Strike Out: Mustangs Baseball #6 Read online

  Torn between apologizing for asking a simple question and responding to her last insult, he took the papers from her. She was worried he wouldn’t be able to read and write? What the fuck? Almost every player he knew at least had a bachelor’s degree. And most of the ones who didn’t were young and still working on theirs. Everyone needed something to fall back on in case of injury or if they simply couldn’t cut it any longer against the new players coming up.

  He looked around for a pen, found one in a coffee cup turned desk accessory, then sat in the desk chair. Dr. Reed, age twenty-five, dragged a pile of wires out of the way so he’d have a place to write.

  “What are all those?”

  “Electrodes and sensors.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  The blood drained from her subject’s face leaving him pale and visibly shaking. If Tricia hadn’t been so pissed, she might have found the situation funny. Who knew a healthy male could pale so quickly? And, God, was he healthy. Why couldn’t they have sent her a guy with a pot-belly and stained teeth? Royce Stryker was six-foot-something of pure perfection. If she’d had one of those build-a-body books where you flip pages, choosing face, torso, and legs to put together your ideal man, she would have ended up with Royce. Dark hair, lean face with eyes the color of a deep, pure lake. Straight, even teeth and lips that would probably send her into a swoon if they ever smiled.

  She couldn’t let him see her attraction. Like a physician, she needed to keep a professional distance from the people she worked with. Doing so would have been so much easier with a tobacco-chewing, beer-drinking slob.

  “You have a problem with wearing sensors?”

  He shook his head, but the color of his skin said otherwise.

  Great. Just great. The last thing she wanted to do was babysit a grown man with phobias. “Look.” She picked one of the tiny electrodes up to show him. “It’s like a Band-Aid. Peel and stick. Nothing punctures the skin, I promise.”

  “No needles?”

  He was talking again. Color was returning to his cheeks, but his eyes were still glassy and distant. Not good. “No needles, though I would like to get a blood test before we begin. It’s part of establishing the base line I talked about. You know, in case there are factors that could influence the results of the experiment.”

  At the mention of the blood work, his skin paled again. Of all the players in the Major League, I got the only squeamish one. Just my luck. Nothing about this project had been easy thus far, so she had no reason to expect this part to be any different, yet, she had hoped. It had taken nearly a year of meetings to convince the national organization her research could be valuable, and almost as long to reach an agreement with the Mustangs’ management to allow her to use a sampling of their players as subjects. Now this. Her first subject was a wimp.

  “You’ve had blood tests before, right?”

  He nodded.

  “And you survived them or you wouldn’t be here now.”

  Another nod.

  “Then you’ll survive one more.”

  His head swiveled from side to side.

  Tricia blew out a breath. “When was your last physical?”

  “Spring Training. March.”

  Four months. Unacceptable if she wanted her results to mean anything. She shook her head. “Nope. Won’t do. I need more current data, or any conclusions I reach will be subject to question. I need a clean base line.”

  “I didn’t agree to be poked with needles.”

  His color was returning along with his spirit. This she could deal with. “Look. Why don’t you fill out the paperwork first? The team doctor agreed to draw the….” He was turning pale again. She changed tactics. “He said he would do the test.”

  She picked up the pen he’d dropped and held it up, inviting him to take it. “I’ll hold your hand through the whole thing. I promise.” She’d do anything, including babysit a grown man to get this project underway.

  He lifted his chin, and Tricia found her gaze captured by his. No longer glassy, his eyes smoldered with determination and resolve. She might have jerked the rug from under his feet with the whole blood-test thing, but he’d undoubtedly found the inner strength to overcome his fear. Damn. That was sexy.

  “I don’t need you to hold my hand.” Said appendage closed around hers, and for the span of a heartbeat, Tricia felt lightheaded. Searing heat liquefied every muscle in her body and vaporized the air in her lungs. She gasped and jerked away from his touch.

  “O-okay.” She schooled her expression to the professional façade she’d worked hard to cultivate. “Today. You’ll do it today?”

  “As soon as I finish this mountain of paperwork.”

  Tricia took solace in his brusque tone, an indication he had recovered his equilibrium. She only wished she could say the same herself. She could still feel the imprint of his palm over the back of her hand, could still feel the lingering warmth low in her body. It was nothing more than a primal response—as old as mankind, but new to her.

  She untangled another wire while silently thanking the thoughtless assistant who had tossed the expensive equipment into the case without taking the time to properly store it. While carefully working another snarl loose, she studied the man sitting at the desk. Whatever she’d felt when he touched her must have been one-sided. He’d reacted strongly to the mention of a blood test, but touching her? Nothing. Nada. Not even a flicker of awareness on his part for something that had sent her heart rate into the stratosphere.

  Tiny tingling sensations still danced on her skin. Yet, he continued to mark down answers as if nothing had happened.

  A trained observer, she noted the return of his normal coloring. Though tanned from hours in the sun, his natural coloring, judging from the band of skin she’d glimpsed below his collar when he bent forward, looked to be a light shade of gold. She’d know for certain soon enough. In order to collect all the data needed, she would have to attach sensors to almost every part of his body.

