Page 23 of Reality With You (Arden Beach #1)

A t the crack of dawn, Dylan pulled into the parking lot of one of the national beach parks.

The barely risen sun cast a soft, diffused glow over the dense trees and wooden administrative cabins.

While the camera crew unloaded their gear from the vans, the production team rushed around in the throes of prep.

Despite Dylan’s packed schedule, the week had dragged on with more of the same.

Baseball practice, physical therapy, talk therapy, workouts, repeat.

Even his first day of filming for the show consisted of cameras following him for an afternoon of workouts and batting practice.

When he got the invitation to participate in a beach clean-up that weekend, he jumped at it.

Not only was it for a good cause that didn’t require him to play golf, but it was also a chance to do something different.

And Lennon would be there.

He hadn’t seen her since the night at her apartment almost a week ago.

“Morning,” Dylan said when Lennon ambled over to him. Her oversized denim jacket dwarfed her sleepy frame, eyes barely cracked open. He couldn’t get over how cute she was, even half-asleep and cranky. “Coffee?”

They’d been directed to wait near the craft services table until the sound team was ready to hook up their mic packs. Hot coffee and various packaged pastries—muffins, doughnuts, bagels—were arranged on platters.

“Can you send it straight to my veins?” Lennon asked, voice adorably hoarse and groggy.

She released a wide, bear-like yawn. Mornings had never been her thing.

Dylan remembered her always staying up late to write music.

Seeing her like that—in the same jacket she’d owned for years with her collection of patches all over it—brought him a pang of joy and heartache at the same time.

She deserved so much better than he’d given her.

“I don’t think they’ve set up the IV machines yet.” Dylan approached the table, smiling at the grey-haired woman in a burgundy apron. “Morning. Two cups, please.” He rattled off Lennon’s order, then his, and as she went to work preparing the coffees, he surveyed the pastry situation.

“How the hell did you remember my coffee order?” Lennon asked. “Especially this early in the morning. I can barely remember my own name right now.”

Dylan shrugged. “It’s not that hard to remember. Lennon .”

“Thanks, Darren,” she retorted before another yawn.

Dylan studied her face. Her makeup looked different from how she usually did it. And there was a lot more of it. “Why do you look like you’re going to a photoshoot? Aren’t we cleaning up trash on the beach?”

Lennon closed her eyes as if taking a mini nap. “That’s what I told them, but they insisted on full glam, anyway.”

“Who’s ‘they’?”

“My glam team.”

“You have a glam team ?”

“I’m moving up in the world, Daryl.”

A smile tugged at his lips, and an ache at his chest. Damn, he’d missed her.

“So, first time we’re officially filming together.

” Dylan glanced around to ensure no one else was listening, then dropped his voice.

“After we’re mic’d up, should we have a code word, or some kind of special hand signal to let each other know when we need to be bailed out of anything awkward?

Like if they’re trying to get us to say or do something we don’t want to do. ”

Lennon scrunched her brows together, opening her eyes. “That’s actually a really good idea.”

“I have those sometimes.”

The server passed her the first coffee. Lennon wrapped her hands around it, seemingly siphoning its warmth in the crisp morning air as she considered his suggestion.

“What about the ones we used to do with Erin when we were kids? You know, when we’d find dirt on the team you were playing against and feed you tips from the bleachers. ”

A grin split across his face. “That was great. Until Dad found out. What were they again?”

They shuffled through their memories for the various hand signals and meanings they had created as kids. His father discouraged them from doing it once he found out, but Dylan always thought he was a little impressed with them and sorry he had to be a fair grown-up about the whole thing.

To send each other an SOS, they settled on the gesture she and Erin used to get his attention when they had some pressing intel to share. They applied new meanings to a few others, as well, like flicking their noses to say “all good.”

“Well, this is a nice way to start the day,” another woman’s voice interrupted. He turned to a blonde with French braids standing by the table, smiling up at him. “Hi.” She offered her hand. “Kelsey McCroy.”

“Hey. Dylan.” He accepted his coffee from the barista, thanked her, and then shook Kelsey’s hand.

“I know who you are.” Kelsey popped an eyebrow. “You’re one of the greatest baseball players of our generation.”

A mangled sound somewhere between a grunt and a laugh shot out of him. “Oh, I know a lot of people who would disagree.”

“The stats don’t lie.” Kelsey gave a small shrug. “They’re just bitter.”

“Hey, Kelsey,” Lennon said, peering around Dylan with a stiff wave.

“Oh, hey, Lennon.” Kelsey grabbed a protein bar from one of the baskets. “Well, see you on the beach,” she said, holding eye contact with him over her shoulder as she turned to walk away.

Dylan lifted his chin in acknowledgement, then took his first sip of his coffee.

The burn felt good. One of the production assistants called Lennon over to the sound area where a few people were getting their mic packs hooked up.

He tried not to take it personally when her eyes lit up at some piece of equipment and she hurried toward it like a little kid.

Leave it to something music-related to wake her up.

Dylan watched with a small smile as she excitedly asked the crew member working on it some questions. The guy was young. Tall. Had a strong, muscular build. Not exactly the stereotypical tech nerd.

His smile faded. A twinge of jealousy tugged at him.

“Little Prince,” came a deep, booming voice behind him.

Dylan winced at the nickname his teammates had given him when he’d entered the professional league.

