Colby (Season Two: The Ninth Inning #6) (22 page)

“Thank you and yours is too.” He closes his eyes.

I continue to stroke his hair. “Colby?”

“Hmm,” he happily moans.

“Are you going back to the Angels?”

He opens his eyes and stares at me. “I don’t know. My knee feels different this time. I’m not going to make any decisions until after the therapy is over, and I talk to the doctors.”

I nod. “Smart.”

“Why are you asking?”

“Curious, mainly. You’ve not talked about it since you left the Angels’ last game.”

He raises up onto his elbows. “I want to go back, and it’s my end goal, but I’m well aware I could do more damage, and I don’t want that.”

I kiss his cheek. “I’ll support you either way.”

His sexy grins appears. “Thank you, beautiful.”

Now, Ariella. Tell him now.
My head screams at me. “Um, can we talk about something serious?”

“Sure.” Colby rolls around and sits up with his back against the headboard. I sit cross-leg in front of him.

“I want to first say I love you and these past few months, even though everything has gone so fast, and I had a freak-out or two, I wouldn’t change for the world.”

“Me either. But, I’m now a little scared on where this is going.”

“Oh, I’m not breaking up with you or anything like that.” I rush out.

“Okay, I’m at ease now. So, is this about me moving in?”

“Um, this is about the spare bedroom, the one at the end of the hall with the boxes in it.”

“What about it?”

“We need to go through those boxes and either get rid of the stuff or find somewhere to store it.”

“That’s no big deal, beautiful. Why are you making it so serious?”

I take a long, deep breath and open the side drawer next to my bed. “I went to the doctor to have my stitches removed, and they took some more blood to make sure all my levels were normal.”

“Okay.” Colby seems baffled. “And what happened?”

“There was something off.”

Colby pales. “Wha...what was it?”

“My hormone levels.” I hand him the ultrasound picture and point to the small dot in the center. “It’s still very early, I’m about four weeks, but I’m pregnant.”

He goes into shock. He stares at the photo and then back at me, then back down at the photo. I can’t tell if he’s happy, pissed off, or ready to bolt for the door. I sit there and let him process the information for a moment or two before a huge smile spreads across his face.

“We’re going to have a baby?”

“Yes.”

“We’re going to have a
baby
?”

I giggle. “Yes.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever been this happy, beautiful.” He grabs my face and kisses me hard.

My life is perfect and I don’t want anything to change it.

HOW DO PEOPLE keep a secret as huge as a baby? I’ve been dying to tell everyone, even the cashier at the gas station, but Ariella wants to wait. She wants to make it special when we tell her parents and mine, whereas I just want to blurt it out. Today would be
perfect
for it considering they are all here for the party I’m hosting that Ariella insisted be at her house. I gaze at all the people and the urge to just shout it is overwhelming.

“Colby,” Ariella says softly, grabbing my hand and squeezing it hard.

“Yeah, beautiful?”

She must have seen it on my face because she says, “Don’t you dare.”

I pull her against me, dipping my head to whisper and ensure I won’t be overheard. “This is the only time everyone we love will be here at once. It’s perfect timing.” I press a kiss to her neck.

“This is my first baby; we should be waiting until we’ve hit the end of the first trimester.”

I’m assaulted with the memory of a drunk Jordan telling me what happened with Heidi. I stand straight and nod. “But just so you know, we’ll be telling my family in person.”

“Okay,” Ariella agrees. “I’ll be prepared to take time off work.”

“Good.” The front door opens, distracting me, and I see Carissa Rodriguez walk tentatively into the house. “Hey, Carissa,” I greet her as Ariella takes a step away from me to see her.

She gives me a weak smile. “Hey, Colby.”

“Ariella, this is Carissa, Hector’s sister. Carissa, this is my girlfriend, Ariella.”

“Nice to meet you,” they both say, laughing at little.

“Have you seen my brother?” Carissa asks me.

“Ah,” I start, looking around the room. “Check the kitchen, and feel free to fix you a plate.” I continue to give her the directions to the kitchen.

“Thanks.”

“I didn’t know she was even in town. She lives in Florida,” I say once she’s walked away. She does come up to visit Hector sometimes, so that’s probably why she’s here. I’m mostly surprised Hector hasn’t announced her arrival.

Before Ariella can respond, my nieces come running over. “Bye!” they all shout.

“Bye?” I crouch down to be eye-level with them all. “Where do you think y’all are going?”

“Your house!” Carly shouts.

Karen walks up behind them and explains, “One of them is cranky, so we’re heading to your house to nap.”

“Okay. Give me hugs and kisses.”

It’s a surge of three little girls, arms bumping into one another as they all try to hug me at once. Loud smacks of kisses hit my cheeks, and I make my rounds of kissing each of their cheeks.

“Are you sure you want to take us to the airport in the morning?” Karen asks, picking up her youngest, Carla.

“Absolutely,” I answer as I stand.

“Okay. We’ll see you in the morning then.” She gives me a hug, says goodbye to Ariella, and then rolls her eyes as she has to find her husband once again.

