Hard and Fast Read online

  And then my sister had become involved. She’d turned me into a heartthrob, a sex symbol. As a college kid, I’d loved it. But now, it just added to the expectations. Somehow I was supposed to win at baseball, and more importantly, look good while doing it.

  Now Gia was suggesting I put my batting average on the line. A million eyes would read all about my struggles to become a better hitter. It would be out there, in public. What would happen if I failed? And I could, very easily. I hadn’t recovered yet from how I’d failed my youngest sister. The last thing I needed was another way to be watched and found wanting.

  “Got any other ideas?” I growled.

  “Nope. It’s this or a celebrity date-a-thon.” She leaned forward. “Come on, Connor. Charlie really likes this idea. It’s a great way to highlight your skills before your next contract negotiation.”

  My contract wasn’t up for another year, but Charlie was always looking ahead.

  “And Joe’s on board, too,” she pressed. “It’s good for the team to see how hard you’re working. And it will increase interest in the team too, as you all work toward winning the pennant.”

  I blew out a breath. Young players needed constant reminders that talent only got them so far. Next came discipline and sweat.

  “And your sister insists that women love a man who’s not afraid to work. So, in a way, you’ll pull in more female viewers.”

  And there it was—the trifecta. Do it for my contract, my team, and for all those female fans. But what if I couldn’t do it? What if all I did was fail?

  “Talk to me, Connor. What is holding you back?”

  Nothing. Just the memory of how spectacularly I’d let down my younger sister. And how that had thrown everything in my life into a different light. Instead of thinking about publicity for me, I was focused on finding private time with her. To support her, however she needed it. But that was the last thing I wanted anyone to know, so I gave in.

  “Fine. Set it up. The batting, not the bachelor thing.”

  “Excellent,” she said in her most obnoxiously perky tone. “We’ll start this afternoon. I’ll get a reporter to watch you at batting practice, then there’ll be a half-hour interview afterward. Rinse and repeat daily over the next six weeks.”

  “Fine.” Then I pushed up from her chair and stomped out of her office. Or rather, I started to. One step outside, and I stopped. Then I backed up enough that I could slug the cut-out figure of myself, straight in my “gotcha” face. Because, damn it, I was well and fully caught.

  Now I had to improve my batting average by an impossible .100—because everyone from my agent, my boss, and my fans were expecting me to do it. God, I hated publicity.

  Chapter Four

  Gia

  Why were grumpy men so attractive? It made no sense to me, and yet every scowl from Connor made me smile inside. I worked hard not to let the laughter show on my face, but really, he kept trying to intimidate me. And that wasn’t going to happen. He made me smile. And he made me ache. Because as much as the man drove me crazy, he also had me hot and bothered.

  Sadly, we were considered coworkers, and office hanky-panky was frowned on. Except for that one spectacular New Year’s Eve kiss before I was officially employed, we were off-limits to each other. Which, naturally, made my perverse nature want to tease him even more. It was way more fun to harass a coworker when I knew nothing could come of my elaborate fantasies about the man. And if I got to ogle his very sweet ass while I did it, well that just made it more fun.

  Which meant I had a whole lot of fun that afternoon watching him at batting practice. I’d already talked to the coaches, telling them what was going on. Unfortunately, the journalist I’d lined up, just in case, had had a family emergency, which left me scrambling to find a substitution. Connor wasn’t going to like my solution to the problem, but it was the only option available on such short notice. I was going to write the articles myself.

  I spoke with the batting coach who outlined the specifics of what he and Connor were working on. Uber-planner Conner had already created a very detailed strategy. That would allow the articles to practically write themselves. We could do a weekly feature on what he was practicing, followed by how it paid off during the games. All that was left was to get pictures of the hottest grumpy man I knew. I was going to enjoy this…

  So there I was in the bleachers. I’d stripped off my jacket because it was so hot, which left me in a linen dress and sandals as I climbed or leaned or crawled to get the right shot. I’d pulled my hair into a ponytail, but it was still hot, sweaty work while Connor kept shooting me dagger-like glares.

