I mean even my best friend doesn’t know where I grew up.
“Apology accepted,” I tell him, because it’s the fastest way to get rid of him and that sexy smile, and also because I’m having this weird tingle in my breasts that suggests I shouldn’t call him by his real name or encourage him to stay any longer than necessary. Especially with the way his girlfriend is sizing me up.
I want to point out to her that if he’s dating her, really dating her and not just in some Hollywood stunt that his PR people told him would make him look good, then she has nothing to worry about.
And not just because why would I ever be interested in a random guy who insulted me on Twitter? I need to get a grip on my breasts.
Not literally, of course.
I look at Mackenzie. “Game’s back on.”
“Oh!” Her eyes dart wildly between the game and the underwear ape. “Um, are you good luck for the Fireballs?”
“I’m rarely bad luck,” he replies with that schmootzy charm. Yes, schmootzy, and you know exactly what I’m talking about. Schmootzy can’t be trusted. He’s a schmaltzy schmoozer with the swoon factor on his side.
Officially outside the circle of trust, no matter what promises are lingering in that summer sky in his irises as he studies me entirely too closely.
He’s not here to apologize because he feels bad. He’s here to apologize because he’s getting bad press.
I hate that I can’t trust people to just have good intentions. Maybe he does have good intentions. Maybe he was raised with the Southern manners everyone in Copper Valley seems to have, and maybe he’s honestly sorry, and maybe this has nothing to do with people burning RYDE underwear in the streets and him trying to save face.
I want to believe he is.
But I have too much experience with Hollywood to believe it.
My best friend is looking between all of us now. She’s mostly ignored the ape’s girlfriend, but Fireballs baseball is not something to be trifled with, and I know she’s sizing them both up to decide if they’re good or bad luck.
“How often do you watch?” she demands.
“Few times a summer,” Beck says while his girlfriend gives the subtle not often head shake.
“Gah! Ack. Okay. Okay. We can try this, because it’s not like we have a lot to lose. You. Sit. Right there. You. Stand by the plant, but don’t look at the cat. Looking at the cat is bad luck. Every time Sarah pets the cat while the Fireballs are playing, they lose.”
Meda rolls her mismatched eyes from her perch atop the flowery upholstered rocking chair.
Beck Ryder takes my normal seat.
His girlfriend dutifully stands by the overgrown ficus where Mackenzie insists she go.
And my possibly traitorous but mostly superstitious best friend pushes me to the couch next to the man I tasered a few hours ago.
“Stop freaking out,” she tells him when he goes tense and eyeballs me again. “Sarah put her taser away hours ago, and we’re only allowed happy thoughts when we’re watching the Fireballs.”
“I really am sorry,” he says out of the corner of his mouth to me while he glues his eyes to the TV, like he’s afraid Mackenzie’s going to yell at him if he disrupts the game, but they keep darting to me like he’s equally afraid to be this close to a psycho.
Legit fear.
Maybe he’s smarter than his billboards and Twitter feed make him look.
“It’s fine,” I murmur back, because I don’t want to talk about it, and my mouth is getting a little dry, and he has really long fingers that are fascinating me, and also, Mackenzie will probably say it’s bad luck to talk.
Some days I can’t remember how she so thoroughly insinuated herself into my life, but she accepts me for the weirdo I am, and I’ve never had to break up with her because she wanted to meet my parents—and yes, I have been through that heartbreak—so the least I can do is return the favor and humor her scientific luck experiment.
Yes, I realize science and luck are not related, but there would be this huge gaping hole in my life if she ever quit coming over to watch baseball with me.
“I know you don’t have a lot of experience with this kind of publicity,” he says, “and if it’s overwhelming, my team’s happy to help you sort through the mess. Since it’s my fault.”
I snort. Don’t have a lot of experience. He has no idea.
“I’m not just blowing smoke,” he insists. “I fucked up. You shouldn’t have to pay for it.”
He smells like Earl Grey tea in a snowy cabin. Bergamot and a thick wool blanket. It should be suffocating in June, but it’s making me crave a trip to the mountains.
“Some other celebrity will get caught stuffing the sausage in a pig next week and this will be completely forgotten,” I reply. “It’s fine.”
“Quit being an idiot and take advantage of him,” Mackenzie hisses. “Oh, oh, oh, run! RUN!” She leaps to her feet and pumps a fist in the air as Jose Ramirez gets a single for the Fireballs.
Meda yowls and darts for the stairs to my converted attic bedroom.
Ryder’s girlfriend stifles a smile and scrolls on her phone.
They’re a publicity stunt, I decide. Because he’s all up in my chili, and she’s not even batting an eyelash.
“The Nature Center could really use some funds for updated playground equipment,” Mackenzie muses as she sits back down and grabs a handful of popcorn as if she isn’t ratting out my favorite weekend project.
“Done,” Beck says. “Which nature center?”
“Sshh,” she replies, waving a hand at him.
Darren Greene’s up. Left-fielder. Her not-so-secret crush who strikes out more often than he gets on base these days.
“Which nature center?” Beck whispers to me.
I shush him too, because I don’t believe in blackmail, even when the blackmailee is volunteering for it, but especially when he smells this good and are his long thighs really all muscle, or is it another trick of the soft denim wrapped tight around them?
His girlfriend is frowning at me again, but I ignore her, because Greene hits a single that advances Ramirez to third.
“Sarah!” Mackenzie shrieks as the camera pans to Cooper Rock stepping up to bat. “BATHROOM!”
“Thanks for stopping by,” I say to the underwear ape. “Seriously. We’re cool. Go away.”
I’ve never been so grateful for Mackenzie’s undying belief that me going to the bathroom is good luck for the Fireballs.
Because by the time Cooper Rock is done at bat, Beck Ryder and his sexy body and bright blue eyes and delicious smell will be gone, and my life will be on its way back to being normal.
Five
Beck
As soon as Sarah disappears around the corner, I glance at Charlie next to the weird leafy plant thing. She’s being uncharacteristically silent through all of this, which means she’s either decided there’s no use in trying to stop me, or she’s getting an idea.
She’s half the brains behind most of my operations—okay, probably like seven eighths, really, which is why I pay her so much—and we’ve worked together so long that I can usually read her, but today, I’m clueless.