Chapter 16

Jenica

Wrapping both arms around my waist, he picks me up and crashes his mouth down on mine, kissing me with bruising force. I grab his face with both hands and kiss him back. Like I've been robbed of air, and he's what I need to breathe. "We can't…"

Reaching for my thigh he pulls one leg up around his waist. "We can," he murmurs hotly and does the same with the other leg. "Fuck, we need to."

I kiss him back feverishly, running both hands through his hair, grabbing fistfuls."This is bad."

"No it's not," he murmurs against my lips, while reaching for the door. "Where's your room?"

"End of the hall," I mutter while still kissing him. "To the right."

His tongue reaches for mine greedily, as he fumbles for the door handle and when he finally finds it, yanks it open and strides into the kitchen and down the hall.

When we reach my room, I close the door with my toe, and he spins me around, and braces my back against the door. Kissing like addicts starved from their fix, I reach for the end of his shirt and rip it over his head and he does the same to mine.

Dragging his eyes down my body, he rakes his top teeth over his lower lip. "How do you want to do this, Sparky?"

I'm breathing hard and my lips are tingling as I bring my hand down his rock hard chest. I don't care how we do it, I just want to feel him against me.

"I don't want to be a diamond you think you can polish," I reply with heat.

"Oh Sparky," he pulls down the cup of my bra, running his thumb over my nipple. "You're already flawless."

Bending down, he sucks the hard bead and I drop my head back against the door, relishing how good it feels. Catchers have a strength in their core that carries an entire team, and he holds me up easily as his mouth works its way back up my body to my neck.

"It's unreal how much I want you right now." Cupping my ass with both hands, he spins me around and starts to head for the bed. As we turn, my leg swings out, kicking down a photo on my dresser. It lands with a thud, only to be followed by the unmistakable sound of shattering. I look over, then down, and when I see my piggy bank on the floor in a million pieces, and its contents scattered amongst the rubble, I push against Jake's chest.

"Put me down," I scramble to the floor, dropping to my knees, the speed in which I collect the money that I've been saving for college, mirroring that of a feral cat eating its first bowl of food in weeks.

"Careful," he drops down next to me, pushing away the jagged chunks of ceramic, "you'll cut yourself."

I dig through the carnage frantically, not caring what damage I do to myself. Cuts will heal. Money is hard to replace. "I need to make sure it's all here. Four thousand, two hundred, and sixty two dollars, and forty three cents."

"All right," he looks over at me, brows furrowed in concern. "We'll get all of it. But be careful."

After pushing aside a chunk of faded pink ceramic, he helps me pluck money from the broken pieces. When every cent has been accounted for, I sit back on my knees and stare down at the last fistful of money I collected.

"I'm…sorry," I shake my head, cheeks hot from embarrassment. "I know it must be weird."

"Why?" He sits back. "Having money put aside is smart. Rainy days happen more than we think, Sparky."

"How would you know?" I look up. "You have a new car and a full ride to college. You've probably never had a rainy day in your life."

He runs a hand through his hair and lets out a wry laugh. "Uh, pretty sure I have."

"Really?" I look at him doubtfully.

He inches over to the bed and rests his back against it. "I have a new car because my parents don't have to pay for school thanks to my scholarship and wanted me to have something reliable in the snow. But for the record, no, I don't have to work now thanks to said scholarship, but I couldn't even if I wanted to because there is no time. Although, one could argue I do work my ass off every day between school and baseball."

"I'm sorry," I say for a second time, guilt adding to that shade of red I'm sure my cheeks are right now.

I know how hard Jake works. The way he balances school alongside baseball is admirable. He's not only the best student on his team, but among the top in his class. Besides, it's not his fault my dreams were forever changed, while his were coming true. My anger was at the universe, not him.

"Don't be," he says with a shrug. "You never have to apologize to me. You know that."

