15. Harrison

I wake up to a faint knocking and a voice I can’t place right away. Then it clicks. Gordon. Fuck. Arlo is curled up naked at my side, and I’m still in his bed. I nudge him as I climb from under his hold. I can’t say anything, though, because with Gordon right there outside the door, he might even hear a whisper, so I quickly grab the condoms from last night, check for any other incriminating materials, and duck back through the bathroom to the guest room and quietly shut the door. Gordon bangs a little louder, and I hear Arlo call out, “What?” as I pull the sheet off the bed and wrap it around me like a toga and head out the guest room door to the hallway.

“Dude, what’s all the banging about?”

“Training is in twenty minutes, are you naked? Did you sleep in the guest bed naked?”

“I was soaked, remember? Besides, sleeping naked is the best.”

He rubs his hand over his face.

“Remind me to burn those sheets. I’ll lend you something to wear to training.”

“No worries, I can go like this. Driving naked is even better than sleeping naked.”

“I’m pretty sure there’s a law against that,” he says as Arlo opens his door.

“What are their laws about?” he asks, through a yawn that is too fucking adorable.

“Harry driving naked,” Gordon replies, and Arlo’s gaze immediately lands on me.

“Oh, Harry. Hi. Did you stay over?” he asks, totally natural like he didn’t just spend the night fucking owning my ass.

“Yeah, after I had that bath, my whole body was exhausted, so I just slept in the guest room. Hope my snoring didn’t bother you.”

“I didn’t hear you snore.”

Gordon frowns. “Actually I didn”t hear you snore either.”

“Isn’t your room like all the way at the other end of this floor?” I reason.

“Yeah, but shit, I heard you three rooms down in Colorado last year.”

“Fuck off, did not.”

“Did, too.”

“I’m going to get changed,” Arlo says, waving in our direction and then closing his bedroom door behind him. I really want to close the door, too, and go and kiss him good morning, but Gordon is waving at me to follow him.

“Come on, let’s get you some clothes so we don’t have to bail you out later.”

“I probably have something in the truck I can wear,” I say as I follow him down the hall.

“It”s cool, I’ve got a heap of training gear. Here,” he says, opening his dresser drawer and revealing it full of Animal Control stuff.

“Dude, where did you get all that?”

He shrugs. “I forgot to take my stuff for a while and kind of built up a collection.”

I pull out a pair of long blue training shorts and an orange shirt, but then I toss it at him when I see it has Gordon’s number and name on the back.

“I’m not your bitch, got anything without your name on it I can wear?”

“Ha, you would totally be my bitch if I swung that way.” He laughs and grabs a plain blue shirt from the drawer and throws it at me.

“Would not. You’re too high maintenance for me.”

“Seriously, I am not.”

“Ask anyone.”

“I changed my mind, go to training naked.”

“Nope, they’re my clothes now. See you there.” I laugh and jog out of his room. I duck into the guest room hoping to see Arlo, but the shower is running, and as much as I would totally get in with him and desperately need a shower myself after last night, I think it would be pushing our luck with Gordon both awake and waiting on him to go to the field. I dress, grab my phone and keys from the nightstand and head downstairs.

“Bye,” I call, closing the front door and heading to my truck. I could go with them, but then I would have to come back here for my truck anyway.

***

I get railed twice by the coach for not paying attention while warming up. It’s not my fault Arlo’s in the stands looking cute as shit with a pencil behind one ear and another pressed between his lips as he sketches.

Gordon jogs over as I climb to my feet. If my legs aren”t stretched out by now, they’ll never be.

“I’ll toss you a few,” Gordon says, throwing my glove at me and nodding for me to get into place. I kick at the dirt, forcing my hand into the glove, then crouch down, glancing over my shoulder where Arlo’s sitting. Before I can turn back, a ball sails past my head.

“Yo, watch it?” I yell, and Gordon laughs as he picks up another ball from beside the mound.

“It wasn’t even close. Come on, I need to practice my fastball. Ready?”

“Ready,” I say, and I give him the signal for a fastball, and just like in a game, he nods acceptance and then sends the ball zooming into my glove. It lands with a thwack and the slightest of stings.

“You can do better than that,” I yell, tossing this one back.

