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Shane rolled his eyes and doubled down on the next ball to come flying across the plate. This time he connected, somewhat at least, earning sarcastic golf claps from Boomer. “You know what’s gonna help your batting performance, don’t you, Shane?”
“Please don’t, Boomer.”
“That’s right, pal. Getting laid. Sinking the old pink. Poking the old corn muffin. Knocking boots. Whatever you country hicks call it back home in Bumfuck, Kentucky, anyway.”
“Just, stop, okay? My blue balls have nothing to do with my batting average.” He grunted, swung, and missed completely.
“Come again?” Boomer teased. “Oh, that’s right. You haven’t come once since you got to school. What’s it been, Shane? Six, seven weeks already? I mean, you must be the only virgin still left on campus at this point. Even nerds have gotten their dicks wet by now.”
“I’m. Not. A. Virgin!” This time Shane connected, and how, thewhackof the ball hitting the bat vibrating through his tensed arms.
“Now we’re talking!” Boomer slid his big, thick fingers back out of the mesh between them and wrapped them around his duffel bag, the one that had been crumpled at his big, lumbering feet ever since they’d traded places in the batting cage minutes earlier. “See that? Even just talking about having sex is improving your performance. Imagine how many you’ll hit once you actually sink the pink, my good man!”
Shane stepped back from the plate, another ball whizzing by as he glanced over at Boomer with eyes half-glaring, half-pathetic. “Boomer! So help me God!”
Boomer ignored his righteous, almost prudish indignation, waving his big hand dismissively even as his eyes grew subtly concerned. “Seriously, Shane. I’m gone all weekend. You’ve got the room to yourself. You’re obviously into this reporter chick. How can she not be into you, right? Just ask her over and do the deed already, damn.”
“And just how would I do that?” Shane huffed, hardly considering the proposition but knowing Boomer wouldn’t shut up, let alone leave, until he’d graced Shane with his boneheaded, Neanderthal wisdom already.
“As part of the interview, duh? You said she needed pictures for her story, just you in your domain, lounging around in your jersey in your dorm room. You know, empty beer cans piled high on the coffee table, baseball posters on the wall, tube socks thrown hither and yon. It’s perfect!”
“What, with your smelly drawers all over the place? No, thanks.”
Boomer frowned, big, meaty lips downturned into full-on lecture mode. Shane had seen that look before. “Look, Shane, make all the excuses you want. I get it, you’ve been with the same girl forever. I’m in the same boat. Only, my friends didn’t find my gal hooking up with some dishwasher behind the dumpster at Booger’s Burger Barn, so there’s that.”
“Yet,” Shane teased his big lug of a well-meaning roommate. “And it wasn’t the dishwasher, it was the fry cook. And it wasn’t by the dumpster, it was in the break room and it’s not Booger’s Burger Barn, and why? Why am I even defending myself here again?”
Whizz. Clank. Clatter.Another ball shot by, landing with a whiff and a whisper in the net that had been catching them steadily ever since Shane had stepped into the batting cage in the first place. “Because you don’t want to admit I’m right, that’s why. But I am, Shane. Real talk? Your girl back home cheated on you. You forgave her. She’s back home. You’re out here. Time to move on and take advantage of what being a jock on campus is really like.”
“Oh, like you? Heading home every weekend to your high school sweetheart?”
“I’m not dating these groupie skanks,” Boomer teased, slapping the mesh one last time before turning gently away. “I’ll leave that to you, pal. But only if you wise up and start gettin’ while the gettin’s good. Pretty soon we’ll be practicing full time, training twice a day, then before you know it, season’s here and that’s that on your free time. So, believe me when I tell you, Shane, it’s now or never for punching that big old V-card of yours, Stud.”
Shane watched him go, the big, lumbering lug turning a corner until even his oversized maroon duffel had finally disappeared. Then he sighed, hoisted his bat once more, and faced the spitting tube, cracking the very next ball out of the park. Then the next one, and the next, until at last the machine was empty and Shane was breathing heavy, arms sore from swinging, legs sore from crouching over the plate, and sweat stinging his eyes in the midday heat of a lazy September afternoon. He hit the red button by his side, turning the machine off and grateful for the silence that followed.
That is, until the golf claps started up again.
“Jesus.” He turned, fully expecting to find Boomer having come back to impart some last piece of misogynistic tripe before jetting off again. Instead he found Tatum, effortlessly elegant and boldly stunning in a burgundy slip dress and black sandals.
“Jesus,” he said, clutching his chest and breathing heavy for a different reason this time. “Holy Mother of God.”
Chapter Eleven
Tatum
“It’s about time.”
Shane slid his fingers through the chain-link fence that separated them, torso lean and bare in the midday sun. “How long have you been standing there?”
He didn’t sound concerned, just vaguely curious. Tatum struggled to breathe, taking in every glistening inch of his long, powerful arms and that bare, sweaty chest. What had he muttered upon seeing her standing there, quiet and anxious in her brand-new dress?
Holy Mother of God indeed!
Somehow, she managed to keep her voice somewhat just below hysterical. “Long enough to hear your Neanderthal buddy give you the most unhinged dating advice I’ve ever heard. And that’s coming from a reporter!”
“Right?” Shane slid a bare forearm across his forehead, sliding his ever-present ball cap up and slightly to the left. The offhand gesture was as boyish as it was masculine, making it doubly charming indeed. “I mean, pictures? Of my dorm room? The hell was he thinking?”
Tatum inched gently forward, struggling to look effortlessly casual on her half-heels, the ones that had gone so perfectly with her purposefully casual slip dress. “Oh, he was right about that part.”
