Double Play

By Karen Ann Dell

Sky Zeigfeld has a new job with Mimosa Key's brand new Minor League baseball team, the Barefoot Bay Bucks. She's left cold, rainy Philly behind—as well has her former boyfriend/boss, Handsome Ben, who'd taken advantage of her naiveté and played her like a Stradivarius. Although she already misses her parents and five brothers, she's found a new roommate, leased a new condo and made a few new rules—no more exclusive relationships and no more special favors for any guys. She'll play the field, pun intended, and enjoy the sunny skies of Florida. With all the hunky guys trying out for the new team, she's got lots to choose from. But the first one Sky will cross off her list is the handsome would-be pitcher who seems to think good looks and a dazzling smile will get him around the rules.

AJ Reed is finally able to follow his heart's desire to become a professional baseball player. He's a bit older than most of the guys trying to make the team, due to obligations he owed his powerful, manipulative grandfather. The multi-millionaire banker, who paid for AJ's first-class education, did so with the understanding that he would enter the high-powered world of investment banking. It took AJ five years to save enough to repay the debt and slip the leash his grandfather had tied so tightly around his neck.

His only goal is to make the team—until he meets the beautiful brunette head of human resources. They get off to a rocky start, but now there is another goal on his list—and he won't be satisfied with achieving just one of them. Between fending off protective brothers and keeping up with dear old Grandad's sneaky tricks, AJ has his work cut out for him to win a spot on the team and the love of Sky Ziegfeld.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cat Herder Productions, LLC
• Release date: Sep 9, 2018
• ISBN: 9781386322146

Karen Ann Dell

I was born and raised in a suburb of Philadelphia, where I survived twelve years of parochial school. After a stint at Penn State, I attended nursing school in Philadelphia, got my diploma and worked in one of the earliest Shock/Trauma units. Then I was off to Baltimore and a few years as an OR nurse before I decided anesthesia was where I belonged. I trained at Johns Hopkins, and have happily practiced my profession - Nurse Anesthesia - for the past forty years. So you see, I'm no spring chicken. About twenty-five years ago I moved to Orlando and I eventually found my way to Melbourne, a lovely town on Florida's Space Coast. I have been rescued by foue cats who have agreed to keep me company in exchange for food and cuddles. Now that I have retired from the practice of anesthesia, the stories and characters I have been keeping under my scrub cap lo these many years are clamoring to be free. I've decided to humor them in the hopes they will entertain you, dear reader. I also create the occassional cover for self-published e-books, am an active member here at STAR, and have served as treasurer on the board. In whatever spare time I have left, I make jewelry. One can never have too much bling, in my humble opinion. Contact me at [e-mail]  or tweet @K_A_Dell

Book preview

"This story is set in a world based on Roxanne St. Claire’s Barefoot Bay Series; it is published with the permission of Roxanne St. Claire, information about whose books are found at http://www.roxannestclaire.com/barefoot-bay-series/."

Dear Reader,

Welcome to Barefoot Bay World, a place for authors to write their own stories set in the tropical paradise that I created!  For these books, I have only provided the setting of Mimosa Key and a cast of characters from my popular Barefoot Bay series.  That’s it! I haven’t contributed to the plotting, writing, or editing of Double Play.  This book is entirely the work of author Karen Ann Dell, a writer who never fails to bring the feels to every book.

Looks like it’s baseball season again in Barefoot Bay and that means love on the field and off.  Karen’s hero has plans to follow his heart, but when the team’s new human resources manager catches his eye...it looks like that heart can be stolen as easily as second base. Karen hits a homerun with this one!

Roxanne St. Claire

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Barefoot Bay Series

www.roxannestclaire.com

Acknowledgments

When I decided to convert the stories in my head to books readable by the public, I looked around and found my local chapter of RWA. Little did I know how lucky I was,  living in a small town on Florida’s east coast, to find a group chock full of talented and multi-published authors of romance. I owe the members of the SpacecoasT Authors of Romance a debt I can never repay. So many of them gave unstintingly of their time and expertise to help the newbie along the path to publication. Roxanne St. Claire, Kristen Painter, Leigh Duncan, Laura Freeman, JoMarie DeGioia, and Chris Kridler are just a few of the women I now consider friends as well as mentors. They are all wonderful writers and I encourage you to try their books.

