Game On(40)

“Complete control,” I murmured and slowly, carefully, leaned forward, arching my back.

Nathan’s lesson seemed to cut off in his throat as I pressed my ass against his hips. He froze, his body rigid behind me.

“How’s my stance now?” I asked innocently.

“Uh,” he managed, before peeling his body back from mine. “Good.” He sounded hoarse.

“Maybe you want to go first,” I suggested. “Show me how it’s done?” I looked over at him and bit my lip, batting my eyes furiously.

He looked dazed. Perfect, I thought, shoving the bat into his hands. He didn’t seem to come out of that fog until I was on the other side of the fence, the gate shut between us. He gave his head a shake, looking for a moment like a big, adorable puppy dog. I tried to keep my own lustful thoughts to a minimum, but it was hard when he glanced over at me with a dangerous smirk on his lips.

“You’re playing dirty, Hall,” he said, wrapping his fingers around the bat.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I responded innocently. “I thought all things were fair with bets and balls.”

He just shook his head at me. “You’d better be careful,” he warned.

“I know what I’m doing.”

“That’s what I’m worried about.”

Turned out that I was the one who should be worried. My suggestive distraction was only temporary, as the moment the pitching machine whirled on, Nathan was focused and sharp, easily hitting the high-velocity balls that were coming his way. One. Two. Three. Four. I began to sweat. I didn’t know what he was going to claim if he won, but the way he kept glancing back at me between swings, that heat in his eyes, I was worried that I wasn’t going to want to object. Luckily, after he hit the fourth ball, when he turned to look at me, I was ready.

My button-up shirt had been sticking to my skin all night, a victim of the humidity and the heat. But now I was going to use it to my advantage. I unbuttoned two more buttons than was professionally appropriate and tucked the hem into my jeans, making the shirt tighter around my torso and pulling the gaping neckline wide. Let’s just say my baseballs were more than ready for his bat. When he glanced over to check my reaction to his progress, he got a whole eyeful of what I had been covering up. I thanked my lucky stars that I had decided to put my black lace bra on because that’s what he was getting a good glimpse at. Black lace and tons of cleavage.

The next ball from the machine spun out at its usual speed, whizzing past a dumbfounded Nathan and thwacking into the padding at the back of the cage. The sound jarred him out of his trance and his face scrunched into a frown as the ball rolled across the dusty ground and hit him in the foot.

“You’re a cheater.” He shook a finger at me.

I just shrugged as I came into the cage, picking up my bat from the ground, making sure he was getting a really good view of my ass. As I passed him, he plopped the baseball helmet on my head and leaned in so his voice tickled my ear.

“You’re playing a dangerous game,” he said. “And I’m looking forward to winning so I can claim my reward.”

I shivered, knowing that there was no way I could lose this bet. Whatever Nathan was hoping to win was something I knew would change everything. And it was getting harder and harder to resist him.

I had good reason to be scared of the batting cages when I was younger. Standing there now, I told myself that I just had to swing at the ball when it came my way. Because when the ball was flung in the direction of my head, my first instinct was to scream and duck. But I stood my ground, closed my eyes, and swung.

There was a crack and my eyes popped open to reveal the ball, just barely clipped by the bat, jump up a few feet and then land directly in front of me.

“I got it!” I cried, doing a little victory dance.

“Watch out,” Nathan warned behind me, and I barely managed to get back into position before another ball headed my way. This time I kept my eyes open and the bat met with the ball in a much more satisfying manner, sending the baseball neatly to the center of the range.

I heard a surprised but impressed whistle behind me and it took all my energy not to turn around and gloat at him. Instead, I gave my butt a little wiggle, satisfied when the whistle trailed off into a choked cough.

One more, Hall, I told myself. You can do this.

And I did. The ball flew across the range, hitting the other end.

“Woo-hoo!” I shouted, dropping the bat and raising my fists in a victory salute. I had won and I was going to get my on-the-record question answered.

I turned around to see Nathan standing on the other side of the chain-link wall with his arms crossed.

“Double or nothing,” he said.

The idea that I could get two questions answered for the article was more than I could resist. After all, I had hit three balls, surely I could hit another three.

“Fine,” I said. “But I’m going first this time.”

“Fine,” he said. “But you’re buttoning your shirt when it’s my turn.

I shrugged and turned back to the machine.

“Wait,” he said, and heard the gate open.

“It’s still my turn,” I argued as he came over to me.

“I just thought you could use some tips on your form,” but his grin revealed that while he was clearly interested in my form, it had nothing to do with baseball.