The copper valley fireba.., p.1
The Copper Valley Fireballs Complete Series: A Baseball Romcom Box Set, page 1
THE COPPER VALLEY FIREBALLS
THE COMPLETE SERIES
PIPPA GRANT
Jock Blocked © 2020
Real Fake Love © 2020
The Grumpy Player Next Door © 2021
Irresistible Trouble © 2022
Have Yourself a Grumpy Little Christmas © 2022
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever, including the training of artificial intelligence, without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. All text in this book was generated by Pippa Grant without use of artificial intelligence.
Pippa Grant®, Copper Valley Fireballs®, and Copper Valley Thrusters® are registered trademarks of Bang Laugh Love LLC.
Editing by Jessica Snyder, HEA Author Services
Cover Image Copyright © Miguel Anxo
CONTENTS
Jock Blocked
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Epilogue
Bonus Epilogue
Real Fake Love
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Epilogue
Bonus Epilogue
The Grumpy Player Next Door
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Epilogue
Bonus Epilogue
Irresistible Trouble
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Epilogue
Bonus Epilogue
Have Yourself a Grumpy Little Christmas
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Epilogue
Before You Go
Sneak Peek of Until It Was Love
Pippa Grant Book List
About the Author
JOCK BLOCKED
COPPER VALLEY FIREBALLS #1
1
Mackenzie Montana, aka a woman on a mission
I never meant to become a criminal. But in the grand scheme of life, I don’t think I’m technically engaging in criminal behavior.
At least, if it is, you could call it a crime of passion.
And I am very passionate in my belief that while the Fireballs need to make changes to halt their record-breaking streak of being the worst losing team ever to play professional baseball, they don’t need to do it with a new mascot. Which is why I decided to take two weeks off work and fly to Florida for spring training, where I’m not saying that I’ve snuck into my home team’s ballpark after hours to steal the worst proposed mascot costume, but I’m not saying I haven’t either.
Meatballs?
They actually let a meatball make the final cut.
I needed at least another full season to get over the fact that the new Fireballs ownership killed the last mascot, and here they are, letting fans vote on replacing Fiery the Dragon with flaming meatballs.
I snort to myself while I creep through the darkened concrete hallways with a flaming meatball swallowing half of my body.
If you’re going to steal a giant meatball costume, it’s best to act like you know what you’re doing. And striding out of here with zero shame means two things—one, no one’s going to stop me, and two, even if they do, I’m incognito.
It’s the perfect crime to counter the crime of killing Fiery.
I’m one turn away from the door that I left propped open for myself after hiding out in the family bathroom after today’s game when voices drift toward me.
One male.
One female.
Neither is familiar, but as I get closer to my final turn, I realize the voices are between me and my exit.
No biggie.
I got this.
I can stroll on by, flash a thumbs-up, pretend like I’m heading out to prank the Fireballs at the team compound they’re all staying at, or to make a fast-food run for publicity.
Acting like I know what I’m doing inside this mascot costume is as easy as breathing. When you’ve seen thousands of baseball games in your lifetime, it’s not hard.
So I turn the corner.
And then I suck in a surprised breath, because that’s Brooks Elliott.
Oh. My. God.
Brooks Elliott.
The Fireballs’ newest acquisition. Like, so new he arrived yesterday. A mid-spring training acquisition, which is practically unheard of.
He plays third base, and he hits the ball like it’s evil incarnate and he’s an avenging angel and it’s his job to send that evil into another dimension.
He could be the reason we legitimately have a shot at making it to the post-season.
And I am not going to hyperventilate like I did the last time I was face-to-face with a baseball player.
Pretending to be a mascot?
I got this.
Talking to the players?
It’s like talking to the gods.
Tall, muscled, chiseled gods who put on a show for me every day from spring to fall with their acrobatics on the field and their powerful swings at home plate.
I’ve had the chance to be in the same room with several of the players in the past two years, and every time, I do the same thing.
I turn mute and make an utter fool of myself, because I cannot talk to gods.
My breath is coming short and choppy, so I give mysel
Brooks is in jeans that fit his muscular thighs like a second skin, with his arms bulging under a tight black T-shirt featuring a bull in a leather jacket smoking a cigarette on a motorcycle. And his forearms.
Oh, god, baseball forearms.
They’re lethal to women’s panties everywhere, because baseball forearms.
He’s leaning a shoulder against the cinderblock wall, aiming smoky hazel eyes and an orgasm-inducing smile at one of the janitor ladies in a blue smock, who’s giggling, because of course she is.
That smile is so potent, I can feel it through this costume. I want to be that smock just to be closer to the smolder.