My parents are next to find me and hug me goodbye as they’re leaving with Karen. Ariella’s family leaves shortly after, and that leaves us, my teammates, and their girlfriends. Someone has brought the booze, so drinking commences. I grab a beer and find Ariella with Jordan and Heidi. By the time I make my way over to them, Heidi and Ariella are leaving.

“Did I scare them off?” I joke.

“They got bored with me, I think. They’re headed toward the rest of the girls.” He glances down at my knee. “Should I ask how it’s going?”

“No.” I’m not talking about my knee today.

Tanner appears next to us and sighs dramatically, looking at Jordan. “I swear, y’all keep on knocking these girls up and we’ll have our own baseball team soon.” He looks at me. “Don’t join the baby train, Colby. We’re losing power with every baby momma. I swear Blake was this close to hitting me because I happened to be standing nearby when something made Sofia cry.”

“Don’t call my wife a baby momma,” Jordan warns.

Tanner throws his hands up. “See, what I mean? I give up.”

I laugh as he walks away while Jordan just shakes his head., “I can’t wait for a woman to lock him down.”

“It will be a sight to see, that’s for sure.”

We make our way to the rest of the guys and enjoy our time. There’s plenty of laughter and jokes to go around. After a while, I walk inside for a bathroom break. The downstairs bathroom is occupied, so I walk upstairs.

The door to one of the spare bedrooms opens and Roman and Carissa step out. Holy shit. Roman runs a hand through his hair to tame it down while Carissa straightens her shirt. Neither have noticed me yet. What the hell was Roman thinking having sex in one of Ariella’s spare rooms?

What pisses me off even more though is seeing Carissa wipe a tear from her cheek. What the hell happened?

“Roman,” I say, barely able to contain my fury.

Carissa’s head snaps up, and she tells him goodbye before rushing past me as I advance on him.

“What the hell are you doing in there? Why the fuck was she crying?”

Roman holds up his hands. “She wasn’t crying because of me. She’s dealing with some stuff, and the tears came after.”

I eye him for a moment before deciding he’s being honest. “No more sex in my house.” That he did surprises the hell out of me. If I expected it out of anyone, it would be Tanner, knowing about what happened when he stayed at Jordan’s.

“Sure thing.” He hurries away from me and I finally make it to the bathroom.

When I return to the crowd, Carissa is on her way out and Hector looks worried. “Everything okay?” I ask, wondering if he’s found out about what just happened already.

“No, and for the first time, my sister doesn’t want to tell me why she’s shown up out of the blue with no immediate plans of leaving. She apparently quit her job and then she showed up yesterday asking if she could stay for a while.”

“She’ll talk to you when she’s ready,” Zoey reassures him.

“Colby,” I hear Ariella call. She’s sitting down with an empty seat next to her. She pats the seat. As I get closer, I narrow my eyes at her when I notice the chair across from it, which is occupied only by two throw pillows stacked on top of one another. “You’ve been standing too much today. Sit and prop it up.”

“Ariella,” I start, but she interrupts me.

“Don’t make me shout and ask one of your teammates to get you some ice.”

“It’s not swollen,” I retort, taking my seat and propping my leg up. It is a little swollen, but not enough to ice it. She rolls her eyes at me. I reach over, take her hand, and tug. “Come sit with me.”

“Sitting next to you isn’t good enough?” she laughs as she stands and then sits in my lap.

“Nope.” She wraps her arms around my neck, leaning her forehead against mine. “What are you thinking about, beautiful?”

“How thankful I am. I got you, a baby on the way, your family, and your baseball family. I wasn’t even thinking about how I’d be drawn into the baseball family, though I really should have. I guess it just hit me today with everyone here. And I’m worried what may happen if you lose your baseball family.”

“Not going to lose them, even if I’m not playing. Let’s worry about my career when the time comes to worry, okay? All I want to focus on is you and our life together.”

“Okay, we can do that.”

“Good.” I grin and kiss her. At the end of the day, she’s all that matters anyway. That’s how I know that no matter what, life will be okay as long as I have her in it.

About the Authors

LINDSAY PAIGE is a romance author from North Carolina who has published YA, NA, and Sports romances of her own. She is a huge hockey fan of the Pittsburgh Penguins and loves read. When not writing, Lindsay is focused on completing college.

MARY SMITH was born in Chicago, Illinois, but currently lives in West Virginia. She is an avid reader, co-founder of Book Nerds Across America, and author of NA, Paranormal, Sports, and other romances. She goes nowhere without her cell phone or Kindle. Mary loves anything to do with Chicago Blackhawks, Patrick Sharp, and hockey related!!

DESPITE THEIR LOVE for different teams and players, Lindsay and Mary write sports romances to vicariously live through their characters and their experiences with these hot athletes. Together, they have written The Penalty Kill trilogy, Oh Captain, My Captain series, and The Ninth Inning series.

Authors Links:

Facebook

Lindsay:
facebook.com/authorlindsaypaige

Mary:
facebook.com/authormarysmith

Twitter

Lindsay:
twitter.com/lindsaypaige11

Mary:
twitter.com/marysmith1980

Blog

Lindsay:
authorlindsaypaige.blogspot.com/

Mary:
authormarysmith.blogspot.com/

The third and final season of The Ninth Inning series will release this Fall.

Stay tuned for more information.