The two of us grow quiet and I wonder if it's time to tell him the truth—why I'm bitter and stuck here, working and attending community college, instead of going to a real college like I was supposed to. If I do, then I have to tell him everything, including why I pushed him away. The two are connected. There is no revealing one, without doing so the other.

"That money is not for a rainy day," I say sadly. "It's my college savings. This money is for my future."

"I figured," he says gently.

"It may not seem like a lot."

"Don't do that." He places a hand on my arm. "Don't diminish how hard you work."

Blinking back the tears that threaten, I scoot over to the bed and rest my back against it the same way he is. "Do you know how Ellery and I met?"

"Not the specifics," he admits. "But it was the day Cruz left for Highland, right?"

I nod. "I'd just learned the future I'd been counting on wasn't going to happen and I was walking the beach, trying to process everything. That's when I stumbled into Miss Southern Belle 1989, drunk as a skunk."

He smiles at my recollection of that day and I can't help but do the same. "She had all these empty wine cooler bottles scattered around her," I continue, "and her eyes were red from crying. She looked like this sad, beautiful doll that had been taken off the shelf and broken. You know kids from Cherry Cove and Elmhurst don't mix, but man, that day it was like the universe was leading us to one another. There was this instant connection—each of us having lost something, only to find out that we'd gained another."

"That's how I feel about Cruz," he confesses. "The connection part. Me and the other guys on the team, we're cool, and sure, there are guys from home that I am friends with. But when Cruz and I met we clicked. He is my brother. I would do anything for that guy."

Jake and Cruz are close, there's no doubt about it. But I never thought until just now, that the bond which connected them might be similar to that which connected Ellery and me. "You know, when you and Cruz met, you probably saved him, the same way Ellery says I did her."

Jake hikes one leg up and drapes his forearm over his knee. "What do you mean?"

"Well, when you two met, he had just lost Ellery and your bond was instant. Probably helped him more than you know."

Jake rubs his chin, brows pinched in contemplation. "I never thought about it like that before."

"People come into our lives for reasons and seasons," I shrug. "She is in mine for life, just as Cruz is for you."

He nods and brings his fist up, resting the side of his head against it. "What happened to you the day you met Ellery?"

I take a deep breath, giving myself one last moment alone with the secret I'd been keeping from him. As soon as he finds out, it will help answer a question I know he's asked himself—why do we have such a strong connection? A connection Ellery has hinted at since last summer.

"A few months before I met Ellery," I exhale slowly, "I hurt my knee. It was a freak accident. The plate slipped out from under me on the mound and my leg went one way and my body the other."

"Plate?" he repeats, with a shake of his head.

"I played softball," I nod slowly. "I was a pitcher."

His eyes widen, and brows push to his hairline. "A pitcher?"

"Yes," I confess. "And I was good. So good, I had scouts watching me from the time I was a freshman. But one second changed my entire life. My ankle rolled over, I heard a pop in my knee, and that was it."

"Holy shit," he whispers.

I draw in a shallow breath and continue. "The day I met Ellery I'd just come from a doctor's appointment where I was told I'd never pitch again. No more pitching meant no athletic scholarship, which meant no more college."

He studies me with a kind of intensity I once had on the mound and I know there's probably a dozen questions racing through his mind. "What about academic scholarships?" he asks, looking slightly dazed by my revelation. "You're smart, Sparky. Like, wicked smart."

"I applied," I shrug, "but it wasn't enough. A couple hundred dollars isn't enough for tuition at a four year university."

"And your guidance counselor?" He sits up a bit straighter. "Your coach? Didn't they help?"

I laugh bitterly. "My guidance counselor was too busy making love to the fifth of Jack he kept in his filing cabinet, and my Coach was a disappointment. When he learned I wouldn't be returning to the team, he stopped checking in on me. And he wasn't the only one. My teammates ignored me, even the guys I'd played hardball with as a kid couldn't be bothered. That's why I say Ellery saved me. The morning I met her, I'd just lost everything. The sport I loved and my dream of going to college…it was gone, just like that. But when we met, it was like I'd found someone who understood me because she, too, had just lost her dream."

