Hard and Fast

She was afraid it might take a big serving of Brad to ease this particular hunger.

***

“SAFE!”

Brad let his head fall forward as the umpire’s words spilled into the air. Son of a bitch. His shutout record was a goner. All this pain. All this torture and the Jets had just scored, thanks to a hole in the Rays’ center fielder’s glove.

But it wasn’t their center fielder’s—or his damn peppermint oil’s—fault, and Brad knew it. If only he’d had a little more heat on that last pitch…

He tried to flex his shoulder without seeming obvious, biting back another curse at the throb deep in the tissue. Forget the rest of this game, would he even make it out of this inning?

Brad watched as Coach signaled to the umpire for a time-out and headed for the mound. Looked as though the decision wasn’t even his to make.

The coach stopped in front of Brad, a wad of dip puffing out his bottom lip. “You’ve pitched a great game, son. You pushed hard for that record and your arm is tired. We’ve got five on the board and their best hitter is up next. Let’s give the rookie a shot to take him on. I need to see what he’s got.”

The muscles in Brad’s gut tightened, and he ground his teeth. Not only had he lost his shot at a record, but the coach wanted to give the mound to Becker. “Simpson is 0-6 against me, Coach. Let me take him and then I’ll come out.”

The coach spit and then eyed Brad. “You’re tired. Let Becker have him.”

Brad cut his gaze from the coach, keeping it low so the camera couldn’t zoom in. He wanted to argue. God, how he wanted to argue. But the truth was, he was hurting, both his body and his pride. He wasn’t sure he could take another blow.

With a heavy sigh, he accepted the inevitable. “Fine. I’m out.”

The crowd booed when Brad started toward the dugout, clearly unhappy with the coach’s decision, and he fought the urge to ask to stay in. Brad took comfort from the fans’ belief in him, even if he doubted himself.

Irritation replaced that comfort when he spotted Becker exiting the bull pen. The kid jogged toward the mound, a cocky smile on his face that seemed to say, “Don’t worry, old man, I’ll bring it home.”

The little bastard didn’t get it. Brad wanted to stalk back to the mound and tell him so. But the coach was there, ready to instruct Becker on what to expect.

Inside the dugout, Brad sat and dropped his glove to the ground. The kid wanted to be a starter. With his know-it-all attitude, he was lucky to be a reliever, in Brad’s opinion.

He eyed the coach as he returned to the bench. “Simpson’s gonna knock it out of the park, you know.”

“We’ll see.”

“Becker gets in there and thinks he can throw a bunch of heat and strike ’em all out. He doesn’t pay enough attention to batters’ strengths and, worse, he ignores Kurt’s signs.” Brad could hear his voice rising but he was too pissed off at being replaced with the rookie to moderate it.

“I’ll talk to him,” Coach said. “He needs a role model.”

“What he needs is an ass kicking,” Brad responded.

“There are other ways of getting to him.”

Brad snorted. “Short of busting him back to the minors, I don’t know how.”

The sound of a bat making contact with a ball drew their attention, and the coach cursed under his breath.

Simpson had just hit it out of the park.

***

BY THE TIME Brad entered the locker room, Amanda and several other members of the press were already there. He’d already dealt with numerous television cameras and the stupid question of the night. “How does it feel to be so close to a third shut out and miss it?”

How the hell do you think it feels? Like shit. It felt like shit. Brad had said as much, although not with that exact language. Normally, he kept his mouth shut when the camera rolled, reciting only management-approved sound bites. But not today. Not when he felt this foul.

Watching Becker take the mound with that smart-ass sneer on his pretty boy face had been pure torture. Watching Simpson smash one of the kid’s fastballs out of the park had been pure satisfaction. And since the run hadn’t cost the game, Brad didn’t feel one bit of guilt.

As his locker came into view, he spotted Becker in deep conversation with Amanda. Brad mumbled a curse as he realized the rookie was in hard play to win the bet.

Eyeing Amanda’s sultry curves displayed in the black skirt she wore, Brad ground his teeth. He’d handed over the mound to the kid. He’d be damned if he was handing over Amanda.

In fact, a good night of hot, sweaty sex would go a long way toward improving his disposition. The sooner he got Amanda’s curvy little body beneath his, the better.