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Lila

New York isn't the city I left behind a few weeks ago.

It's not the weather. It's not the news. It's not the people on the streets. It's not my friends.

It's me.

I'm different.

Two weeks ago, I wouldn't have felt this overwhelming desire to show Tripp the letter Uncle Al left me, so I could explain to him why I was crawling in the ceiling at Duggan Field.

Two weeks ago, I wouldn't wake up wondering if he'd email me today—which, of course, he has, every day—and night—and it's morphing into less let's argue over everything about the team and more into we're two lonely people thrown together by circumstance who have more in common than we want to admit.

Two weeks ago, I wouldn't have wanted to be in Copper Valley instead of here, closing final deals for Wellington Holdings and signing off on acquisitions and marketing plans for Bubble Bath Books.

But I don't want to be in New York.

I want to be meeting more of my players. I want to be taking part in interviewing coaches. I want to be able to walk over to the ballpark myself and look those insane ducks in the eye after reading another news report about what good luck they're going to be for the team.

I want to go to another cookout with Tripp and all of his friends and watch a family act the way normal families act—some arguments, some bickering, but mostly just fun and affection and support for each other.

With Wellington Holdings, I'm not part of something. For years, I managed a billionaire's estate and business. I directed dollars to companies and entrepreneurs that I believed would be profitable and let someone else manage the people and the work and getting their hands dirty for the sake of making a buck. Everything was cold. Dollars and cents.

Charitable donations are managed through another arm of the company, the only arm that remains standing, other than Bubble Bath Books, which is my parting gift from the company, and the thing I thought would give my life meaning and challenge as I move away from what was and into what comes next.

With the Fireballs—no, check that.

After that cookout, running the team isn't just a challenge.

With Tripp at the helm, the team truly is a family organization again, and now I'm part of something bigger than myself for the first time in too long.

I didn't even know I was in the desert until I got a sip of water, and now I need the whole bucket. A lake, even.

I want to swim in that feeling of being included in a loud, boisterous family with history and inside jokes and love and support.

And my entry ticket came from a man who knows what it's like to feel lonely, to have lost something you can't get back, who's still dealing with the psychological toll—the hand sanitizer makes so much more sense now—but who's pushing ahead and living his life with a family despite all the fear and uncertainty and insecurities that go with being part of that family.

I miss Tripp Wilson.

And I don't know what to do with that.

I'm strolling down West 52nd on my way to book club—which is something I'm part of, but not in the same way, and I can't explain why—when someone brushes past me wrong.

Adrenaline surges under my skin, and I fight the urge to whip around and blatantly check my pockets. My phone is fine—I have one earbud in, listening to Mae Wood's This Time is Different, so I know it hasn't disappeared. My ID is tucked into an inside pocket in my jeans beneath my zipped jacket. My gloves are on.

Which means it's far more likely someone put something in my pocket than tried to relieve me of any of my belongings.

I navigate the foot traffic to step into a coffee shop. Once I'm in line, I do a subtle check of my pockets.

And there it is.

A note from Uncle Guido.

He must've changed phone numbers again or be up to trouble if he couldn't text the normal way. Or even the not-so-normal way.

I follow the instructions on the note and head two blocks down to a hole in the wall bagel shop, where I ask for a classic bagel soaked in orange juice.

Yes, that's disgusting.

But the clerk nods, charges me fourteen dollars and forty-seven cents, which I pay in cash, and then points me to a table in the corner where I find a five-digit code taped under the napkin dispenser.

I text a codeword to the number, and a message pops back up immediately.

Tripp Wilson's digging in the rafters.

I blow out a slow breath, and then I text him back.

Leave Tripp alone.

What's Tripp going to find out about me? The CIA has completely erased my association with my parents. Wellington Holdings is functionally gone. And if Uncle Guido has left any trace of the link between us, I'll streak naked through Central Park yelling I'm a hamster!

After five minutes of silence, I add, He's a single dad with two kids who need him, and yes, this is the hill I will die on. Drop. It. Now.

I don't expect an answer to that, so I leave the shop—without my bagel soaked in orange juice, thank you very much—and head to Knox and Parker's apartment.

I don't go to every book club meeting. There's that line where I'm technically Knox's boss, and that other line where I like my friends not close enough to learn all of my little secrets.

