Strike Out: Mustangs Baseball #6 (6 page)

“Lookin’ for me?”

“There’s a problem with one of the sensors.”

“Which one?”

Her gaze dropped to his groin then jerked back up to his face. His conversation with Jeff had helped calm his libido, but seeing her eyes drift down his anatomy had him harder than cured maple again. “Left thigh.”

He wasn’t going to let her off so easy. He rubbed his leg while wishing he, or she, was rubbing something else. “Want me to drop my pants?”

Up. Down. Up. Down. Her gaze followed his hand as if he were hypnotizing her. He’d never tried mesmerizing a woman into bed with him.
You are growing sleepy. No, make that, you are growing horny. Spread your legs, let me taste you
.

That line of thought didn’t help anything. His hand stalled, and she looked into his eyes.

“Well…maybe. I don’t know. I need to see what’s up…. I mean, I need to see why it isn’t working.”

Damn, she was cute when she was flustered. His fingers itched to feel the heat coloring her cheeks, to trail down her body to test the temperature of the rest of her. If he peeled her T-shirt off, would he find more rosy skin?

“Come on.” He considered holding out his hand to her, but just waved her along as he turned and headed down the hallway. There was no time to seduce her. He had to get out to the bullpen to warm up.

She followed him to a small room stacked floor-to-ceiling with cases of water bottles and cardboard boxes containing God only knew what. Stuff they used in the clubhouse, he assumed.

As the door swooshed closed behind her, her eyes went wide. “A supply closet?”

“Hey, it’s private.” He worked his belt loose followed by the waistband button then the zipper. “You didn’t think I was going to let you grope me in the hallway, did you?”

“No.” Her gaze was locked on the triangle made by his open britches. “I….”

He leaned back against a stack of boxes and spread his legs. “Do what you need to do. I’ve got to go to work.”

She placed her laptop on a case of sports drinks then stepped forward. She moved as if she had pine tar stuck to the bottom of her shoes, all the while looking at his groin. His dick swelled until he was sure if she didn’t get a move on, he would explode right there.

“I haven’t got all day,” he reminded her.

He should have made it easy on her. He should have pushed his pants to his knees, but he hadn’t. She came closer. So close he could smell the floral scent on her hair. Below was an earthy scent that was all woman.

He was hard. Everywhere. He felt as if he’d turned to stone—living, breathing stone. While his body was frozen in limbo, his senses were painfully alive. The toe of her sneaker squeaked on the polished concrete floor. If he hadn’t already been blind with lust, her halo of spun gold hair would have done the job.

Toe-to-toe with him, she pressed the tips of her fingers to his stomach. He sucked in a breath and held it as her tiny hand slid inside his uniform. She skimmed the elastic band of his jock strap then moved down past the crease where his hip and thigh joined. Everywhere she touched him, his flesh burned.

As her hand explored farther south, her body pressed closer to his until her breasts flattened against his ribcage. She turned her head so her cheek met his sternum, her cute little nose so close to his left nipple her breath made the tiny nub pucker and bead.

Royce ground his teeth until the pain in his jaw forced him to speak. “Stop!”

With one hand on the box behind Royce and the other not more than an inch from finding the malfunctioning electrode, Tricia froze. If anyone were to see them like this, both their careers would be over. Well, maybe not his, but hers would be. It was her hand down his open pants. Her cheek pressed to his heaving chest, her forearm planking next to his raging hard-on.

His hands were flattened against the box in a sort of reverse Spider Man death grip. He wasn’t even touching her.

Embarrassment and shame washed over her followed by anger—at him for practically daring her to take his challenge, and at herself for doing so.

“I’m sorry.” She peeled her face from his incredibly warm chest even as she began to extract her hand. Fingers like steel bands clamped around her forearm, stilling her movement.

“Don’t. Move.”

Once again, she froze. His labored breaths stirred the hair on the top of her head. She didn’t dare look up at his face. Instead, she focused on his hand wrapped around her arm. She was fragile porcelain to his sturdy ironstone. As unbreakable as his grip was, it was gentle, too.

“I need a minute.”

Along the length of her forearm, his penis had escaped the bounds of his jock strap. A trickle of scalding liquid trailed down her skin. She licked her lips, wanting suddenly to taste that drop of pre-cum, to taste all of him.

She tugged on her arm, and he let her go. All the reasons she should not do what she was about to do ricocheted around inside her skull. Before one of the tiny bullets of sanity lodged in her brain, she grasped the waistband of his uniform in both hands, and sinking to the floor, she took his pants down with her.

