Page 20

“This field isn’t that big,” he says, as he allows me to precede him into the row, settling down beside me and gesturing around us.

“So, that means fewer people to notice,” I counter.

“No, I mean, they’ll be able to see into the stands from the dugout.”

“I doubt they’ll be worrying about some random woman in the stands. They’ve got a game to play.”

“I promise you, the boys in that dugout are gonna notice you, anyone who looks in this general direction is gonna notice you. You gotta know that, right?”

Rolling my eyes at him, I say, “I don’t know any such thing.”

Charlie shifts in his seat, angling his shoulders as much as he can in the tight seat, not nearly as roomy as the cushioned luxury we enjoyed on the flight down.

He has to lift his elbow onto the plastic edge of the seat back to turn and face me.

Blue eyes steady and warm as his forearm brushes my shoulder just slightly.

“I don’t know how to say this, because I can’t imagine you don’t already know it, Sullivan, but you’re the most beautiful woman in every room you walk into.”

I want to say something clever, something flippant, about how we’re not even in a room, and how beauty is subjective – anything that doesn’t require me to actually deal with the way he’s looking at me and the words he just said. The only words I can manage are a murmured “Thank you.”

It’s odd. I’ve never wanted to be judged by how I look, but it’s been a while since a man offered a compliment that sincere.

Because he meant it. I can tell by the warmth in his eyes and the nod he gives me when I don’t protest. Though it seems like maybe he doesn’t know what to say now and it’s so odd to see him tongue tied that I determinedly break the silence.

“I’m at a ballpark to watch a baseball game. I need a hot dog and a beer,” I say, reaching into my bag and pulling out my card, waving it at him. “I buy, you fly?”

“Put the card away, Frankie,” he insists, before sliding from his seat and jogging back up the steps to the concourse to grab us food.

He’s gone before I can react to him actually using my name.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard him say it before, at least not while he was conscious.

Then again, on the plane it was Francesca .

That was indescribably hot, but this, just a casual Frankie, there was something more to that, something simple and easy about it, like he knows me.

And maybe he does, or at least maybe he’s starting to.

I busy myself with my phone, trying not to think too hard about what just happened, scrolling through messages, ignoring most of them and then my emails – nothing urgent there either.

What good is having a high-pressure job if it isn’t there to distract you from the extremely hot ex-major league star who just called you beautiful?

Something in my chest flutters pleasantly at the thought.

No. I decided last night that this couldn’t happen. Actually, I decided a long time ago. You don’t smash glass ceilings in professional sports by fantasizing about your colleagues. And that’s what he is. He’s a colleague. We basically have the exact same level of authority within the organization.

Clearly, it’s something that concerns him also. He said as much that last night in LA , that we didn’t work together anymore, and then he kissed me. So clearly that’s a line for him too.

We’re both adults. We’re both capable of controlling ourselves. And we’re here to do a job, because this is our job, even if right now we just look like two people out for a date night at the ballpark.

Even more so when he comes back a minute later laden down with a box of food, balancing two beers and a scorebook underneath it all. Oh, I should have told him to get me one too. Keeping score is an art form all its own and it’s been so long since I’ve been able to do it just for fun.

“I didn’t know what you liked on your hot dog,” he says, handing one off to me and then digging into his pocket for a fist full of packets. Mustard, ketchup, mayo, relish, and a little plastic cup of jalapenos. “ LA girls like a little kick, right?”

“We do,” I agree, trying desperately to keep the resolve I’d just managed to build up less than a minute ago.

Handsome. Confident. Thoughtful.

A far cry from the arrogant prick I faced down every day back in LA , even if he thought it was a sign of respect.

Retirement has been good for him.

“Can I ask you something?” I squeeze some deli mustard onto my hot dog, licking a bit off my fingers when I’m done.

He clears his throat and blinks at me, expression blank. “What?”

I don’t repeat myself, sure that he heard me. “Is it just for a championship?”

“What?”

“Are you only back for a championship? If we win it all this season, are you one and done?”

