—sit-ups, hand weights, wall sits—which meant come Tuesday, I’d be sore as hell.
Outfielders had the machines across the hall for another few minutes, which meant the infield squad—me, Pink, Roman, Tuck, Matty, and our catcher, Bennett—had the weight room.
When I finished my final set of crunches, I moved over to the wall, taking the free spot next to Matty. I pretended not to notice the way my knee creaked when I slid down until my thighs were parallel to the ground.
Fucking hell. This is going to be what kills me.
“Sinclair, this is very important.” Matty checked the doorway. None of us wanted another Bailey-Ward scolding. “Did she saybless your heart?” he asked, his inflection light and playful. “Or was itbless your heart?” The second time around, he said it more condescendingly. Like he’d just told a joke and I was the only one who hadn’t gotten the punchline. Or in this case, that I was the punchline.
“Definitely the second one.”
He whistled. “Aw, hell, man. You’re fucked.”
Damn right I was. I still had twenty seconds to go in this wall sit and already, I felt like my stomach was gonna fall out of my ass.
“Doesn’t matter,” I huffed, clenching my core muscles. “I’m not looking for anything right now. Just trying to stay focused on my game.”
“Time,” Roman called out. He tapped Bennett’s shoulder and signed the same to him. Bennett was deaf and even though he had cochlear implants, he turned off the external speech processor sometimes during workouts or practices.
My body crumpled, sliding the rest of the way down until I met the floor. Damn, I shouldn’t be this winded after a thirty-minute training circuit. I dropped my head back against the wall, straining to catch my breath. My legs were going to feel like mashed potatoes by dinner time.
Fuck, I’d kill for some mashed potatoes.
Matty used the ends of his tee to wipe the sweat from his brow. “It’s probably for the best.”
“Huh?” I asked him. My brain, along with the rest of my muscles, was mush.
“Focusing on your game and not on—”
“Clarke Myers,” I finished for him.
He nodded. “Cute name.”
Cute woman, I thought to myself. Scratch that, cute didn’t even begin to cover it.
Clarke was a fucking smoke show.
I couldn’t lie. She’d shocked the hell out of me when she’d strolled into the locker room this morning. She’d traded her robe for the standard PNW getup: jeans, a flannel shirt, and a raincoat. I’d done a double-take when my eyes landed on her very impractical, open-toed shoes. I guessed the saying was true—you could take the belle out of the South, but you couldn’t take the South out of the belle.
I bit my tongue and tried not to smile. I didn’t know why I irritated her so much. I didn’t know why I liked it so much either.
