Page 14

Chapter 14

Down Bad

Delilah

G oing into the top of the ninth, the game is tied.

“Never prayed for rain while watching my boys play,” Lorretta says quietly. “But last night, seeing them at each other when their dreams have both come true, not something a momma wants to experience again. So, here I am on a Sunday afternoon, praying for it to.” She pauses and gasps.

I follow her line of vision to the field.

There’s a rustle, a ripple of motion from the Jags’ dugout and, suddenly, a bunch of them are standing , which is weird. And then they move in perfect unison, like they’ve practiced this, and every single one of them lifts up their damn jerseys.

I blink.

No. No, they did not.

But they did.

Across four extremely bare, extremely athletic abdomens are words, painted in thick black marker.

Delilah Monroe’s Biggest Fans.

The crowd loses it.

And me? I just … freeze.

My entire train of thought derails so hard it bursts into flames. I let out this stupid, shocked half-gasp and cover my face with one hand like that’ll help.

Harlan’s laughing her fool head off, and Rae’s standing up, hands thrown in the air, screaming, “That’s my best friend!”

Dawson gives me two slow, dramatic finger guns. AJ winks— winks!

My mouth is wide open.

I glance toward the Terrors’ dugout and, yep, Damien’s standing there, arms crossed, jaw tight, looking like he wants to launch himself across the field and throw four grown men into the Delaware River.

I don’t know if I want to laugh or combust. Instead, I give him heart hands, and his lips twitch. He doesn’t smile. Doesn’t blink. But I can see it. That low smoldering, that heat. It makes my uterus—that may be bruised—quiver.

One out. Two on. Damien strides out, bat in hand, shoulders loose, eyes locked in. There’s this calm in how he moves, a sexy confidence, not cocky conceit.

My heart’s already racing, and not just because of the scoreboard.

He steps up to the plate. The pitcher winds up. And when the crack of the bat splits the air, it’s like thunder in my chest.

The ball soars. Fast. Far. Gone.

Both runners take off, flying for home. The stands erupt as they cross the plate, and Damien’s rounding first with that fierce, focused look on his face, like nothing exists except the dirt beneath his cleats and the fire in his swing.

I don’t even realize I’m on my feet, screaming his name, hands cupped around my mouth, and the reality of this, the fake part, has never felt more real.

I’m falling.

***

Dawson’s last at-bat seals their fate.

The Terrors lose by one.

One.

The Jags storm the field like they just won the World Series. Confetti. Screaming. Dawson literally crowd-surfs across his teammates. AJ blows another kiss toward our box. It’s a lot.

And Damien—God, Damien—stands there with his jaw tight, eyes dark, gripping the brim of his cap like it’s the only thing keeping him together.

It should’ve been a win.

And I know— I know it’s ridiculous, but the second the final out hit, the thought slammed into my brain with the force of a foul ball.

We slept together the night before. I jinxed him. My vagina is a curse.

I haven’t said it out loud. Yet, here at O’Donnell’s pub, amongst Jags fans, I’m thinking it so hard it might as well be printed on my forehead.

Jags players and fans are doing shots. Damien is smiling at the bar with his parents, Dawson, and more of the team doing one, too. A few of the Terrors players came, too. But they’re playing pool, nursing beers and bruised egos.

Rae, Harlan, and I claimed a booth near the back, trying to blend in.

I’m poking at a plate of fries like they personally offended me.

“I’m just saying,” I mutter. “It’s a little suspicious that the Jags won. ”

Harlan sips her lemonade. “You mean the fact that the Jags had five stolen bases and your boyfriend’s second baseman tripped over his own cleat?”

“No,” I whisper. “I mean … what happened the night before. ”

Rae gasps with my admission. “ You think it was the sex? ”

“Keep your voice down!”

Harlan chokes on her drink.

Rae’s eyes are already glittering with glee. “You think Miss Thang hexed the team?”

“I didn’t say that?—”

“You implied it!” She laughs a little too damn loudly.

Harlan’s trying to hold it together. She’s really trying. “You think your … your hoo-ha is, like, career-ending?”

“ I’m not saying that! ”

“But you’re also not not saying it,” Rae says then flags down the waitress. “She needs tequila. She thinks she’s cursed.”

“I do not think I’m cursed!”

“You said ‘vagina bad luck,’” Rae says like she’s reporting the weather.

“I did not use those exact words.”

Then Damien walks up to the table, all hot, muscley, and quiet eyes. He looks tired.

“Hey,” he says, soft and low.

And then Rae, angel of chaos that she is, grins wide and says, “We were just talking about how Lala thinks her vagina jinxed your game.”

Silence.

Harlan turns to stone, fry halfway to her mouth, and I consider slinking under the table.