  He wouldn’t be the first man she’d wired, but none of the others had elicited any sort of physical response from her through casual physical contact. A few had tried out their wittiest pickup lines while she attached sensors to various parts of their anatomy, but they’d laughed with her when she rolled her eyes and tugged to make sure the adhesive held.

  Concentrating on a pesky knot, she let her mind wander further afield. If merely touching his hand had elicited such a primal response in her, what would happen when she touched his biceps? Or his pectorals? Or his abdominals? Would she feel the same overwhelming feeling, or would it be business as usual?

  “Why do you need to know this?” Royce’s baritone snapped her out of her thoughts.

  “Hmm?”

  “Number forty. How many times do you have sex in a week? What does my sex life have to do with anything?”

  “Sexual activity can be a marker for overall health.”

  He tapped the clicker end of his pen on the form in a jittery rhythm while he reread the question, presumably considering it in a different light, thanks to her explanation. Tricia resumed her task, hoping and praying he’d write something down and move on to the next question. She didn’t want to think about him having sex. After her reaction earlier, imagining him having sex with her wasn’t much of a stretch, and that was the last thing she needed to be thinking about.

  “Does masturbation count? Or only sex with a partner?”

  Tricia’s fingers tightened on the thin wires in her hand. He didn’t really just ask about solo sex, did he? Her ears had to be playing tricks on her. “What?”

  “Does masturbation count as sex? That’s all I want to know.”

  “Uh. I….” Does it? Why hadn’t she thought of it before? Why hadn’t any of the other men who’d answered the questions asked? “No.” She closed her eyes. “Yes. I don’t know.”

  When she opened her eyes, Royce Stryker was looking at her, a giant smile transforming his already handsome face into a work of art. The same heated r
ush she’d experienced when he touched her consumed her once again. The cartilage in her knees softened. She placed her hands flat on the desk for support.

  His embarrassment at the prospect of writing a big, fat zero in the space provided, unless masturbation counted, was nothing compared to the entertainment value of watching Dr. Tricia Reed grapple with his question. Since his wife left him, his only sexual companion had been his right hand. For most of those months, he’d admit, the woman on his mind had been Hannah, but as time moved on, so had his imagination. More and more, the female on his mind was someone he’d recently met, or the occasional actress in the news. No doubt, tonight a certain scientist with big eyes, small breasts, and tanned legs would star in his private musings.

  The author of the infernal questionnaire hunched forward, using her hands to support herself over the desk, giving Royce a perfect view down the front of her V-neck shirt. He almost swallowed his tongue. Jesus. Her breasts weren’t small. They were perfect. His palms itched to feel their weight, to lift them to his lips.

  He shifted, trying to relieve the pressure in his jeans. Not even the threat of a blood test could make him not want her. Hell, she could make a dead man rise. And wasn’t that what he’d been for the last few months? Dead? Not anymore.

  “Well? How should I answer the question?”

  “Maybe you could average the two over the last year?”

  “Okay.” He wrote a number in the blank space. “Seven it is.”

  “You have sex seven times a week?”

  Royce smiled at the disbelief in her voice.

  “No. I masturbate seven times a week. On average.” And, he knew without a doubt, the number was going to increase, now that he’d met Dr. Reed. His mind was already coming up with fantasy scenarios to accompany the hand action. “Do you have a lab coat?”

  “What? Why?”

  I’ll take that as a yes. Royce smiled. “Nothing.” He turned his attention to the next question, which, thankfully, asked about his eating habits.

  ***

  The team’s medical staff, having dealt with him before, understood his limitations when it came to needles and blood. The nurse practitioner, Mary Alice something-or-other, let him lie on the exam table during the procedure, so if he passed out, he wouldn’t end up on the floor. While she searched his arm for a suitable place to drain his life force, he turned his head and closed his eyes. Immediately, his mind conjured fantasies of the fabulous Dr. Tricia Reed draining him in a much more pleasant way.

  He saw black the instant the needle pricked his skin, coming to when Mary Alice patted his cheek with her latex-clad fingers.

  “All done?” He tried to sit up, but a firm hand on his shoulder was all it took to keep him on his back.

  “All done. Just lie there for a few minutes.” She shook her head. “I’ve never seen anyone as weak as you when it comes to blood work. Boggles the mind.”

  Royce blanched at the sound of her removing her gloves. He hated that sound.

  “Let me get you something to drink.” For a woman in her mid-fifties, she had a nice ass. As she walked away, he pushed to a sitting position. The room spun once or twice, but by the time she returned with a glass of orange juice, he was feeling better.

  “Thanks.” He took a sip. “Let’s not do this again anytime soon.”

  “Hey. Wasn’t my idea this time. But you know how I enjoy seeing you suffer….”

  “Wasn’t my idea either.”

  “Who’s Tricia?”

  The name hit him like a sucker punch. “Huh?”

  “Don’t play stupid with me. You always talk when you’re out of it. Used to be you talked about Hannah, but today it was Tricia.”

  Royce frowned. Why didn’t he know this about himself? He resolved then and there to avoid blood work for the rest of his life. “Nobody.”

