Double Play (36 page)

Pace could tell by the look on Holly’s face that she was trying to formulate a denial, a denial for his sake, to protect him, and that killed him. She was smart and sweet and loyal as hell, and she loved him—not because he was a baseball player, but in spite of it.

His own miracle. “Me, too,” he told Chipper, grabbing Holly’s hand. “I’m glad she’s my girlfriend, too.” He felt her stiffen in surprise at his side, and he looked into her eyes, which were warm and filled with things that somehow warmed him, too. From inside his pocket, his cell phone rang, and he pulled it out “It’s Sam,” he said.

“Pace,” the publicist said in a voice that told him she’d been crying, possibly still was. “Holly isn’t the leak. She never was. It’s Jeremy.”

“What? How did you find that out?”

“I lied and told him I had proof it was him, and he caved like a cheap suitcase. He’d stolen my password and was accessing my computer for privileged information. He’s turned in his resignation at the Bucks.”

“Are you okay?”

“Not really, no. I tried to turn in my resignation but no one would take it.”

“Good.” He couldn’t imagine the Heat’s PR department without her running it. “This isn’t your fault, Sam. Any more than it was Holly’s.”

“I’ll work on believing that.”

“Good. You and Holly both deserve better.” He slipped his phone into his pocket and found Holly looking at him. “What?” he asked.

“Nothing.” She leaned in and kissed him. “Everything. You stood up for me.”

“That’s what boyfriends do,” Chipper said. “Right, Pace?”

Pace found himself smiling into Holly’s eyes. “Right.”

She smiled back, and for the first time ever before a game, he felt light as a feather. Like he could do anything.

With her at his side.

 

 

In
the stands, Holly distracted herself with her camera, taking shots of the guys warming up and interacting on the field. As practice ended and the stadium began to fill, adrenaline seemed to run high. From where she sat, she could see straight into the Heat’s dugout, and she turned her camera there, zooming in for some great shots. She hadn’t gone online to see the lineup today, and she wondered who was pitching as she got pictures of Gage talking to Pace, and then she went still, her eyes locked on the lens as Pace looked up and unerringly found her in the crowd.

He was a hundred yards away and yet in her lens he was right there, eyes warming. He smiled and mouthed her name.

And then, oh God, and then he mouthed three little words.

Staggered, she sank to her seat, lowering her camera to take in the real Pace, but he was nothing more than a blur so she went back to the lens.

Because surely she’d imagined it, just a funny little trick her brain had decided to play. Ha ha. Funny.

Her eyes soaked him up, willing him to say it again, but Gage got in her way, squinting out into the stands to see what Pace had been looking at.

Holly sucked in a breath, painfully aware that she was probably still persona non grata around these parts. And it was then, while trying to lie low, that her cell phone buzzed. “You coming?” Gage asked in her ear.

“Um, what?”

“Get your ass down here. You have a player to kiss.”

She dropped her phone, stuffed her camera in her bag, and raced to the clubhouse, passing by several of the training staff and maintenance staff, all of whom greeted her. At the door to the clubhouse, Gage pulled her in for a hug.

Stunned, she hugged him back.

Henry smiled at her. All the guys smiled at her, some even hugging her as Gage had. Hell, Wade gave her a smacking kiss right on the lips, lingering over it until she was yanked out of his arms and into another pair that she knew like the back of her hand.

“Hands off,” Pace said over her head to Wade.

Wade grinned broadly. “Aw, that color of green looks so hot on you.”

Gage pushed Wade clear. “You two have a shower room to get to in a damn hurry.” He pretty much shoved them inside. “You know the drill.”

When the door shut, Holly leaned back against the tile wall, her heart so full she could scarcely stand it. “I think we’ve had our quota today already.”

Pace grinned as he came in close. Trapping her against the tile with a hand on either side of her face, he stepped into her. “Maybe we’re due for more than our fair share.”

