Chapter 15

[Vee]

To my surprise, Ross spends the night.

As he arrived closer to eight-thirty, we finished the bottle of wine, and then decided to watch a movie. Nothing romantic. Nothing graphic. Nothing baseball. The happy medium was a movie with a touch of intrigue and mystery but not a suspense thriller. I didn't need horrific dreams.

What I dreamt about instead were the developing characters for my book and Ross as the main man in my real-life storyline.

He listened attentively as I talked more about the publishing industry. He even asked thoughtful questions and offered compassion. We discussed agents, and how I don't have one. It would be nice to follow the traditional path, with an agent for support and services, like securing foreign translations and movie deals, but I could do those things on my own. Or at least, I had been for the past ten years. I was comfortable where I was in my career, although there was always hope for more. More sales. More ideas. More years.

For now, I am relieved the writing well is not dry.

In the morning, I give Ross privacy to dress and follow his wake-up routine while I make him coffee. I don't drink the stuff, so I'm grateful for a machine with a pod you pop into the top and add water which automatically brews the liquid gold, as coffee lovers call their caffeine jolt.

As Ross enters the living room, I present the coffee in a travel mug. "For the road." Although he doesn't have far to travel.

He accepts the cup but lowers his head, thumb running around the ridge of the cap. "I've been thinking."

This sounds like another dangerous idea. "Okay."

"And I promise this will be the last time I ask."

Oh, God. What now?

"But about that two men sharing one woman thing—"

"Jesus," I hiss, digging my fingers into my hair and holding the length against the back of my neck a second. "Look, I don't expect you to understand." My tone is defensive while I wave up and down before his body. "Because you're you."

His thick brows lift. His thumb stops rotating on the coffee lid. "What does that mean?"

"You're a beautiful man." Exasperation wrestles with my defensiveness.

His cheeks tinge pink while shock registers in his eyes, and then his brows crease. "And you don't think you're a beautiful woman?"

"I'm not saying I'm not." But my expression surely says I don't think I am. "It's about feeling beautiful. Feeling desirable." I'm pretty certain we covered this concept the first time I told him about my possible plot line, but maybe he needs the refresher.

"By two men at once?"

"By anyone!" My voice crackles with frustrated tears I don't wish to shed in front of him.

Maybe a beautiful man doesn't get it because he is desirable. He's had sex with beautiful women.

"You're a beautiful woman, Vee. And anyone who doesn't see it, doesn't deserve you."

I sigh. Now, he's placating me. Giving me compliments like I was fishing for one. I don't need this, and I step left, intending to open my front door and practically kick him out.

Only he catches my wrist and tugs me toward him. Stumbling over my own feet, I collide with his chest, then his hand is cupping my jaw, and he leans toward me.

When his mouth makes contact with mine, I'm so surprised I immediately pull back. Our eyes lock on each other's before his gaze drops to my lips again.

Then, he kisses me.

Full on, lips on lips. His hand moves to cup the back of my head. My fingers fist in his shirt .

I'm kissing Ross Davis . And it is heavenly. Divine. Spiritual and inspirational and . . .

He pulls back. "I probably shouldn't have—"

"I don't know that this—"

His mouth cuts me off again, swallowing my agreement, dismissing the fact that this probably isn't a good idea.

What is good, though, is this kiss. The connection of our mouths. His lips full but tender. The scruff around them tickling. His fingers fist tighter in my hair. He sips at me like I'm that liquid-gold jolt he needs to brighten his day. Then his tongue dives inward and I'm up on my toes, tugging him closer to me.

However, when his other arm comes around my back, and a travel mug hits me in the lower spine are we reminded of who we are, where we are, or perhaps, what we shouldn't be doing.

We break apart again.

With shock in each of our eyes, we stare at one another a beat. My heart races, as does his beneath his shirt, which I'm still clutching with tight fingers. Like I want to tear the covering off him or curl underneath it or just draw him closer to me again.

Finally, he speaks. "I should probably go."

"Yep." I release his shirt like I'm dropping a hot pan of cookies. The burn hurts. The cookies ruined. I step back and swallow hard, still tasting his minty tongue against mine. Still feeling his lips as if imprinted with mine.

"Good luck today, Coach."

He glances at me only briefly before darting his eyes toward the door, no doubt eager to flee from the awkward exchange of words and the desperation in that kiss.

Or should I say devastation?

Because that moment turned out to be the kiss of death.

The Anchors lost their game later that day.

+ + +

"I don't know what I was thinking, Cee-Cee," I explain to my best friend on the phone four days after the kiss.

"About which part?" She chuckles good-naturedly as I've just told her everything.

"The experiment. The kiss. Coming to Arizona. Take your pick."

"Why would going to Arizona be an issue?"

I sigh, tipping back my head as I sit on the couch, another blank page on my laptop resting on the ottoman. "Because I'm not getting any words in like I'd hoped."