  He mentally patted himself on the back for pulling the lie off with such ease. Tricia Reed, in the span of an hour, had wormed her way into his life and, apparently, his subconscious, too. But she wasn’t going any further. He’d done the relationship thing, had the divorce papers to prove it. Not to mention, he was supposed to be keeping an eye on her research.

  “She wouldn’t be the researcher I heard about, would she?”

  “Mind your own business.” The words were meant as a warning, but his delivery insured Mary Alice wouldn’t take offense.

  “You are my business, Stryker. I love you guys. Why else would I hang around this place?”

  He slid off the table. Finding his feet steady beneath him, he headed for the door, calling over his shoulder as he went, “You know you stay because of the hot bodies you get to touch. Don’t think we don’t know it, too!”

  A rather unladylike word followed him from the room. He might not like what she did, but he loved Mary Alice like a mother. They all did.

  ***

  Tricia thumbed through the questionnaire, checking to make sure Mustangs Test Subject #1, MTS1, for short, had answered every question. The second time around, she glanced at the answers to confirm his understanding of the question and appropriateness of the answer. With previous subjects, she’d never had a single qualm about reading their responses to the highly personal questions, but somehow, reading Royce’s neatly penned answers made her feel like a Peeping Tom.

  By the time she reached the end of the document, she knew more about him than he probably knew about himself. She’d bet he didn’t know his weekly alcohol consumption was well below the average for men his age or his usual six hours of sleep nightly could be a contributing factor to his on-field problems. She’d have to talk to him about those issues. In order for her data to be meaningful, he’d need to be well rested.

  Which brought her to question number forty. He’d checked divorced under marital status on the first page, which made his inquiry regarding masturbation a bit more understandable. She stared at the number scrawled in the box. Seven. On average.

  She vaguely recalled reading somewhere that men were prone to exaggeration when it came to their sex lives, but why would any man admit to masturbation being his sole sexual outlet, much less report taking matters into his own hand seven times a week? On average.

  He hadn’t sounded as if he were bragging. No, he’d simply been stating a fact. One she couldn’t credit. Divorced or not, the man was beyond hot. He was also wealthy and a professional athlete. If he wanted sexual partners, he could have them.

  Which meant he didn’t want them.

  Was he still in love with his ex-wife? That would explain his solo sex for the last year or so. She made a note to herself to find out when he’d gotten divorced. The information didn’t matter to her research, but the idea of a virile man like Royce Stryker not pursuing natural inclinations was troubling. As a scientist, it was her job to explore every possible factor that could influence the results of her experiment.

  She scribbled another note in her lab book. Does masturbation = sex w/ partner? Does lack of sexual partners = decreased libido? Check testosterone levels on MTS1.

  Under Observations, she wrote – Casual observation does not indicate a lower than normal testosterone level. In fact, MTS1 exhibits physical attributes consistent with high levels of T hormone. i.e. pronounced Adam’s Apple, deep voice, pronounced facial hair mid-afternoon. NOTE: Could be from lack of personal grooming in morning. Requires further observation.

  Tricia flipped the notebook closed. Or I could just ask him. Another first. She’d never felt compelled to ask any of her college-aged subjects if they’d shaved or not. A few of them had exhibited five o’clock shadows early in the day, but most of them probably could have skipped a day shaving and no one would have noticed. She doubted that was the case with Royce Stryker. She’d bet her next pedicure the man shaved twice a day.

  She was still contemplating what his T levels could mean in terms of her research when MTS1 returned from his blood test. He walked with a confident gate, no sign of the distress he’d exhibited when he left for the innocu
ous procedure. Either he was supremely pleased with himself for surviving or he’d been somewhere else for the last half hour. Tricia narrowed her eyes at him.

  “What?” he asked, stopping in front of her desk.

  “Where have you been?”

  “I went to see Mary Alice.” He stretched his arm out, revealing a cartoon bandage holding a cotton ball in place. “All done.”

  “And you lived to tell about it. Amazing.”

  “Hey, do not underestimate medical procedures. They can be dangerous.”

  She couldn’t help it, she rolled her eyes. “No one has ever died from a blood test.”

  “Can I see that in writing?”

  She stood, reaching for the bag where she’d stored all the sensors she’d spent a good part of the day untangling. “No, you can’t. But you can take your clothes off.”

  He froze, his eyes wide, cheeks flushed with color. “What?”

  Assuming a stance she hoped conveyed a no-nonsense professional demeanor, she stared him down. “Should I have your hearing tested, too? I said, take your clothes off. You can leave your underwear on. It won’t be in the way.”

  Expecting him to comply, she turned her back to him to dig in her bag for the box of self-adhesive electrode pads she’d brought. As she dug to the bottom, the rustling of cloth told her MTS1 was doing as she’d asked. Nakedness had never been an issue with previous test subjects, but the idea of this one disrobing in her presence did crazy things to her body. She forced her lungs to take deep, measured breaths, and though she’d easily located the small box, she continued to feel around in the bag, willing her out-of-control heart rate to go back to normal.

  This is so not good. Get a grip, Dr. Reed. Be professional. He’s just a test subject—nothing more.

  She’d just about convinced herself the man behind her was just like all the other men she’d tested in her research—then she turned around.