“I’m game.” She was still smiling when he kissed her, but at the first touch of his lips all humor faded, replaced by a familiarity that was as natural as breathing and a heat that never failed to amaze her. She wound her arms around his neck, loving the feel of his bigger, stronger arms pulling her up against the body she planned on nibbling every single inch of later. He smelled like soap and deodorant and Ace Wrap and she inhaled him in—

“Okay, that’s all we have time for, thank you.” Gage fisted his hand in the back of Pace’s jersey, pulling him free.

“Wait,” Pace told him. “I’ve got to—”

“Later.”

And just like that, he and Pace were gone.

A little dizzy, Holly made her way back to the stands, where just before the first pitch, Sam appeared at the empty seat next to her. “Is this seat taken?”

Holly looked up at the woman she’d become such good friends with and felt her throat tighten. “Yes. By you.”

Sam sank down next to her. “I’m so sorry, Holly. I’ve given you such a hard time, and it wasn’t your fault and I’m just so . . .” Her eyes filled. “Sorry.”

Holly hugged her. “You were only protecting your team. I get that. I heard about Jeremy. Are you okay?”

“I’m shocked and hurt and pissed off, but I’m okay. And we’re going to kick ass today to prove it.”

When the announcer called out the starting lineup, the pitcher walked onto the mound.

Pace.

Holly gasped as the home crowd went crazy. “What?” she whispered to Sam. “He’s pitching?”

“Yes.”

He stood on the mound looking tall, tough, and a little lean after all the rehabbing he’d done.

And ready.

He pitched a tight seven innings and left the game with the score tied three all. By the bottom of the ninth, the Heat was down two. Henry, a power hitter, came up to bat with two men on base. He singled.

And then Wade came up to bat. Holly began to sweat. Sam was chewing her nails. “He can do this, he can—”

He hit hard, bringing all three runners home, and the crowd went wild with the win.

The players and management poured out of the dugout, all tumbling over each other right there at the home plate. Holly stood up, watching them from eyes that burned with fierce pride and joy.

After a minute, Pace separated himself from the pack, and with cameramen and reporters dogging him, he climbed the fence, determination all over his face.

Heart racing, Holly stared at him in shock as he leapt lithely to his feet right in front of her.

“Hey,” he said.

She grinned. “Well, hey yourself, and congratulations.”

“Thanks.” He eyed the cameramen trying to follow his route, stymied by the fencing, then looked at her wryly as he rubbed his jaw. “We’ve got maybe ten seconds of privacy, so I’ll be quick. About what I said in the dugout. About what I’d been trying to say since the boys showed early at the park.”

She brought a hand up to her chest to keep her heart from leaping right out. “I . . . I thought maybe it was my imagination.”

“No.”

Around them she was aware of the other spectators, how they were beginning to take notice of them, a few even pulling out their cell phones to take pictures. She didn’t care, and tried to pull him in.

“I’m filthy,” he said, then gave up the fight and hugged her back. “All this time,” he said in her ear, “I thought I was the worldly one, that between the two of us, I was more experienced, that I was waiting for your heart to catch up, but I was wrong.” Pulling back, he looked into her eyes. “Every single moment since you came to Santa Barbara, you’ve schooled me. On top of being smart as hell, loyal, passionate, gorgeous, you are the most amazing woman I’ve ever met.”

Behind them, two camera guys finally made it over the fence. Huffing, they stuck microphones in their faces.

Pace turned his back on them and, still holding on to Holly, looked down in her face. “I fell hard for you,” he said quietly, for her ears only. “And the only thing better than knowing it, is going for it. Going for something other than baseball, something that means even more to me.”

“Me?” she asked with a smile.

“You. Only you. I love you, Holly, so much.”

“Hey.” One of the camera guys behind them pushed his way around to look at Pace in horror. “You’re not retiring, are you? You just got back.”

Pace glanced at him with irritation, and the camera guy lifted his free hand. “Sorry, man. You’re trying to get laid. Carry on.”

Pace looked like maybe he wanted to shove him back over the fence, but then yet another camera guy came running down the aisle and stuck out another microphone. “What’s this about retirement?”

