AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Okay. But don’t leave after that. We need to talk.”
“Of course not.” He wanted to be irritated at the suggestion that he’d try to avoid the conversation, but he knew where it came from. In his younger days, he hadn’t taken things like disagreements seriously. He’d blown off plenty of confrontations, mostly because he’d known he was in the wrong and hadn’t wanted to admit it.
Upstairs, he took an extra moment to tuck Bean into bed. The boy’s cheeks were flushed from the night’s excitement and too much pie. At least he hadn’t broken anything; Bean was absurdly accident-prone. Recently, Jenna had taken him to an eye doctor, but his vision was perfect. Apparently, his only problem was a need to keep up with his older brother.
Billy dropped one last kiss on the top of his head and headed downstairs to face the music.
Jenna had changed into comfy lowrider sweatpants with a stripe down the side, and a baggy sweater. She also wore her fuzzy fleece slippers. The combination was clearly not meant to be sexy, but still led him to imagine cuddling on the couch with her. She held two cups of hot chocolate, one of which she offered to him.
He made a show of sniffing it before taking a sip.
She raised an eyebrow. “You know one of my Rules for Divorce is don’t poison your ex unless absolutely necessary.”
Her rules cracked him up because they seemed to morph according to circumstances. “Yes, but you don’t always follow rules. Do I have to remind you about the time we snuck into—”
“Nope.” She cut him off with a rueful smile. He could have ended that sentence with a number of forbidden locations, starting with a summer estate rumored to be haunted and including the VIP room at the Blue Drake. “I’m not always the good girl people think, am I?”
“Definitely not.” He tried to keep the insinuation out of his voice, but it was impossible. He knew Jenna’s fiery side better than anyone. He hurried onwards. “I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you about Japan right away. I don’t know how Zack heard about it, but I’m sorry about that too.”
Her gaze flicked away from him, then she set her mug down, sank into the armchair and folded her legs under her. “So what’s the deal? Are you moving to Japan?”
The way she said it, he knew she’d spent the evening steeling herself for that possibility.
He set his mug down too, then crouched next to her. “Jenna, I would never move anywhere without you signing off on it. You know I wouldn’t.”
She chewed on the inside of her mouth, a stress habit he was familiar with. “Go sit on the couch.”
“Sure.” He hesitated, then did as she asked. He’d just have to get his point across without using their mutual physical awareness to do so. “There’s a team in Japan that has expressed interest in me. That’s as far as it goes, but Pete thinks I should seriously consider it. It would be a huge jump from my current contract, and you know the new manager at the Twins doesn’t like me. He’s been putting Pedro in the lineup almost as much as me. Pete doubts they’d be willing to match what the Chunichi Dragons would offer. He thinks they’ll use Pedro as a way to lowball me.”
“The Chunichi Dragons…” Jenna tilted her head. “If you take that offer just because the team has a cool name, I’ll break all the damn divorce rules.”
He had to laugh at that. “The name is pretty awesome, but I’m more about the money. We’d have a lot more to work with.” On top of child support payments, he put most of the money he made in a fund for the boys. He’d only started making decent money a few years ago. Before then, they’d both scrambled for funds. At the beginning, Jenna had made more as a botanical illustrator than he had as a minor league baseball player.
“How long is the contract?”
“Two years, probably. I’d come back here in the offseason, same as now.”
“But the boys wouldn’t see you as much during the season.” She shook her head unhappily.
“I’d fly them to Japan whenever they want. You too,” he added. “You could all come. Summer in Japan. Pretty freaking cool.”
“Yeah, maybe. But they have so much going on here in the summer. They look forward to it all year long. Fishing, canoeing, swimming, soccer…”
He wanted to tell her they had all those things in Japan, but he actually didn’t know. Surely they must fish there. But canoeing? Or the Minnesota state sport, mosquito-slapping?
“Cultural exposure,” he said. “It’s good to experience life in other countries. Broadens your horizons.”
“Bean is six. He doesn’t need his horizons broadened yet.” Her wry tone echoed what he believed, too. Bean might not even remember living in Japan if he was only six at the time. Billy’s own memories from that age were fuzzy and mostly involved playing with squirt guns and worrying about his mother.
He slouched back on the couch and linked his hands behind his head. “Yeah, I should forget about it. Tampa Bay is also an option, or I can take my chances with the Twins. Honestly, I’m not sure the Dragons would work out anyway.”
Her gaze flew up to meet his over the rim of her mug. It had an anatomically correct picture of a frog on it, inspired by one of her first jobs, illustrating an Encyclopedia of Tree Frogs. That gig had left Jenna with a lasting love for frogs. It was the oddest thing, but endearing too. She even recognized the different croaks from their local frog species.
Just one of Jenna’s many quirks. From her blond, perky exterior, people never guessed how secretly weird she was.
“Why not?” she asked with a frown. “Because of the kids?”
“No, not that. I mean, that would be my reason. But the Dragons might not pull the trigger anyway. They’re concerned about my…” Ugh, he had to say it. “Reputation.”
