The Last Strike by A.R. Henry

Chapter 3

I make my way through the crowd with two beers in hand. It’s intermission, and for some godforsaken reason, I let Ash talk me into coming here.

Here being—you guessed it—a UTK baseball game.

Her nephew, Adam, is in his sophomore year at the school, and he just so happens to be the best catcher in the school’s history. We’re at a scrimmage game the team is playing that’s only open to family and friends of the team.

“Here, Ash,” I pass her beer while I take my seat. We’re seated down in the front right up against the fence. Close enough to heckle Adam from time to time, and his coaches are eating it up.

“What did I miss?”

“Well hottie Coach Number One came over and asked for my number, but I turned him down.”

“What! Why?”

She can’t be serious. She’s been passing flirty looks back and forth with this guy ever since we got here.

She gives me a shrug trying to act like it’s not a big deal and says, “He’s too young, he’s just an assistant, and he only graduated last year.”

I roll my eyes at her, “Since when is someone that’s only...What? Three years younger than you, too young?”

Another shrug and she looks away from me pretending to be interested in something happening in the stands.

I know something’s up with her, but I don’t push for more.

Ash and I have been through a lot together, and I know when not to push her for more information.

I’ll have to get a few more beers in her before she’ll tell me what’s going on.

Suddenly, everyone around us starts murmuring so I bring my attention back to the field to see what the commotion is about.

I knew my ass should have stayed at home today.

Because as soon as I swing my head around my gaze connects right to the same man I was trying to avoid seeing today.

Standing directly across from me with only the fence separating us is head coach Weston Bell, and he’s staring at me. Literally just standing there staring at me. Does this man have some kind of social problem where he can’t converse with people normally? Jesus. It’s times like this when I wish my parents had raised me to be a heathen rather than a nice person who has manners.

“Hello,” I give him a tight smile, “How are you Mr. Bell?”

I bite my tongue on the comment trying to make its way out about the last words he spoke to me.

His gaze hasn’t moved from me—which surprises me since there’s about fifteen other stunning women sitting around us, showing a lot more skin than I am. At the very least I expect him to check out Ash, but he hasn’t wavered from my face. I start to squirm under his obvious attention.

Just when I think this can’t get any more awkward, he finally speaks.

It speaks! It’s a miracle.

Not that we’ve broken any records because he only mutters, “fine,” before turning his attention back to the team.

It’s only one word, but you would think the man just proclaimed his undying love for me the way my whole body has broken out in chills.

Jesus, I need to get it together.

Ash, of course, is staring at me with her mouth open again.

She really needs to work on that. One of these days she really is going to end up with a fly in there.

“Court.”

“I know, Ash. Drop it.”

“Oh no missy. Oh hell no. That man came over here to see you. The same man that hasn’t so much as been within fifty feet of the opposite sex, if he can help it, in the past four years. Have you seen him since the bar incident?”

Shit.

She gasps.

My lack of response is too obvious, and on her exhale, she shrieks causing everyone in the immediate area that wasn’t already looking at us, to turn our way.

I hiss, “Shut it Ash! Everyone’s looking!”

My face is fifty shades of red by now.

“I will not shut it! Everyone’s looking because the hottest man in the whole state just came over here to talk to you! I cannot believe you’ve been holding out on me! Spill. Right. Now!” She’s practically bouncing out of her seat with excitement.

I take a deep breath.

I so did not want to tell her this because she’ll be on my case for the next ten years about this idiotic man.

“You know the little girl in my class I told you about? The sweet one that told me about the turtle she saved?”

Her face twists in confusion not connecting the dots. “Yeah? She made her dad carry it across the street and he told her he couldn’t stop to help every turtle they saw, but she reminded him that if that turtle was her, he would stop to save her, and he should treat every turtle like they were his precious little girl.”

My heart warms at the memory of Cami telling me that story.

She really is the cutest kid. She definitely doesn’t take after her dad in the friendliness department. I wonder if she gets that from her mom. Nobody really talks about her, and I’ve yet to see her pick Cami up from school.

I drop the bomb on her.

“Yeah, her name is Cami. Weston is her dad.”

I glance over at her, and sure enough her mouth is wide open again.

One day a bat is going to turn her mouth into its own personal bat cave.

“No,” she breathes.

I snort.

“Yes. The jerk-wad was late to the parent teacher meetings we had a few weeks ago. He acted like he didn’t remember spilling my drink all over me and said maybe five words to me. He didn’t even apologize for being late or thank me for staying late for him, and right before he walked out, he told me I should quit my job.”

Okay, so he didn’t actually say those words, but she doesn’t need to know. It was what he meant.

“Courtney! You have to get his number. Wait! Don’t you already have his number? This is fate. MybestfriendisgoingtosnagthehottestmanthissideoftheMississippi.”

The last sentence is rushed out so quickly it takes me a few minutes to catch up.

This is exactly what I was afraid of. When Ash plays matchmaker, she is relentless.

Shaking my head I tell her, “I would not go within five feet of him if I have to Ash. I would rather pick up every piece of trash in this stadium than have to have another one-sided conversation with that man. I don’t think he even knows how to say more than ten words let alone spend an entire evening with a woman. He’s rude, he’s arrogant, and he’s not even that good looking. He thinks the sun comes up just to hear him crow.”

Now she knows I’m lying.

I never make that much of an effort just to argue against something. I’m the easy-going type.

That and we both know that even a blind woman would let him butter her biscuits.

“Okay, that was a lot of protesting Court. Are you sure you aren’t interested in him? Cause I’m pretty sure he keeps looking over here at you.”

“What? No way, he’s not looking at me.”

I look around desperately for a subject change and point, “Look Adam’s back in the game.”

Thank the good lord she lets the subject drop because Ash can be worse than a bloodhound if she even gets a whiff of me being interested in a guy.

I told her that I wasn’t going to start dating for a while since the breakup from Josh was still fresh, but she won’t let it go.

She means well and just wants me to be happy, but I’m fine being single.

We go back to heckling Adam, much to his dismay and to our delight.

The game goes on for a few more innings, and I may have noticed a certain coach looking my way a few times.

Huh, maybe Ash was right, but I’m not going there.

Nope. No way.