Fastball (9 page)

You had to appreciate those magical days,
because they were damn near rare as alligators in Minnesota. And if
it had something to do with Maddie, he sure as hell had no
intention of giving up so easily. The situation was tricky, but he
was confident he could resolve it somehow to their mutual
satisfaction. And the thought of satisfying Maddie—in every way—was
enough to put a big smile on his face as he headed down from his
room to the team’s airport bus.

He had hoped to get lucky and bump into her
in the hotel, or maybe even at the park, but he hadn’t caught a
glimpse of her all day. Just knowing she was there, though,
watching his spectacular night at the plate, made him feel better
despite missing her. At the very least, he figured, he’d see her on
the post-game flight to Phoenix. That was a lock.

On the bus to the airport, the players were
dog-tired but happy, joking and kidding around more than they’d
done since the season started. The pressure to win the pennant this
year weighed heavily on everyone in the organization, from the
general manager down through the coaches and the players. The
Patriots had forked out megabucks in the off-season to sign two
top-of-the-line free agents, and everyone now expected them to
contend for and probably win the pennant.

They remained in first place but the players
knew the pressure would only intensify as the season wore on.
Almost every sportswriter in the country had picked the Patriots to
win their division, and many had tabbed them to go all the way to
the World Series. So, splitting the Padres series, while okay,
wasn’t all they’d hoped for. But it sure was a hell of a lot better
than leaving San Diego one-and-three if they’d lost tonight. The
papers and the fans back home would have been all over them. No
wonder the players felt relieved and ready to relax as they headed
to pick up their chartered flight to Arizona.

As Jake boarded the plane, his eyes searched
for Maddie in what he had learned was her usual spot, a window seat
on the left side near the back. He spotted her there, looking down
at something—probably her laptop, possibly a book. While his eyes
were still fixed on her, she looked up and caught sight of him.
Jake immediately broke into a broad smile, and raised a hand in
greeting.

Maddie gave him a brief, tight nod, then cast
her eyes back down toward her lap. Jake’s smile and his good mood
evaporated instantly. Her unspoken message was crystal clear—she
was going to make sure nothing she did would give others a hint
that anything had happened between them, and he should do the
same.

Feeling annoyed—and knowing he had no right
to be, which made it worse—Jake grabbed the seat next to his friend
Nate Carter, the left-hander who was the Patriots’ ace. Just
reaching his prime at twenty-six, Nate had become the heart of the
strong Patriots’ pitching staff—a true “stopper,” the guy who could
be relied on to shut the opposition down and give his team a chance
to win almost every game he pitched. He was already three times an
All-Star, and Jake expected Nate to soon add a Cy Young Award as
the league’s best pitcher to his growing list of
accomplishments.

Jake had gotten to know him even before Nate
was rocketed up to the bigs, and the two had forged a strong
friendship. It certainly wasn’t because they were very much alike.
Though both were tall and fit from rigorous workout regimens,
Nate’s hair and complexion were dark to Jake’s light, and his body
lanky and whip-like to Jake’s sturdiness. Nate was the fast lane,
big-city boy to Jake’s laid-back, farm-country upbringing. While
Jake was all about raw power and strength, Nate was about electric
velocity and crafty delivery.

It was a testament to the strength of their
bond that Nate had gone miles beyond the call of duty to support
Jake during his rehab from the devastating ankle injury. If
anything, Nate was probably happier than Jake was when he finally
made it back to the big leagues.

“Man, you are absolutely murdering the
freakin’ ball,” Nate said with a lazy grin as Jake took his seat.
“God, I’m just glad I don’t have to pitch to you except in spring
training.” He gave Jake a frat boy punch in the shoulder. “You make
me think there’s hope for all of us.”

Jake shot him a puzzled frown. “Hope? What
the hell are you talking about?”

Nate shrugged. “You know—hope that we might
still be able to play a bit when we’re really old bastards like
you.”

