Stealing Home: A Reverse Grumpy-Sunshine College Sports Romance (Beyond the Play Book 3)

THE BEST PART of my pregame routine is batting practice.

For all my talent in left field—and I do love chasing down fly balls and stopping base hits in their tracks—I’m most comfortable in the batter’s box. I’ve always had a good eye for strikes, and when it’s just practice, I get plenty of nice pitches to hit. It’s what my father was known for, and over the years, every batting coach I’ve worked with has remarked that our swings are nearly identical. Same leg kick, same sweeping arc.

While Ozzy, a lefty with a fantastic curveball, works something out with our pitching coach, I step out of the batter’s box. I tuck my necklace under my collar and adjust my gloves, then tap the end of the bat against my cleats. I’m not superstitious, but I still have a routine.

This game is going to be good. I can feel it. Bryant’s pitcher for the evening is at the bottom of their rotation. If I can keep myself focused, I’ll do some damage on the bases—and hopefully help us get out of the skid we’ve been in for a couple weeks now.

I’ll likely focus better if Mia doesn’t show.

Didn’t stop me from leaving a ticket with Billy, the man who manages the box offices for the McKee baseball and softball programs. One ticket for Captain Kirk. Hopefully she thinks it’s funny. She loves the stars so much, I figured it was a good bet.

Just as I settle back in the box, Coach Martin beckons me over. He’s standing in foul territory, a clipboard underneath his arm. “Callahan, a word.”

I give Ozzy a shrug and jog off. Hunter steps into the batter’s box instead.

I adjust my baseball cap to block the glare. “Coach?”

I admired Coach Martin from the moment I met him. He’s someone who has been around baseball for a long time, and who remains steadfast in his love for it, even as people wonder if America’s game is too slow, or too boring, or too time-consuming. When Cooper decided that he was going to play hockey at McKee—or rather, Richard decided for him and gave Cooper the choice between a couple of top hockey schools—the logical choice was to tag along, and lucky for us, McKee’s baseball program wasn’t too shabby. We were terrible last season and we’ve been terrible this season too, but that’s not for Coach Martin’s lack of trying. Sometimes in sports, luck plays a bigger factor than people want to believe. Sometimes, you try your best, but another team bests you.

His hand, a deep, weathered brown, rubs over his goatee as he considers me. “Thought we might start chatting about the draft.”

Coach Martin never made it to the majors. He played in the Dodgers minor league system before suffering a career-ending injury and turning his focus to coaching. He knows how grueling that rise to the top can be.

I nod, leaning on my bat. “What about it?”

“That was the plan, heading into today,” he says. “Get a sense of where your head is at. But then I got a call this morning, from The Sportsman.”

Shit. I haven’t answered the reporter yet, but I guess she’s going ahead with the profile anyway. If she reached out to Coach, Richard and Sandra will be next on the list. They profiled Richard when he retired from the NFL, after all. I remember Sandra running around, totally stressed, as a decorating crew glammed up the entire house for the family photoshoot.

“And?”

“They have the same idea as me, thinking about the draft. It’s finally time for Jake Miller’s son.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you want me to talk to her?” He regards me with serious eyes. “She said she hadn’t heard from you yet.”

“She left a message. I just… wasn’t sure what to say to her.”

He nods. “She’ll want you to talk about your father, no doubt.”

Over the years, people have tried to pry, but for the most part, Richard and Sandra shielded me from it. Documentary segments. Remembrances by the Reds and by baseball in general. I gave exactly one interview as a teenager; the summer I turned sixteen, the Reds retired my father’s number and wanted me at the ceremony. But for the most part, all of this is foreign to me. The thought of a reporter prying in on those memories makes me flinch, and that’s without the little scrap of doubt about the future in the back of my mind, stubborn as hell and refusing to fade.

Not that I’d ever give voice to it. I’m a baseball player, end of story.

“I’m sure, sir.”

“I don’t have to talk to her. It’s your call. I’m happy to sing your praises, son, but I understand if you want to lay low. I’m your coach, draft or not, and part of my job is to protect you.”

I swallow the lump of emotion in my throat. During these chats, he reminds me of Richard, who is truly like a father to me.

Whenever Richard and I talk about baseball, it brings up pieces of memories, faded now, but with enough color in them to highlight the conversations I used to have with my dad about the same things. He went to as many of my games as he could, even though he was on the road constantly. Professional baseball demands so much of a player. Not just the game itself, but the preparation and the time. It’s a marathon from spring training all the way to the postseason, resetting each day for a new game with breaks few and far between.

“Thank you,” I manage to say.

Coach squeezes my shoulder with a broad hand and says, “Why don’t you get in touch with her and decide. Richard might have some thoughts, too.”

I give him a wry smile. “If there’s anything Richard always has, it’s opinions.”

Coach laughs. “You’re a good kid, Callahan. Go lead the outfield in some drills before we start whole-team warmups.”

I FINALLY GET a chance to check my phone just before the game. After our conversation this morning, I hoped to see some more texts from Mia, but there’s nothing. For all I know, when I get back to the house later, she’ll be gone, already placed in another dorm.

I hope not. If I’m going to convince her to at least be friends, this is the best bet. Once she’s not sleeping next door, who knows if I’ll see her until the fall semester.

There is, however, a voicemail from Richard. I know roughly what it says—no doubt the reporter reached out to him for an interview—so I just dial his number instead.

That familiar deep voice fills my ear. “Sebastian?”

Even before he became my father, he was a larger-than-life figure in my mind. When I was little, I loved when the Callahans visited, not only to see James and Cooper, but to see Richard. I remember him and my father on our sprawling back lawn, chucking a football back and forth. James was nine, which meant Cooper and I were seven, and we all took turns playing running back. For that night, being a quarterback sounded cooler than a left fielder. When I told Richard that, he and my father looked at each other and burst into tipsy laughter.

“Hey,” I say. “I got your message.”

“Game’s starting soon, right?”

I glance at the wall clock hanging above the lockers. Most of the guys are in the dugout already, loosening up before first pitch, but I need to finish getting into uniform. “I have a moment.”

“Did you connect with the reporter yet?”

“No.” I lean my head against my locker with a thud, blinking at the ‘17’ hammered in bronze at the top of the wood panel. “I didn’t answer the phone the first time.”

“You know you don’t have to talk to her.”

I nod, then remember he can’t see me. “Yes, sir.”

“We can always redirect them. I have some influence there. I don’t want you doing it if it’ll distract you from your game. You know how important it is to give your all until the end of the season.”

“I know.”

He sighs. “I’d talk to her, get a read on how much she wants to know. What ways she wants to bring your father into this. You’re a man now, Sebastian. No one can protect your father’s legacy but you. Switch to video chat, I want to see you.”

I do, and when his face fills the screen, those blue eyes, so like my siblings’, regard me with that familiar seriousness. Even though Richard Callahan has been out of the game for years now, he’s physically fit, mentally tough, and capable of withering a man with a mere glance. His retirement has been less of a vacation than a pivot to the media and broadcasting, and I have no doubt he holds sway with The Sportsman.

“He’d be proud of you, son. You’re getting to the place he always dreamed for you.”

I blink. To hear him speak with such frank honesty in this way is rare. Perhaps Cooper changed him more than we realized. “Thank you.”

He laughs slightly, running a hand through his still-thick hair, silver now at the temples. “At least you did turn out to be a baseball player. A damn good one, at that, and getting better all the time. Jake would never forgive me if you hadn’t.”

The edges of the room blur for a half-second as my heart pounds in my chest, hard and fast. The praise makes me smile, but I can’t ignore the little flash of panic it brings, too.