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So it’s fine if he wants to take me shopping in the wee hours of the morning because I don’t want this night to end. Because when it ends, we’ll go back to sitting on different sides of the table instead of together.
I like together. I know it’s not my reality, but I like it. It’s fun. A refreshing change. It feels right, almost, but I’ve been fooled before.
“I thought this was the place that never sleeps,” I complain after fifteen minutes of staring at dark windows as Mase searches for a shoe store.
“There’s got to be someplace open. If I can’t find something soon, we’re going to have to stop and get another drink.” He stares down the neck of the champagne bottle.
“I don’t think you need another drink.” My earlier tipsiness has settled into a pleasant buzz, for once making me feel awake rather than sleepy.
I feel very awake. Very alive.
“I always like to have another drink,” Mase says. “But it’s always baseball season. Then it’s only one beer at a time because I never stop training.”
“You’re really serious about it, aren’t you?”
“I love it more than anything in the world,” he pronounces, spreading his arms wide like he’s about to take flight.
Maybe he can. I’m beginning to think this man can do anything.
“What do you love about it?” I like my job but I’ve never felt as passionate about anything as Mase so clearly feels about baseball.
And he gets an expression on his face when he talks about it that produces a strange flutter deep in my stomach, and I wonder what it would be like to have him talk about me like that.
Mase slows down, and our hands are still tangled together. “There’s this anticipation about being on the field and you’re ready for anything, you know you can handle it all, but you really don’t want the ball hit to you, or the guy to try and steal second because there’s a split second of fear that you’ll screw up somehow. Then you get the ball and make the play, and it’s all good, it’s the best feeling because you did, and you did it damn good. I like being good. And it’s something totally separate from my family.”
Caught up in his words, I have to give my head a shake. There’s passion and depth, and he looks so cute... “That’s really good,” I say breathlessly. “I don’t have anything like that.”
“You will,” he promises and I believe him. “Look.” Jerking my hand, Mase takes off and I trip along behind him. “I see lights.” An actual flashing arrow leads us down some stairs into an underground mall reminiscent of Canal Street in New York. “Shoes!”
“You don’t need to buy me anything.” Once again, my protest falls on deaf ears and I follow along, won over by his enthusiasm.
It might be drunken enthusiasm, but still. Being with such an open and excited Mase frees me of inhibitions I didn’t realize I still had. Like holding hands with a man. When Mase first took my hand, I was afraid the shock would be a current flashing between us, burning us both.
Now? I like the heat.
Mase pulls me into a discount shoe store, with a sleepy-eyed cashier propped up at the counter. “Help you with sumthin’?” she mutters.
“We want all the shoes,” Mase cries, which makes me laugh. “What size?”
“Seven on a good day.”
“What are you on a bad day?”
“Depends on the shoe.”
“Is this a good day?” Mase looks at me, suddenly sober, and my stomach does an actual backflip and nails the landing. “Because I think it’s a great day.”
“Me too,” I say in a soft voice, and the way Mase looks at me makes me think he’s really about to kiss me.
Kissme. Kissme.Mase Stirling doesn’t kiss girls like me.
And he doesn’t. Instead, he grins and jumps back. “Pick,” he orders.
“I have no idea.”
“I’ll pick for you,” he threatens.
“Go for it.” I collapse on a bench and watch as Mase heads down the aisles of the store. We’re the only ones in there, and the girl at the cash register goes back to looking at her phone. I suspect we could do anything in here and she wouldn’t care.