“Asshole,” Jake tossed back genially. He was
happy to take the ribbing. As long as he was able to hit like he’d
been doing since being called up, everybody would be happy. There
was no doubt the team had some high expectations for him, but he
didn’t think anybody had expected him to have such a dynamite start
to the season—first in Triple-A, and now in the majors.

Nate widened his eyes. “What? I’m just
telling the truth, old man.”

“Jesus, I’m only thirty-one, but I guess to
an emotional adolescent like you anybody over thirty is an
antique.” Jake donned a serious face. “Now the difference between
you and me, my boy, is that I actually live my life as if I want to
still be around at forty. You haven’t quite figured out yet that a
hard workout isn’t going out on the town and then having sex all
night with your latest and greatest squeeze. It’s just that sort of
unhealthy living that will ultimately lead you to a life of riding
buses in the minors instead of maintaining the lofty heights of
those of us who have overcome our baser instincts.”

Of course, the idea of Nate Carter riding
minor league buses was about as probable as an asteroid destroying
Earth.

Nate howled in protest. “Oh, yeah, right.
Saint Jake Miller. How could I forget? Sure, maybe I push the
envelope a bit, but last time I checked you weren’t exactly a
virgin anymore either.”

Jake let his jaw drop open. “Push the
envelope—that’s an interesting way to put it. How about ram the
envelope through the shredder?”

They both laughed. Nate had been teasing Jake
about being a baseball senior citizen for a couple of years
already. Jake, in turn, had ragged Nate non-stop about his penchant
for a life of barhopping and one-night stands. He knew his pal was
an immensely talented pitcher, one who would be a dead-cinch for
the Hall of Fame if he kept his act together. But he couldn’t help
worrying that Nate might burn himself out with his lifestyle, as so
many talented young players had in the past. What Nate needed was a
good woman to keep him on track, maybe a woman like Maddie
Leclair.

Jake mentally groaned. Jesus, he could not
keep his mind off the woman. When Nate threw him a quizzical look,
he just scowled and pulled his book out, hoping his friend would
let it drop. Yeah, he was acting like a jerk, and the antidote for
his jerkdom was sitting only a few rows away, ignoring him for all
she was worth.

* * *

Maddie stared blearily at her laptop,
ignoring the buzz of male voices all around her on the team plane.
She had been up until almost four in the morning. Once she had
started working on the Jake story, she didn’t stop until she was so
exhausted she couldn’t keep her eyes open. She’d played the
recording of the interview over and over to jot down notes and help
her write or rewrite sections. But she also found herself replaying
it because it gave her such pleasure just to hear Jake’s voice. It
carried a quality she found difficult to describe. Deep and smooth,
yes, but there was much more to it than that. She found the quietly
masculine, confident tone mesmerizing, even hypnotic.

After a few hours of sleep, she’d woken up,
ordered breakfast from room service, and gone right back to her
laptop, finishing the piece before noon. She’d put her heart into
it, and had no doubt it was one of the best things she’d ever
written. She emailed it to her editor at the
Post
, crossing
her fingers and toes that he’d get what it was about.

It hadn’t taken long to find out. When her
cell phone buzzed shortly after two o’clock, it was Martin James,
the long-time
Post
sports editor. Martin’s voice had boomed
so loudly in her ear that Maddie had winced in pain. “Maddie, it’s
fantastic and I love it. How in God’s name did you get Miller to
open up like that? He’s never given anybody that kind of access
before. This is great, great stuff,” he’d gone on, almost
breathlessly. “We’re going to run it tomorrow. Full page. No reason
to wait.”

A huge surge of relief had rushed through
her. “Well, thanks, Martin. I think it’s one of my best, too.
Miller was very kind, and totally cooperative. I don’t exactly know
why he decided to be so open with me. I suppose he felt more
comfortable talking with me for some reason than with other
reporters.” She hadn’t been about to tell Martin what was really
going on, though she figured he was plenty smart and savvy enough
that he might put two and two together.

Fortunately, he’d taken the dodge. “Whatever
it was, it’s great. Anyway, I gotta run. Congratulations, Maddie. I
wouldn’t be surprised if this one turned out to be an award winner.
See you when you get back.”

