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I had no idea what else to say, so I just smiled too before sitting back in the seat and letting out a long sigh.

He followed suit, his knee knocking gently into mine, his large frame nearly too big for a stadium seat.

His knee was warm against my bare one, which was only just peeking out from beneath my pencil skirt – Dodger blue, of course.

And for a moment we might as well have been the only two people in the world, breathing in the slightly chillier than normal autumn air.

“That last at bat,” he murmured, his head turning toward me, drawing my eyes to his again.

“Your last at bat? The home run?”

“Yeah. What did that computer of yours say I was gonna do?”

“Not that you’d hit it out. I can’t predict things like that, but odds were over fifty percent that you’d barrel it, though, which is basically as good as those odds get.”

“Fifty/fifty shot, huh?”

“Not a bad way to end a career, with a World Series home run.”

“Not as good as a championship, though.”

“No. No, it’s not.”

“You’re supposed to say it’s okay, though, Sullivan.”

“Am I? Sorry, I don’t know the protocol.”

“It’s okay. Neither do I. Guess we’ll just have to figure it out together.”

“I lost one of these too, you know.”

“A World Series?”

“A championship,” I corrected him. “My senior year at Cal. We were an out away when that bitch from Oklahoma launched a homer and walked us off.”

“Brutal. I didn’t know you played.”

“You never asked.”

He had the good sense to seem abashed. “What position?” he asked, but realization dawned quickly. Like understands like. “Catcher.”

“Yeah. Anyway, it’s happened to me a lot. Runner-up at the Little League World Series and the California High School State Championships. Runner-up at ASA Gold Nationals. Runner-up at NCAA Championships and now . . .”

“Runner-up at the World Series,” he finished for me.

“Second-Place Sullivan,” I sing-song.

“No one calls you that.”

“I do, in my head.”

“Fuck,” he breathed out, “my therapist would have a field day with that.”

“Oh, mine does, believe me.”

His laugh is a deep, rumbling sound and I join him just as a breeze kicks up and I shiver against it. I left the jacket to my skirt suit up with Raúl and just the camisole from beneath it isn’t enough as the night grows ever darker.

“I should go.” I stood up with a soft sigh.

“I’ll walk you to your car.” He stands too, his eyes trained away from the field in what I assume is a deliberate attempt to stop looking at it.

“You don’t have to. Raúl usually—”

“If it’s okay, I’d . . . I don’t think I can walk out of here on my own.”

“Oh, right. Of course.”

The last time he’ll leave Dodger Stadium as a player after the last game of his career. That would mess me up too.

“C’mon then.”

He followed me back up through the suite exit, through the tunnels of the stadium, until we reached Raúl’s desk. Then, from somewhere inside the dark brown leather of his jacket, Charlie pulled out an envelope with the security guard’s name on it and handed it to him.

“Mr Avery, that’s unnecess—”

“No arguments,” Charlie cut him off, and grinned. “There’s a little extra in there, you know, for all the years.”

“You’re done?” Raúl asked, and for a moment the tough security guard, fifty if he’s a day, sounded like one of the little kids who line the edges of the stands before every game waiting for their favorite player to jog over during warm-ups to sign a baseball or a hat.

A lot of grown men felt like little boys once the news dropped.

But, in that moment, only the three of us knew for sure that Charlie Avery’s career was over.

“Thank you for everything,” Raúl said, extending his hand.

“Nah, thank you , man,” Charlie said, taking it and shaking it firmly.

The reserved parking lot that the players and front-office staff use is empty except for our cars. His Grand Wagoneer in the reserved spot in the first row, my Audi set way further back. Our job broke our hearts tonight, but it does pay well at the top.

He bypassed his car and followed me to mine, waiting patiently as I hung the jacket to my skirt suit up in the back seat and then put my things into the passenger side.

“Are you gonna be okay tonight?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he trailed off, before he leaned up against the side of my car and looked up into the sky, the stars obscured by the city lights beyond Chavez Ravine. “I was just thinking.”

“Don’t you let your gut do your thinking for you?”

It’s something he’d thrown at me more than once during our pre-game discussions. That his gut instinct was way more reliable than my algorithm.

“Who says I’m not now?”

“Fair enough, what is your gut thinking?”

“We don’t work together anymore.”

“No, technically your contract expired after the last out tonight.”

“I was just thinking about what I always wanted to do after one of our discussions.”

“I still wouldn’t call them that. Nuclear implosions I think is probably the closest I can . . .”

But I didn’t get a chance to finish the thought, because he kissed me.

Almost.

I’d always assumed Charlie Avery was the kind of guy who didn’t ask permission, who took what he wanted because he could, just like he did out on the field.

I was wrong.

Because in an empty stadium parking lot after the worst loss of his career, with one hand at my hip, the other gently cupping the back of my head, his mouth hovering just over mine, he whispered, “Can I?”

“Yes,” I whispered back, and he smothered the sound with the press of his lips to mine, firm and insistent, his hand tangling into my hair to tilt my head to the side as he deepened the contact.

His tongue nudged at my bottom lip and then flicked against mine as I opened up to him, my body following the same signals.

I pressed into him, his broad chest and strong thighs easily holding me up.

He spun us around, my car a solid surface at my back while I held on to his shoulders to keep my balance and surrendered myself to it, his hot mouth and his firm hands sending my heart into a frenzy, juxtaposed with how entirely safe I felt enveloped by him.

His lips never drifted from mine; his hands never explored places they weren’t welcome.

And then he was gone, pulling away, steadying me on my feet before striding away to his car, hands shoved into his pockets, shoulders hunched against the weight of whatever complicated cocktail of emotions were running through him, all while I tried to catch my breath.

It was just a kiss, but I’d never been so thoroughly ravished in my entire life.