Long Relief (Hardball Book 1) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Acknowledgments, author note, and copyright

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Also by Abigail Barnette

  About the author

  ACKNOWLEDGMENT: Big giant shout-out to Jill M. Barry for her baseball expertise, which I leaned on super heavily while writing this project!

  AUTHOR NOTE: True baseball fans know that there is no such team as the Grand Rapids Bengals. True baseball fans also know that MLB is protective of their trademarks. Therefore, I’ve needed to get creative and create my own teams. No character in this story is intended to resemble any person, alive or dead, connected to Major League Baseball.

  Copyright © 2019 Abigail Barnette

  Previously released as Long Relief, Copyright © 2012 Abigail Barnette by Resplendence Publishing LLC

  Prologue

  The Nashville Cowboys’ clubhouse had plastic wrap on every surface to protect the lockers and the walls and hell, even the ceiling from the champagne popping in celebration. The whooping and cheering reverberated through the cinderblock and steel of the stadium. Camera flashes ticked, and on the field, local police and stadium security tried to round up the fans who’d poured out of the stands.

  It was awesome to be a Cowboy that night.

  Chris Thomas, closer for the Grand Rapids Bengals, sat on the bench in the visiting team locker room. There was no plastic up here, no champagne, no reporters. There would be a press conference, and probably some interview requests. The biggest playoff blunder since Buckner? Yeah, they would want a scoop.

  What would he say? What was there to say other than, “Sorry about that?”

  He’d come in on a two-run lead. Bottom of the ninth, an easy close. Game five. He’d walked out of the bullpen confident, ready to save their asses and take them into game six. His first few pitches were rough--rough enough to walk a man. There were a thousand excuses for that walk. It had been unusually chilly that night, and his shoulder had been killing him since the start of the series. And all the stretches and soaks in the world wouldn’t take off the years.

  He’d had an incredible career, until this season. He’d taken the mound with the intention of proving all those armchair analysts wrong. After that walk, all the best intentions in the world couldn’t get his head on straight. The next batter had gotten a double off him and had earned him a visit from the pitching coach. What had probably looked like a tense exchange to the fans had actually been a pep talk and gentle inquiry. He’d insisted he could stay in. The next batter up left with an out. The one after him, too. Chris had just gotten his good stuff back when a high fly ball advanced the runner. The next batter hit it into the stands. A few seats south and it would have been a foul ball. But it hadn’t been.

  “Hey, Chris? You still in here?”

  He got up and hefted his bag over his aching shoulder. “Yeah, I’m coming.”

  Javier Vargas stepped around the corner. A lot of the young guys had looked at Chris with sympathy, but he’d sensed their resentment. He’d lost their bonuses, their rings, video game contracts, and the covers of all the sports magazines. But Javier hadn’t tried to sympathize. He hadn’t offered false support, and Chris appreciated that more than any of the empty platitudes he’d gotten from the other guys.

  “The bus is leaving,” Vargas said. “We kind of need you on it.”

  “Do you?” Chris had thought it would sound funny and self-deprecating. It just sounded sullen.

  Vargas tilted his head. He was a catcher, good with body language. Right now, it said, “Are you fucking kidding me?” A clipped laugh preceded his words. “Yeah, we do. But we don’t need you feeling sorry for yourself. You had a bad game. It was a big game. Man up, get on the damned bus, go back to the hotel and drink the mini bar, do what you have to do. But don’t drag everyone else lower. They’re already down.”

  “You’re right.” It was good advice, but that didn’t mean it would be easy to follow.

  Javier went out--whistling, the guy was always whistling and it drove everyone crazy--but before the locker room door slammed again, he called back, “There’s always next season.”

  And that was exactly what Chris feared.

  Chapter One

  "You see that, Magpie? You'll never see anything that green anywhere in the world. Not emeralds, not paint, not the eyes of God himself. That's as green as green gets."

