Page 28 of Wild Hit (Wild Baseball Romance #3)

AUDREY

W hen Miguel comes out of the bathroom, I’m in the middle of tying up my hair in a loose bun on the top of my head. Once I’m done, I lean forward to pull the sheets up and freeze.

This man seems even more tired than I am, going by how he drags himself. But that’s not the problem. I’m not going to say anything about it—even if I did, he wouldn’t hear it because he’s on autopilot.

The problem is that he’s shirtless and in gray sweatpants.

Does he not know ?

In fairness, other than earlier tonight I haven’t seen him glued to his phone before.

Everyone on the staff side of the team knows that he has no personal social media presence.

If he ever did, he must’ve deleted the accounts at some point.

It’s safe to say that he’s not chronically online and probably has no idea that this, er, outfit, is essentially a bat signal for thirsty women.

I check the windows and thankfully the curtains are down. Pretty sure he would’ve stopped traffic otherwise and incited many couples to fight.

Using all my willpower, I focus on the bed sheets and tuck myself in.

At the same time, he flops down on his bed, face turned my way and smushed against the fluffy pillow, his giant frame absorbing the entire queen bed to the point that his feet hang out the edge.

And just like that, a tiny snore escapes from his mouth.

This is when finally my jaw drops and my eyes widen.

His hair got messy somewhere along the way and a strand falls over his forehead.

Being collapsed on the bed accentuates things I didn’t register before, like the incredibly shaped shoulders, arms that any other guy would kill for, the line of his spine as it narrows the lower my eyes go, and then…

The butt.

I blink hard and pull up the soft sheets around my chin. They stay there, because I’m a red blooded heterosexual woman and I can’t help staring. Especially because it’s the first time I’ve allowed it.

Is that dump in his trunk genetic or did he gain it with years and years of exercise? Probably some combination of both. No matter how much I worked out in my early twenties, I couldn’t develop cakes anywhere close to Miguel’s.

Poor guy, he should’ve put rules against me checking him out.

That’s the thing, though. In the course of tonight I realized how absolutely selfless he is.

Of course, seeing him interact with his daughter, her nanny, other teammates, and our friends, I already had a clear understanding that he’s a genuinely good person.

But everything he’s done for me in the past three days is next level.

Not only he agreed to this wild scheme with me, but he’s also thought about my needs every step of the way.

No one’s had to say it, but I know he’s the one who made sure the whole wedding went smoothly. And something broke inside of me when, even though he was absolutely destroyed by the day, he still grabbed my suitcase so I didn’t have to make any effort. When he asked Rose if he could escort her back?

Ugh, where do I nominate him for best guy award? Up there with golden retrievers, to be honest.

Here’s a big difference, though. Golden retrievers are cute. This guy is freaking hot. A stab pierces my chest—hard enough to make me gasp—made of sharp guilt. I suddenly feel terrible for the woman who is supposed to be by his side, whose role I’m usurping for my own gain.

I press my lips, but that does nothing to slow down the hot tears the pool in my eyes. Pushing the sheets away, I sit up to wipe at my face with the sleeves of my comfy sweatshirt.

I better treat him nicely too. The least I can do right now is to cover him up so he doesn’t catch a cold.

Sniffling, I hover near his bed and take in the challenge.

Fortunately, he’s not fully on top of the sheets because there’s no way I can move the incredible mass of muscle that he is.

Even shifting one of his legs so I can reach the sheets is a workout.

My grunting doesn’t wake him up, so I guess it was true that he’s a heavy sleeper.

The other leg kinda hangs out, and all the effort I have to do there is to push it over the mattress.

Finally, I bring the sheets over him and whisper, “Good night, Miguel.”

There’s no response, only a soft exhalation.

I run my sleeve over a stray tear, get back in bed, and turn off the light.

*

An alarm goes off.

I flinch but other than wishing it away, I can’t do much else about it. A string of deep words in a foreign language makes me think of a cursing man. But why would one of those be in my bedroom?

Oh .

My whole body grows stiff as a plank. The alarm finally quiets and I force my eyes to stay closed for a moment longer.

I recall saying that I also don’t sleep like a feather, so it should seem believable that I can sleep through an alarm, right?

It also didn’t ring for a long time. It should be fine.

Miguel yawns and slowly, I crack one eye open, the one that’s closest to my pillow as I lay on my side.

Oh, no . I shouldn’t have done that. I slam it shut.

Then a hidden part of me comes out from a corner and asks a very simple question: why not?

If I wanted to, I could plug his name on a search bar at any browser and get all sorts of pictures. Miguel in the middle of games, on ads, pictorials, and with varying degrees of dressing.

So I peek the same eye open again. He kneels on his bed, half turned away from me as he yawns into the sun that filters through the window curtains.

He stretches his arms wide, purely to relieve his shoulders and not because he’s trying to show off his absurd wing span, or the way his shoulder and back muscles play with the motion.

I tuck my hand against my mouth to allow not a peep to escape.

I knew he had good shoulders, I even felt them under my hands last night while we danced again.

But seeing this? Leonardo DaVinci and Michelangelo would’ve killed to have such a perfect study subject.

He must’ve moved enough during sleep that the sweatpants slid down, revealing the waistband of his SPORTY underwear that has also betrayed him a little—enough that I can see the exact point where his tiny waist ends and his pancakes begin.

