Reaching First (7 page)

Ten days. That sounded like forever.

She locked her knees and stood straight. Ten days was exactly the break they needed. Ten days would remind both of them what they had to do together, what they had to accomplish. “I shouldn’t keep you, then. You’ll have to get up early, to get to the airport.”

She wanted him to correct her, to say he wasn’t in any rush. He had plenty of time before he had to meet up with the team.

He shoved his hands in his pockets and turned on his heel, walking down the steps like a man on a mission.
 

“Hey,” she called out. Only the fact that he froze let her know he was as unsteady as she was. “Thanks for dinner.”

He shook his head. “You’re welcome.” And he hurried to the car before either of them could say something else they’d regret.

He didn’t start the engine, though, until she took her key from her purse. He waited for her to fit the metal into the finicky lock. He watched as she pulled the door to her, turning with the well-practiced twist that released the tumblers. She felt his eyes as she extracted the key, as she opened the door, as she crossed over the threshold and into the cool darkness of the deserted house.

Only after she closed the door did he key the ignition. The low rumble sounded unhappy, dissatisfied. Or maybe that was only the vibration in her thighs, reporting back to her that she’d made a foolish mistake.

She slid down the length of the door until she sat on the floor, her head leaning back against the wood. Staring into the living room, she was haunted by the gaping space that had once held Aunt Minnie’s shelves, the woodwork that Tyler had ripped out that very morning.

She knew she’d done the right thing, sending him home. She’d been the grown-up. The responsible one. Just as she always was.

Then why did it feel like something inside of her was breaking?

On Thursday evening, the Rockets played in Chicago, losing a heartbreaker in the bottom of the ninth. Emily thought about calling Tyler to offer her condolences, but she wasn’t sure exactly what she’d say. And she wasn’t sure exactly how he’d answer. But she stayed awake until three in the morning, planning all the conversations they could have had.

On Friday night, the game went into extra innings. When the marathon ended with another Chicago win at one in the morning, Emily could barely keep her eyes open, much less sound witty and entertaining over the phone. If, that was, she even called Tyler. Which she knew she shouldn’t do. Couldn’t do. Wouldn’t do.

On Saturday afternoon, Chicago swept the series, vanquishing the Rockets in a devastating game that barely lasted two hours. Emily watched as the camera panned over the ballplayers’ faces. It lingered on Tyler, who had failed to even get on base. His shoulders slumped as he dragged himself off-screen, into the clubhouse, she assumed. She wanted to call, but she couldn’t imagine what she could say that would make a difference.
 

As part of their grueling schedule, the team had the nationally televised Sunday night game, against St. Louis. Emily told herself she couldn’t watch. She felt like she’d been the source of all the team’s bad luck. They’d certainly begun to slump the instant she started scrutinizing their games.

But she couldn’t help herself. She turned on the TV, keeping it as background noise while she worked on the Minerva House website. And somehow, the Rockets’ luck turned. The team seemed to have been refreshed by its flight from the Windy City. The players were energetic, enthusiastic, and they won by an easy five runs.

Before she had a chance to talk herself out of it, she picked up her phone and dashed off a text to Tyler. “Great Game! Hope the rest of the road trip goes as well!” She added her name and hit Send, then told herself to get back to work. It wasn’t like the guy was standing by, waiting for her message. It wasn’t like he was going to text her back from the locker room.

Her phone rang.

Her pulse soared when she saw the call was from Tyler. With the second ring, she asked herself what she was doing.
She
was the one who’d sent him packing the week before.
She
was the one who had promised to be mature about this whole thing, to be the adult. With the third ring, she thought about burying the phone beneath the couch cushions, drowning out the ringtone so she could pretend she’d never heard the call.

She answered before the fourth ring. “Hey,” she said.

“Emily?” He sounded surprised. There was a lot of noise behind him, the shouts of men, the bustle, she assumed, of the locker room after the game.

“Um, yeah.” She squinched up her eyes, regretting her impetuous text now more than ever.

“How did you get this number?” His voice had turned hard. Angry.