That cookout last week shook me up though.

Wouldn't it be nice if I could confide all of my secrets in someone?

I'm not in the CIA. If a friend betrayed me, I wouldn't end up wearing concrete shoes at the bottom of the Hudson. I wouldn't get kidnapped and tortured. The world wouldn't implode.

I'd get my feelings hurt.

I'd lose a friend.

But what about the friends—the family—I could make in the meantime?

Like Tripp.

This week, book club is talking about a cowboy romance that gave me erotic dreams for a week straight, all of them starring Tripp in chaps and a cowboy hat, and I clearly need help, because just his name is enough to make a delicious shiver curl through my belly.

My belly is fully on board with the new version of my erotic dreams. And not just the ones where he's a cowboy, but also the ones starring Tripp dressed up as a firefighter, or in baseball pants, or that one with him hand-feeding me hot cookies and smearing melted chocolate all over my stomach so he can lick it off.

I'm fanning myself when Knox opens the door, and I immediately yank my hand down and leap to attention. "Any progress with that author and the—oh. Am I early?" I pause just inside the jungle-themed apartment and realize the usual crew isn't here.

Parker's cover band friends—and sometimes their boyfriends, and generally at least one of her brothers—usually beat me by at least thirty minutes. They like to beat each other for the best of the taco spread. Knox's nana is almost always here too, ready to demand we read at least a scene of whatever book she's been working on this week. And we used to have a hockey player or two, but it's hockey season.

Today, though, it's just Parker—who looks like I wouldn't want to cross her on a wrestling mat—and Knox—who looks like he was forced to act out one of his nana's weirder scenes in the name of research—and Parker's baby brother, Brooks.

The toilet flushes, and oh, thank goodness.

There she is.

Knox's granny.

"Don't go in there, sonny," she tells Brooks. "Damn Iris and those prunes in her brownies. It's enough to make a cowboy toss his beans."

"Nana, you know where the Poopouri is," Knox reminds her.

She hitches her polyester pants up to her boobs. "Just reminding everyone who's boss. Oh! Lila. Good. You're here. I need to hear all the details about how Tripp Wilson kisses. It's for research. My next aliens are going to be in a boy band. It's reverse harem." She winks. "With a lady of experience, if you know what I mean."

"Sia's stuck at the office, Willow's helping Dax write a song, and do not ask what Eloise is doing with my brother," Parker whispers, quickly summing up why everyone else isn't here.

Basically, she just gave me the code for everyone else is getting laid.

"I didn't need to know any of that," Brooks says, confirming my understanding of what I've just heard.

"Neither did we," Knox assures him. "Pretzels?"

I blink.

Brooks blinks.

"Where are the tacos?" Nana demands. Her eyes go wide. "Unless this has something to do with what you did to Parker's taco?"

"Nana."

She touches her tight white curls. "You can't find a unicorn head to put in my bed, so I'm gonna ask if you knocked your wife up."

It takes me a second to realize she's twisting a Godfather reference, and I'm still not sure I follow her, but I follow Brooks sitting straighter on the zebra-print couch.

He's not beefy, but he's not lanky either. More in-between, with light brown hair and light brown eyes. Although it's not baseball season, I know he's been working out hard and doing a little charity work for off-season visibility with his team.

That's what baseball players do. I've had several members of the Fireballs team report in to me with their own favorite charities and lists of appearances in the off-season.

"Does Mom know?" he asks Parker.

"If I can't even get a stomach bug without all of you thinking I'm pregnant, this is going to be a long seventeen years until menopause," she says with a scowl, and god help me, I want to offer her hand sanitizer.

Tripp's wearing off on me.

"But it's not a stomach bug," Brooks says.

"It's a stomach bug, or I'm going to ask Lila to make your team an offer they can't refuse to get you traded to the Fireballs."

He starts to laugh.

Glances at me.

And he, too, goes pale. "Yeah. Pretzels."

"Your mother would kill me," I remind him. "I like breathing."

That doesn't help his complexion, which makes me wonder what secrets he's keeping. "Wait. Are you on the chopping block? Is New York thinking of trading you?"

"No."

It's instant and adamant and there's fear in his eyes.

I should tell—no.

No, I should not tell Tripp.