He reacted fast, but perhaps having so much blood pooled in his groin was a detriment to his athleticism because his hands were too late. By the time he grasped her head between his palms to stop her, she’d freed his cock and swallowed as much of it as she could.

“Christ Almighty!” he hissed, digging his fingers into her scalp.

Tricia hummed her agreement, earning another growled oath from his lips. She used her tongue to taste him, sweeping along his length then swirling around the bulbous head until he rewarded her with another drop of pre-cum. He smelled like he tasted, salty and pure male.

Addicting.
For a second she gave in to the sheer panic of thinking she could not live without tasting this man again. Then one of those missiles of sanity lodged in her brain.

What am I doing?!
She tried to pull away, but his big hands held her steady.

“Fuck, no. Finish it, Tricia. Fucking finish it.”

Her heartbeat was bruising her ribs, pounding with enough force she thought the protective bones might crack.

Just this once. Never again. One time. For him. For me.

She wrapped the fingers of one hand around the base of his cock and braced her other against his hip. She’d only done this once before—in a car with a gearshift knob grinding into her tit and a steering wheel thumping against her skull. She’d been underage and stupid enough to believe the college senior when he’d said he cared about her. When she let his cum jettison onto his dress shirt, he’d called her a bitch and took her home.

This was different. She wanted to take Royce into her mouth. His desire was nothing more than a physical one, but it was one she returned wholeheartedly. She craved his scent, his taste, his strength. And when he took control, holding her head steady while he fucked her mouth, she submitted to him. He clearly knew what he was doing where she knew next to nothing.

He let go of her head with one hand long enough to force her fingers from his shaft, gently guiding them to his hip, silently encouraging her to hold on tight. She dug her nails into the rock-hard muscles as he drove his cock to the back of her throat.

Anatomy lessons were her friend. She remembered to breathe through her nose and relax the soft palette to lessen the gag reflex. He was big, but she was taking nearly all of him by the time he tensed and let go of her head, giving her the option to swallow his impending release or not.

There was no decision to make. She pulled his hips forward. The head of his cock hit the back of her throat. Royce’s fingers bit into her scalp. Muffled curses exploded in the fetid air. Liquid heat bathed her tongue then slid down her esophagus. She worked the muscles in her throat, swallowing and draining him at the same time.

When his body relaxed a tiny fraction, telling her he was spent, she eased back on her heels. She couldn’t bring herself to look at his face, but watched through her lashes as he righted his uniform, the wayward electrode still in need of repair.

She said nothing.

What could she say?

She’d literally blown her research project. On the second day.

“I’ve got to go. Do you want these back after the game?”

He meant the sperm-like electrodes. She shook her head, unable to explain that she had different ones to try out each day. She wouldn’t be needing them now. He had every right to be angry. She’d used him. Not like he’d expected to be used, but in the most degrading manner and unprofessional way possible.

“I’ll take them off myself, then. Meet me at the player gate after the game.”

She remained on her knees long after he’d left, the door closing behind him with a decidedly final
kerthunk
.

CHAPTER SIX

He was so blind with rage he couldn’t see where he was going.

He could still feel her lips on his dick, and damn, if he didn’t want to feel her hot, wet heat again. He should have stopped her. It was all his fault. If he hadn’t been an ass, had pulled his pants down and let her fix the damn electrode instead of making her sidle up close so she had to put her hand down his uniform…. But, Christ Almighty, he’d wanted to feel her hands on him, wanted to provoke her.

You did a damn fine job of it, asshole.
If anyone had discovered them, the scandal would have ended both their careers.

After turning a corner that led to someplace in the bowels of the stadium, he sagged against the wall and sucked in a deep, cleansing breath. He had to get his shit together.

From where he was, he couldn’t hear the crowds, but he could sense the energy building. In a few short minutes, he’d be expected to go out to the mound and pitch at least five innings. Six if he could manage. Seven if he got lucky.

He hadn’t been lucky in months.

They called him Strikeout. Strike for short. But lately, the media had been more inclined to say Stryker had gone on strike. Like he’d deliberately quit striking batters out. He wished his problem was so simple. If it had been, he would just as deliberately begin striking them out again.

But it wasn’t simple. It was complicated as hell. It seemed the harder he tried to throw strikes, the fewer he threw. Scratch that. He was throwing strikes alright. Right. Over. The. Plate. Down the middle. Right in the batter’s wheelhouse.

Didn’t matter who the batter was, or what kind of pitches they excelled at hitting. Everyone in the league had gotten a hit off him this season. Or so it seemed.

