Page 115 of Last Fall

“I was too but once Lily and Scott joined the project everything has gone light speed ahead. I told them in the future we need more of aheads-up.”

“Yeah thank you. Forward me the details and I’ll get my travel plans squared away.” LA and movies still seemed kind of imaginary. I had a feeling after next week it be a lotmorereal.

The sliding glass door behind me slid open and closed. Warm lips caressed my cheek as strong arms surrounded me. Ileanedback.

“Thanks for understanding, Zoe. And tell Erik I said good luck. You can say that to ballplayers, right? It’s not bad luck like intheater?”

I turned to the man in question. “Maggie saysgoodluck.”

He kissed my cheek again. “Thank youMaggie.”

Maggie giggled. “Talk to youlater.”

I ended the call. “Timetogo?”

“Yep. What was Maggie callingabout?”

“Turns out I’m going to make a quick trip to LA for themovie.”

“Now?” His arms tensedaroundme.

“No. Maggie’s sending me the dates. Week after next. I might miss a couple ofgames.”

“No problem.” He spun me around. “You have big dreams too. It’s part ofourdeal.”

He had no idea how sexy that made him so I decided to show him with a muchdirtierkiss.

Jack knocked on the glass behind us. “Come on, Lovebirds.Let’sgo!”

“You have a game to win.” I kissed him once moreforluck.

“How can we lose with you there to cheeruson?”

* * *

Turnsout winning was not as easy as Erik predicted. In fact, they were very much in danger of being eliminated. It all came down to the final game. They had home field advantage but the entire series had been ugly, filled with trash talking, injuries, and games going into extra innings. I wasn’t expecting tonight to be anydifferent.

I sat between Carrie and Bernice. Erik’s brothers and their wives sat in front of us. I’d never been so grateful for Carrie’s friendship than I had been this last week. Without her by my side I didn’t know how I would have made it through so many tensegames.

“Shit,” she swore two batters into the fourthinning.

“What?”

“Wes ismouthingoff.”

I squinted but from our position I couldn’t see anything other than Wes squatting behind home plate. “How doyouknow?”

“See how his right shoulder keeps dropping? He does that when he’s talking. And you see the batter? How he’s glaring downatWes?”

Oh...Now that she pointed it out I could see it all. I was going to have to get better at reading player’s ticks if I wanted to keep up. “It’s stillearly.”

“Exactly,” she muttered, slinking down in the seat. “This game is going to end inblood.”

I really hoped she didn’t mean actualblood.

But as the game progressed I started to wonder. I could see June checking players in the dugout. One got tangled up with the catcher sliding across home plate, another was bleeding after a collision with a third baseman. The Phoenix players weren’t faring anybetter.

The trash talking got worse. The Mantas even started out of the dugout at one point in the eighth. Erik managed to keepthemcalm.