Damien blinks. “I’m sorry … what now? ”

I slap both hands over my face. “ Rae. ”

“What?” She shrugs, totally unbothered. “You did.”

Damien’s mouth twitches like he’s trying really hard not to laugh. “So … I lose one game, and now your body is cursed?”

“I was spiraling, okay?”

He leans in, arms braced on the table, eyes locked on mine with that wicked gleam. “Then we better test the theory again. Just to be sure.”

Harlan shrieks. Rae actually falls over in the booth.

And me? I throw a fry at him and inform my sister and best friend, “I’ll never tell either of you anything again.”

He walks away, and I catch him looking back, still smiling.

When he returns, it’s with his parents, and all hexed hoo-ha talk is gone, because as ridiculous as it is, it’s a real fear.

When it’s even more clear Rae is not herself, an effect of her meds mixed with too much drink, we say our goodbyes.

***

Damien:

You asleep?

The Uber event—a drunken confession from Rae—plays in my head, and I half-hoped we wouldn’t have to do this now, but it involves him, too.

Me:

Eyes wide open.

Damien:

Got something heavy I don’t wanna carry to bed. Need to share it with you. Come over?

Me:

Give me a couple minutes to make my escape.

Damien gives it a thumbs-up.

Brushing my teeth, I overthink the thumbs-up. His first emoji response feels passive-aggressive. Did he mean that? Does he even know that? I mean … ugh .

***

He opens the door, and I feel my heart do this little skip when I see him. Not because he’s in a towel or shirtless. No, it’s worse. He’s in sweats and a worn gray tee, the kind that clings just right and smells like sleep and a little bit like cedar.

“Have a seat?” he says, nodding toward the couch.

“Okay,” I murmur, stepping inside.

He doesn’t turn on any lights, just the faint glow from streetlights behind us illuminates the room.

I sit, but he doesn’t. He stays standing, leaning back against the wall like it’s holding him up. Like he’s bracing for something.

But before he can say a word, I lift my hand.

“Wait. Let me go first.”

His brow furrows, but he nods once.

I take a breath then another. “Rae saw the NDA in my DocuSign. We share an account and … yeah.” I exhale. “She’ll never say a word, but we were in the Uber when she whispered it to me, and she’s, well, she’s not feeling great, and it may be me being sensitive and all, but it was more a stage whisper, and?—”

“A stage whisper?”

“Like you do onstage when pretending to whisper.”

He nods his understanding.

I continue, “Harlan heard, but I don’t think the driver did. I just wanted you to know. She feels awful, and I will not make her feel worse.” I shrug. “So …” And I leave it at that.

Damien curses under his breath, dragging a hand through his hair.

“I was gonna tell you. After the show. After the series. After everything.” My voice cracks, but I power through it. “But yeah, I didn’t wanna go to bed with that, either.”

He stares at me, unmoving, and then he walks toward me, slow and quiet, and drops onto the couch like the weight’s finally too much to carry on his feet.

The silence between us stretches, but I bet he can hear my damn heart beating so hard it may pop out.

“I don’t listen to music,” he says suddenly. “Not since I was eighteen. Not since Sally.”

I nod.

“She was my girlfriend, the one Ty …” He shrugs. “Well, you got all that the other night.”

I nod.

“Choir girl. Wild laugh. Always barefoot in the grass. She got sick; died soon after I left for the minors.”

“Damien …” I whisper so softly he doesn’t hear it and continues.

“Before she broke up with me, she showed up outside my window, demanding I pick our song. I had no idea what she meant. She got pissed, explained, and I told her to pick it since music was her thing.”

He shakes his head. “In a small town, the three of us were always rubbing elbows, and it was good. Ty was so good to her, gave her all that I didn’t. But she would hum this tune all the damn time when he wasn’t around. Never told him. Didn’t need to ruin that for them. They were our class couple in the yearbook kind of love.” He takes my hand. “The kind you sing about. The kind baseball would never allow.”

My heart sinks a little.

“Less than a week after she died, I heard that same tune, the one she hummed, on the radio. She’d picked our song.”

My eyes fill with tears.

“Haunted me, fucked with my head, my heart, so bad the first time I came home, I visited her grave to tell her I should have given her a better song to hum.”

Big, fat tears roll down my cheek, and he turns to me, takes my face in his hands, and swipes them away.

“And this, Songbird”—he shakes his head—“is why I don’t listen to music.”

He’s calling us off, in a way that will scar my heart.

“But today, when you were singing with that kid, and then Tris, all these big feels you put into those songs, it fucked with me.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“No, don’t you be sorry about that.” He smiles softly. “Because I won’t be sorry that I picked our song before you didn’t even ask me to.”

