Page 48 of Wild Hit (Wild Baseball Romance #3)

MIGUEL

I t’s the bottom of the ninth at the fourth game against the Longhorns. The past few days have been a slog between not playing, so the medical team could run all the exams they wanted—including measuring the diameter of my eyelashes and shit—and the weird dynamic at home.

Audrey and I can’t seem to find a way to talk to each other anymore. Either I freeze when I find her suddenly in front of me, reaching for a cup or for the fridge or about to leave at the same time as me or…

She runs. Once, she almost slipped to near death in her rush toward the guest bedroom.

Marty has obviously picked up on the weirdness. She continues treating Audrey as usual, hanging out, joking, and spending time together. But my own daughter is ignoring me like she knows that deep down, I’m the one who screwed up.

She’s right. I shouldn’t have pressed Audrey for an answer.

That was selfish of me. Maybe I really was loaded up on adrenaline and just used that as an excuse to satisfy my own craving for her.

I could tell that I screwed up the second I asked with how Audrey immediately shut down.

The concern wiped off her face, and every line carefully turned to reflect absolutely nothing. Not even annoyance.

I finally made her be done with me.

And I can’t stop agonizing about it, because if I could turn back time I’d do the same damn thing anyway. I would ask her for a crumble of hope, for permission to want her. I would’ve still been unable to keep it bottled up any longer.

The consequences are that I’m now on the outfield at the bottom of the ninth inning, we’re about to sweep the Longhorns in two more strikes, the crowd is riled up and already celebrating with horns and whistles and a million voices, and all I feel is an anvil is perched on my shoulders.

The Longhorn batter hits off Josh Thomason, who is closing for the game.

The hit is long, high enough that it could be dangerous.

My feet take off, eyes still on the ball as it flies in the dark sky.

I know the exact point it’s going to land at, and my legs act like springs when I’m right at the spot.

But I jump a little too high.

The ball bounces off my glove on the wrong side.

I’m cursing in more than two languages in my mind.

I waste further time rolling to a stop on the grass, but luck finds me anyway because the ball isn’t far.

Landing on my feet, I pick it up and take a deep breath.

I’m glad I’m not mic’ed up for the big word that comes out of my mouth as I throw.

It’s a whole damn cannon. Lucky intercepts it right in time to tag out the runner from second. He throws to home with all he’s got and?—

“Two outs! Game over!”

The whole place comes down in wild cheering.

I stand there, breathing hard, soaked in sweat through my uniform, kinda shocked that my error didn’t cost any runs for the team. If those two runners had scored, we’d be looking at a game five. I could’ve screwed it all up for everyone just because I’m feeling like a failure in my private life.

“Guys, I’m sorry,” I say once we’re in the clubhouse. It kills the celebratory vibe. Removing my hat, I wipe the sweat off my face with my forearm and say, “I was in my head and that error could’ve cost us.”

You’d think Beau would be the one to reprimand me here, and he would be right to. Instead, he just keeps chugging some more of the electrolyte drink from Henry Vos’s company.

The one who picks up the baton is Logan. “Why were you in your head? Are you actually hurt?” He points his chin toward my ribs, which further entices the attention of the whole team.

Everyone’s eyes are on me, waiting to see if this moment will mark the last celebration of the team this year.

Conscious of the weight of every second I don’t respond, I take a deep breath and decide to just spill the beans, all of them. In a way that would make Marty cringe herself into a black hole.

“I’m in love with Audrey, but she doesn’t return the feeling and she asked me for a divorce.”

The first part surprises no one. The second part, though… that one gets jaws dropping, throats gasping, eyes bulging, mouths spluttering. Even the team manager and his crew aren’t immune. Even the trainers are at a loss for words.

“But you just got married like, yesterday!” O’Brian exclaims.

“Yeah, what did you do to screw up so early?” asks Fernandez.

The three guys who are in the know are looking at me like this —and not breaking the record set by Barry Bonds earlier tonight—is what I have completely shocked them with.

Lucky murmurs, “No way.”

As the noise increases, I raise my hands while still holding the cap, and manage to quiet them down. “We got married just to help her out of a situation, okay? Divorcing wouldn’t be a big deal, it’s just…”

“That you love her,” Cade states like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“And that you don’t think she loves you back.” Lucky gives me something like a side eye, even though he’s squared up in front of me.

From between a couple of players, Otto Berger—a physical therapist—asks, “Why are we talking about this instead of doing the postgame cooldown?”

“Shhh,” one of the players next to him hisses. “Can’t you see one of our own needs therapy right now?”

“Yeah, but not of the physical kind. Or at least not one you can provide, my dude,” someone else adds with a chuckle.

Logan folds his arms, his pads creaking against the strain. “The question here is, do you know that she doesn’t feel the same, or do you think she doesn’t?”

“Oooh,” someone whispers.

I realize my mouth has been hanging open and close it. My eyes lower to the floor, a massive art piece of the team’s purple logo with a green alligator.

“It’s pretty obvious.” I frown at the gator. “After the beanball, I asked her if she cared about me and she said that she cared about what getting injured could mean for the team.”

Mierda, it hurts even more to say it out loud.

“And that was it?” our captain asks in a completely offhanded way. I look up sharply. “You just assumed from that point forward?”

My eyebrows scrunch in confusion. “I mean, she asked for a divorce after that. What else could be happening?”

He sighs hard enough that his throat vibrates, almost like a growl. “After everything you saw me go through, didn’t you learn the lesson that you have to have a clear conversation with women? That we can’t read each other’s minds?”

Cade raises his paw. “And is that all you said or did you also explain your feelings in full?”

“I…” My mouth opens and closes. “I did not.”

Berger explodes. “Ugh, just go and talk to her so we can cooldown once and for all.”

“Shut up, Berger,” someone yells from the back.

However, as weird as it is to be talking about my fee-fees in front of the whole team, including the managers and everyone else who is part of the player support team… I needed this.

I needed a reset. Something to get me out of my funk and back into thinking more clearly.

Nothing worth having comes easy and I didn’t even try hard.

I’ve never told Audrey that I’m in love with her, that I want to be her rock, that she’s the one who was meant to join my family—no one else.

That I don’t want to lose her. That I want her in my bed every night. During the day too.

My baseball cap falls to the floor and I reach for my head, running my hands all over my face and hair. I grunt, “You’re right. I need to tell her?—”

“Damn right,” Lucky interrupts.

“—Right now,” I finish.

Silence, but not the tense kind. The one that permeates the air right before a game.

I drop my hands and sure enough, each one of my teammates looks like adrenaline has hit their central processing system. The series is over, and yet they’re even more amped up than when the game was about to start.

“Let’s go.” Lucky pumps his fist in the air. More voices join him.

I square my shoulders and pivot for the door. “Let’s do this.”