Lucas has three boxes full.
I stare at the boxes. Blink at them.
This shouldn’t be a surprise. He has almost a million followers on ReelTime alone. Fan mail comes with the territory. And so what if half the letters smell like perfume or come with handmade beaded necklaces? Women could be mailing him engagement rings, and it wouldn’t change the facts.
I’ve been assigned to help him.
We’re not a thing.
I willnotbe jealous.
I’m just placing his itinerary on top of the tower of fan mail when the air in the corridor shifts. A split second later, a pulse vibrates through the soles of my sneakers.
THUNK.
The sound echoes down the long concrete hallway leading to the batting tunnels, cutting through the mechanical hum of the building. In a stadium this empty, every sound is magnified, and this particular sound—wet and heavy—hits less like someonepracticing and more like someone working out his personal demons.
I look at the glowing exit sign over the lobby doors. I should leave …
THUNK.
A sharp, frustrated yell gets cut off by the heavy acoustics of the tunnel.
The guard said he’s been in there since eight. It’s almost ten now. My gaze jumps back to the itinerary I just put in Lucas’s box. If that man blows out his rotator cuff because he’s having a late-night meltdown, my career hopes will melt all the way down with him.
And that’s theonlyreason I grab the itinerary out of the box and storm toward Tunnel Three.
The temperature drops ten degrees when I approach it. Green netting lines the cavernous tunnels, and buzzing fluorescent lights make everything look like a noir film.
At the far end of the third lane, I find Lucas stripped down to a charcoal-gray shirt that’s turned black with sweat where it drips between his shoulder blades. He’s throwing into a nine-hole net—a vinyl target with cutouts where the strike zone lives—aiming like he’s trying to thread a needle through concrete.
I stay in the shadows of the doorway for a beat, watching him. Gone are the flirty smile, the cake jokes, the easy cockiness I bet he’d unleash so fast if I ever agreed to a date with him.
In its place is an intensity I haven’t even seen from him on the mound. His windup is a study in controlled violence—the high kick of his lead leg, the way his body coils like a spring under tension, and then the explosive uncoiling as he drives toward the plate. His release is so fast, my eyes can barely track the white blur of the ball before it’s gone.
The Rapsodo chirps beside him.
I glance at the screen—and freeze.
102
My jaw drops.
That’s not bullpen work. That’s not “get your reps in” velocity. That’s closer heat. That’s end-of-game, no-one-is-touching-this stuff.
And he’s doing it alone. At ten o’clock at night.
In the pros, the mound has a hierarchy. The starter sets the tone, carrying the bulk of the game. The relievers bridge the gap. And the closer—the high-velocity, all-ego, unflappable closer—gets the glory in the ninth.
But there’s also the setup man.
The one they call in the eighth to maintain the lead, the one whose success is measured in holds, not headlines.
Like most pitchers good enough to get drafted, Lucas has always been the best arm on every team he’s played for. A starter.Theguy.
But the Firebirds don’t need another starter.
They need a setup man.