  Clearly, he hated what I was doing. I knew that as a catcher, he had to be aware of everything that was going on in the field during a game. But I wasn’t on the field. Still, he kept scowling my way, and I kept grinning in return.

  Finally, I figured I had enough pictures. Hell, I had ten times the photos I needed. It was time to go back into my office and get back to my real work.

  Only I didn’t. I decided to watch the rest of batting practice, treating myself to the sight of Connor squatting down in batting position, his tush tight and his shoulders broad. I watched the flex of his bulging biceps, the taut line of his back, and wham, all that explosive power as he slammed the ball to the outfield.

  Consistent raw power—pure male in my thoughts. Every time he crouched in preparation, I imagined him doing that naked. I thought of his muscular behind as he gripped not the bat, but my legs. Of the way he’d pull my thighs open as he readied himself to rock my world.

  I watched the coil of his swing. Sometimes, he twirled the bat in his hands, the thick end making sweet circles in the air. I imagined him doing that on my nipples or deep inside me. Then there was this tension that thickened the air. It was the wait, wait, wait for the pitch. I wasn’t at an angle to see his face, but I knew what he looked like. I knew the furrow of his brow, the intense focus of his eyes, and most especially, the clench of his jaw.

  He was intent, his whole body tight with preparation. And every single damn time he paused like that, my toes curled hard against my sandals and my teeth pulled at my lower lip.

  But not yet. Not until…

  Crack!

  His swing was so fast, I could never fully catch it—that perfect moment when every part of him uncoiled with a snap. It sent a very physical pop through my body. My thighs would pulse. My breath caught every single time. And I found myself rubbing my chest with my forearms. No one was looking at me, right? No one else could see how hot Connor made me, just from hitting a ball.

  And then there was the follow-through. The release of power as the bat swung around. I barely ever noticed where the ball went. I was more interested in him as he twisted. It was always on the follow-through that the magic happened. He’d shift on his feet, the bat would swing wide and loose, and his eyes would find me.

  Piercing gray eyes.

  I couldn’t tell if he was looking at my face, my breasts, or my throbbing clit, not that that was exposed to view. But every time his swing ended, his gaze landed on me. Sure, it was just his normal follow-through, but that’s where I was sitting, and that’s where he looked.

  Except every time his gaze landed on me, I felt like he was stroking me from top to bottom, inside and out. I felt him from the swell of my breasts to the clench of my sex. It was insanely wonderful, and I couldn’t force myself to leave. Not while I was close to climaxing, just from watching him. Because this was fantasy at its most potent, and I would not deny myself this pleasure.

  We were coworkers. We could never do the things I was fantasizing. So it was safe and wonderful to just wallow in the imagined thrust of his powerful stroke inside me. Coil tight, circle the bat, breathless pause, then…

  Crack.

  My breath caught. My nipples tightened unbearably. And those eyes, touching me after the pop. It was like afterglow that lasted just a moment before we began again.

  Coil, circle, pause.

 
Yes! Do it again, please. Oh please!

  And he did, until sweat was running down his face and his eyes seemed to blaze at me. Then he threw away the bat with a growl that I felt all the way down my spine. He held my gaze as he stomped toward the bleachers, grabbed a towel and wiped off without ever breaking eye contact. I thought he’d duck into the dugout then the locker room. I was waiting for the moment when he would be forced to stop staring at me, but it never happened.

  Instead of going inside, he jumped up and grabbed hold of the railing. I watched his fingers wrap around the iron bars and heard his grunt as he climbed the wall. A second later, he leaped over the metal and landed with a thud right in front of me.

  Right. In front. Of me.

  “Um…” I swallowed. “Connor—”

  “Not a word,” he said as he grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet.

  “What—” I argued, but he didn’t give me a chance to talk.