"But inspiration did strike while you were at the ballpark, right?"

I nod although she can't see me.

"Maybe you need to go to another game."

"And look like I'm chasing after Ross Davis? No way, Cee-Cee." While my best friend has that kind of confidence, I do not.

In the dating game, there is a three-day code.

Day one, a call looks too eager.

Day two, too calculated.

Day three, make contact.

But I'm on the morning of day four with only minimal texts.

Team meeting tonight.

Coaches' dinner, I forgot about.

Late call with the front office.

Those dating rules are a suggested holding pattern after a first date. What are the rules after a first kiss? What does day four signify? The obvious. He isn't going to call. He isn't coming over. No more kissing and no more sleeping arrangement.

I don't know whether to feel grateful or depressed.

Instead, I'm pissed. Ross kissed me first, much like he came to my hotel room, and he came to me with his hairbrained scheme. Of which, the Anchors have flowed in a pattern of loss-win-win.

I feel used and tossed aside, like people who leave their half-eaten snacks behind at a stadium game. Am I simply an unfinished hot pretzel? Screw that. And screw Ross. No one leaves a hot pretzel unfinished, and Ross needs to man up and finish us. I deserve a phone call, or at least a full sentence text with an explanation, not this emptiness after a kiss that changed my life.

How am I supposed to kiss someone else after that kind of kiss? I might never eat a hot pretzel again at this point, and the idea of that is just disappointing.

"Look, you went there to write," Cassandra interjects, her tone sharpening in a way I recognize. She's about to get real with me. Picture a woman in riding boots, tugging them hastily on in preparation to get dirty and take charge of a situation.

"I know, but—"

"Aunt Sassy is imparting wisdom, so you need to listen."

"You are not my—"

"Shush."

My mouth falls open. She did not just shush me, and I'm ready to argue again with her when she begins her wisdom-incantation.

"You are strong. You are beautiful. You are kind."

I snort. "You cannot steal someone else's words as your own advice, Cassandra."

"Oh, fine. But it's the truth. You have resilience like no one I know. Cameron. Writing. You make decisions, and you go for it. You have goals and don't let some guy get in the way."

"If you go into the montage from Say Anything about men versus guys . . ." I warn.

"Oh my gosh, such a good movie," Cassandra croons. "But I digress."

"Yes, tell me how I'm all woman, hear my roar."

"You are all woman," she growls, giving me her best rawr for effect. "And you're a beautiful soul with an active imagination. It's a gift, Vee-Vee. And no guy, or man , or hot baseball manager with a tempting ass in baseball pants should make you question that worth."

"He didn't exactly—"

"And you're a good person, Vee. You're sweet and nice. God, so nice. And look what you did for him." Her voice rises. A shift in the tide is coming, a rolling whitecap curling into itself, where she does break into a montage of her own about women's worth and men being dicks, or thinking only with them, or acting like one, which never makes sense to me because dicks have limited purpose or action and . . .

"You will not hide, Verona. You will not be ignored."

"Are we moving over to the Fatal Attraction portion of this pep talk?" I chuckle but Cassandra takes in a deep breath, like she's about to jump into that rising tide and swim for her life.

"And you can go where you want to go, which is a damn baseball game for inspiration so you can write your next bestseller and take all the trips to Anywhereland."

"Anywhereland?" I scoff.

"You know what I mean?"

"Actually, I'm not certain I do."

"You don't need him. He needed you."

Basically, what she isn't saying is he used me, and I exhale at the thought again.

Then I retrace my steps a bit. Hadn't I let myself be used? Hadn't I opened myself up for this downfall? This stupid experiment. What was I even doing with Ross Davis?

We shouldn't have kissed. But it was just a kiss. A toe-curling, soul-awakening, clit-pulsing kiss, but still only a kiss. Like only sleeping together. Maybe I'm making the moment bigger than it is, or was, because the moment is clearly past tense. Ross isn't coming back.

Which means the kiss was a big deal to him.

One that has him reneging on his experiment.

"You're right," I sigh, although I'm not entirely sure what I'm agreeing with in her speech.

I am resilient. I weathered Cameron's affair and took him back because of the girls. Because I thought we would have a chance to rebuild our marriage and our family. Then, he was taken from me, and in the midst of our marital rebuild, the house collapsed, so to speak.

My subsequent grief conflicted with my already unstable emotions. I'd been broken by my husband's poor decisions. With his absence, I dove deeper into my writing, turning it from my little hobby, as Cameron mockingly called it, to a profitable career. One that has afforded me a sensible apartment, a few vacations, and college tuition for the girls.

And dammit, I need to write. The creative itch is a real rash, one that festers and grows until you either ignore it with some other interest or give into the scratch.

Not exactly the best analogy if I'm trying to wax poetic and romantic, but a good one, nonetheless. Writing was a part of who I am, and I needed to write.

I needed inspiration, and I needed that ballpark.