We have Cooper Rock. And a coaching staff to build. And a front office staff to build for that matter. The only reason the previous president wasn't fired when Tripp took the job was because there wasn't a team president. Uncle Al was acting as both owner and president.

"Did you really make out with Tripp Wilson?" Nana asks me. Brooks dives into the pretzel bag Knox offers while the spotlight turns to me. "Was it like sticking your tongue in a vat of chocolate cotton candy?"

And there go all my happy spots lighting up like a Christmas tree.

"Nana," Knox sighs.

"What? I'm not the only person who wants to know. There are only about seventeen women in the entire world who have ever made out with Tripp Wilson. He's the responsible one, you know."

That look on his face when I fell through the ceiling—yeah.

I know.

I know he's the responsible one. More worried about saving me than asking questions.

And then there are our emails.

The emails that feel more like secret confessions than just getting to know you since we'll apparently be working together for a while emails.

"Everyone thought Davis was the party animal, but he wasn't," Nana declares. "That was Cash. Davis was the one who struggled with the fame and acted out because of it. But Levi—oh, Levi's the ladies' man. Could you introduce me? I think I have half a chance with him."

I almost offer to introduce her to Uncle Guido, then remember I'm mad at him, then realize I'd probably be better off actually calling him to tell him to leave Tripp alone instead of vaguely threatening him through text message.

Also, my friends don't know about Uncle Guido either, because first, he's not easy to explain, and second, that could lead to other questions.

"I went to Tripp's house to make out with him again before I left Copper Valley, but we accidentally set off his home security system and the cookies in his oven caught on fire, so nothing happened, even though we were making out first," I blurt.

And oh my god, it feels so good to tell someone that.

Parker squeals. Knox pumps a fist. "Called it."

"Better than making out with one of your players," Brooks says with a slow nod.

Parker gives him a playful shove, goes green, and darts to the bathroom.

"That means shove it," Knox tells his brother-in-law.

He starts to follow Parker, who waves him away in a universal get the gossip while I go puke sign.

Actually, there is no universal sign for that, but if there was, that hand gesture was probably it.

My phone dings, and I realize Parker's texting me from the bathroom.

I want dinglehoppers night cow-cow-sheep-brr.

Knox leans over my shoulder. "She wants details. You know how to send a voice text? So she doesn't have to try to read her phone while her head's in the toilet?"

My phone dings again.

I can eat you.

"Oh, never mind. She can hear us." Knox says. "So. Go on. Spill."

"But go easy on my ears," Brooks says.

I nod. "Virgin ears, right."

He goes pink.

Knox chokes on a pretzel.

And my phone dings again.

I can't make promises until I know you're safe.

That's not Parker, because it makes sense.

"You have an Uncle Guido?" Nana leans over my phone from the other side. "Does he know anything about money laundering? I have some stuff I need to hide from the feds."

"Nana."

I shove my phone in my pocket and make a note to check the settings. How the hell did my phone guess that's Uncle Guido? Is he using an old number again? "I think there's something wrong with your electrical fields in here," I tell Knox while Brooks beats him on the back, glowering while he helps Knox dislodge the pretzel. "Between Parker's autocorrect and my phone getting wrong numbers, it's definitely your apartment."

"Details," Parker calls.

And then heaves.

"We're not talking about cowboy romances tonight, are we?" I ask the ceiling.

Which doesn't answer, because there's no one crawling in it, looking for any otherwise inconsequential treasures that a little girl might've hidden for her own daughter to discover one day.

"Whoa, Lila, was it that bad?" Knox straightens, his voice raw, still pounding on his own chest to clear the rest of that pretzel. He shoves his brother-in-law at me. "Brooks. Give her a hug. I need to check on Parker."

"I don't need a hug," I tell Brooks.

"Good, because I don't hug baseball team owners. Even when they're very attractive women that I was trying to flirt with at my sister's wedding before they were baseball team owners."

"You weren't trying to flirt with me."

"Yes, I was."

"No, you weren't."

He glowers again. "Yes, I was."

"Oh. Okay."

So I can see why else he might be a virgin.

Not that it's any of my business.

"Honey, if the man makes you cry, there's only one thing to do," Nana declares. "You send him a chocolate dick and tell him to eat it."

"He didn't make me cry."

