Page 17 of Reality With You (Arden Beach #1)

Dylan nodded, his throat bobbing. “I’m glad. I know I already said everything in the letter Erin gave you, but I’ve been hoping for a chance to say it to you in person. Or at least, over the phone. I didn’t want to force it on you when you were already going through a lot.”

Guilt needled her heart. The letter—still sealed—was in a box waiting to be shipped from New York to wherever she ended up living in Florida.

“To be honest, I haven’t read it yet. I haven’t …

been in the headspace for it.” Her heart clenched at the disappointment in his expression. “But you don’t need to say anything.”

“I want to—”

“I’d rather you didn’t,” Lennon said. He stared at her. “I don’t want to get caught up in the past. We’ve both been through a lot. We’ve grown a lot.” At least I have , she didn’t say out loud. I don’t know about you yet. “Let’s just agree to start with a clean slate.”

His expression was unreadable. The Dylan she divorced would have been relieved. Not even serving him divorce papers—her last desperate attempt to reach him—had cracked him open. Instead, he’d signed them.

That signature had finished splitting her heart in half.

Lennon recognized the irony of their roles flipping, but it had taken years for the hard scab to form over that wound.

Like hell she was going to rip it open now while the rest of her life was on fire.

Nothing he could say would heal it, anyway.

The vows he made to her before had meant nothing, so why would she believe them now?

Muscles flexed along his jawline before he dipped his head. The gentle waves in the background filled his long pause. “OK,” Dylan said, eyes softening on her. “Can I say one thing? And then we don’t have to talk about it again. Unless you want to.”

The wounded, carefully guarded side of her heart stiffened, afraid. The other nudged her, aching for closure. “Just one thing.”

“I’m sorry, Lennon,” Dylan said, those three words punching the air from her lungs.

“I’m sorry for letting you down. For breaking so many promises to you.

For putting you through hell—for bringing you into my hell.

You deserved better. You deserved everything and I …

I couldn’t give it to you. I should’ve never promised you I could. ”

Lennon bit down on her tongue, tears blurring the edges of her vision. Otherwise, she remained completely still, unable to move.

“You were my best friend. I shouldn’t have shut you out.

I’m so sorry, Lennon. I’m so, so sorry,” Dylan said quietly, his voice breaking slightly.

Heavy with what sounded like regret. He swiped a hand over his jaw.

It may have been a trick of the light, but before he turned his head, his eyes seemed glassy.

For a while, they sat in silence. Lennon tamped down the wave of emotion beating against the dam in her chest. Even though it wasn’t enough to heal everything, she hadn’t realized how much she needed to hear that from him.

The side of her heart carrying the wound breathed a little easier, beat a little less painfully.

“Thank you,” Lennon said. Was all she could say.

Dylan waited a moment before lifting his head, his expression now stoic. Awkwardness swelled between them. “So, um … are you really going on a reality show?”

Lennon cringed and groaned at his effective—but unfortunate—way of breaking the tension.

It snapped her out of it, even if it did come at the cost of her embarrassment.

“Yeahhh,” she admitted. After a moment, she snort-laughed, which prompted him to release a laugh he’d been holding onto, which prompted her to release a full-bodied laugh.

“Shut up.” She reached back for one of the fluffy pillows and buried her face in its sweet floral scent.

“No, no, it’s just … not something I would’ve expected, is all.” Dylan’s laughter tapered off. “You used to watch them all the time, but you always said you’d sooner strangle yourself with a guitar string than ever go on one.”

“Well, having your dreams go up in flames and not wanting to relocate to a cold slab of concrete under a bridge will change your perspective on things.”

“You could’ve chosen one of the ones with grass or a nice little pond.”

“Wow. You can’t hit a home run or tell a funny joke anymore.”

“Kinda hard to hit home runs as a pitcher,” Dylan pointed out. It’d be nothing but a sarcastic remark to anyone else, but a tightness crept into his voice, betraying the bitterness buried beneath it.

He’d shown promise as a two-way player growing up, possessing strong skills in both batting and pitching. Batting had been his preferred position, but his father had strongly encouraged him to become a pitcher when he went pro. Dylan had fought him on it but ultimately relented.

“Sounds like an excuse,” Lennon joked back, keeping things light.

An amused smile pulled at the corners of his mouth as he shook his head. “In all seriousness, I get it. It’s a great opportunity for you to get yourself out there. Once people get to know you, they won’t be able to help falling in love with you.”

Warmth spread through her. It noodled her brain for a moment as she rested her chin on the pillow, until something occurred to her. “How’d you even know about the show?”

Dylan made an uncomfortable, restrained sound as he scratched the back of his neck. “My manager told me. He uh, got a call from the two producers you were with.”

Lennon didn’t even have to wait to find out where this was going.

She already knew. Rolling her eyes, she momentarily dropped her forehead into the soft cotton.

“Of course they went over my head. I told them you wouldn’t be interested, but they’re very …

persistent .” She had a few other words in mind for what they were.

“They’ll get along great with my manager,” Dylan remarked bitterly. “He’s been bugging me all afternoon. He thinks it would be good for my image.” The shift in his voice was subtle, but she felt it. The quiet ache of remorse.

