The Hot Corner (25 page)

After the game, we went back to his hotel and he surprised me with a steak dinner, flowers, candlelight, and champagne. I knew he hadn’t had to do much more than call the front desk to arrange it, but it still touched me. Of course, Brad had been confident enough to assume he’d win me over to staying in his room. The old mixed with the new yet again.

We sat on the couch, and he pulled out a small box. I opened it to find an infinity link diamond bracelet.

“I can’t, it’s too much. We’re too early into our relationship for gifts like this.”

“I always told you I couldn’t wait to give you diamonds and forever. It’s been nearly a decade, Dani, let me have this.”

“We were in a different place then.”

“And you don’t think we’re headed to that place now?”

The hurt in his voice tore at my heart.

“I don’t know where we’re headed yet. There’s still so much we have to figure out, and maybe you’ll hate me after we do, or maybe I’ll hate you.”

“I couldn’t hate you when I tried before. How could I possibly hate you now?”

But he could and it scared me. I almost wanted him to have cheated on me all those years ago at this point, because then I would have been right and justified for walking away. And maybe an idiot for finding myself in the same situation with the same man again. I could handle that a lot better than if I had ruined everything instead. I could forgive Brad; hell, I already had. I didn’t know if I could forgive myself.

“Maybe you
should
hate me,” I said.

He shook his head and pulled me into his arms. “On your birthday? What kind of present would that be?”

“Not much of one, but . . .” He silenced me with his lips and moved me into a dance that had no music but was beautiful just the same.

“Happy birthday, Red.”

I couldn’t ruin the moment with long ago questions. He carried me to bed and made long, slow love to me, leaving me spent and boneless and ready to declare my love for him. Neither of us had said it yet, but I was pretty sure we were both falling hard and fast. A man didn’t give a woman a present like he’d given me if he thought it was just a passing fling. I caught him running his fingers over the links when I woke up the next morning. When I asked what he was doing, he just smiled and kissed the top of my head and told me it looked good on me.

When we arrived back in LA, he parked his car in front of the condo while I stared out the window.

“Earth to Red, come in, Red.”

I shook myself out of memories and focused on the man who starred in them. “What?”

“You look like you’re a million miles away. Anything you’d like to share?”

“Not really. Just thinking.”

“Having second thoughts?” He kept his tone light, but I saw the way his brows furrowed. I reached out to smooth the frown line away.

“Not at all.” Third and fourth thoughts, maybe, but not second ones. And I wasn’t regretting the decision to stay with him either. I was nervous about it, but that was normal. “I was thinking about my birthday, actually.”

A wolfish grin lit up his face and I socked his shoulder. “That was a good birthday. You’re going to have a hard time topping it for mine.”

See? There it was. His birthday was over ten months away. He was planning for the future, even though we hadn’t talked about what happened after I finished the book. Honestly, I could leave at any time. I’d conducted most of my interviews. I’d seen what I needed to see when it came to road trips and home games. The rest was just spending time with Brad and getting to know him better, and it could be argued that I knew him plenty well at this point. But still I needed more. I needed to know about his father, and we needed to discuss us.

“I’ve got time to plan,” I said, unable to stop myself from returning his smile. I thought I was being noncommittal; he thought I was commenting on the future. Who knew which was which?

“That you do, but first things first.” Before I knew what was happening, I was swept off my feet in the hallway outside his condo.

“What are you doing?”

“Carrying you across the threshold, what does it look like?”

My heart fluttered. “We didn’t get married, Brad.” Though I’d pictured it a thousand times before, and he’d always held me just like this whenever I’d imagined our wedding night.

“No, but I finally got you to move in. That seems momentous enough.” Before I could argue the point, he opened the door and deposited me inside before stepping back out to get the rest of my bags.

Oh well, nothing to be done about it now. I walked into the living room and burst out laughing. “What did you do in here?”

The normally immaculate living room finally appeared lived-in. More than lived-in. It was a mess. Clothes were piled on the couch to the point we couldn’t even sit on it. His toiletries were littered over the coffee table, along with keys, a half-eaten orange, and several empty cans of soda. There were shoes in the middle of the room and boxers on the recliner. “Those better be clean,” I said as Brad entered the room with my bags, laughing.

“I just thought I’d make you feel at home.”

I picked up a picture of Pam that had somehow made its way onto the end table. “With pictures of your exes lying around?”

Brad shook his head. “I asked her to come in and make the place look more homey. I guess she thought I needed pictures.”

He did, badly, but still. I looked closer at the picture and saw that she’d stuck a note on the back of it.

To my favorite would-be lesbian lover, welcome home. Feel free to remove my picture. You might just have a present behind it.

I smiled as I unhooked the back and removed Pam’s photo. What was behind it made me gasp. Brad came up behind me and looped his arms around my waist.

“Now, that’s more like it,” he said.

It was a picture of the two of us at the game in Chicago. I was smashing the cake against his lips as he laughed at me. We looked like we were lost in our own little world, which, of course, we had been.

“Where did she get that?”

“Cameras are everywhere, baby.” He took the picture from me and set it in the center of the mantle above the fake fireplace. “There. It’s perfect.”

And it kind of was. “That’s more than I can say for the mess in here.”

Brad chuckled and kissed me soundly. “I just wanted you to feel at home here.”

I couldn’t help it. I melted. “You’re here, how could I not?”

“How about we go check out the bedroom?” Brad suggested, nipping my earlobe as he steered me down the hallway.

“How about we do?” I shot him an inviting smile as I picked up my makeup case where he’d dropped it. “I need to put my clothes away.”