"Looks like he made you cry. Want me to turn him into a Fefflemuffer in my universe? They're the bottom-feeders, and after they mate, the female bites the male's head off."

"I can't believe my sister married into this," Brooks murmurs.

I throw my hands up. I have to give them something. "I can't get involved with a single dad. There's…responsibility there. And I don't know if I'm the responsible type, even though his kids are adorable and he's stupidly charming and just…just… He's just, okay? That's all I have to say about it."

"Honey, boinking a man when his kids aren't around works even better than signing up to be a stepmom," Nana says. "All the benefits, none of the responsibility."

"I need to go lift weights," Brooks mutters.

His phone dings. He pulls it out of his pocket, looks down, and winces. "Or I need to stay here so Parker doesn't dooble-booble me."

I grab a handful of pretzels. "Pretty sure that one means murder."

"Or tickle. She sometimes threatens to dooble-booble Rhett too, and he's ticklish as hell. She gets us confused sometimes."

"I do too," Nana says. "I still only count three of you, but she swears she has four brothers. Lila, when Tripp Wilson kisses you, does he use sloppy tongue or just-right tongue?"

The bathroom door opens, and Parker and Knox both emerge.

And if Parker's not pregnant, I'll eat a street meter. Puking shouldn't make people make lovey-dovey eyes like that.

Brooks covers his face with his hands. "Mom's gonna kill me if I know anything before she does," he mutters.

Oh, hell.

I'm going to start crying.

Why? Why am I crying?

Because you've spent your entire life denying that what they have is exactly what you actually want, I answer myself. Because your uncle sent you to boarding school and your fake-uncle is probably plotting to scare the piss out of the first guy you've had any long-term interest in since college. Because you spent your formative years too paranoid to make actual friends, because you whispered "I know people who can kill you if you betray me" to the first man you slept with when things got awkward the next morning, and because you didn't have any real girlfriends to talk to about that night, and because you've been living a lie since high school.

And there are no margaritas.

"Lila? What's wrong?"

"I think I have what you have," I blurt.

She sucks in a breath.

Knox's jaw drops.

"Huh. Didn't see that coming," Nana says. "I thought you were a virgin. Like a works too much to have time to screw virgin. Not like a men don't find me attractive or an I'm saving myself for marriage virgin. Or a science experiment virgin."

"I have the stomach bug," I snap.

Parker touches her belly and nods. "Sorry. It's not nice of me to be contagious."

"I'll just—go—so I don't get anyone else sick."

I don't want to be here.

I want to be in Copper Valley.

And I don't want to not want to be here, because Parker and Knox are my friends, and I don't want to abandon them, or for them to think I'm running away because I can't handle the idea of Parker being pregnant, and everything changing, and when did my feelings get so damn complicated?

Brooks leaps to his feet. "Need an escort?"

"No, I—"

"Please?" he mutters.

"We're having lunch when we both feel better," Parker informs me.

I nod to them both, because a quiet lunch in a deserted park while I have frequency jammers turned on around me sounds like heaven.

I need a girlfriend.

For all the things she's confessed to me—things she confessed the minute we met, before she had any reason at all to trust me—I owe her more of my truth.

I outbid Parker to win Knox at a bachelor auction as I was formulating the business plan for Bubble Bath Books. I'd heard of this mythical Mr. Romance creature, but I don't trust anyone to be who they say they are online, so I wanted to interview him in private without him realizing he was being interviewed.

Buying him at a bachelor auction seemed the easiest way.

But Parker approached us as we were leaving and told us a truly mortifying story about being called Pimple Popper Parker in high school, and needing a really hot date to her reunion.

We all got to be friends—them way more than just friends—over the next few months, and Parker and I sometimes grab lunch just to chat about how lonely it can be to be a woman at the top.

She thinks the extent of my story is that my parents disappeared and I work for a reclusive billionaire, and now I've inherited a baseball team from a distant uncle.

I think I owe her more of my story.

That's what friends do, right?

They trust each other. And they help each other.

And maybe, if I can actually learn to be someone's real friend, then I can be more than that to someone else too.

Maybe.

Please, maybe.

Because I'm tired of wanting things I can't have.

It's time for me to be able to have the things I want. And to deserve them too.

Thanks so much for reading!