Gordon doesn’t bite back. He knows I’m right. I throw the sign again, and he pitches it right down the middle into my glove again. His precision is impressive, but his speed is off.

“You okay?” I ask, tossing the ball back again. He rolls the shoulder of his throwing arm and nods. If he’s hurt, he shouldn”t be pushing it with the fastballs, and he should definitely tell the trainers.

“Try a curve,” I tell him, throwing its sign, but he frowns and shakes his head.

“Fuck off, get ready for another fastball.”

He swings his arm around twice, shrugs a few times, then readies for the pitch. It flies down as fast as I”ve ever seen it and lands with a sharp sting in my glove.

“Shit man, that was fast,” I say, pulling off my glove and stretching out my fingers to try to get the blood flowing through and relieving the slight ache that”s settled there.

“See, just needed a few to warm up,” he yells back, and then Ryan from the Funky Monkeys jogs to his side.

They talk for a second, and then Gordon steps off the mound.

“Hey, mind if I toss you a few?” Ryan asks, and Gordon fucking winks at me. I told that asshole I wasn’t interested in anything with a player.

“Ahh, where’s Dave?”

“He’s working with Pat and John. They need to build up their accuracy throwing the ball home.

He’s not wrong. Dave, the catcher for the Funky Monkeys, had to dive for more than one of their tosses last season. I guess I can catch a few.

“Alright. Want to start with a curve or a fastball? What are you sending me?”

“Curve.”

“Right, on with it then,” I say, bouncing in my position. His curveball is good, not great, but he’s probably holding back a little, too. It’s not exactly normal to be helping the competition train.

“So, I heard you went to that art thing last year,” he says, sending another curveball my way. I have to move my glove a little left to catch it but it’s no more than you’d expect.

“Yeah, a few of us guys did. It was good,” I say, tossing the ball back.

“So you like art?”

“Some art,” I say, thinking of the amazing sketches Arlo has done of me. I still need to get that one framed and hung in my room.

“Well, there is this thing at the KOBO gallery this weekend. I was thinking maybe you might want to go?” he asks, sending a ball down the line that goes so far wide I wonder if he even had his eyes open when he pitched it.

He’s got a lot of balls yelling across the pitch to ask me out. With no crowd, his voice has got to be traveling to half the players out here, but even that isn’t going to get me to agree. I want to look back at Arlo and reassure him I have no intention of saying yes, if he happened to hear him too, but that would look suspicious as hell and we’re trying to keep this on the DL, so I walk over to the mound where Ryan is holding another ball he’s picked up from the pile Gordon left behind and is rolling it between his hands, a nervous smile on his lips.

“Thanks for the invite, really,” I begin, and his cheeks start to grow a rosy pink. “I promised myself a long time ago I’d never date a player. It’s just too messy if things go belly up. You understand, don’t you?”

He forces his smile wide and nods. “Totally, I get it. It’s cool. No worries.”

“Did you want to throw a few more?” I ask, and he looks over his shoulder at his teammates practicing across the other side of the field.

“I think Dave is free now, so all good. Thanks, though,” he says and jogs off. I turn back toward where Arlo is sitting and rub the back of my head, sending him a smile. His eyebrows are raised like he did hear Ryan’s question and now he’s wondering what my answer was. He has to know I would never agree to date anyone, not now that I’m with him. I mouth, I said no, and he smiles and goes back to his sketches like nothing happened. Gordon jogs back over and slaps a hand on my shoulder.

“So, what’d you say?”

“Seriously, dude,” I complain, shrugging out from under his hand to face him. “I told you I wasn’t interested in dating a player.”

He nods. “That’s what I told him, but he insisted on asking you out himself. I was going to warn you, but it was kind of fun watching you say no to someone. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it. How did it feel? Are you okay? Do you need a hug?”

I laugh and shove him. “You asshole. I’ve said no to a guy before.”

His eyebrows rise. “When?”

“Junior year, that guy in our dorm who smelled like cheese.”

His nose scrunches up, and I know he remembers the guy I’m talking about, then he looks past me to his brother.

“Hey, Arlo. Come get some sketches of the real players.” He laughs, then runs away before I can shove him again.