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To be honest, it was kind of sexy.
Graham slung the ball in, and I froze. The smack of the glove was thundering as the umpire called a strike. I shook it off and waited as the new catcher threw it back to him, letting the bat hang between my legs for a moment and then picking it back up to my shoulders. Why didn’t anyone ever tell me how heavy these damn things were?
Another pitch, but this time it was way outside and low, hitting the dirt and sending up a cloud. I worried instantly that something was wrong. Graham didn’t miss like that, not when he was a professional. If he missed that badly, it was on purpose to get the player to swing at something terrible. But he knew I wasn’t going to do that. I just hoped he hadn’t hurt himself.
Principal Runnels tossed the ball away and asked the ball boy to grab him another one. I thought that was odd, since the umpire usually had a bag of them on his hip. I looked back to him, and sure enough, he had a bag there but was patiently waiting on the ball boy to come back. I looked back at Graham, who was also waiting, and instead of the ball boy coming to the catcher, he ran right out to Graham.
Weird.
Graham got set, and the ball boy ran off the field, so I took my stance again. I was determined to swing at least once. Just one pitch was going to have my bat chasing after it, even if I was super off or super late. I couldn’t just stand there for the entire at-bat.
He wound up and threw, and I closed my eyes, taking a hack at it with the too-heavy bat and hoping I would at least make some sort of contact.
I didn’t.
Instead, I almost fell as I twisted myself up like a pretzel. As I unwound myself, I noticed Dustin was still holding on to the ball. Graham was walking toward us, and I figured he was going to have a conference with his catcher, so I stepped back. But he wasn’t walking toward Principal Runnels. He was looking directly at me.
Confused, I stood there, not knowing exactly what to do as Graham stopped a foot in front of me and held out his open glove. Grinning, Dustin shoved the ball into his glove and winked at me. Things were getting weirder.
“I can take it from here,” Graham said.
“What is going on?” I muttered.
Graham smiled and brushed one of the errant hairs that refused to stay in my ponytail away from my face and pulled the ball out of the glove. But when he tossed his glove away, he pulled at the leather of the seams, and it opened in a way I was sure neither baseballs or softballs were supposed to do. Like a lid, it rose, and I saw it. It wasn’t a real ball. It was a box made to look like one.
And there was a ring inside.
“I know this might be fast,” he said. “But I have a whole lot of time to make up for, and I refuse to let five years go by again before I take the next step. Over the last few months, I have realized something that I knew in the back of my mind and didn’t admit to myself until now. I am in love with you, Mallory Taylor. I always have been. Even when I didn’t really know it.
“I’m sorry it took me this long to get to where I should have been years ago, but I am here now. And if you will have me”—he knelt down on one knee and held the ball-box up— “I would like to make you my wife. Mallory, will you marry me?”
I felt like I might faint, but my head started bobbing, and I forced out the only words that mattered.
“Yes! Yes, I will!”
Rising with a smile as bright as the April sun, Graham swept me into his arms and laid a kiss on my lips. The crowd around us cheered loudly, and I wondered how many of them knew this was the plan. He spun me around as he kissed me, and I felt the thunder of the crowd get loud, students stamping on the metal benches and players hitting the cage of the dugout. When he sat me down, I looked around and saw the crowd all on their feet, including Tessa and Kat, and sitting right beside them, somehow, Tamara, Dale and Steven.
I spun back to him and pulled him close.
“How did you do this? What would you have done if I hit the ball?”
“I didn’t really think you had much of a chance at that,” he laughed.
I acted offended and then dissolved into laughter myself. He was right. That control I had felt while he was on the mound was real. I didn’t stand a chance.
“Mommy! Daddy!” came a little voice that I could pick out in any crowd.
Owen was running, full tilt, across the dirt, heading toward us. Graham dropped down to his knees and held out his arms, and Owen dove into him, making my heart swell. He picked up our son, and they waved at the crowd together before he brought Owen back to me, and he hopped into my arms. Owen placed a big, wet, smack of a kiss on my cheek that was somehow sticky. When I pulled back to look at him, I saw the stain of chocolate over his lips. That must mean that Mom was out there somewhere.
“Does this mean we’re a family?” Owen asked.
“Yes, baby. It does,” I said.
“Yay!” Owen exclaimed. “Now Daddy can sleep over!”
I laughed and pulled him in tight for a hug, and Graham wrapped himself around both of us. At that moment, I didn’t know if it was possible to be any more in love.
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