  Maggie remembered her father's oft-repeated words and sucked in a breath. Her hands on the railing, she slid her arms wide apart and leaned over, breathing in the smell of the concrete and fresh paint. In the outfield, the groundskeeping staff rolled the grass flat in a lattice pattern of squares that shimmered in the early April sun. Ronald Harper had been right; nothing, from thermal springs in New Zealand to the Baccarat tables of Monte Carlo, not even the money Maggie had used to buy her father’s former team could compare to Bengals Stadium.

  Continental Bank Ballpark, she reminded herself.

  "Miss Harper?"

  She straightened and smoothed the front of her gray silk jacket. "Mr. Thorgerson. Three more days."

  "Call me James." The tall, pale man who'd approached her had lips as thin as his salt-and-pepper hair. "Enjoying your ballpark?"

  "Not my ballpark," she reminded him, turning away from the field. "I believe Continental would like us both to remember that."

  "Well, your father was a good tenant, so I'm sure they'll let that slide."

  “My father wasn’t exactly a tenant, Mr. Thorgerson. He coached the Bengals. I own them.” She wasn’t about to let anyone in the organization forget it. If she slipped up and fell into the role of Little Maggie Harper the Coach’s Daughter, she’d never come back from it.

  Thorgerson offered his arm. "Shall we take a tour? It’s been a while since you’ve been here and there have been some exciting renovations."

  She nodded but didn't take his arm. He wouldn't have offered it to her father. "My assistant hasn't seen the park, either. Let me get her."

  She pulled her phone from her inside pocket and slid the keyboard out to text Molly. Touring ballpark. Need back up. Thorgerson wasn’t the type of guy Maggie longed to be alone with. Looking up, she gave her most pleasant fake smile. "She'll catch up."

  Thorgerson and men like him had been the reason she'd stayed away from baseball for the past twenty years. She'd been nineteen when she'd gone to college, and her father had tried hard to rope her into the family pizza chain. It wouldn’t have been a bad job; her brother, Tommy, pulled in mid-seven figures as CEO. But Maggie’s head for business had earned her far more.

  With Thorgerson's eyes all over her ass, Maggie gritted her teeth and walked ahead of him, down the concrete stairs that led through the stadium's rows of narrow plastic seats. "These are a tight fight," she said, and then wished she hadn't. Who knew what perverted thing it would conjure to his mind.

  "More seats means more tickets sold," he reminded her. As the manager of the ballpark, that kind of thing would interest him more than the comfort of the asses that had to squeeze into those seats.

  "It's so different." Continental Bank had sunk millions into renovating the classic park rather than tear down nearly a hundred years of history, but not much of that history remained. Maggie hadn't come home to see the changes, even when they’d dedicated the bronze statue of her father outside the main gates. She'd been too busy building her fortune.

  You could have taken the time.

  Now, it was seventy-two hours to opening day, and Maggie was worried about f
ans' asses fitting in seats. She would have laughed if she could trust it wouldn't make her cry.

  "Different means more revenue," Thorgerson reminded her.

  "That it does." She didn't say any more as she walked with Thorgerson through a security gate and onto the warning track. From the field, the view of a ballpark was substantially more daunting.

  "You see everyone is hard at work for the home opener." Thorgerson waved a hand at the groundskeepers. "We can move on."

  Ignoring him, she waved to a man on a riding lawnmower. He pulled to a stop at the very edge of the grass and cut the engine.

  Thorgerson looked put out when he introduced them. "Mr. Sheff, this is our new team owner, Miss Harper—"

  "Ms. Harper," she corrected, putting her hand out to shake the groundskeeper’s. "Thank you for all your hard work, the outfield looks fantastic."

  Sheff was a short man, round like a barrel, with dark skin and a pair of glasses that looked like they were from the 1990s, at least. He pulled his ball cap—not a team cap, a green one that proudly proclaimed the name of the landscaping company that was also emblazoned across his nylon jacket—down and shook her hand, but he didn't return her smile. "We got grubs in the outfield. Only reason it looks good is 'cause you can't see ‘em."