Though she was still on a high from that call
as she sat waiting for the team to board the plane, her sense of
uneasiness remained. It was a great story, but she’d broken the
rules to get it. That might not have bothered a lot of the
reporters, but it bothered her. She’d been raised to respect rules,
respect authority, and to do things the right way. Sneaking around
behind the team’s back to meet clandestinely with a player was not
something she’d ever thought she’d do. Now, she just hoped it
wouldn’t come back to haunt her. A great story was one thing, but
her credibility in the small, tight world of professional baseball
was far more important in the end. The fact that she was so damn
attracted to Jake made the guilt that much harder to bear.

So, when she looked up and saw him standing a
dozen rows away, grinning at her, her instinctive reaction was to
nod and duck her head. In what seemed only a second, she looked
back up, but by then Jake was sliding into his seat, his back
toward her.

Crap.
Why did she just do that? He’d
been nothing but kind, and she’d just been unbearably rude. Maybe
she could blame part of it on fatigue, but the other part was
simply stupidity.

The short flight to Phoenix was over
mercifully quickly, and Maddie was able to avoid Jake completely by
staying on the plane for a few minutes longer than she normally
would have. She knew that what she
ought
to do was walk by
Jake and give him a genuine smile, but she felt too embarrassed by
her earlier behavior to even make eye contact with him again
tonight. When she finally deplaned, she strode quickly through the
terminal and grabbed a cab to the Wyndham Phoenix, praying to God
she wouldn’t run into anyone on the team.

Maddie jerked awake, the harsh ring of the
hotel phone pulling her out of a restless sleep. As she grabbed for
it—more to silence the noise than anything else—she cursed the
idiot calling her room at this hour of the morning.

A quick glance at the clock and she winced.
It was already nine. Not exactly dawn, but altogether too early for
her since it was nearly three by the time she got to the hotel and
turned in last night. She held the receiver to her ear only to pull
it back when the booming voice of Charley Cameron, director of
media affairs for the Patriots, came over the line.

“Maddie, we need to talk.”

She held back a sigh. Obviously her morning
was going to start with a chewing out. “How can I help you,
Charley?”

“My secretary just emailed me a copy of your
story on Jake Miller in today’s paper. It’s a nice piece of work.
You really captured Jake better than anybody I’ve seen so far.”

His frosty tone didn’t match the
congratulatory words. Not that she’d really been expecting kudos.
Still, she played it straight. “It’s kind of you to say that.”

“It’s praise well-deserved. You’re a good
writer and you showed it again today.” He took a pregnant
pause.

Here it comes.

“I’m puzzled about one thing though,” he
said. “When did you manage to get all that information and those
quotes from Jake? You didn’t ask me to set up an interview. So, how
exactly did that happen?”

She fell back onto the pillow and stifled a
groan. It was just as she had feared. Now she had to confront—and
fast—her lingering doubts about Jake’s suggestion that she lie and
say they’d done the interview over the phone. Maddie was pretty
sure Cameron would be skeptical at best. There was so much
detailed, in-depth information—the kind normally not the stuff of a
phone interview. It was the kind of piece a reporter writes after
spending hours, or possibly even days, with her subject.

When it came right down to it, she couldn’t
lie like that. Even if she had it in her, she’d make such a hash of
it that Cameron would see through it before the words were all out
of her mouth. No, she had to own up to her misdeed and face the
consequences. And she damn well wouldn’t dump the blame on Jake. He
might have suggested the unsanctioned meeting, but she’d agreed to
it. So this was on her.

She cleared her throat, trying to get past
the lump that had formed there. “I’ll be honest, Charley,” she said
contritely, “I didn’t go with a formal interview because I thought
I could only get the kind of story I wanted if we could talk in a
place where Jake could really relax—”

“What?” Cameron yelled. She again had to yank
the phone away from her ear. “You know damn well that’s against the
rules. Jesus, I can’t believe you did that.” He paused for breath,
obviously fuming. “Miller should know better, and so should you. We
have those rules for a reason.”