That’s when I squeeze my eyes shut. I have no right to look any further, especially the moment he turns around. What if his clothes have also slid down at the front? I would die. And then he’d notice that, and he would also die.

Shifting that big body causes inevitable noise, and I pretend like that’s what’s stirring me from sleep. I make a big show of rubbing my eyes, and he takes it as his cue to rasp out, “G’morning, Audrey. Would you like to use the bathroom first?”

That rasp also does something to me. It’s an almost physical experience.

In turn, I squeak out, “G’morning. You go ahead.”

“Okay, thanks.” He yawns again and rustling tells me he’s getting out of bed.

Continuing with my pretense, I sit up in my bed and ignore his existence entirely as I feel around my pillows for my phone. I find it just as Miguel’s closing the bathroom door.

I collapse against the headboard. “What the hell am I doing?” I ask myself.

A sign from the heavens appears right that second, in the form of my phone buzzing in my hand. When I see the name on the screen, everything makes sense again.

I pick up, not wanting to put this off and cause him to call me again. “I told you to only call me for work reasons,” is my greeting.

“Good thing that this is work related, huh?” Henry Vos laughs into my ear and I have to pull my phone away so that I don’t audibly gag. “I saw your out of office notice, and it left me with no choice but to call you. Did you forget that we were supposed to have a meeting this morning?”

Why does he say it like it’s midday already? I check the clock and it’s only eight thirty.

“I didn’t forget,” I retort nasally because I need to blow my nose. Ugh, is this how I sounded to Miguel a moment ago? Gross. “That’s why I sent you a new time proposal, and I’m going to finish this call because I’m off the clock right now.”

“Wait a second, please.” It’s the please what makes me pause.

My brain short circuits because the guys in my dad’s world never use that word, or any other expression of politeness, so I trained myself to welcome it from normal people.

But then he opens his mouth to say, “We can talk about that later, but there’s one more thing.

Your dad asked me to escort you on the cocktail party we’re hosting this weekend to celebrate our new partnership.

I said yes, of course. Can you wear a red dress and some makeup? ”

The hell I can. I grit my teeth hard enough to hurt.

Before I can formulate a response that is even more cutting than that fleeting thought, Miguel comes out of the bathroom—now with his sweatpants pulled up properly—and freezes when he sees that I’m on the phone.

Staring at him, I raise a finger to my mouth. Then say to the guy on the other end of the line, “I’m going to hang up and you’re not going to call me again until I’m back to work.”

“But—”

I take great pleasure in tapping the red button, and then I navigate in his contact info to block him. I may leave him in that status forever from now on. He can reach me on Teams and I’ll answer when I can.

“Everything okay?” Miguel asks.

I lift my face and get a frontal view of a heck of a lot of man.

A gold chain with a crucifix hangs from the thick column of his long neck, nestling between the tight masses of his pecs.

They look like dreamwork, not big enough to look like boobs but defined enough to make my hands itch.

He doesn’t have clear abs like some of the other guys do, but there’s enough muscle to reinforce the knowledge that he’s not a run of the mill type of guy.

But his shoulders, oh, his shoulders.

Parting from that thick neck, the tight muscle tapers in the perfect way to dip at his clavicle before giving spotlight to his arms. That has to be genetic. Only the Big Guy in heaven can create something so perfect.

I shut my mouth and force my mind back to more reasonable, and definitely unpleasant matters. “Henry Vos just called. He asked me out to a silly cocktail party in the most condescending way.”

Miguel grunts and puts his hands on his hips, in an annoyed-dad pose. “I guess that’s our first assignment.”

“I guess,” I repeat, for lack of anything better to say.

He nods, and with that he continues his journey to rummage for something in his duffel bag. That triggers something in my addled brain, and I jump from my bed.

“The rings!” I scramble to my suitcase and splay it open in the middle of the room.

My intimates are hidden by the side of the suitcase that has a full zippered cover, and the rings are on the other side, the box bundled in the sweatshirt I’ll wear to travel back to Orlando.

I take the box and straighten out. “Voila.”

Miguel approaches with a clothing bundle tucked against his ribs, and he stares at the box.

“Right.” He motions with his lips in a way I’ve seen all my Venezuelan friends do before.

It can have all meanings under the sun—there it is, pass me that, look at that, etc.

—but in this case I interpret to mean, open it .

And so I do, and we both stand still for a long moment, admiring the rings that look very much real.

“Can I?” he asks in a whisper. I nod, even though I don’t know what he’s asking.

Then Miguel plucks the smaller right from its nest, and raises his other hand, palm facing up.

“Oh.” I hasten to put my left hand on his.

And then the wildest thing that’s ever happened in my life happens . A man slides a ring into my finger, until it meets the engagement ring look-alike I’ve been wearing the past few days.

My heart slams hard against my ribcage and my stomach is doing something confusing, like it wants food but also to empty itself.

With slightly trembly hands, I grab the other ring and mirror the motions.

Miguel’s hand feels so warm and heavy, but those big muscles of his keep it in place so there’s no effort for me.

We both know I had a sample to measure his ring against, and so it fits perfectly.

The contrast of the gold against his velvety brown skin, versus mine against my white and pink finger is a shock.

I look up and find his eyes on me, a sun beam hitting them in a way that makes them look like translucent amber. I swallow hard.

A corner of his lips rises. “Hello, wife.”

I almost choke in my own saliva.

“Husband?” I rasp out.

Miguel nods. “Good girl.”

And I nearly expire.