Pace shook his head. “Okay, all of you, back up. I need a second.” He turned back to Holly. “I’m trying to propose here.”

“Propose?” she gasped.

“Yeah. I—oomph,” he let out as she flung herself into his arms.

He smelled like the dust and dirt and sweat that was all over him, and she couldn’t get enough. “Oh, Pace. I don’t need a proposal.”

“You don’t?”

“No. I just need you.”

He let out a slow, heartbreaking smile. “You were right before, you know.”

“When?” she asked, liking to be right, about anything.

“When you said baseball was everything to me. It was, until you. Now you’re my everything.”

“Love the sound of that.” She melted against him and put her mouth to his ear. “I also loved your pitching tonight. It turned me on.”

His eyes heated. His hands tightened on her. They might have been alone as he dropped his forehead to hers. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She put her mouth back to his ear. “Now get me out of here, because you have another perfect game coming. This one private.”

He tossed his head back and laughed out loud as the flashes went off all around them. And that was the shot of him that made it into all the papers the next day, and later into many books on the sport.

And only Holly knew that the special light in his eyes at that moment wasn’t for the game the Heat had just won, but all for her . . .

She’d
read somewhere that the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach, but Samantha McNead knew better than that—in certain men the stomach was aiming just a bit too high.

Wade O’Riley was one of them.

One of the most celebrated catchers in Major League Baseball, he had women lining up to meet him wherever he went.

And it wasn’t home cooking that they wanted to give him either.

Not that Wade minded. Nope, even with all the constraints that went with the new big, fat contract he’d just signed with Santa Barbara’s expansion team, the Heat, the guy seemed oblivious to pressure. Laid-back and easygoing, he took everything as it came, with a grain of salt and a slow, knowing smile that let everyone in on the joke.

Because life was one big funny to Wade.

She appreciated that, she just didn’t live it the way he did. Didn’t know how. As the publicist for the Heat and the lone female in a man’s world, Samantha’s life tended to be more work than fun lately. Hence her mission today.

The limo pulled up in front of Wade’s big beach-cottage-style house, which was perched on a bluff over the ocean. From the backseat she could see the ocean froth and pitch.

The motion matched what her stomach was doing.

In the work aspect of her life, she was extremely comfortable. That was a given. She’d been raised by men: her father, her uncle, her brother, and her cousins were all tough, implacable, unforgiving alpha males. Failure had never been an option, which translated to Sam being very good at whatever she tackled. Unfortunately, all she’d tackled lately was her job.

Maybe one of these days a guy would sweep her off her feet and then into bed, but it wouldn’t be today and it wouldn’t be with the guy she’d been tasked with babysitting.

The Heat had played last night. It was the first week of April, and it’d been an exhibition game, a prelude to their season opener on Sunday. They’d played the Padres, and it’d turned out to be surprisingly down and dirty. Wade had hit a homer in the second inning then been beaned in the third when the pitcher had hit him in the thigh with a throw-away pitch. The game had gone two extra innings and way past midnight before the Heat had finally won on Wade’s double, so Sam expected him to be exhausted and probably sore as hell. Maybe she’d even have to pull him out of bed.

The thought brought concern and a secret tingle to parts of her body that had been neglected for far too long.

Nice to know they still worked.

As she started to exit the limo to go get him, his front door opened. Six feet of rugged, leanly muscled male stepped out in Levi’s and an untucked blue-and-white-striped button-down. A gust of wind molded his clothes against the body that tended to make her tongue stick to the roof of her mouth, and he stopped to slide on his sunglasses and take in the ocean, the picture of a California surfer.

He’d been a rock star in another life, she was convinced. She purposely let out a breath and leaned back, reminding herself he was just a guy. A
flawed
guy at that, though certainly none of his flaws happened to be showing at the moment.

He walked across the lawn with an unhurried, easy stride in all his scruffy gorgeousness and opened the limo door, letting in the chilly April afternoon air. With one hand on the roof, the other on the door, he bent down, peering in through his Prada sunglasses, merely arching a brow when he saw her.