I’ve read all of Roxanne St. Claire’s books—many of them several times—and loved them all. She is amazingly talented and those books have provided me with hours of enjoyment as well as education. Rocki, as she insists her friends call her, has generously offered to open her world of Barefoot Bay to her many fans and I am delighted to bring this novella into her world, with the intention of adding more stories to follow.

I would also like to thank Rich Milliard, Kevin Bates and Ryan Scarff (who packs a wealth of baseball information into a twelve-year old mind) for their insights into the world of baseball. Any mistakes are strictly my own.

And as always, thanks to my first readers—Darlene, Hilde, and Karen, who give me the encouragement to carry on, in spite of my conviction that what I give them to read should be burned. Also, my patient copyeditor, Chris Kridler, who is an excellent author in her own right and chases storms when she’s not doling out commas and crossing out ellipses. Check out her amazing photographs at skydiary.com.

Chapter One

Sky tugged open the curtains and tossed her purse onto the bed. The maid at the Fourway Motel had left the air conditioner on max, and the chill raised goose bumps on her arms. Okay, it’s Florida. I get it. But heck, it’s also January and the temperature outside is a delightful seventy-two degrees. She opened the panel and dialed back the control.

Then she gave in and did a quick happy dance. She’d done it. Her interview with the three big spenders who were putting the new minor league baseball team together had lasted over an hour. When she first walked into the conference room and saw Nate Ivory, Zeke Nicholas and Elliottt Becker seated at the long table, she almost stumbled. Nate Ivory was instantly recognizable from the barrage of media attention that followed him everywhere. She recognized Zeke Nicholas from his cover shot on Forbes magazine, and while she couldn’t remember seeing Elliottt Becker in the news, he was no less handsome and just as rich as the other two men. The testosterone factor in the room was off the charts.

Zeke rose and offered her a chair across from them, which she needed, considering how badly her knees were shaking. Sitting in a room with three unbelievably handsome men in their early thirties was daunting enough. Knowing they were all billionaires was downright intimidating, to say the least. Good thing she’d grown up in a household with five brothers where she learned to fight for what she wanted, be it the last pancake in the stack or the remote control for the TV.

The three men had studied her credentials—she’d graduated summa cum laude with an MBA from Lehigh University and had a three-year stint as assistant director of human resources in the biggest ad agency in Philadelphia under her belt. They grilled her with questions that left her palms damp, but she’d fielded them all without a hitch. In the end, after a five-minute wait in the lobby while they conferred, they hired her on the spot. She wasn’t sure if that was because she was the best applicant, or the only applicant. But, really, she didn’t care why. I’m going to work for a baseball team! Minor league, true, but still, a baseball team! Wait until I tell Mike and Jed; they’ll flip.

While her whole family was devoted to the Phillies, her two bracket-brothers (one a year older, the other a year younger) lived, breathed, and ate baseball for breakfast. Exposure to their passion had fueled her own, and she could trade player stats with the best of them.

She changed out of her charcoal, pin striped, business suit and three-inch stilettos into a pair of skinny jeans, a red tank top and cowgirl boots. She pulled the pins from the neat chignon and let her long, chocolate-brown hair tumble down her back. Perching a straw Stetson on her head, she was ready to check out Mimosa Key.

Her new home was an island just off the western coast of Florida and a bit north of Naples. Considering it was thirty-eight degrees and raining back in Philly, the warm breezes from the Gulf of Mexico that pushed puffy white clouds across the sunny sky made her want to text raspberries to her older brothers. She’d kept her hero-worship under wraps growing up, in order to survive their teasing. Let them envy her for a change.

Sky pulled up to the gas pumps across the street at the Super Min and went inside, where she trolled the aisles and stocked up on junk food—her biggest guilty pleasure—then looked for a local map as she unloaded her goodies at the counter.