  "Mr. Sheff has been concerned about the grubs for weeks, but the pest control company isn't nearly as alarmed." Thorgerson had a really irritating laugh when he was condescending to people.

  "You'll be concerned," Sheff replied matter-of-factly.

  "We should really move along," Thorgerson took Maggie by the elbow and tried to steer her away

  She reached for her phone as a polite way to break contact with him. "Sheff. You were here when my father was coaching."

  “That’s right.” The old man grinned.

  “Well, I’m glad you’re still will us. We need people who understand what this park needs beyond what’s best for the bottom line.” Opening her text to Molly, she entered grubs and slid her phone back into her pocket, then extended her hand to Sheff once more. “Very nice to meet you again.”

  Thorgerson made a non-committal noise.

  They toured the dugouts, as if one needed a tour of a hole in the ground. Both home and away sides had been scrubbed clean and given a fresh coat of paint, but that wouldn't last long. The amount of trash that accumulated in a dugout during a game was disgusting, and Maggie suspected that hadn't changed much over the years.

  Molly caught up with them as Throgerson was explaining why he felt the new net behind home plate was far superior to the one from last season. Maggie had never been so relieved as when she spotted her assistant picking her way down the stairs toward them. Molly had the uncanny ability to be both completely scatterbrained and entirely too organized. If Maggie asked her to find a piece of paper she'd written a phone number on, Molly probably already had it filed away. Ask her to show up somewhere on time, though, and she'd miss every bus, drop her wallet in the sewer, and probably get arrested. Molly had committed fireable offenses every week since she’d been hired five years before, but Maggie knew it would be impossible to find anyone as good at the job. Plus, Molly had been willing to uproot from New York to move to Michigan—and an entirely different industry—with her boss. That kind of loyalty was rare.

  "Hey, sorry, I tried to use the elevator, but it was locked because they were delivering your new desk. So, I took the stairs down and met the delivery guy, then I realized your office was locked, so I had to wait for them to wrestle the desk in so I could ride up with the keys, but the desk is teak, and we crazy overloaded the car and it alarmed. So, I had to get back off and run all the way up the stairs, unlock the office, and I wasn't about to get back into the elevator. With my luck, it would have gotten stuck. I'm Molly Simmons, by the way, I'm Maggie's assistant." When she finished her breathless explanation, she stuck her hand out expectantly to Thorgerson, who looked like he would rather bite his own fingers off than touch her. Molly's bright smile, translucent white skin, and close-cropped black hair made her look like some demented pixie who would not be denied a new and exciting friend. Thorgerson quickly shook her hand and turned away.

  "We'll move on to the umpires' locker room, which has just been remodeled," he said, motioning ahead of them. As they transitioned from the cool April air of the field to the even colder cinderblock corridors of the stadium, Maggie's phone vibrated. She checked the screen and gave Thorgerson an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, I have to take this. I'll only be a moment."

  She answered, but the reception in the basement wasn't the best and the call dropped. Holding her phone in front of her like a dowsing rod, she kept her eyes trained on the little row of bars

  She left Thorgerson with Molly to follow the signal down the wide cinderblock hallway, occasionally tilting her phone up, then down. The call had long since stopped ringing in, but since it was the only thing offering her a momentary reprieve from Thorgerson’s mind-meltingly boring tour, she’d gladly call whoever it was back. If she could only get a damned signal. The service indicator spiked near a set of double doors, so she pushed the handle down with one hand and shouldered her way in. The little right triangle filled up solid. With a hissed “yes!” of triumph, she slid her fingers over the missed call symbol.

  And then a totally naked guy strolled right into her peripheral vision.

  Jolted from her singular focus on her phone, she realized with crashing horror that she’d entered the clubhouse. The warm, copper-toned wood of the lockers gleamed under the inset can-lights. Stuffed leather rolling chairs, each embroidered with the team logo, stood sentry before each locker. Above a wide table with a navy tablecloth, a huge television hung on the wall, blasting Fox Sports to what would have been an entirely empty room, if she and Mr. Naked hadn’t blundered in.

