Hello again. So far it seems you folks are enjoying this. Glad to know that. Hope I can keep living up to expectations.-J

"Fly me to the moon
Let me play among the stars
Let me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars
In other words, hold my hand
In other words, baby kiss me."-Frank Sinatra 'Fly Me to the Moon'


Morgan worried all the way to Claire's place. He had never, ever taken a woman to a sporting event for a date before. Of course he'd never dated anyone who seemed the slightest bit interested in sports either. He allowed the thought that perhaps she didn't enjoy baseball as much as she let on and she'd be horribly bored. His fears melted when she opened the door. He took notice of the curve hugging jeans and t-shirt and of her hair pulled into a pony tail and then pulled through the back of a Detroit Tigers hat but all of that paled next to the sight of the ball glove in her hand.

"You have your own baseball glove?"

"Actually it's a softball glove. It's hard to play the game without the glove."

"Damn woman, are you trying to make me fall in love with you?"

"I just wish to be prepared should a foul ball head in our direction."

Once at the ballpark, Claire made a bee line for a vender selling programs.

"You actually keep score, don't you?"

"Oh no, my secret's out. I am a giant baseball nerd."

"A nerd who wears a Tigers cap to a Nationals game."

She rolled her eyes at him as he approached another vender and purchased two hats more appropriate to the game. Begrudgingly she took the one he offered, stuffed the Detroit cap in her purse and placed the new one on her head.

"Go Nats," she said.

"Ditto."


Morgan spent the first three innings stealing glances over at Claire to make sure she really was having a good time. During one of his furtive glances he saw her reaching into her wallet to pay for beer.

"No, no, no…I asked you here, remember?"

"And the least I can do after yesterday is buy you a beer."

She handed one to him and sipped at her own.

"Well then thank you. So which gourmet offering do you wish to have for dinner?"

"I'm a total nacho junkie."

"Say no more. If the lady desires nachos then nachos she shall have."

Morgan left her with his beer and went off to find a concessions stand that would sell them. He returned to find her smiling giddily. She reached down and picked his beer up from where it was sitting next to her feet.

"Sorry I had to put it down to catch this."

She held out her glove and showed him a baseball.

"You caught a foul ball?"

"Yup. I wanted you to see it to prove it to you before I did this."

She then went over to a young boy of maybe seven who was sitting nearby and handed him the ball.

"Now then, my nachos, sir."

"You may be the coolest woman I have ever met in my life."

"Do you not get out that much?"

"Not with women who find nachos and beer at the ball park to be an acceptable date."

"Well, it sounds like you need to acquaint yourself with a better class of female."

"I think I just did."

This brought a satisfied smile to Claire's face. She was never short of dates or of men asking her out. She knew that she was an attractive woman and men that she encountered never failed to reassure her of that fact. But since her divorce which had been more years ago than she cared to think about, none of these men panned out into anyone that she really wanted to spend an extended amount of time with. They each could attach themselves to a portion of her personality but no one could stick with her for all that she was. And that wasn't flattering herself either. She liked being able to have intellectual conversations about books and things of that nature. You don't get a doctorate in literature unless you like those things but she also liked contemporary music and sports and a host of other things. If she found a guy who liked sports or modern music, he often wasn't the intellectual type and unfortunately a lot of the intellectual guys she met at the college were a little too pretentious to care about sports and the like. Many were still harboring grudges against the jocks in high school that beat them up. Derek was very different. He was certainly a man of action but he was learned as well. He had gone to school and done really well. He liked to read and talk about books that he read but he went to college on an athletic scholarship and he actually thought to take her to a ball game for a date. As much as she liked being wined and dined at nice restaurants, sometimes a girl just wanted a beer and some junk food while she watched a bunch of guys trying to hit a round ball squarely. Well, maybe not all girls wanted that but she did.

"Claire, honey, are you okay?"

She shook herself from her internal monologue that she often got lost in.

"Yeah, I'm fine, why?"

"You haven't marked that play yet. It was a 4-6-3 DP."

"Thanks, I guess I just got lost in my thoughts. Baseball relaxes me."

It was Derek's turn to smile as it finally confirmed for him that he had done the right thing by taking her to the game.


Derek walked her to her front door and noticed that her step was lighter and she nearly bounced onto her stoop. He noticed that particularly certain parts of her were bouncing and he wondered if she wore that top on purpose to showcase those bouncing objects. While he was pondering her breasts she had taken off her hat so that the brim of it wouldn't impede her progress toward his lips and the way she ground her body against him, he was pretty sure the top had been intentional. Before he could even try any of his patented Derek Morgan moves on her, she had her door open and was pulling him into the house. How did she do that without breaking the contact between their lips? This woman was beyond good. There were no words spoken as she led him up the stairs and for the second time in two nights he found himself in her bed with her. This time, however, there were clothes falling like rain around their feet and there was no reason not to give into this desire.