Thrown By Love (21 page)

Stars reached a sparkling canopy in the inky black sky as Chloe walked out into the gardens surrounding the guest cottage. It was later than she’d realized. The Donovan clan and their friends had partied late into the night, celebrating Dara, congratulating her on her new teaching job and sharing jokes and stories with the ease and humor of people who’d known each other all their lives. She wondered if Scotty realized how special it was to have such a large, loving family. When she’d visited friends’ families during break at Laughton Hall, she’d envied their inside jokes and good-natured jousting, but she’d never felt her loneliness as strongly as she did now. Until her dad died, she’d never really thought much about family, she’d been so caught up in school and then her teaching. But now, surrounded by the Donovan’s boisterous, deep love, she felt the hole that losing him had carved, felt the yearning for connection haunting her.

Scotty had said goodnight to her at the kitchen door since he could hardly have come out with her to the cottage. But she wished they’d made plans to spend at least a few minutes alone together. These might be their last, at least for a while. Though it had been a hard decision, she’d decided they needed to take a month away from each other. Wherever their relationship might go, if it could go anywhere, pursuing it would have to wait until after the stadium vote. If what they shared was strong, if it was real, what difference could a month apart make?

Owls hooted to their mates as she walked along the path leading past the barn. At the edge of the field where they’d played their game, she stopped to stare up at the glowing path of the Milky Way arching above her. So many, many stars. They reminded her of permanence, of beginnings and of the future. And focusing on them settled some of the imbalance that had shaken her the last few months. The sky and the universe, for all their mystery, didn’t confuse her.

“Are the heavens still in their right place?” Scotty’s voice was soft against her neck as he slid his hands around her waist and pulled her back against him.

“You surprised me. Again.”

He closed his arms around her.

“I’m just getting started surprising you,” he said as he pulled her down to the soft grass.

Chloe stared into his eyes, ran a finger along one brow and then cupped her hand around his jaw.

“What?” Scotty asked. “You look quite solemn.”

“Hmm . . . I was wondering . . .”

She moved her fingers to trace his lower lip, and he took a nip out of one. He grinned when she gasped softly.

“Wondering what?”

She searched his face in the darkness, trying to see inside him, trying to see
him
. She wondered at his depths. At the drive that had taken him so far from a family he obviously dearly loved. Maybe that love was what allowed him to go so far, confident they’d always welcome him home.

“Chloe?”

“Yes, Chapta?”

He groaned. “That’s what you’re wondering about?”

“Yep.”

He rolled off her and onto his back so they could both look up at the stars. He reached for her hand and entwined his fingers with hers.

“You already know I like to read. Well, I liked to read when I was young too. When I should’ve been sleeping or heading to school or pitching or helping with chores.”

When he fell silent, she squeezed his fingers. “And?”

“And when Mom or Dad or G’maw called me to the table or the field or wherever, I usually begged for just one more chapter. G’maw started calling me Chapta and she got my brothers and Dara doing it and it just stuck.”

Chloe focused on the sky. When she didn’t say anything, Scotty rolled to his side and stared down at her.

“Well?”

“That’s really rather . . . ”

“Silly? Dumb? Childish?”

“Sweet. Darling. Adorable.” She grinned. “Maybe we should share the story via social media?”

Scotty growled and pounced, lying on Chloe and then rolling them a couple of times in the grass. “I’ll show you sweet.”

He stopped them with her on top, held her face between his hands, and proceeded to kiss her not only sweetly, but passionately.

She loved the combination, a blend that was pure male passion and rising desire.

A blend that was Scotty’s own. One she imagined she’d never tire of.

Chloe was still cocooned in the haze that their lovemaking had conjured when Scotty leaned up onto his elbows and hovered over her.

“Want a lesson in cosmology, professor?” He shifted and brushed her hair away from her face. He slid down onto one elbow and rested his head in his upturned hand.

“First off,” he said with a mock serious look, mimicking straightening a tie around his neck, “as you look up at the sky, remember that gravity is pinning you to the Earth.”

She had to giggle at his comic professorial tone, but the humor quickly faded as his other hand tracked fire when his fingers roved from her shoulders to her hips.

“You’re making it mighty hard to concentrate.”

He traced the curve of her hip, then her waist. Then he flicked his fingertips across her already hard nipple.

“Do pay attention,” he said in a dramatic, admonishing tone. “Now imagine that you are lying on the bottom of the Earth and you are looking
down
at the stars, not up.”

He gestured into the darkness. “See the stars as down there, below you. Feel how gravity bonds with the Earth and keeps you from falling into the stars. Well, that and”—he cupped her breast—”my left hand.”