Alas, even if my tongue worked when I’m around baseball players, Brooks Elliott is off-limits.
He’s a virgin.
Intentionally.
According to my very reliable sources, when he tries to score with the ladies, he doesn’t score on the field. And I very much need him to score on the field for my team this year.
Work, I silently order my legs, and look at that.
They’re moving. With a bounce, even, because that’s how a meatball mascot in a Fireballs jersey would move.
Huh. If my nine-to-five trash engineer job thing ever fails, maybe I can get a job as a baseball mascot.
But not the meatball mascot.
If I had to pick a new mascot—which I’m not, because I’m running the Bring Back Fiery campaign—I’d angle for the firefly, because at least it has fire in it naturally. I get why the duck is in the running after that thing with the ducks at Duggan Field—the Fireballs’ regular season stadium back in my home city of Copper Valley, Virginia—but the echidna is strange and not at all related to baseball, or fire, and even if his spiky hands are sort of threatening and cool, no one even knows what an echidna is.
Not in this hemisphere, anyway.
Plus you don’t want to know what the internet is saying about echidna penis. You really don’t.
In short, the Fireballs need to bring back Fiery the Dragon, which is my number one mission this year.
“So, you wanna go get a room?” Brooks says to his companion. His eyes dart to me, then back to the janitor lady.
She reaches out and strokes his chest. “Oh, yes.”
Wait.
What’s this?
And I’m not talking about the fact that she’s twice his age, which I didn’t notice until I was nearly right on top of them.
I’m talking about how she’s angling in like she’s going to kiss him, murmuring things in Spanish that I can’t understand because I’m only fluent in English, baseball, and drag queen, and how he’s tucking his arm around her waist like he’s going to press her against him.
Did I say bringing back Fiery was my number one mission?
Not anymore.
“Oh my god, stop!” I shriek.
They both jump.
Naturally, because a talking meatball isn’t normal. First rule of being a mascot is that you stay silent.
“Uh, are you okay?” Brooks’s hazel eyes scan me—or rather, the meatball—and even though my vision is a little dark from peering through the costume, I’m still getting a hot flash from him looking at me.
Which isn’t relevant, because he just invited this woman old enough to be his mother to GO GET A ROOM.
“No!” I shriek. “You’re hitting on her!”
His face goes adorably pink. His thick brown hair’s standing up like he ran his fingers through it after a shower, and gah, it is so working for me.
He murmurs something to the janitor and turns to fully face me. “Who are you, and what are you doing?” he hisses.
I point at him. At the growing bulge in his pants that has me getting warm, and not from being half-encased in a flaming meatball. “What am I doing? How about what are you doing? Because it looks like you’re going to try to have sex with her!”
She stutters something and backs farther away from him.
“That’s none of your damn business,” he growls.
“But if you lose your virginity, you’ll never be able to hit a ball again.”
The janitor lady gasps and crosses herself, then scurries down the hall.
And Brooks goes from cute and pissed-off pink to redder than a flaming meatball in the cheeks. After a split second of freezing so hard I swear he creates his own gravitational pull, he looks back at the janitor, who’s slipping out my escape route, then turns to prowl toward me like a leopard barely containing its fury. “Who the hell are you?”
“I’m Meaty the Meatball.”
“Take your head off.”
“No.”
“Take. Your fucking. Head. Off.”
This is where I should really run. Or call my best friend. Or the Fireballs’ owner, who happens to be a good friend of mine, and who didn’t listen to reason when I told him the meatball was a bad idea, which is why I have to do this even if it means I’ll lose a friend.
But I’m talking to a baseball player.
For the first time in my life, I’m talking to a baseball player without hyperventilating.
I back down the hall. “You’re trying to sabotage the Fireballs.”
“They’re the worst team in baseball. There’s nothing left to sabotage.”
“Last year’s team was the worst team in baseball. Which is why you’re here now. To make them better. And you can’t do that if you have sex.”
“Who told you that?”
I try to clamp a hand over my mouth and end up knocking myself in the meatball instead. I can’t tell him where I heard about his virginity.
That really wouldn’t be nice.
“I have my sources.” I’m backpedaling hard now, but I don’t have eyes in the back of my head—even though the damn meatball does—and I stumble over a water fountain sticking out of the wall. “And aren’t you supposed to be at the compound with the rest of the team? Why aren’t you getting your rest? Don’t you have catching up to do with arriving so late? When’s the last time you ate?”
It’s not often I need to shut up around a baseball player, but I really need to shut up now. And run. Not that I have any faith at all that I can outrun him, because hello, baseball gods can run fast, but I can make enough racket that possibly some security would hear me.
