Home Run Baby: A Sports Romance (15 page)

“Oh, yeah?”

He nods. “Definitely.”

“Well, I think you should worry about your own problems,” I tease. “What’s the deal with you and
Trisha
?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

I chuckle. “One day she’s using your shoulder as a pillow and the next she’s barging into my shower and asking me about
your story.
”

Devin flashes a smug grin. “She did, did she?”

“She did. What’d you do?”

“Nothing,” he says, his lips continually curling. “I went down on her a few times.”

“Of course, you did.”

“Hey, you wanted me to distract her.
I’m distracting her.
Wait…” He looks at me. “She barged into your shower?”

“She barged into my shower,” I confirm.

“What’d she see?”

I don’t answer.

“Oh, come on,” he whines. “What’d she see?”

I sit and smile.

“
Dammit.
Now I have to compete with your giant, donkey dick.”

I laugh. “What makes you think I have a donkey dick?”

“
Of course
you have a donkey dick, man,” he says.
“Fuck.”

“She didn’t see anything, Dev,” I say. “She never got past the curtain.”

“Thank Christ…” He heaves a sigh of relief. “I’m right about that donkey dick, though, right? Eh?”

I shake my head with amusement.

Chapter 18

Daisy

“How are things with your
boyfriend
?”

I wince and pause at the top of the stadium section. “No. That doesn’t work for me, either.”

Rose sighs. “Well, we have officially run out of labels.”

“I just don’t understand what he’s supposed to be yet,” I say, balancing the phone on my shoulder and raising my camera to get a wide shot of the field. “He’s not really a
fuck buddy
but he’s not my
boyfriend
, either.”

“He’s your
sperm donor
,” she quips.

“Well, I can’t argue with that one.”

“Have you talked to him about this?”

“No.”

“Don’t you think you should?”

I hesitate. “I don’t wanna.”

“Daisy.”

“Every time I’ve ever had
the relationship talk
with a guy, it’s all over by the end of the week. Every single time.”

She sighs. “Daisy, Hunter is
not
going to leave you.”

“Why not?”

“Because he adores you.”

I sit down in an empty seat to rest my throbbing feet. Flats just aren’t as comfortable as a good, old-fashioned, pair of sneakers. Maybe I’ll grab a pair from my place when we drive into Hartford later tonight. “What makes you think that?” I ask her as I rub my ankle.

“Why else would he have stuck with you so far?”

“Because we have
great
sex,” I say plainly.

She sighs. “Don’t you think that maybe — just
maybe
— you two are using sex as an easy escape hatch?”

“I don’t follow.”

“It sounds like you guys rely on your alter egos to step in whenever you want to avoid talking and dealing with your issues.”

“Jeez,” I say. “I thought you were studying
Chemistry
, not
Psychology
.”

“You don’t have to be Freud to see what’s going on here,” she says. “Talk to each other. The next time you guys start wandering towards the bed, pump the brakes. Use that as an opportunity to talk about what really matters, even if it’s just for five minutes. You might be surprised by the results.”

“Yeah,
or
I’ll be single again,” I point out. “And still pregnant.”

“Talk to him and find out.”

I frown. “Nah.”

“Well, has he said anything to make you think he’d bail or are you just projecting irrational fears?”

“I saw his face, Rose,” I argue. “If you saw it, you would agree. No matter what he says,
I saw it
. There’s only one thing he wants in this world and that’s to play major league baseball.”

“Daisy, are you familiar with the term
self-fulfilling prophecy
?”

I roll my eyes. “Yes, Rose.”

“So, you know why I’m mentioning it now?”

“To annoy me?”

“No…” she says. “I’m mentioning it because Hunter liked you before the baby, he likes you after the baby, and the common factor of both of those things is
you
.”

“What’s your point?”

“My point is that there is no chapter in
What to Expect When You’re Expecting
that tells you to expect your partner to leave you, so you should not be expecting that.”

I scoff. “You read that crap?”

“You
haven’t
?”

“Nah, I figured I’d just wing it.”

“Daisy…”

“Women had babies for millions of years before pretentious how-to manuals,” I chuckle. “The human race did just fine. I’m sure I’ll be fine, too.”

She groans. “Please tell me you’re — at the very least — seeing a doctor at some point.”

“As a matter of fact,” I nod, “I have an appointment tomorrow morning in Hartford. Getting my twelve-week ultrasound and everything.”

“Thank god,”
she says. “You excited?”

“Kind of.”

“Is Hunter?”

I bite my lip. “I actually haven’t told him about it yet.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t want to distract him,” I say. “He’s got enough on his mind right now.”

“Self-fulfilling prophecy.”

“Rose, if I wanted someone to nag and berate me, I would be talking to
Mom
instead.”

“I can put her on,” she says. “She’s in the other room.”

“Please don’t.”

“And speaking of not telling people stuff, you think you’re gonna get around to telling her about this soon?”

I wince. “Yeah, soon.”

My phone vibrates and I check the screen to find a new text from Trisha.

East exit. Now.

“Rose, I gotta go. Trisha is beckoning me.”