  He hadn’t noticed her. He’d gone straight to his locker, towel slung over his shoulder instead of over parts that should be shielded from view, and hummed to himself while he dug through a black bag. Maggie noticed the name over the locker, and froze. It was Chris Thompson.

  Back when her father had still been the coach, Maggie had spent plenty of time watching Chris from the stands. He’d been brand new, sinuous and tanned, called up from the minors at twenty, and the only pitcher who hadn’t been rocking a truly heinous mullet. She’d spent her days in the park pretended to be reading or doing homework, but she’d always had one eye on him. Her girlhood crush had been a legend in the Harper household, and not entirely secret to the object of her affection, either. And now, that object stood, completely naked, not thirty feet away.

  I thought he got traded to the Comets. What the hell is he doing here?

  And he had no idea she was there. This was not how she had wanted to reintroduce herself as the new team owner. This was not the way she had envisioned her first day on the job.

  Chris turned slightly, and she did the only thing she could think of. She dove beneath the table.

  Once she was under it, her plan didn’t seem so great. What if he sat down to watch tv? How long could she reasonably hide? And the longer she was under it, the harder it would become to explain her presence.

  Peeking out from beneath the tablecloth, she got a great view of Chris’s ass. She’d spent plenty of her hormonal teenage years ogling his behind, but this wasn’t quite as innocent. It was a lot more creepy. When he turned around to look at something on the television, she let the tablecloth swiftly drop. Not before she’d gotten an eyeful. The snug pants of the Bengals uniform had certainly hinted at something sizeable in the groin region, but she’d assumed that was down to a cup. Unwrapped, things were...impressive. Further north, he sported an amazing, l-shaped curve of muscle over his hip, and his legs were very toned for playing the only position on the team that didn’t have to run.

  She did a quick mental calculation. He wasn’t much older than her, in his early forties, at least, and he looked better than most men half his age.

  There was a rustling of fabric and she c
hanced another peek, hoping for a way out. She caught him pulling his jeans over his hips and bit her lip, watching the muscles of his back slide beneath his skin.

  Two minutes in the same room with him and her teenage hormones had returned in full force. She wanted to rake her nails over that back, to bite those shoulders… hell, even the bright-red sunburn on the back of his neck was enticing.

  “And in here, we have the clubhouse.”

  She sat back so fast she almost hit her head on the underside of the table. Thorgerson and Molly came through the door, and Thorgerson muttered, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize anyone was here yet. I thought batting practice wasn’t until noon.”

  “It isn’t,” Chris said mildly. “And I’m not a batter.”

  “No, of course, you aren’t, Mr…”

  “Thompson,” Molly interrupted. “You’re Chris Thompson. It is an honor to meet you, sir.” Molly’s shoes thudded across the floor, and Maggie knew her assistant had practically run across the room to shake his hand. “It would have been better with your shirt on. I’m really hoping this isn’t going to be some kind of lawsuit.”

  Molly, no!

  Thorgerson cut her off, thankfully. “This is Miss Harper’s assistant. I’m sure you remember, Miss Harper is our new team owner.”

  “Yeah, sure. Magpie. Ron Harper’s daughter. I remember her.”

  He remembered her! The fifteen-year-old part of her psyche rejoiced that he even knew she was alive. What was wrong with her? Earlier that morning, she hadn’t thought of Chris Thompson in years. Was her libido so deprived that now she couldn’t focus on anything but him, just from seeing him slightly very naked?

  “Where is she?” Molly asked Thorgerson. “She took a phone call and vanished.”

  “It does seem odd we didn’t see her in the hall,” Thorgerson replied. “Mr. Thompson, did you see her?”

  “I was in the shower, and she wasn’t in there.” Maggie could imagine Chris’s half-smile when he spoke. As a teenager, she’d certainly studied him enough to recognize the cocky disdain in his response, even if Thorgerson never would have.