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“You like her.”
I nod. “I do.”
“No. I mean, more than anyone before her.”
I look around the dining room and then back at her. “I do, and I’m afraid of what that may mean.”
“What do you mean by that?” She has a confused look on her face.
“Well, I was about to propose to Renee when I caught her… well, you know. What does that say about my decision-making skills when it comes to these kinds of things?”
“Hudson, son, it says you love with your whole heart. And there is nothing wrong with that. You trusted Renee, and she betrayed your trust. You and she weren’t meant for each other, and you found out before you proposed. That’s the universe helping you out. All of that is on her. Not you. Remember that.”
“I know you’re right.”
“I’m always right. I’m the mom. It’s my job.”
I laugh, “You never liked Renee, did you?” I’ve never asked because I never really wanted to know. Maybe that should have been a clue, too.
“It’s not that I didn’t like her. She just never seemed to be the right one for you.”
“Bark!” Pepper is standing by the front door.
“I think your dog is ready to go home, and I have some shopping to do.” Mom holds up her list.
“Okay, okay. I can take a hint. We’re leaving.” I grab Pepper’s leash and kiss Mom on the cheek. “Love you.”
“Love you, too. Have fun tonight with your new friend.”
I wave behind me as Pepper jumps into the truck and we head home.
CHAPTER 21
KATE
It is hot. Stupid hot. And humid. Florida summers are ridiculously unbearable sometimes. I have no idea why I did this to myself, but here I sit in a dugout with almost no breeze blowing, watching my team get annihilated in a school-age game of kickball. The other team, the Palm Beach Pirates, has a score of twenty-five to our zero runs. Their team is also an all-female team, but they’re so good, they could easily be a professional team… if there was such a thing.
“Run, Mia!” Sunni, our captain, suddenly screams from the dugout opening.
We all jump up and start cheering for the only player on our team to actually kick the ball today. Yeah, we suck that bad.
“Go, go, go!” I scream as I grab onto the chain-link fence surrounding the dugout and jump up and down.
Mia is running as fast as possible as she drops her foot onto first base. She pauses for a second to see where the ball is and sees that the outfielders are still running towards it as it lies against the back fence of the playing field.
She makes a fast decision to run to second. As her foot hits second base, Sunni and the rest of us are all screaming for her to keep running.
Mia doesn’t even slow down at third as the other team throws the ball to their third base player, but she misses. As their player picks up the ball and throws it to home, it’s a race to see which player will make it to home-base first.
Mia gets tagged by the catcher only inches from the base. And just like that, Mia is called out, but we don’t care. We are all so thrilled that Mia almost made it to home base that we’re cheering and congratulating her like she made the winning run in the World Series.
“Mia did so great!” Riley says to me with a wide grin as we walk away from shaking hands with the other team players and telling each other ‘good game’.
“She did! I’m so glad at least one of us got a kick in. How embarrassing would it have been had none of us been able to make contact with the ball?”
“You are not wrong, Miss Kate.” Riley laughs.
“Ladies, can we have a quick post-game meeting before we all leave?” Sunni corrals us into the dugout once more. As we all file in and sit down, we congratulate Mia again for almost making a run.