***

Royce wiped his brow with his sleeve. Sweat stung his eyes. He could thank the unseasonably hot temperatures for that, but the river running down his spine had nothing to do with the weather and everything to do with his state of mind. It was only the third inning, but he’d given up four runs and loaded the bases twice on a combination of walks and dinky hits. Some pitchers might blame the fielders for not making outs, but not him. Every one of the hits he’d given up had been legit. He had no one to blame but himself.

No way would Doyle bring in a new pitcher this early in the game, so Royce had no choice but to stick it out for as long as it took. Another two innings, maybe three before he could tuck his tail between his legs and skulk away.

He’d have plenty of time to think about escaping later. First, he had to get out of his current situation—hopefully, without giving up any more runs. Experience told him not to expect such a fortuitous outcome, so he shut off the voice of reason and tried to concentrate on the next pitch.

One pitch at a time. Nothing you can do about the runners standing on first and second so focus on getting this batter out.

Royce took a deep breath then let it out before wedging his right foot up against the pitching rubber and turning his head toward home plate. The ball felt natural as he held it lightly behind his back. He’d been here thousands of times in his career, he told himself. This was just one more day at the office.

Jason flashed a series of signs to indicate the pitch he expected Royce to throw.

Coming to a set, hands together in front, he visualized the pitch. His mind and body knew every minute detail—how to grip the ball, how hard to throw it, when to let it fly from his fingers. He saw the pitch in his mind’s eye—saw it break before coming in over the outside corner of the plate for a strike. If he did everything just right, the ball would end up in Jason’s mitt and not over the center-field wall.

If.

Over the last few months,
if
had become a very big word.

Royce willed the negative thoughts out of his brain. With runners on base, two outs, and two strikes on this batter, there was no room for anything but perfection.

Certain he had his head screwed on right, and everything from his brain to his toenails were in complete sync, he went into his wind-up. The ball flew from his fingertips only to soar back over his head like a guided missile a split-second later.

For every foot the ball traveled, his stomach sank a few inches. The Mustangs were behind seven runs, thanks to him, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do but stand there on the mound looking like a fool.

***

Tricia monitored the incoming data with little interest. Whatever had been wrong with the one errant transmitter had somehow fixed itself, though she had no clue how. Perhaps it had been nothing more than a bad connection and all the jostling of clothing when she gave Royce a blow job had done the trick.

She stifled a groan as the memory of what she’d done before the game flooded back in—for the zillionth time. No doubt, she’d managed to jiggle the tiny device back into working while she had her hands and mouth on a certain, not so tiny device.

And, she had the records to prove it.

Several minutes of the data stream told the story in clear, scientific detail. Elevated heart rate, tense muscles, skin temperature bordering on heat stroke. It was all there in graphs and numerical charts for the world to see.

If—no, make that,
when
Royce Stryker told the world what she’d done, there would be no way to deny it. She could delete those few minutes, but any good computer forensics person could drag it out from the bowels of hell in a matter of seconds. No point in even thinking about it. She’d meet Royce after the game, as decreed, and take her punishment like a woman.

In the meantime, she brought up the file she’d saved. What harm would it do to look at it now? The damage was long-since done and nothing would change it so she might as well enjoy the satisfaction of knowing she’d made his heart race and his blood pressure spike—among other things.

She closed her eyes, and the taste of him burst on her tongue all over again. As long as she lived, she’d never forget a single detail of that encounter. The way he’d tasted, his unique scent, the size of him stretching her lips, filling her, demanding she take all of him. She didn’t really need the computer graphics to remind her, but she was damn sure going to print out a copy before Royce or the Mustangs or whoever made her destroy the information.

Without hesitation, she sent the documents to the remote printer she’d hooked up in her temporary office. She wouldn’t have gone to the trouble of setting the device up if she’d known how temporary her situation would be.

In the top of the fifth inning, Doyle Walker, the Mustangs’ manager, stalked out to the pitching mound. Royce was finished for the day, and none too soon, judging by the reaction of the fans. He’d managed to get through the fourth inning without giving up any more runs, but he walked the first two batters in the fifth, and that, apparently, had been enough.

Tricia let the data stream continue until Royce disappeared through the dugout to the clubhouse, then she shut the computer program down. His physical reaction to being removed from the game wouldn’t be useful for her purposes. Neither was his reaction to getting a pre-game blowjob, which was why she decided to head back to her office and start packing her equipment.

