“Kid, I’d appreciate it if you . . .”
“No worries. I’ll keep it locked down. No one would believe me anyway. Why would you want to manage the Eagles?”
That’s the real question, isn’t it?
I’ve got my reasons – more than one, really – but they aren’t anyone’s business. Definitely not a stranger’s I just met on the street, even if he is a fan.
“You have a good night, okay?” I say, and shake the kid’s hand before turning and looking at the cars as they pull up. Stew said the team would send a car, but there’s a sea of sleek blackSUVs and luxury sedans jockeying for position, even this early in the morning.
There’s one, and, yeah, it’s got an Eagle logo on it, subtle to avoid attracting attention, but definitely there. Except there’s a woman getting into the car, a foot encased in a stiletto heel that leads up to a long, shapely calf and then a black skirt that just skims her knee, but it does nothing to disguise the curve of her thighs and the absolutely incredible rise of her ass.
I’m not ashamed to admit that it’s a familiar ass.
Frankie Sullivan, formerVPof major league analytics for the Dodgers, before she left last year to take the AssistantGMjob with the Eagles.
Our battles were legendary. She was always sosurethat her equations and whatever answers her computer spat out should be taken as gospel, even when my gut, the thing that got me to the majors, the thing that kept me there, was telling me otherwise.
Then there was that last night inLA, the last night of my career, after everyone had gone home – one hell of a kiss.
I haven’t seen her since then, not even the next season, when they retired my number. I wondered then if she was avoiding me, but that day was such a whirlwind I never got the chance to track her down.
“You jackin’ my ride, Sullivan?” I call out.
She freezes at the sound of my voice and then turns, eyes wide, her hair falling out of a loose bun at the top of her head, strands of her long blonde hair sticking to her cheeks, her generous mouth open in a small o, as the rain starts to fall harder around us.
Yeah, she definitely had no idea I was coming.
Interesting.
I assumed her boss would have warned her, that maybe she even gave the okay to bring me in for an interview. I’d be lying if I said that thought hadn’t intrigued me. That maybe, in her time away fromLA, her philosophy had shifted toward an approach that prioritized on-the-field decisions made by actual human beings.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, and I assume she’s censoring herself more than a little bit. I can practically hearthe fuckthat she left out.
Oh, I’m going to enjoy this, probably more than I should.
“Stew didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?” she asks, but the question is barely out of her mouth before it clicks for her, just like it did for the kid I just met.
“No.”
“No?” I ask, unable to stop a corner of my mouth from lifting, and she glares at the mere hint of a smirk.
“No,” she repeats. “Absolutely not.”
“I don’t think that’s your call, is it?”
“Why would you . . . you never said that you’d be . . . how is this . . .”
My grin grows wider and wider every time her thoughts cut off and change track.
“Uh, folks?” a new voice, lower and a little gruff, cuts in. “We should get going. The cop’s gonna kick my ass if we keep blocking this spot.”
The driver gestures toward the open door and then goes to take my suitcase from me.
I let him and then give the still stunned woman in front of me a nod as I move toward the car and wait for her to climb in.
“Are you gonna get in,” I ask, “or are we just gonna stand here in the rain holding up traffic?”