“From the paperwork,” she said. “The forms you filled out with the court.”

“Dammit,” he muttered. “Just a second.” As she winced at his exasperation, the chaos around him dropped out. He must have found some private office, closed some door. “Sorry,” he said. “I really hate texting. I figured I’d return your call instead.”

“I just wanted to congratulate you on a great game,” she said. “I won’t keep you.”

“I don’t mind being kept.” Did he have any idea what that little growl did to her? His tone—forget about his words!—tightened every muscle in her belly. She ran her fingers through her hair, grateful he couldn’t see the flush that heated her cheeks. “Where are you?” he asked. “What are you doing?”

She was sitting at her desk, blinking at a computer screen, wearing a ragged T-shirt and faded pajama bottoms. “I’m upstairs. In bed,” she said, surprising herself with the lie.

“I haven’t been upstairs.”

Well, what had she expected? Of course there was a teasing note in his voice. She’d practically announced she was wearing her best lingerie, sprawled across a dozen pillows, licking her lips as she prepared to tell him all the wicked things she’d do with him if he were there.

Which he wasn’t. And which she couldn’t do, even if he were.

She sat straight in her chair and cleared her throat. “You should get back to the team,” she said. “I shouldn’t have called.”

“You didn’t,” he reminded her, with enough insinuation that she caught her breath.

But she shook her head. “Nothing’s changed since Wednesday. This is still a bad idea.”

“Don’t I get a vote on that?”

“Maybe later. After you’re through with your service.”

“There are all sorts of services I can provide.”

God. With that tone thrumming through her, she had no problem imagining
exactly
what he meant. “Tyler…” she breathed. And then, because she knew she was right: “Please.”

He waited for nearly a minute, the silence stretching between them until it was a tangible thing. And then he said, “All right, beautiful. Have it your way. Goodnight.”

She swallowed hard, trying to wash away the sparkle of excitement his whisper raised down his spine. “Goodnight,” she said. And she hung up the phone before she could change her mind, before she could undo all her hard work with a single flirtatious phrase.
 

But that didn’t keep her from replaying the entire conversation in her head, over and over and over again.
Beautiful
. No one had ever called her that. Not like Tyler had. Not like Tyler meant. The word tickled inside her, making her smile, even as she told herself she was being ridiculous. She fell asleep wishing she’d made a very different decision.

* * *

He was slipping into the rhythms of the new team. He was starting to understand the unspoken language of the club—when Coach was swallowing anger, when he was merely being quiet. Tyler’d already figured out the bonds between most of the guys—who was always up for a few hands of poker to unwind after the game, who was going to order the first round of drinks in the hotel bar, who was going to slip away early, shrugging and saying he had to call his wife, talk to his kids.

But that feeling of belonging didn’t keep him from reaching out for Emily after Monday’s game. He called and let the phone ring four times before it slipped over to voicemail. Just to be certain, he dialed again, but she didn’t pick up.

He couldn’t be certain, of course, but he could picture her sitting in her office. She had a pen in one hand and was tapping it against her bottom lip. She was staring at the phone, that tiny smile firming up her lips as she shook her head and arched her eyebrows.

She was doing what was right. What was proper. And damn, if that didn’t drive him totally batshit. He shuffled off to the showers, then took a cab back to the hotel. The guys were already hanging out in the bar. He considered it a victory that he settled for two beers and didn’t call her again.

But he tried again on Tuesday. And on Wednesday, he refused to give up. Every fifteen minutes, he hit the redial button, determined to talk to her, even if he had to wake her out of a deep sleep.

She answered on the fifth try. “I shouldn’t be doing this,” she said.

His throat went dry as cotton. This was worse than asking some cheerleader to the high-school prom. This was as bad as being asked to read out loud in class, before he’d found a way to ditch the classes that would put him on the spot, before his teachers had decided to just let him go.

He cleared his throat and said, “I thought you were avoiding me.”

She hesitated, for long enough that he thought the call might have been disconnected. “I was,” she said at last. “But I’m not now.”