“What?” I sniff. “Our?—”

“‘Tennessee Whiskey.’” He smiles. “That’s our song, and not because of a fake relationship, but because this hasn’t been fake since I chased a girl for the first time and did it down Broadway.”

I must be pulling a face because he laughs. “You’re making that what’s-an-orgasm face again.”

“You shush,” I say, swiping at my tears.

“I wanna ask you to be my real girlfriend, Delilah,” he says sweetly. “I want us to break the curse that seems to plague people who chase dreams like you and I do, or get too busy making ends meet that they lose what matters. Not just schedule our dates in, but make each other a priority, make it work when you’re on the road, living your dream, sharing all those feelings, telling stories with that beautiful voice, the one that healed something in me I never knew could be fixed.”

“I—”

“I want a love like my parents have with you.”

“Damien,” I whisper.

“Don’t say it’s too soon to want that, because that’s bullshit. I’m living proof. And don’t say you don’t believe in that, because you sing songs about people like us daily.”

When I open my mouth to reply, and he attempts to cut me off again, I kiss him—hard. Like I’ve been holding it back for too long. Like this is real, ’cause it is.

His hands are on my waist in seconds, pulling me onto his lap, the kiss deepening into something wild, and slow, and starving . His mouth moves against mine with this perfect blend of control and hunger, like he’s memorizing the taste of a feeling he thought he’d never let himself have again.

He exhales into my neck. “Need an answer, Songbird?”

“For real?” I ask, sliding off his lap.

“Delilah?”

“We can’t have sex,” I say as I kneel down between his thick, muscular thighs and look up. “Is that a what’s-Delilah-doing-on-her-knees … all sexy, confused face you’re pulling?”

To that, his lips twist up as he tries to pull me back up. “Trust me; your pussy is not bad luck. It’s a blessing. And don’t tell Mom this, but it’s now my favorite dessert.”

I still don’t budge.

“Sweetheart, the Jags outplayed us. Amais Steel’s last bat fucked us as hard as I’m planning to do … my girl?”

I hook my thumbs in the waistband of his sweats and lick my lips, taking in what I’m about to get my mouth around. It’s the kind of thing that should come with a warning. Maybe a permit. “As good as that all sounds,” I breathe, “I think you bruised my uterus.” The thought of his massive—yes, massive—dick makes my knees unsteady.

“You win, we celebrate. You lose, you need incentive.” I yank his pants down. No undies, and his huge—yes, I’m repeating myself here, but I mean it—huge dick springs up, slapping me right on the lips with perfect precision. The shock makes me gasp.

“Sorry,” he says as his head falls back. He tries to hide a laugh by scrubbing his hand over his face.

“Well, hello there. You miss me?” I wrap my hand around the base like I’m introducing myself for the first time. My fingers barely touch around his shaft. It’s like gripping a Louisville Slugger. “This is a big bat you’re swinging.”

“You cannot be fucking real,” he groans then shudders when my tongue slides over the head, and the way he breathes in deep and ragged, applause.

“That feel real?” I mutter, tracing the bottom of his length and licking up a bead of precum. I know the answer, but I want to hear him say it, beg for it.

“Fuuuck yes.” He practically chokes on the words, as if I’ve punched him in the gut. He groans, and it does something to the air—makes it hum between us.

I lock eyes with him and almost pinch myself because he’s looking down at me with a kind of reverence that doesn’t match the dirty things we’re doing. It rattles me in a way I never expected.

This man, this … cock.

Stroking him, I take in each reaction he makes. It’s unbelievably sexy the way he’s losing it, and I savor every moment, love every second that I have this effect on him, that my hand is on his rock-hard dick doing this.

I watch him fall apart as if it’s a show made for me alone and only I have a ticket, as the tiniest movements of my fingers make him tense, and shiver, and gasp.

His fists are clenched, pressing into the cushion, muscles straining against skin. His jaw is tight like it takes everything he has not to yell out, like the smallest sound might give me too much power. But I can tell he’s ready to break.

A small noise grits through his teeth, and he closes his eyes and gives in, lets go, just for me.

It’s the kind of victory I’d high-five myself for, but I’m a little busy.

I shiver at the sight of him losing control, the way it affects me …

After swallowing him, I lean back on my heels, running the back of my hand under my chin in case I have a little something left behind.

He cranes his neck to meet my eyes. “I didn’t mean to go so deep,” he murmurs, his voice all soft, deep, and sweet.

I almost believe he feels bad about it. But not quite.

His hand rests casually on my jaw, half-cupping my cheek like he doesn’t plan to move it anytime soon, his thumb sliding across my lower lips softly.

“Stay,” he whispers.

“They’re leaving in the morning.”

He forces a laugh. “When we’re sharing a house, they’ll have to have a space. I don’t like you leaving when I know you belong.”

Oh. My. God.