***

He should have remained in the dugout with the rest of the team, but given his present mood, he didn’t think anyone would call him out on it. Slumped in the chair in front of his locker, he tried to sort through the array of feelings swirling around inside him. Frustration rose to the top. He’d always prided himself on what he brought to the team, but he hadn’t brought anything but crap in too long. At this rate, it was only a matter of time before they took him out of the rotation. A trade was out of the question. There wasn’t a team in the League who would take him with his current stats. Which left the Minor League. If the Mustangs took him out of the rotation, they’d have to bring someone up from the Mavericks, their AAA farm team in Waco.

They’d make room on the forty-man roster by sending his ass down to God-only-knew where. He doubted the Mavericks would want him, so he’d probably end up riding the bench with some team down on the Mexican border until his contract expired.

Fuck.
Getting his shit together had to be priority one.

So why was it the one thing he wanted most was to paddle Dr. Tricia Reed’s ass?

She’s a pain in my ass.

Since he was the only person in the locker room, he removed his shirt and undershirt and began ripping electrodes off his body. Even without hair, the process hurt like a son-of-a-gun. A month of this and he wouldn’t have any skin left. All the more reason to end this project now. The sooner the woman was out of his sight, the sooner she would be out of his mind and he could go back to concentrating on saving his career.

Royce showered and dressed in record time. It was cowardly, but he wanted out of there before the game ended and the rest of the team came into the clubhouse. Unless a miracle occurred in the last half of the game, the Mustangs would lose, and the failure rested squarely on his shoulders. No one would dare say anything in the locker room, but for months, he’d heard the messages in his teammates’ silence. If he listened closely, he could hear the minutes, hours, and days ticking away on his career.

***

A shadowed figure leaned against the concrete wall.
Royce.
Tricia’s heart did a flip-flop before settling into a tap-dance-worthy rhythm she could only partially attribute to the man holding her career in his hands. The rest of her physical reaction to the Mustangs’ pitcher was pure chemistry. Wrap testosterone up in a pretty package like Royce Stryker then dangle it in front of anything with an abundance of estrogen, and as they say, opposites attract.

The possibility of turning and going back to her office, locking the door, and staying there until the stadium emptied out crossed her mind. Reason screamed that taking the coward’s route would only postpone the inevitable. At least if she met with him, perhaps she could convince him not to turn her in for sexual harassment. Maybe if she promised to keep her hands, and her mouth, to herself? Maybe if she apologized, explained to him how much her research meant to her, how much it could mean to people suffering from serious injury, not just athletes wanting to improve their game?

Squaring her shoulders, she approached the solitary man with caution. For all she knew, he would march her straight to the corporate offices and throw her into the pits of hell without so much as letting her utter a word in her defense.

You have no defense. What you did was offensive and aggressive, not to mention unprofessional. He has every right to demand to have you removed from the premises.

Wary of his stillness, she stopped a few feet away. Her footsteps had echoed in the barren hallway, so there was no possible way he didn’t know she was there. Yet, he hadn’t moved a muscle since she’d first spotted him. Her shaky resolve to take her punishment like a woman dissolved under an onslaught of reality.

Royce Stryker was a force to be reckoned with.

He wore a dark gray suit with a matching shirt that blended perfectly into the shadows. A tie, blue, perhaps, hung loose from beneath the starched collar he hadn’t bothered to button. His hands bracketed his hips, the suit jacket hanging in the crook of his right arm. He seemed to be staring at a spot on the floor in front of him.

Uncertain what to do, Tricia waited. She’d thrown the first pitch in this battle. What became of it was up to him.

“We can’t talk here.”

Startled, Tricia barely heard his soft-spoken words.

She didn’t think there was much to talk about. But if they were going to have it out, better to do it somewhere besides a stadium filled with forty thousand or so people. “No,” she agreed.

“Is your car in the player’s lot?”

“Yes.”

He nodded then used his massive shoulders to push away from the wall. “We’ll go to my place. It’s private. You can follow me.”

His place. Private. Where he could yell at her all he wanted and no one would hear. Then maybe, when he was through yelling, he’d let her plead her case.
Yeah, right.
“Okay.”

***

His home was everything he said it was, though secluded might have been a better description than private. The exclusive neighborhood screamed old money, where massive houses hid behind brick walls and electronic gates. Enormous trees that pre-dated the manmade structures shaded the streets and buckled with sidewalks only the hired help used. If you didn’t have a car, you didn’t belong was the unspoken statement.

After waving her through the gate that swung open at his approach, she watched in her rearview mirror as the wrought iron monstrosity closed behind her.

Trapped. In a cage of her own making. He led her around to the back of the three-story Grecian-style home where she parked beneath the limbs of an oak tree shading an enormous garage and bricked turnaround. If she hadn’t known for a fact she was practically in the center of Dallas, she would have thought she’d been transported to a palatial estate in England or France.