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“Who’s the scorekeeper?” Jake yelled to the bleachers. “Better get ready to write another K for this one!”
“I don’t know what that means,” Riley hollered back, “but let’s hope you’re wearing a cup today!”
“He’s not!” Grace yelled from the dugout.
Riley gave her trademark cat smile as her eyes dipped to the vicinity of Jake’s waist. “Excellent.”
But Jake Malone was made of stronger stuff and knew Riley well enough to be wise to her tricks, because he merely slipped on his game face and got into a rather intimidating pitcher’s position.
Playing the part, Riley stepped up to the plate and hovered the bat over her shoulder.
“Just keep your eye on the ball, Riley,” she heard Mitchell call from the dugout in his calm, nothing-riles-me voice.
“I always do,” she called back, getting the expected laughs.
She wanted to sneak a look at Sam, but then Jake was doing his windup thing, and she became determined not to be one of those girls who couldn’t manage to hit a little ball because she had a crush on a boy.
She could have sworn that the first pitch was going to be way to the right, but then it did some weird thing where it came back at the last second. Riley knew even before she heard Cassidy mutter a satisfied strike right before Camille’s more begrudging pronouncement of the same call.
“Lookin’ good,” came the husky voice from behind the catcher’s mask as he tossed the ball back to Jake.
“Shut it, Cole.”
Cole Sharpe was one of Oxford’s other golden boys and normally fun to flirt with in a harmless, platonic kind of way, but right now she wanted to win.
The second pitch was outside, although just by a hair.
“The count’s one–one!” Cole hollered needlessly. “Two more strikes and it’s beer time.”
“One more hit and it’s beer time,” Riley snapped.
Cole’s teeth flashed white in a way that claimed bullshit.
Riley remembered that she’d have to actually swing. So she did.
She missed.
Strike two.
“I thought this was supposed to be as simple as keeping your eye on the freaking ball,” she grumbled.
The next pitch looked almost perfect but seemed to dip low at the last second, and Riley checked her swing.
Camille declared it a ball.
Then Jake declared Camille a scheming witch, which ended up in a rather fantastic shouting match. Riley gladly stepped away from the plate and let her boss and Grace’s fiancé duke it out.
Riley snuck a glance at Sam, who was leaning against the chain-link fence, arms crossed over his chest and hat pulled low.
She couldn’t actually see his eyes to know that he was watching her, but she felt it. Despite the fact that the game was inexplicably held in late September instead of summer, Riley felt suddenly hot.
Camille won the argument by a landslide, surprising nobody, and Riley stepped back up to the godforsaken plate.
The count was two and two, and her palms were beyond sweaty. To think she’d thought her biggest hurdle of the day would be getting caught staring too long at Sam.
The next pitch came at her so much faster than any of the ones before, perhaps fueled by Jake’s temper, and Riley didn’t have any time to gauge whether or not this was going to be high or low, or in her freaking face.
It was swing or die, and Riley wasn’t about to go to her grave an almost virgin.