“Good.” He closed his eyes, and he could picture her, sitting across the table from him at Artie’s. He could hear her laughing at one of his stories, felt his easy relaxation as he’d responded to one of hers.

There were a dozen things he wanted to ask her. What was she wearing? Had she dreamed about him, the way he’d dreamed about her? Did the fact that they were talking turn her on, make her feel like—

She’d never pick up the phone again if he said any of those things. So he settled for, “How’d the meeting go with what’s-his-name? Aunt Minnie’s bulldog?”

“Oh!” He’d surprised her. And he discovered that her little gasp of astonishment was almost as fulfilling as all the other sounds he wanted to coax out of her. “You remembered!”

Who was he kidding? Surprising her wasn’t one hundredth of what he wanted to do with her. Or rather, it was
everything
he wanted to do with her—but not by asking about her crazy aunt’s will.

“Mr. Samson was pleased with the progress we’ve made. All of the demo is done.”

“Listen to you,” he said, laughing. “You sound like a pro.”

He could picture her proud smile as she said, “I drew up a schedule. Showed him how everything can get done on time, with you helping out. He signed off on that. And I think he was actually impressed by my flyers.”

“Who
wouldn’t
be impressed by your flyers?” It was a stupid thing to say. A ridiculous joke. But he heard her amused laugh, and he was pretty sure she was blushing.

Nevertheless, she stuck to business when she replied, saying something about the publicity she was planning, about ads she was placing in the local newspaper. After meeting with what’s-his-name, she’d met with her accountant. She had another meeting with one of the bigwigs at the university tomorrow.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I must be boring you to tears.”

“Never,” he said, and he was surprised to realize he meant it. “I can’t believe how much you’ve done in such a short time. You’re good at this.”

“I’m not,” she protested. “I’m only doing this because they fired me from my last job.”

He heard the bitterness in her voice, practically
felt
her wince. “You were laid off. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I know they say that whenever people are laid off. But no one else was let go in the rest of the office. They didn’t kick anybody else out. I just keep thinking about my clients, about the women I was supposed to help.”

“You did help them as much as you could, for the time you were given. And now you’re helping even more people with Minerva House.”

He thought he heard her sniff. Shit. He’d been trying to make things better, but he’d made her cry instead. But she said, “Thank you. I hadn’t thought about it that way.”

He made his voice as gentle as he could. “You should. You should be easier on yourself.”

Yeah. She was definitely crying. Dammit. “Or what?” she whispered.

“Or I’ll catch the next plane out of Kansas City and come home to repeat it until you decide to listen to me.”

Home
. Raleigh wasn’t home. Not yet. But she didn’t know that. She said, “Is that a promise?”

“Do you want it to be one?” He caught his breath, waiting for her answer.

“Yes,” she said. “I do.”

God, he wanted to be on that plane. He couldn’t do it. They both knew that. He had to settle for saying, “It’s late back there. Go to bed. Get some sleep. And things’ll be better in the morning.”

“They’re already better now.”

The words filled him with pride. This wasn’t the easy accomplishment that came from the game, from hitting a ball over the fence, from digging for a nearly-impossible catch and coming up clean, with the ball in his glove.

Hearing Emily’s words, picturing her smile, was like sex. Like he’d played her body, found the specific things that drove her wild, made her shout his name as she came harder than she’d ever come before.

But he’d done it without laying a finger on her. He’d done it without giving in to the dozens of dirty dreams she’d given him for the past week. And there was something about that power, about that
trust
that made him want to solve all her problems for the rest of her life.

“Good night,” he whispered, because he didn’t trust himself with what he’d just discovered.

“Good night.”
 

They both laughed when neither of them hung up the phone.

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said.

“I’ll be waiting.”

He counted to three, and this time, they both hung up.

So he called her on Thursday. Friday and Saturday too. They talked about the games he’d played, about a problem Will was having with the floorboards, about reserving a power sander to finish the job. They talked like they’d known each other for years instead of for weeks. And when Saturday night turned over to Sunday morning, when they were both biting back yawns and pretending they weren’t talking through set jaws, she said, “Come over here tomorrow. After you get home.”