“Okay. Let me know how the appointment goes, all right?
And tell Hunter about it
.”

“I will. Bye.”

I slide my phone away and take one last wide shot of the field as the home team takes their place on the diamond before heading back down the stairs to the exits.

“There you are!” Trisha scolds me as I round the corner. “Where have you been?”

“I was getting a few shots from the top,” I explain. “What’s up?”

She shifts on her feet and slides her sunglasses back to rest on her head. “I wanted to tell you about this earlier but I couldn’t find you. You weren’t in your room.”

I think fast. “Oh, I had to run out early for new shampoo. The motel stuff is starting to eat my scalp—”

“So, the editors at the magazine are quite impressed with the shots you’ve sent in so far,” she says, talking over me.

“Really?”

“And I must admit…” she forces the words out, “I don’t think they’re that bad, either.”

“Wow, thank you, Trisha,” I say, feeling my cheeks burn red. “That means a lot coming from you.”

“I know,” she nods. “I had my doubts about you at first but we get along well enough.”

“Well enough for what?”

She smiles. “The magazine wants to bring you on full-time.”

My heart pounds. “They do?”

“Our New York guy is getting sick of commuting around New England — and who could blame him — but you live in Hartford. Any plans to move anytime soon?”

“No, none.”

“Good. You’ll still answer to me. After baseball season, I’ll have you shoot the university teams up there. The Harvard and Yale boys always bring in readers. You like football, right?”

I frown. “Eh…”

“Yeah, me neither. But it’s a job and someone’s gotta do it. Might as well be you, right?”

“Yes,” I say, forcing the laugh from bursting out. “Holy shit, yes.”

“That’s the spirit!” She lays her sunglasses back down on her nose. “Now, run along. Take some sexy pictures for me.”

I turn around and walk away from her but I don’t feel the sensation of it at all. My senses are frozen solid — stuck fast in this moment.

It’s all happening. Everything I’ve worked for; every shift at the photo studio, every damn step I’ve taken has finally paid off.
Sports Illuminated
magazine wants me. My photos will be seen all over the country, in magazines and online, and it never would have happened if I hadn’t have met—

The crowd bursts around me with screams and waving hands. All eyes turn to the sky and I follow them to see a baseball firing towards our section.

I flinch, succumbing to a post-traumatic stress I didn’t know I had, as a man a few rows ahead raises his gloved hand upward and catches it without any trouble at all.

Hunter.

I look to the diamond and there he is, taking his sweet time around the bases as he waves to his beloved fans.

“Home Run Hunter! Home Run Hunter!”

I shake my head and smile before raising my camera.

This never would have happened without Hunter. All of my dreams are coming true. I’m going to travel. I’m going to hang out with athletes. I’m going to become the Annie freakin’ Leibovitz of sports photography and there’s nothing out there that can stop me except…

I lay a hand on my stomach and the new, fancy walls come crashing down.

I can’t travel with a baby. Hell, can I even travel that much while I’m pregnant? Bending and twisting will become a problem the bigger I get. I doubt I could work with a baby — a baby is a full-time gig on its own. If I’m going to keep this dream job, then I’m going to need help. A partner.

Ugh
, I’m really gonna have to bring up that relationship talk with Hunter, aren’t I?

Chapter 19

Hunter

Four home runs and a double play.

I’m not sure which of those was more difficult to pull off but I did it.

That double play was insane. Bottom of the ninth, bases loaded — as the cliché goes. Just when I thought I’d let Daisy down by not getting that double play, the batter whacked that ball straight to second base. It bounced right into my glove and I tapped my foot on my base.
Bam
, first base runner out. Then it was just a fast throw towards first base and the batter-runner was out by a fraction of a second. A goddamn double play.

“Hunter, let me talk to you for a minute!”

I look up from the locker to see Bud waving me down. He gestures me towards the office in the back and I follow him inside.

“Close the door behind ya,” he says, lowering himself into the chair behind the desk.

I take a look around to see Coach Carl standing by, leaning against the wall by the door. “What’s up?” I ask them.

“What’s up?”
Bud laughs and gawks at Carl. “This guy hits four home runs and he asks
us
what’s up?
You’re
what’s up, kid.”

I chuckle. “I’m just doing my job out there, sir.”

“And you’re damn good at it. I’d say almost
too good
but you’ve never once failed a piss test so what do I know?”

I glance between them, waiting on twitching toes. The question was obviously rhetorical but he stares at me as if waiting for an answer. “Thank you,” I say.

“And thank
you
,” he says. “I’m having dinner tonight with some good folks and they want to talk to me about
you
. I thought I’d give you a heads up so you don’t catch wind of it elsewhere.”

I blink. “Catch wind of what?”

He laughs again. “This kid…” he says to Carl. “He has no idea how badly the major leagues are gunning for him.”

“They are?”

“I’ve fielded almost a dozen offers so far to buy out your contract, and that’s in the last
month
alone,” he says. “Each time, the numbers get bigger and bigger. I haven’t accepted because I’m damn curious how high that number can get and after four home runs and a double play — you can bet your ass the sky is the limit.”