Page 45 of Pitcher Perfect (Big Shots #4)

In a way, I deserve this, don’t I?

That was Robbie’s first thought upon seeing Madden and Skylar come down the driveway in Madden’s truck, the fact that they

went out together confirmed by his own eyes. When he’d arrived after a surprisingly traffic-free drive back to Rhode Island,

he’d found Doug and Vivica in the living room watching Under the Tuscan Sun .

“Robbie, you’re back,” Doug had called, sitting forward with a glass of white wine cradled in his hands. “What happened to

practice?”

“It got canceled because of some leak at the arena.” He’d jerked his chin toward the back bedroom. “I’m going to see Skylar.”

“Oh. She...” Vivica had looked at her husband. “She went out for a drink with Madden a little while ago.”

At that point, Robbie’s stomach had turned to fucking lead. “ Just Madden?”

Vivica must have sensed the storm brewing inside of him because she laughed and tried to make light of the situation. “Just

having a friendly chat, I’m sure.”

Maybe.

Yeah. Maybe that was true or maybe Vivica was wrong and they hadn’t gone alone.

They could have met some old friends. There were a million possible explanations, but none of them stopped this ugly, oily jealousy and panic from bubbling in his gut.

And now, when he saw her sitting in the driveway in Madden’s truck, the sensation amplified itself until he felt ill.

Because Skylar didn’t look happy to see him.

Nah, she looked guilty. Like she’d gotten caught.

Robbie tried to make his legs work when she hopped out of the truck, but he couldn’t, so he just remained stuck, staring at

her. Waiting to find out what could put that expression on her face.

“Hey,” Skylar said, sounding winded, swiping her palms on the legs of her jeans. Observing him through owl eyes. “You’re here.”

She attempted a smile and couldn’t hold on to it, spreading the panic inside of him. “Practice didn’t happen?”

“There’s a leak,” he responded, lips stiff.

“Oh.”

He swallowed a fistful of gravel. “What is this? A date?”

“No,” she breathed, waving a hand. “Not at all.”

“Then why do you look like you want to cry?”

Skylar didn’t answer.

Several moments ticked by, the silence broken when Madden stepped out of the vehicle—and Robbie had never wanted to kick someone’s

ass so badly in his life. As a hockey player, that was saying something. Ironically, he wanted to kick Madden’s ass for being

too blind to realize Skylar was perfect, while he also wanted to kick his ass for noticing. Oh yeah, the latter way more than

the former. “Robbie, I can see you’re upset, but there’s no reason to be.” Madden scrubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sure

Skylar will explain it to you, but this was only meant to be a drink between friends.”

“You can get back in your truck now,” Robbie managed to say despite the manacle around his throat. “And I’d suggest you drive

away fast.”

Skylar’s expression was one of shocked reproof. “ Robbie. ”

Robbie pointed at Madden. “You fucking heard me.”

Madden held his ground. Robbie would give him that. The guy probably would have been a decent fight, too, but the Irishman

chose to diffuse the situation by finally getting back in his truck and backing down the driveway, although not as fast as

Robbie would have liked.

“Why do you look like you’re going to cry?” he asked Skylar again.

“Because. I know how I would feel if I saw you out with a girl you used to love. I know it would probably feel terrible.”

“It does.”

She closed her eyes. “We didn’t even have a drink. We only made it to the parking lot and I asked him to bring me home.”

“Why?”

“I felt guilty.”

“If it was just a drink with a friend, why did you feel guilty?” A seven-hundred-pound weight sat on his chest. “Were you

curious to see if your feelings were really gone?”

“No. I know they’re gone. They were never even as deep as I thought they were.”

“Then I’m still in the dark, Skylar. Why do you feel guilty?”

“Because I saw...” She took a long, shuddering breath. “Eve googled you and this website came up that she showed me. It

has details, like really specific details about you a-and women you’ve been with. There are pictures of you and you look so

happy like that. It just blindsided me.”

This was his first time hearing about a website with pictures and intimate information on it that pertained to him, and his

first thought was Time to grow up and get a good lawyer, bro , but he’d worry about that later.

Right now, he was quite simply sick to his stomach just speculating on what Skylar might have seen or read.

God, that must have been hard for her. If the shoe were on the other foot, that kind of imagery would kill him.

