Total pages in book: 46
Estimated words: 44850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 44850 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 224(@200wpm)___ 179(@250wpm)___ 150(@300wpm)
Marigold has got me all fucked up. I’m acting like a damn girl. Hell, at this rate I’ll be putting rhinestones on my uniform and dipping my glove in pink glitter.
“I see what’s going on here,” Ryder says.
“What’s that?” I respond, getting off the machine. I may be upset I’m getting a booty-call with Marigold and not an actual date, but the last thing I want to do is to exhaust myself working out before she even shows up.
“You’re so used to Bat-Bunnies falling all over your cock and begging for it that you don’t know how to deal with a good woman.”
“What would you know about it? Far as I know, you don’t even date.”
I’m not lying either. The guys in the locker room have begun to take bets on what’s going on with Ryder. There’s a pool started. A few of the guys think he’s living in the closet and are waiting for him to come out. Big Mike says he’s a virgin and thinking of joining the priesthood. I haven’t thought much about it—mostly because I don’t care. Still, I’m a bastard for snapping at him.
Ryder laughs, but there’s not much humor in it. “I don’t date because the one woman I want is the one I can’t have.”
“Who’s that?”
“I’d rather not get into it. It’s enough to know that she’ll never be mine and I need to accept it.”
“Sounds to me like that’d be a reason for getting laid.”
“Fuck her out of my system?”
I shrug. “It might work.”
“Do you think fucking other women will get Marigold Lucas out of your mind?”
Not one damn bit.
“She’s not off limits and she’s getting in my bed. The situation is different.”
“Not really. To be honest I’ve tried that—so much so that I earned a horrible nickname by my last team.”
“What was it? I ask because he doesn’t really have a nickname here.
“Mister Break Your Headboard, because I broke more than a few, trying to fuck Emmie out of my mind and yet here I am… still wanting her.”
“That’s a lame as nickname,” I respond, not sure what to say about the rest of it that won’t make things worse.
“Yeah, but it is what it is.”
“We should give all the guy’s lame nicknames just to fuck with them.”
“We could. We should get Rooster to help. He comes up with some great names—better than anything we could come up with.”
“Rooster?” I laugh.
Rooster is kind of a team coach. He knows a hell of a lot about baseball, but the man is strange as hell. Word is Green hired him after finding out he was homeless. Some of the higher ups weren’t happy, but there’s no denying that Rooster improves the team. He’s helped me with my RBI average more than any team coach I’ve had. Eventually the results quietened down the head honchos and they gave Green free rein when it came to decisions on staff. They even look the other way when they found out Rooster came with a pet that lives at the playing center and we’re not talking a dog. Hell, no. It’s a damn chicken named Gladys. If you don’t think that’s weird enough, Gladys is a male and has a freaking harem of hens that he nails all day long anywhere he chooses.
My first day working out with the team I went to jump in the shower only to find Rooster in it with seven hens lined up in front of him and he was laying it to each one of them. I stood there naked, traumatized, and wondering if I should light up a cigarette for Gladys. The guys got together and had Coach’s mom order a purple blazer and gold chains to fit the damn thing as a gag gift. Ida Sue went one step further and found a pair of sunglasses for the damn chicken. Rooster doesn’t put them on Gladys all the time, but often enough that no one bats an eye anymore when the damn thing struts down the hall.
“Yeah. That man is hilarious even if he does scare me.”
I nod because I can’t disagree. “I’m going to jump in the shower just in case Marigold actually shows up tonight.”
“You think she’ll stand you up?” Ryder asks as I start walking toward the locker room where the showers are.
“Let’s just say that at this point if Marigold Lucas is involved, nothing would surprise me.”
His laughter follows me out of the room. I wish I could find humor, but I can’t. For the first time in my life, I want to claim a woman and not just have casual sex and apparently, that’s all she wants.
CHAPTER 13
Marigold
“What’s going on with you and Slater Daniels?”
I close my eyes. I knew this was coming, I was just hoping against hope that it wouldn’t. I should have known better. With my brothers, nothing is ever easy.