The sight of her on her knees before him, with her lips wrapped around him, had burned into his mind indelibly. She tucked him away and disappeared for a moment, then came back to settle into his side on the couch, lifting his arm so she could snuggle against his chest with his arm around her.
It was so nice, his eyes closed automatically as he soaked in the feel of her warm body bleeding through his. “You know I won’t ever think about pitching again without thinking of your tongue piercing, right?”
She laughed, her fingers toying with one of the buttons hanging from his shirt. “I wanted to give you a unique experience. Since you did that for me. Last night.”
The information she’d just shared filtered through his poor, beleaguered brain. “You mean I was successful?”
Of course, their conversation had been extremely limited last night because their mouths had been on each other, not talking.
Her smile was a little misty. “Let’s just say I have a lot of selfish men in my past and I’m not sorry they’re in my rearview mirror. Plus, I’m looking forward to how you’re going to repay me for that.”
“Yeah?” he growled. “Lucky for you I’ve got hours and hours to come up with something spectacular.”
Unfortunately, it would have to wait, because what he had in mind would not work in their current environment, given that people might start arriving at any time. And that he’d stupidly left all the condoms back at the hotel. But honestly, he’d never have considered a baseball stadium ripe ground for a sexual encounter.
He would not make that mistake twice.
Once he had all his clothes in order, Trinity stood with him at the glass and listened intently as he explained the mechanics of the game—at her request. She asked intelligent questions and genuinely sought to understand the rules, of which there were a lot.
“No wonder you’re such a fan of rules.” She rolled her eyes good-naturedly. “My eyes glazed over ten minutes ago.”
No, they hadn’t. She’d absorbed every word, even when he’d gotten entirely too impassioned in his defense of the concept of a designated hitter, which he should hate as a pitcher. Former pitcher.
But all at once, he didn’t feel like he had to make the distinction. He was still a pitcher even though he didn’t do it professionally any longer. He didn’t have to pretend it wasn’t a part of him. Trinity hadn’t labeled him as a former pitcher or asked if he used to pitch. She’d just understood that baseball wasn’t a job, it was his essence.
And then gave him the most amazing sexual experience he could imagine.
How in the hell was he supposed to go back to a one-color, lackluster, boring woman after that?
Short answer—he had to. Trinity was temporary. He couldn’t be constantly distracted from his life by a sex-on-a-stick marketing executive. Especially not one who’d just demonstrated a remarkable ability to entice him down a rabbit hole of fantasy, which was apparently an Achilles’ heel he’d just discovered. They should start talking about exit strategies, stage a public fight. Surely their fake affair had done all the good it was going to do.
But the universe wasn’t finished knocking his plans around.
The Mustangs won. And Trinity instantly became a good-luck charm. What was he going to do now, drag her to every game from now until the end of the season?
It was not cool how great that suddenly sounded.
* * *
Logan had not been kidding about the interminable rounds of interviews that happened after the game. Trinity lost count of the number of times she heard him repeat the same phrases to yet another reporter.
“Johnson can absolutely repeat that three ninety tomorrow,” Logan said easily, which was always followed by, “O’Hare is still on the DL, but we’re calling up a reliever from Round Rock who will knock your socks off.”
Three ninety—that might have been a reference to the mysterious stat called a batting average that Logan had mentioned earlier. But she wouldn’t put money on it at this point. DL meant nothing to her.
It was like a secret code that only the kids in the know could crack, and by the time dinner rolled around, she was jonesing for a glass of wine. Spending an hour on her stuffed-to-the-gills email inbox wouldn’t be out of line, either. Her face hurt from smiling as she stood by Logan’s side, but his arm never left her waist, and the photos would be brilliant, especially since she’d worn this green dress that would pop on camera.
Several of the reporters asked about her, and Logan eagerly introduced her without a label, but the adoring look he gave her told the story vividly and none of the eagle-eyed cameramen missed that shot.