Pitch Please (There's No Crying in Baseball 1)

I snorted.

“I’m no different or better than the next man, Sway,” I groaned. “Don’t put me on a pedestal because I’ll surely fall,” I hesitated. “I’m just a country boy. I grew up in Arkansas, on a farm. I used to get up at the crack of dawn, check the cows. Run fences. Hell, three quarters of the time I went to school with cow shit on my shoes.”

She started to giggle. “Like your father?”

I nodded in all seriousness. “Exactly like my father. When I’m done with baseball, that’s where I’m going to be. Right back there, hand in hand with my brothers, taking care of the ranch.”

“You’re not going to live fat and happy on the lake?” she giggled.

I grinned. “Well,” I hesitated, just now thinking about having to leave the lake house behind. “The fat part, no. I don’t want to be fat. But I’ll keep my lake house. I love the fuck out of it.”

She snorted.

“So eloquent,” she teased.

“That’s me, never at a loss for words, even if they aren’t so well spoken,” I rolled my eyes, and we sat in silence as we both thought about what I’d said.

“How far away is your parents’ ranch?” she asked, interrupting my silence.

“They live just over the Texas/Arkansas border. They own about 200 acres, and run some wild horses, as well as cows, on it,” I expounded.

“My family and I grew up in the city. I have never once ridden a horse,” she smiled. “Though, my mom says I rode a donkey once.”

I chuckled. “That’s brave of you. All the donkeys I’ve come into contact with are ornery. I don’t think I would ever try to ride one.”

“It was once at a fair,” she explained, her hand dropping down to the seat between us. Only inches from my still hard cock.

If she lifted her hand slightly up and to the right, she’d be touching it, and my dick pulsed at the thought.

“I was a newborn when I was on my first horse with my dad. He said it was the only way to get me to shut up…apparently, I had colic like a motherfucker for three months,” I explained.

She shivered. “I can’t imagine. My brother has a kid, you know.”

My brows rose.

“What?” I asked. “Isn’t he like twenty-two?”

She nodded. “He is. Though, he got his high school girlfriend pregnant when she was sixteen, and he was seventeen.”

I blinked.

“Are they still together?” I asked.

She nodded her head. “They are.”

“Wow,” I murmured. “You think they’ll make it?”

A small grin graced her mouth.

“I do,” she confirmed with a short tilt of her head. “They have that once-in-a-lifetime kind of love that will stand the test of time.”

“Fame changes people,” I muttered.

She nodded her head in agreement. “That’s why he went to the team he did. It was close to us, and he had our parents support, as well as her parents, if they ever needed it.”

“That’s amazing,” I murmured. “My older brothers have been married since they were all eighteen.”

“They’re married?” Sway asked in surprise.

I nodded.

“They all have three kids, too,” I confirmed. “Hannibal and I are the lone rangers.”

She snickered.

“They don’t seem the type,” she admitted. “Too much wildness, I guess.”

“They’re wild,” I agreed. “Dad and Mom raised a bunch of hotheads.”

“Why weren’t you married at eighteen, then?” She tilted her head to the side.

“I almost was,” I said. “But when I went to college, she didn’t want to go with me. She wanted to stay there and play the rancher’s wife…and that just wasn’t what I was looking for at that point in time.”

“So, you broke up?” she guessed.

I nodded. “Ellie and I were good together…but she was too meek. I should’ve seen that for what it was.”

“You’re not telling me all of it,” Sway guessed.

I tossed her a grin, despite the fact that she couldn’t see it.

“No, I’m not,” I agreed. “But I don’t want you to think badly of my brother before you’ve had the chance to meet him.”

“Okay,” Sway hesitated. “Tell me.”

I sighed.

“When I left, Hannibal…”

“I still can’t get over his name.” Sway interjected.

I nodded.

She waved me on to finish, even though I knew she wanted to say something else about, it which was a fairly normal reaction to Han’s name. Now, it worked since he was a special operations bad ass. Then, when we were in school, everyone teased him relentlessly.

Though that was the name of the game in school. You were made fun of for just about anything, names included.

“Hannibal had about three weeks before he went into the Air Force after I left, and in that time, they got close.”

“You mean they did it,” Sway demanded, sounding offended on my behalf.

I started to chuckle.

“Down tiger,” I soothed, patting her bared thigh.

“I can’t help it,” she grumbled. “I don’t think it’s right. Especially after only a couple of weeks since you split.”