“What exactly happened that night?” Lennon knew the basics, but she wanted to hear it from him.

Dylan adjusted his hat. A nervous tick. “We’d lost the last three games in a row, including the one that afternoon.

It was my fault. My head wasn’t in it. I made mistakes.

I knew it, but everyone made it a point to let me know.

” He swiped his tongue through his lips, tightening them.

“Drinking always took the edge off bad days, but I went overboard that night. I’d never passed out like that before.

” Fear laced the admission. He avoided her gaze.

Lennon wanted to reach out to him, brush her fingers down his cheek. She had wanted him to wake up, but not like this. Not by almost dying. And not with it sensationalized in the media like juicy, entertaining gossip.

“I get that you made a mistake, but you weren’t the one driving the boat, and you weren’t conscious when he crashed,” Lennon pointed out. “I don’t understand why the media—or the league, for that matter—is giving you such a hard time.”

“Some people who were there that night sold fake stories. Said I encouraged Craig to take the boat out and pretended to pass out—oh, and that I was doing drugs, too, even though my tests were negative. All my sponsorships dropped me because brands don’t want to be associated with controversy, and the league is cracking down on players’ code of conduct.

They’re not convinced I’m worth keeping around.

Especially if I’m not pitching as well as I used to after the injury. ”

“I thought it was the team’s management that had the final call on suspensions?”

“They used to. Last year, several of the UBL’s board members were lobbying to have control over players transferred to them, and they won.

They also got rid of our union.” The long grass sprouting from the dune swayed behind him.

Dylan’s gaze went inward. “That’s not even what bothers me the most about all this, though. ”

Lennon waited, sensing there was something deeper weighing on him—something he needed to release. His brow sunk low.

“Kids used to come up to me with my jersey on, wanting to take pictures. Have me sign things for them. They told me they wanted to be like me when they grew up. It was one of my favorite parts of the job.” A smile ghosted Dylan’s lips.

A pang shot through her heart.

“One of the bright spots, even when I was miserable. But now … their parents guide them away from me when they realize who they’re talking to.”

Lennon winced at the sorrow beneath his casual tone, something squeezing deep in her chest.

“I know I’m not a good role model but … I’d like to be someday. Not just for baseball, but for actually being someone worth looking up to. The way I looked up to my heroes when I was a kid.”

Lennon ached to touch him. She remembered how much it meant to Dylan when kids came up to him or sent him letters.

He always took the most time out of any of the players to talk to them between innings and after games, to toss them balls and wave to them from the field.

She didn’t need to hear the sadness in his voice or see it in his eyes to know how much that hurt him.

And she didn’t have to use her imagination to understand the shame behind his words—the deep desire to be someone worth admiring. That was a hole in her own heart she was desperate to fill.

“Does your manager really think the show would help?” Lennon asked.

“The twenty-three text messages he’s sent me about it would indicate yes.” Dylan removed his baseball cap, releasing a mess of thick, dark hair. He drove a hand through it.

Lennon’s thumb troubled the edge of the pillow. “Would you want to do it?”

Dylan’s fingers paused in his hair, eyes meeting hers. He mirrored her hesitant tone. “Would you want me to do it?”

She ran her teeth along her lower lip, unsure of her answer to that. “They were very interested in our relationship. They’d probably be looking for drama or a reunion. It’d invite more scrutiny from the public, too.”

“It would,” Dylan said, dropping his hand.

“But it could also give us a chance to control the narrative. Show everyone the truth,” Lennon reasoned. “Tell our side of the story.”

“We don’t owe anyone an explanation.”

“No, but it would be satisfying to have the last word.”

Dylan smirked. With a hint of mischief in his eyes and his hair a mess like he’d just rolled out of bed, she saw a glimpse of the boy she had fallen in love with at the ballpark all those years ago. In another lifetime.

He’d made mistakes, but he didn’t deserve to lose everything over them.

When Lennon remained serious, his expression tumbled through confusion to realization. “Are you seriously asking if I’d want to do the show?” Dylan asked.

Lennon asked herself the same question.

With the media breathing down Dylan’s neck, it was a matter of time before they started hounding her, too, now that she was in the same city. Filming a reality show, no less. Whether she liked it or not, their fates were intertwined. They both had problems the show could solve.

If they could get ahead of it and take control ….

“Maybe,” Lennon answered.

They were both quiet for a moment, thinking to themselves, having a silent discussion with each other as they weighed the decision. He narrowed his eyes, darting back and forth between hers. She pressed her tongue into her molars, brows knitted together.

Dylan finally said, “Do you want to—”

“Should we just—”

“Go for it?”

“Maybe? It’ll either be the smartest thing we’ve ever done or the dumbest,” Lennon said.

“I’ve worked with worse odds.”

“Me too.”

A beat passed. Dylan hesitated. “Are you sure?”

“No.” Excitement and trepidation swirled into a familiar adrenaline rush, sparking her impulsiveness. That exhilarating feeling of standing on a cliff’s edge. “But let’s fucking do it, anyway.”

The corner of his mouth arched. Something seemed to spark alive in him, too. That same sense of danger—thrill.

“OK,” Dylan said. “Let’s fucking do it.”