  “No!” he growled. “Not until we’re inside.”

  I wanted to look around for help, but I couldn’t move my gaze away from his eyes. His pupils had expanded until the dark gray was nearly black. And that stroke I’d felt inside and out now seemed like a tether wrapped around my spine. Where he pulled me, I willingly followed.

  We were at the ballpark, so he took me inside to the empty main hall, my sandals echoing on the concrete floor as we walked. But there wasn’t any real privacy in the huge space. He paused long enough for me to catch up but then headed straight for the nearest door. It was to the women’s bathroom, and he slammed through it as if he were busting through the gates of hell.

  “Connor, what’s going on?” I demanded. He’d broken eye contact the minute we’d made it inside, and that had allowed me to snap out of my thrall. The cooler air had also helped me marshal my scattered thoughts, thank God, though they were still soaked in lust.

  He didn’t answer but stomped farther into the empty bathroom. Then he whipped around to glare at me.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  “Fuck” was not the right word to use, because my brain was already there. Fortunately, my mouth wasn’t. It was reacting to the accusation in his tone.

  “My job! Getting pictures of you for the articles.” As proof, I lifted up the digital camera that had been strapped around my neck.

  “That’s not your job. It’s the journalist’s.”

  “I know.” I took a deep breath. Confession time. “The guy I had lined up fell through, so I decided to put together the articles myself. I’ll be the journalist.”

  “You sure as hell aren’t!”

  “I am,” I argued. “Get used to it.”

  Okay, so that was not the most professional way to handle things. I tried to calm myself. I stared at the nearest sink, rather than at his flushed face or rippling chest, and I made sure my voice was modulated to some level near normal.

  “I realized you were right. The journalist I had in mind couldn’t do it, and I don’t trust anyone else to handle it right. No one, that is, except me. I can put it out under my name personally and offer it to the outlets. Plenty of websites are desperate for content. And I know it’ll get picked up by a lot of places, because I’m damned good at my job.”

  “You can’t do that.” His words came out like hard bullets of sound.

  I twisted, facing him enough that my gaze could connect with his. “I sure as hell can. So long as I let everyone know my connection to the Bobcats, it’s all above board. In fact, it happens all the time.”

  “You said the journalist would have to watch me at practice. I’d have to talk to him every day. Honestly.”

  “Yeah. And now, that’ll be even easier because you already know me.” Okay, so he obviously didn’t trust me, but hell, I couldn’t have everything. And he really needed to stop whining about it.

  “You can’t do it,” he repeated, his expression tight and hard.

  “I can, and I will. It’s my job.”

  “I can’t do it,” he said, stressing the first word with a hard thump on his chest.

  I huffed out a breath. “Why not?”

  I expected to hear some misogynistic rant about women reporters or something about team unity and him not wanting to be singled out. My mind was scrambling in a dozen, increasingly ridiculous directions. Aliens had told him not to do publicity or some other stupid excuse. The last thing I expected him to do was stare at me with raw pain in his face.

  “I’m trying to save my career here,” he rasped. “My knees could crap out any time. One bad fall, one stupid ripple in the field, and I’m done as a catcher. But even with the best of luck, the wear and tear is going to make it hard for me to do my job much longer. I’ve got maybe a couple of seasons left before I either have to quit or switch positions.”

  “I know that,” I argued, but he kept going.

  “So I’ve pinned my hopes on becoming a great hitter. I have to get better at it. I have to.”

  “I know that, too,” I said, my words getting more pointed.

  “And you fuck with my concentration!” he snapped.

  I blinked. “You’re stared at every day. You’ve got a million fans, not to mention the press—”

  “It’s you!” he interrupted. “You.”

  I rolled my eyes. “And what makes me so special?”

  He didn’t answer at first, just gaped at me as if I had just sprouted a second head. But then he grabbed my shoulders with a curse, and before I could react, slammed his mouth down on mine.