She stared at the dark bowl above her and the scattered points of twinkling light. She’d looked at the night sky for as long as she could remember. She’d never look at it the same. So much of her life would never be the same. She pushed herself up and slid her hands around Scotty’s neck.

“Do you work at turning the world upside down,” she said as she nipped a kiss to his lips, “or does the ability just come naturally?”

Her announcement could wait. Just then she wanted to be held and look at the world with new eyes, make love with him, looking down into the universe.

Scotty sat across from Chloe in the cushioned leather seat of her jet. At least there was no cabin attendant fawning over them; she had spared them that. She had her nose in the paper they’d bought at the general store that morning as they’d passed through Cedar Creek. Dara had driven them to the plane, chattering all the way and occasionally shooting questioning looks at Scotty in the rearview mirror.

He watched Chloe as she reviewed the box scores in the sports section. She had decisions to make about the team down the road if she followed through on her plan to rid the Sabers of the weak players Fisher had brought in. Though there was more to a player than his numbers in the box scores, the numbers gave a damn clear snapshot of a player’s strengths. She made tic marks as she went down the page. He squirmed a bit, recognizing once again that she could buy and sell players. Could sell him. He’d never been this close to the person responsible for those sorts of decisions, hadn’t considered what it was like from the other end.

He was tired, even though after he’d snuck back to his room just before dawn, he’d slept deeper than he had in years. It was a tiredness that came from hours of the most stunning sex he’d ever had. And he sure wasn’t going to complain about that. Yet it’d been way more than sex. What he and Chloe had shared had satisfied not only his body, but his soul, stirring him and soothing him at the same time. But dwelling on what had happened, on his reactions, wouldn’t do any good. They still had no future.

And anyway, it seemed clear that their night under the stars hadn't had the same effect on her. She was sitting across from him, working diligently and easily, as if their night together had been simply another night.

“Any prospects?” he asked in an attempt to get her to talk. She hadn’t said much since they’d settled into their seats. After what they’d shared in the past day, the silence felt like a yawning gap. He didn’t like it.

She looked up from the paper.

“My dad wanted Tory Griffin. I think he was right.”

She pressed her lips into a thin line. He knew her well enough to see that something other than player trades was on her mind.

“You can tell me,” he said. “Whatever’s bothering you, you can tell me.”

When she slid her gaze to the window, he wished he hadn’t spoken. They were returning to the real world, the world where she was an owner and he was a member of a team—a team she happened to own. There wasn’t any way around that.

“We’re going back,” she said as she kept her face averted.

“Should we tell the pilot to change the flight plan to Bali?”

“I should’ve thought of that.” There was nothing playful in her tone.

She turned to him, and he read the sadness in her eyes. He’d known this moment would come; it was just a question of which one of them would call it. The heroic deed would be to make a move first, save her from having to take the inevitable first step. He inhaled a heavy breath; he didn’t want to do it. She was the only woman he’d met that he could imagine making a life with. Hell, before he met her, he hadn’t wrapped his head around any of that, hadn’t thought beyond the next baseball season. But it wasn’t his head that was doing the thinking, and his heart didn’t have the experience to know what to do. He’d never known that caring for a woman could be world-shaking amazing and soul-crushing at the same time. But he couldn’t tell her that. Not now.

“We should take some time away from each other, Scotty. At least a month.”

She’d beat him to the first move.

“See if all this cools off,” she added, gesturing between them with one hand.

As if it would. But he saw the strong feminine resolve in her eyes, the same kind he’d seen in his mother and grandmother when they’d settled on a course of action. He doubted she was much of an actor; the resolve was real. She’d said “all this” as if what had happened between them was some sort of quantifiable object to be turned and examined, its benefits and drawbacks weighed and measured. A wash of unease dropped into his gut. Maybe she wasn’t in as deep as he was. They hadn’t talked feelings, hadn’t had time between the sex and playing and more sex. But maybe there weren’t any feelings to discuss. Maybe on her side it was only sex and companionship. She was alone; her father had just died. And Scotty was convenient. Maybe he was simply support. He pushed back in his chair, uncomfortable with his thoughts. Uncomfortable in his skin.

God, she’d never once mentioned feelings. What woman didn’t mention feelings if she had them?

He wiped a hand across his jaw.

Only a woman who didn’t have them.

He thought he was damn good at reading people. But she wasn’t a hitter, and he wasn’t looking to see if she feared his fastball or had a clue about his pitching sequence. And she wasn’t a woman looking to improve her lot by adding him to her list of conquests.

There were plenty of guys who’d be a hell of a lot less trouble for her, guys who could accompany her to events without raising eyebrows. Guys who fit in her world. Guys who wouldn’t make her job harder to do.