Page 207 of Force Play
I shrug. “I wouldn’t want her to.”
I walk away from the guys now to a less crowded part of the dugout. Don’t particularly want my girlfriend to reprimand me for not listening when we get home.
I get into position and close my eyes, keeping mental count as I go.
“Need any help with that?” a voice cuts in.
I immediately roll my eyes. “Nope, I’m good, Logan.”
He crosses his arms and doesn’t move away. “My job is to help you.”
“I don’t need your help,” I chide.
“Well, Lucia shouldn’t have just left you to do it on your own.”
I huff. Naturally, this is about Lucia.
“She left me on my own because I know how to stretch out my fucking hips.”
Logan’s nostrils flare. “When I’m Head Trainer next year, you’ll be doing all of this with help.”
I fall out of position as I laugh. “You’re not going to be Head Trainer next year, Dawson. Lucia’s better at her job than you are.”
“I’m the best trainer we have,” he asserts as if I’m just going to believe what I already know to be untrue.
“Oh, I believe youthinkyou’re a better trainer.” I stand up since Novak just struck out, and we need to head back to thefield. “You don’t have half the ambition and drive Lucia does. If the team’s opinion matters at all, I can fucking promise you we’d tell Dr. Coltrain we want her over you.”
Logan seethes behind me as I readjust the cap on my head and jog out to first base.
Knox takes to the mound and warms up before tossing his signature knuckleball to the Sharks’ center fielder. Unfortunately, it hits him in the arm, so he walks to first base.
Their second baseman bats next and sends a two-run homer over the right field wall.
“Fuck,” I mutter under my breath.
Knox doesn’t give up many home runs. When he does, we usually end up losing the game.
Not sure why that happens, but the stats don’t lie.
The catcher comes up now, and Knox throws a fastball this time. He connects with the ball and sends a line drive straight to me. I nab it right out of the air.
One out.
The left fielder hits a single into the shallow outfield next, and then the shortstop walks up to bat.
He whiffs on the first two pitches, but the bat connects on the third one. Another line drive, this time straight to Josh at third.
He snags it out of the air to give us our second out of the inning, and then guns it over to me. The left fielder is still turning on his heel to get back to first, and I catch the ball and tag the base before he makes it back.
We escape the inning with just those two runs.
We jog back over to the dugout and get ready to bat again, but Lucia grabs my arm before I make it inside.
“You weren’t working on your stretches.”
“Doing them now, sweetheart.” I wink and jog backward into the dugout.
Lucia laughs and shakes her head.