At the same time, he couldn’t change the past.

Maybe he’d been naive to try to change her mind about him in the first place.

His actions and words were all he had—and they obviously weren’t enough. “I’m sorry you saw that,” he rasped, in a tremendous

understatement. “But I can’t change the things I did before I met you.”

She took a step forward and stopped, her tone sincere when she said, “Of course not. And I wouldn’t want to change any part

of what made you this Robbie. I fell for that Robbie.”

He only half heard that statement, because the pieces that formed tonight were coming together. “And yet you saw this website

and decided to go out with Madden, anyway. Was that to spite me, Skylar?”

Her face was already in her hands.

“Wow.”

A huge part of him had expected her to say no. To give another explanation.

There wasn’t one, though, and now a hook twisted inside of his chest cavity, making it very hard to breathe. Anger and resignation

and regret caught him in the chin all at once. “Well,” he managed, staggering to his feet, getting his phone out of his back

pocket and opening the Uber app, ordering a ride, so he wouldn’t have to borrow Skylar’s car. “Who’s the one who can’t be

trusted now, huh?”

She came closer, looking down at the screen of his phone and starting to breathe faster. “Please don’t go. I want you here.”

“I want to be here, too, of course I do, because I love you. I love you, Skylar. But I’m fucking mad. And I feel empty and

sick right now and you’re the one. You taught me to trust what I’m feeling and stop laughing everything off. So I can’t laugh at this. I can’t pretend I’m not feeling judged and punished when I just came here to love you .”

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, hands pressed to her cheeks.

The sheen of tears in her eyes almost broke him in half.

He wanted to get on his knees and crawl to her, ask her to forget everything and go inside and make love and wake up tomorrow

like nothing happened. But would this happen again? Could he live worried that she’d punish him every time an unsavory detail

emerged from his past? And he meant what he’d said. Skylar had shown him how to express himself openly and now that he’d experienced

that growth, going backward was impossible. The fact that this girl had made him a better person and he had to leave her there

crying was the worst insult to injury imaginable, but right now, he had to.

His hurt was valid. He wasn’t going to disregard it.

Ignoring the agony in his middle that came from walking past the girl he loved without drying her tears, Robbie picked up

his bag and strode for the end of the driveway to go meet the Uber that would take him back to Boston.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have left,” Robbie slurred on Monday as he bit into his Stouffer’s lasagna. “Maybe I should have stayed

and fought it out. She was crying .”

“You shouldn’t cry and eat at the same time, man,” Mailer said, handing him a napkin. “You’re going to choke to death.”

“Good.”

Mailer reared back, alarmed. “You don’t mean that.”

“I fucking do mean it.”

“Ah, she’ll come back around,” Mailer said, recovering from his shock enough to slug him in the shoulder. “They always do,

am I right?”

“No. That’s what I’ve been telling you. She’s not like anyone else.

” Robbie stood and lumbered to the refrigerator, searching through various frozen meals for another lasagna.

Not that he could find anything he was looking for when his brain was only showing him visions of Skylar.

Practicing flirting with him at that rest stop.

Pitching to those kids. Her face covered in raindrops. “She’s Skylar.”

Mailer groaned up at the ceiling. “You know, everything was fine when we were having empty sex with strangers.”

“ Was it, dude?” Robbie shouted.

“I don’t know anymore.” They sat with that statement for a while, the modern kitchen feeling sterile and cold. Then Mailer

said, “This is out of my depth. I’m calling Burgess and Sig.”

“ No ,” Robbie shouted, jabbing his fork in the air in front of Mailer’s face, before his arm gave up and dropped like he was holding

a bowling ball. “Okay.”

Robbie lay face down on the couch while Mailer talked on the phone in the other room. He couldn’t make out the conversation,

but he overheard the phrase he smells like cheese and ass . After that, he must have passed out, because when he woke up, Mailer was presenting him with another lasagna piping hot

from the oven and someone was knocking at the door.

“That’s Sig and Burgess?”

“Yup,” Mailer confirmed, striding across the floor in his socks to let in Sir Savage and Sig—and they weren’t alone. Chloe,

Sig’s future stepsister, breezed in with a beaming smile and Tallulah, Burgess’s girlfriend, entered more slowly and cautiously.