An affectionate—and sometimes, not-so-affectionate—jab at him being the son and grandson of two baseball legacies and his thin frame in adolescence.

Hadn’t taken long for the fans and media to catch on and adopt it, too. Unfortunately.

Dylan turned to the tall, broad-shouldered man demonstrating his impressive wingspan as he held his arms out.

“Bricks,” Dylan responded warmly, a grin spreading across his face. As they said in the south, Chad “Bricks” Mormont was built like a “brick shithouse.” A much better nickname. They slapped their hands together, pulling each other in for a hug. “Good to see you, man. What’re you doing here?”

“I’m here with the wife-to-be,” Chad said, jutting his chin toward Avery as one of the production assistants finished attaching her mic pack.

Avery approached them with a smile as she readjusted her white tank top. “Hey. It’s good to see you, Dylan.”

“You too,” Dylan said, leaning down to hug her. “Congratulations, by the way. I didn’t realize you were Chad’s Avery.”

Her smile deepened. Chad pulled Avery close, his tree-sized arm nearly engulfing her petite frame. Their size difference was comical. “You’re coming to the wedding, right?”

“No way I’d miss it,” Dylan said.

“I wanted to elope, but she wanted a big wedding,” Chad remarked. “We compromised and settled on a big wedding broadcast on a reality show.”

Avery elbowed him in his ribs. He barely flinched, laughing instead. He squeezed her into his side. “You know I’m just playin’, baby.”

Dylan smiled at them, but a deep ache rippled through him.

He glanced at Lennon. She’d removed her jacket, holding it in front of her, as the sound guy in a quarter-zip carefully fed the wire under the neckline of her top from the back.

He remembered the day they ran off to get married.

They’d eloped on a whim. The memory was as vivid as if it were yesterday.

One of the best days of his life.

“So, you’re the famous baseball player we’ve been hearing so much about.

” A tall woman wearing a black bodysuit and a tight, slick bun approached Dylan.

His grip tightened around his coffee, assuming she meant the media.

“You were a big topic at brunch the other day. I’m Tana.

” He relaxed as she held out a hand with long, pointy fingernails. “This is my husband, Trey.”

Dylan shook their hands; pretty sure he’d seen Trey in cologne ads or something. Tana looked familiar, too.

“Hey, where’s Candace?” Tana asked Avery.

“She’s having a bad case of morning sickness,” Avery explained with a frown.

“ Ew . Bummer.” Tana smacked her chewing gum.

“OK, people,” Carol Anne called out, storming into the center of the crew’s makeshift headquarters.

She made the ex-drill-sergeant-turned-trainer Dylan had in high school seem mellow by comparison.

“Let’s go over the day’s schedule. You two—why aren’t you mic’d up yet?

” She waved her pen at Dylan and Chad. “Do it while I’m talking. ”

“Yes, ma’am,” Chad said before sneaking an amused “get a load of this lady” glance at Dylan.

Lennon smirked at Dylan as he approached the sound area. “You got in trouble,” she sang quietly. She’d slipped her denim jacket back on and dropped her aviators in place.

Dylan leaned down to whisper in her ear teasingly, “I thought you liked that.”

He couldn’t see her eyes, but the way Lennon’s head turned and cheeks slightly blushed told him enough. Satisfied, he continued to the production assistant, who was waiting with his mic pack, as Carol Anne quickly relayed the schedule.

“Ezra and Steph are from the Seas the Mission Foundation. If you have any questions, they’ll be your liaisons for the clean-up,” Carol Anne announced.

Dylan noticed Chad’s face drop in surprise. He followed his line of sight to the Seas the Mission crew members. Across the parking lot, a man with dreadlocks tied in a bun and a redheaded woman in a blue polo shirt unloaded equipment from a truck.

Steph. Chad’s ex -fiancée.

Avery snapped a questioning—and worried—look at Chad, who appeared to be second-guessing every life choice he’d ever made that led him to this exact moment.

“OK, let’s head to the beach,” Carol Anne said, tapping her pen on her clipboard. “We’ll start with Ezra and Steph introducing the organization and explaining what you’ll all be doing, then you’ll grab your gear and begin the clean-up. Let’s go.” She marched toward the path that led to the beach.

Steph picked up a bin and turned to carry it in the same direction, glancing their way. Her eyes widened when she clocked Chad. Ezra said something to her, and after a beat, she faced forward, answering as she followed him.

“I swear—I had no idea she worked with Seas the Mission when I set this up,” Kelsey insisted to Avery.

Tension pulled the cool morning air taut. Avery and her two friends followed Carol Anne. Trey gave Chad a look of condolences before going with them.

“Fuck me,” Chad groaned right as the crew member switched on his mic pack.

Falling to the back of the group, Dylan and Lennon walked beside each other as they headed toward whatever awaited them on the beach.

“Who is she?” Lennon quietly asked him.

“Chad’s girlfriend in college,” Dylan answered. “They were engaged, but he broke it off.”

“Oh, shit.” Lennon observed Avery and her friends huddled together as they walked ahead, engrossed in conversation. Chad trailed a few paces behind them. “Well, at least the drama won’t be focused on us.”

As sorry as he felt for Chad, he was grateful for a reprieve from the spotlight. Dylan relaxed slightly, one corner of his mouth lifting as he glanced down at Lennon. Knowing she’d be there with him also brought him some comfort.

This might even turn out to be fun.

Dylan flicked his nose at her.