  The impact was hard and quick, the thrust of his tongue nearly brutal. But I’d just spent the last half hour fantasizing graphically about his mouth on mine, his body filling mine. So, while my mind was caught up in WTF?, the rest of me was already on board. Besides, we’d already kissed once before, so I knew just how spectacular it could be.

  I wrapped my leg around him and pulled myself against him. My hands, which had been pressing against his chest, slid up and gripped his head, and our mouths dueled with each other as if we were trying to consume each other.

  And then suddenly, he was pushing me away from him, hard enough that I stumbled and caught myself on the nearest sink. Our breathing sounded harsh in the tiled room. And when I looked up at him, I saw panic in his dark eyes.

  “That’s why,” he growled.

  Oh God, he growled, low and throaty, and my sex spasmed in reaction.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he said, and this time, there was a husky quality to his words.

  “Like what?”

  “Like you want more.”

  “I do.” I don’t know what demon possessed me to say that. I had already decided that he was a safe fantasy because I would never—never—get together with a coworker. And yet here I was, nipples hard, panties wet, panting over a guy and staring at his hands. His hands! They were big and calloused, and they’d gripped that bat, swirling the thick part in a steady circle. And my clit throbbed.

  He stalked forward, one slow, deliberate step at a time. Then he touched my chin, pulling my face up to his. And as he leaned down, I stretched up to him. But I didn’t connect. He didn’t let me, and when he pulled back, I made a sound of dismay.

  “You were watching me bat,” he said with that raspy growl that trembled through me.

  “Yes.”

  “You were fantasizing about me?”

  I nodded.

  “Say it.”

  “Yes!”

  “I was, too. I was thinking about having my hands on you. About the sounds you’d make. The way I would lose myself in you.”

  This time, I groaned, the sound desperate and needy. Then I felt his hands on my hips as he spun me around. I wanted to lean back into him, but he pushed me forward until I caught myself on the sink.

  Zip.

  My dress abruptly loosened and fell off my shoulders. My mind was still scrambling to get a grip on what was happening, to slow it down. But while I was busy trying to think, my hands lifted off the sink and let
the dress drop to the floor.

  “Copper lace,” he murmured, commenting on the color of my bra as he stepped up behind me. I could feel his heat on my back, the hot caress of his breath against my ears. But what I saw was his gaze on my breasts.

  “Same color as your hair in sunlight,” I said. His gaze moved to mine, and my mouth went dry. “I have your calendar in my bedroom,” I explained.

  His brows shot up. “In your bedroom? When you touch yourself?”

  I nodded, my face burning hot.

  He popped the hooks on my bra. A quick pinch and I let it drop to the floor.

  So there I was standing in my copper panties with my full breasts free. He stood behind me, not touching me, but his eyes burned where they looked at my tight nipples.

  “Let me see what you do.” It wasn’t a question, but it wasn’t quite a command either.

  It didn’t matter. I wouldn’t refuse him. My breasts had been aching to be touched since the beginning of batting practice. I cupped them and lifted, squeezing slightly. And in the mirror, I watched him watch my hands.

  Suddenly he made a sound of frustration. “That’s not how you do it,” he said. And he was right. I wasn’t really focusing on how I felt. Just on how he looked, watching me. “Let me?”

  I nodded.

  His hands replaced mine. Large. Calloused. Strong. He lifted me and squeezed, but then he began to pinch my nipples. Lightly at first, then a pull and twist. I gasped at the first contact and then began to tingle as he continued. Pinches became startled breaths. Pulls became contractions in my belly. And pain shot lightning to my womb.

  I felt his mouth on my neck, firm and wet as he stroked my skin with his tongue. I arched, pressing my breasts into his hands and stretching my bottom to his groin. But he kept away. And when I whimpered in frustration, he bit down on my neck. Not hard, not even enough to break the skin. But I felt the compression, and I stilled while my body thrummed in hunger.