Well, hello there, Missy. You leave your horse tied up out back? The woman behind the counter took inventory of her clothes, shoes and hat, and then began to ring up the chips, cookies and sodas.

A bit taken back by the cashier’s attitude, Sky mumbled, Too country for down here, huh?

Heck, no, not at all. Don’t mind me, young lady. Hell, we’ve got more cowboys in Florida than they do in Texas. Well, almost. The five-foot-two woman, whose frizzy caramel hair needed a root touch-up, winked at her across the counter.

I didn’t know that. Guess I’ve got a lot to learn about this part of the world. I’m Sky Ziegfeld. She put her hand out and got a surprised look and a perfunctory handshake from the woman.

I’m Charity Grambling, proud owner of this establishment. And if you want to know about this neck of the woods, you’ve come to the right place. You here for a mid-winter vacation?

Sky grinned. Nope. I’m about to become a permanent resident. I just got hired to work for the Barefoot Bay Bucks.

I can see why you’re celebrating with all this. Charity swept her arm across the counter. But you’d best watch out you don’t lose that nice figure while you’re celebrating.

I’ll be careful. Not that it’s any of your business. Do you have a local map? I need to find a place to live. An apartment or maybe a small house? Any suggestions?

Charity pointed out the front windows. If you head south on the main road, you’ll find some older neighborhoods with small private homes—those that survived the hurricane a few years back. There might be some for rent. I don’t keep up with that sort of thing. If you head north toward the new stadium, you’ll come across mostly new construction. Town houses, small apartment buildings and the like. Guess I’d try up that way first.

Sky gathered up her purchases and the map Charity slid across the counter. Thanks for your help, Charity. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again.

Of course you will. Sooner or later, everyone comes by the Super Min. Charity smiled smugly.

Sky filled her car up at the pump, then retraced the route she’d taken earlier to the Bucks stadium. Now that her mind was not totally preoccupied with her impending interview, she noticed a sign for Buck’s Landing and turned off the main road to explore.

She parked her CR-V in front of the rental office next to a silver Mercedes SL500. Heck, does everybody on this island have a six-digit income? I guess the Casa Blanca Resort & Spa has raised the bar for residents as well as vacationers. I may have to live across the causeway, if the rent here is too rich for my blood.

As she got out of her car, two women exited the building, one of them carrying keys, the other dressed the way Sky had been an hour ago.

Seeing her standing by her car, the woman holding the keys approached her with a smile. Can I help you? I’m Natalie Schuster, the rental agent for these properties. She offered her hand.

Hello. Nice to meet you. I’m Sky Ziegfeld. She shook hands and nodded to the younger woman waiting by her car. I’m interested in renting but not sure whether I want an apartment or a townhouse. Since you’re already busy, perhaps I could make an appointment to come back later?

The other woman spoke up. Since we both seem to be in the market for rentals, I don’t see why Natalie can’t give us the tour together. Would that be okay with you?

Of course, Natalie said. Whatever you’re both comfortable with is fine. Ms. Zeigfeld?

Sounds good to me. What were you on your way to see? Considering the car and the clothes, Sky assumed the other woman, although about her age, would be looking for more upscale lodgings than she could afford.

The woman stepped closer to shake hands and offer a friendly smile. My name is Kelly Singer. Nice to meet you. The apartments were our first stop, but I’d love to see the townhouses, too.

Good to meet you, Kelly. Sky glanced between the two women, then eyed Kelly’s car. Maybe we should take my car if it’s too far to walk. I love your ride, Kelly, but I don’t think we’ll all fit in it.

Before we leave, let me get some other keys, the agent said. I’ll be right out.

While they waited for the rental agent, Kelly grinned and said, I should have changed, too. You look much more comfortable.

Sky gestured to Kelly’s silk blouse, pencil skirt and three-inch heels. Bad enough I have to dress like that on the job, but my shoes came off automatically as soon as I hit my motel room. I’m really a country girl at heart.

"I hear you. I was just so excited when those hunks hired me, I couldn’t wait to find a place to call home. I turned in here as soon as I left the Bucks’