“I . . .” he starts, but then stops. “I hadn’t thought about it.”

“You signed a five-year contract.”

He shrugs. “It’s what my agent negotiated. As you’ve been more than happy to point out, I don’t need the money.”

“And so I ask again, are you just here for the ring? And then that’s it, back to retirement?”

“Maybe,” he says. “I’m not sure I really know.”

“Okay.”

I let it go, not sure if that should bother me or not.

If I should want him to stay and keep doing this with me or if these ridiculous butterflies that have followed us from Brooklyn to Bozeman and now Glendale could be unleashed if he called it quits after a year and we’d be free to explore what that might mean.

“Okay?” he asks. “Nothing else to say?”

“Not really anything else to say.”

“Unlike you,” he mutters, and I’m saved from having to come up with a zinger of my own when the public address announcer calls us all to our feet and asks us to remove our hats for a local kid singing the national anthem.

And when we do, both of us generally standing taller than the rest of the crowd, it’s easy to see the three kids in Brooklyn Eagles uniforms standing just outside the dugout steps beside each other, all three of their gazes locked directly on us.

Yeah, we’ve been spotted.

“Told you so,” Charlie mutters, out of the corner of his mouth, and I’m not mature enough to keep myself from elbowing his side sharply, grinning at the wheeze he lets out at the contact.

“I think they’re looking at you ,” I shoot back, and get a glare from two extremely patriotic looking older men in front of us as the kid wraps up with a slightly off-key and warbling and the home of the braaaaveeeeee.

He makes that sound again, that half tsk, half grunt, but I let it go this time because I’m still thinking about that question he didn’t answer.

Is this it for him? I’m trying to build something that lasts, a team that won’t just win one championship, but contend every year.

And somehow, in the last two weeks, Charlie Avery has become a part of that plan.

And maybe it’s too soon to worry about it, too early to let it take up even the smallest bit of space in my mind, but it’s there now and it’s too late to forget it.

I busy myself arranging the jalapenos on my hot dog and then dousing it with some more deli mustard, a combination that feels like an odd convergence of the old and new in my life, LA heat and New York spice. Half Dodger Dog, half Eagle Weiner.

I take a bite and feel the heat spark against my tongue. Nice. Then I look to my left and Charlie’s spreading ketchup across his hot dog.

“What are you doing?”

He stops and looks over at me. “Eating?”

“No, with that ketchup, and what is that, mayonnaise?”

“I’m putting it on my hot dog?”

“That hot dog is a travesty.”

“It’s how I’ve always had them.”

“You can take the Midwest out of the boy . . .”

“Okay, coastal elite snob,” he teases. “Don’t knock it until you try it.”

“That will not be anywhere near my mouth. I have standards.”

He lifts an eyebrow at me and I can actually feel the pink in my cheeks as I flush, and it only grows when his eyes flick down to my lips.

I release a shaky breath, but he clearly doesn’t care one bit for my sanity as he flicks his tongue against his bottom lip, still staring at mine.

I reach for my beer to take a long sip and keep my stupid mouth from talking me right into another awkward innuendo.

Oh thank God, warmups are done and Archie Esposito stands on the mound ready to throw the first pitch and get this game going.

“Here,” he says, reaching down to his feet and handing me the scorebook and a pen tucked inside the spiral binding.

“It’s for me?”

“I remember you used to keep a book during spring training.”

“You do?”

“You were always in the stands, even during the split squads, exhibitions, whatever. Hard not to notice.”

“It was my job.”

“No, it wasn’t. You had all the video and biometrics stuff recording. It wasn’t your job to sit there and keep score of a game that didn’t even count.”

“No, it wasn’t,” I agree, finally, not even sure why I didn’t want to admit it. “It makes me feel like I made it.”

He doesn’t seem to understand.

“When I was five, my dad taught me how to keep score sitting in front of the TV . And when I do it now, it’s like I’m talking to that little girl, telling her we made it.”

The umpire signals play ball.

Yeah, I made it.