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“I always sleep naked. The only reason I had on pajamas is to keep you away from me.”
“Clothing hasn’t stopped me so far.”
Wrapping the covers around both of us, she straddled my lap. “It’s your turn to tell me what little Drew wanted to do when he grew up,” she said. “Maybe I should turn on the lights so I can see if you’re lying to me or not.”
“I’ve been honest with you so far. It’s you who’s lying.”
“I didn’tlieabout hoping that if I got in bed you’d get out. That was partially true. Maybe even mostly true.”
“But . . .” I prompted with a sly smile.
“I wanted to snuggle,” she huffed, and I laughed in her face, wrapping my arms around her.
“Snuggle?” I spit out another laugh. “Oh, come on. I’d have believed you more if you said you’d come in here to chop off my balls.”
“Whatever.”
I heard her annoyance, but under that, she was telling the truth.I’ll be damned.My tigress was allowing me to see past her tough-as-nails façade. Perhaps only available under the cover of darkness, but shit. As she said, whatever.
I stood and deposited her on the bed, then fumbled around until I’d collected the blankets off the floor. After a poor attempt at getting them straight on the mattress, I crawled in beside her and pulled her close. A little sigh escaped her, soft breath on my skin as she exhaled against me.
“A professional baseball player.” I’d avoided that subject for many years, and now it was a damn daily topic of conversation. Itstillwasn’t any easier.
“All boys want to do that at some point,” she said dismissively.
“Not all of them get a few days away from signing with the Rangers,” I fired back, and she shifted, her chin on my chest as though she was trying to look at me in the dark.
“Was that you on the baseball card in your wallet?” I cringed that she’d caught me carrying that around, but she continued before I had a chance to come up with a smart remark. “You were that good?”
“I was way better than ‘that good,’” I corrected, and I could almost picture the skeptical look on her face.
“What happened?”
“Final inning, College World Series. We were three runs behind. Bases were loaded. Two outs. I was up at bat. What every guy dreams of. I hit one almost to the fence. The outfielder fumbled, and it was enough to get everybody home except me. I dove for the plate, and somehow tore up my shoulder muscles, dislocated it,andblew out my knee. But I made it home. We won. I lost everything.”
“People get injured all the time,” she protested.
“Yeah, but I’d really done a number on my shoulder, not to mention the years of use before that. I’d torn my rotator cuff severely on my throwing arm. I tried, but even after all the surgeries, it was never the same.”
“Drew,” she breathed, anguished.
I opened my mouth to give her the spiel about how it didn’t matter, that I was fine with it, but that was a lie. “I was this close.” I held my index finger and thumb a millimeter apart even though she couldn’t see it. “I loved everything about the game.Everything. But it turns out, she didn’t love me as much as I loved her.”
“The ultimate betrayal of a lover. You understand the disappointment and anger more than most. We have our dreams, think they’re going to happen, and then life has other ideas. Guess we aren’t that different. Injuries stole both our dreams.” My story was sad, but people didn’t really get it. Sonya did, and she didn’t give the bullshit excuse how everything works out for a reason or that it wasn’t meant to be. Sheknew.
My mood had darkened. She didn’t tell me to snap out of it. If anything, she was down in the mud with me, indulging me, joining my pity party. It felt good not to be the only one in attendance. It felt good not to pretend. Not to be so . . . alone.
Chapter Thirty
Sonya
“What the fuck?”
I whipped around at the sound of the masculine voice behind me. It was sexy, but it wasn’t Drew’s. And I was in the kitchen making coffee . . .naked.
“Good morning,” I said with false cheer as if I were dressed from head to toe. “Coffee’s almost ready.”
He kept his eyes locked on mine. They never strayed down for a look at the goods. I might have even tried to tempt him by subtly thrusting out my chest, but the man was as honorable as they came. I hopped up on the counter, my bare ass hitting the cool laminate and swung my feet as we awkwardly waited for the coffee to finish brewing.