“That is not what I had in mind,” he said, pouting, but hefting my big suitcase and medium one easily.

“I know.”

I marched down the hallway, where more pictures of the two of us now hung on the walls. Where Pam had gotten them I couldn’t say, but there was one from mini-golf that must have been taken by the paps because we were kissing and completely unaware of the cameras. There were a couple from other games I’d attended, us smiling at each other as Brad leaned on the fence, and one from the charity ball—our first event together—where we looked beautiful but rather stiff.

“Pam’s been busy.”

“Yeah, she was more than happy to help.” Brad tossed my suitcases on the bed. “She said she was going to clear out some drawers.” He pulled open a few and they were empty. “What the hell?” He opened more drawers and scowled. “Where are my clothes?”

I laughed as I piled a stack of underwear and bras and carried them to place in the top drawer. “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask her.”

He stomped over to open the closet and grimaced. “About half my stuff is here. Damn it.” He hurried out of the room as I continued unpacking, laughing to myself over Pam’s idea of assistance. He came back in, his eyes narrowed. “She put all my shit in the guest room. Not cool.”

“I guess she thought I needed more room than I do.” Most of my stuff was back in Jacksonville, of course. And I wasn’t moving it here, yet. “I’ll help you bring your stuff back in.”

“Thanks. Remind me to take back the key I loaned her and change the locks, will you?”

He threw himself down on the bed and started going through my clothes. “You don’t have enough stuff. We should go shopping.”

I batted his hand away from my suitcase. “I have what I need, and now that I have easy access to a washing machine, I’ll be fine.”

“If you say so.” He held up a black silk nightgown that had magically appeared in my room after one of Pam’s visits. “Why haven’t I seen this yet?”

“Because I usually don’t bother with clothes when you’re around at night.” I took it from him and shoved it into a drawer.

“Good point. But now that you’ll be living here . . .”

I laughed and put my shirts away. “Yes, I’m sure I’ll wear it for you.”

He smiled happily as I emptied my other bag and placed the medium into the large before putting them in his closet. “Now, how about you get out of those clothes and we’ll celebrate you being here the proper way?”

“How about you show me where I can set up my computer and have some office space?”

“All work and no play make Dani a dull girl,” he said, running a hand over my ass as I passed into the bathroom with my toiletry bag.

“All play and no work make Dani late for book deadlines,” I called over my shoulder. “And since it’s your damn book, I’d think you’d be more supportive.”

“Since it’s my book, it can wait while we—

Brad appeared in the doorway just as I was pulling out a box of tampons. His eyes went wide and he turned around without a word.

I giggled as I finished putting my stuff away. “Still not over the trauma?”

“A guy just doesn’t recover from such things.” He turned back around, arms crossed. “Are they gone?”

“They’re put away, yes.”

“Good. Come on.” He led me down the hallway into an office. “You can set up anywhere in here. I don’t use the computer for more than e-mail, so if you need to move it, no big deal.”

His desk was plenty big without me moving anything. “This will work.” I glanced around the room. He had a big, cushy, black leather couch and a huge television set up, along with movies, a DVD and Blu-ray player, trophies, and baseball memorabilia in the room. “Now this looks like you.”

“This is where I spend most of my time. I watch game tape in here and listen to music and such. Will that bother you?” He looked almost nervous as he asked.

“Of course not. I like noise when I work.”

He smiled. “I remember that, too.” It used to drive him nuts that I had to have music blaring or the television on when I was studying. “I think this will work out rather well.” He was right. And I kind of wanted to watch him watch game tape.

“What is it you look for when you watch tape?” I took out my notebook, and he grinned.

“Are we working now?”

“Yes. Play later.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” He grabbed a disk out of a case on his entertainment center and slid it in. “I watch the pitcher, his mechanics, how he looks when he throws a fastball, a slider, a curve . . . you get the picture.” He queued up the DVR and the screen filled with the face of Emilio Chavez, starting pitcher for the Phillies, Brad’s next opponent. He patted the couch and I sat down next to him.

“It’s the little things.” Emilio wound up and fired a pitch right down the middle. “See, that was a fastball.” He rewound it. “He kicks higher when he throws a fastball.” He fast-forwarded, seeming to know just where to stop. “That, that was his slider.” Try as I might, I couldn’t see any difference in the way the ball was thrown.

“He leans more, less height on the kick,” Brad murmured, seemingly forgetting I was sitting there. I watched him while he commented on infinitesimal moves, sitting forward and devouring the film like he would be tested on it. I guess in a way he would be.

“Can you really see all that as you’re standing at the plate with a tiny ball firing at you at ninety miles an hour?” I asked, because damn.

“Ninety-eight,” he said, and I scowled. “And no, not really. I mean, I don’t have time to think about what he’s doing, but my brain can recognize it and hopefully adjust accordingly. I react, and hopefully it’s the right way.” He hit a button, and there was Brad at the plate. “Now, I can watch myself and make changes if need be. See, I pressed on that first pitch. I knew Fields was a first pitch fastball thrower, and he changed it up on me. That’s why I popped up. And my stance, it’s all wrong.” He shook his head while I tried to see what he was seeing. Nope. He looked exactly the same to me.

“How so?”

“I’m too far back on my heels, my balance is off, and I’m a half-second behind on the swing.” He kept muttering as I absorbed this new side of him. In college, he’d kept practice at practice. He might complain about something he did wrong, or about getting yelled at by the coach or something, but he wouldn’t sit and watch himself for hours. It was just more evidence of the perfectionist he’d become. I liked that he took it so seriously. I doubted all players were as dedicated.