I take a deep breath and look up. I know Ellery understood how hard it was for me to lose the dream of going to college, but only Jake would understand losing the ability to play ball. Only one who loves the sport as we do would understand.

But that wasn't all I see in his eyes. He now knows the reason for our connection. The indescribable tether that ties us is clear—the catcher/pitcher bond. A spiritual connection that could not be defined with words. I always assumed the bond was player to player, but I knew it had a hand in the connection he and I shared. I was just too stubborn to admit it.

Through it was an inherent trust that you felt in your core. A bond that was either there or it wasn't. Once I knew what position Jake played, I tried to deny that it was there between us, but it was futile. It's why I gave in that night at the cave when we first kissed, and why I gave in every time we were together since. I couldn't fight my attraction to Jake any more than I could breathe because it was bound by a law that superseded both physical and spiritual.

Did I ever plan to tell him I was a pitcher once? No. It was part of a broken dream that I didn't think anyone needed to know. That's why I asked Ellery not to say anything. But I should have known better. Like all secrets, it was bound to come out and now that it has, I can tell that the look in his eyes is not one of sadness, but confirmation. Our intense, natural connection not only makes sense but is irrevocable.

"That's why you don't like athletes," he says matter of fact.

I nod, giving him the only explanation that I can. "I'd known guys like you my whole life and I thought because I was one of them, they would always have my back. But when push came to shove, they didn't. Those I trusted abandoned me when I needed them most. It's why I lit you up the night of your party. You were guilty by association."

"I would never abandon you, Sparky." He drops his hand and scoots over, reaching for my hand. "You should know that by now."

I do know that. Jake is one of the most incredible people I have ever met. But he can't be bogged down by me and my life. He has his own. That's why I let him go.

"I'm so sorry your dreams were taken from you." He brings the hand he's holding to his lips, kissing the back of it gently. "Did you ever get a second opinion?"

"And a third," I sigh. "My dad refused to give up. It was his dream to see one of us go to college. But surgery was out of the question."

Jake looks at me, confused. "Why?"

I look down at the money in my hand. "Staying home, going to DCC, and saving for school, that I could do. But even with health insurance, my portion of the surgery doctors said I needed was tens of thousands of dollars. I couldn't afford it."

The sadness and regret in Jake's eyes makes my chest hurt. I don't want him to feel sorry for me. He needs to know I moved on.

"I was devastated at first," I admit, "but then my father told me something I will never forget. Dreams can be a part of you for so long, and when you least expect it, change. But that doesn't mean you still can't have them. They may not be as bright, but that doesn't make them any less. Just…different."

"Smart man," Jake replies somberly.

"He is," I nod. "But Jake, that new dream is all I have, and that weekend at Highland I realized it will happen, but not at the same time as all of yours. I couldn't expect you or Ellery to wait for me while I worked and saved for the chance at mine."

"What do you mean wait for you?" He pulls my hand to his lap and clasps it with his other one.

I swallow and look down, hating to admit the catalyst that had driven the wedge between us. "With the money I spent changing my flight that weekend, I knew I wouldn't be back to see you guys until Easter and I thought for sure you would be gone by then. I figured it was our last weekend together and it was time for us to move on."

"Gone?" He shakes his head.

I look up and nod. "You're getting drafted, Jake. Both you and Cruz are. It's only a matter of time before you leave Highland, and when you do, Ellery will go with Cruz and you will go wherever you do. That's why I didn't call you back. I didn't want to be longing for something that was no longer there. I put an end to our chapter before your future did."

It takes a moment to process everything I just said, but once he finally does, he looks at me in a way that warms me from the inside out. "Sparky, I don't care where I go, I want you in my life."

"We will always be friends," I smile slightly. "I know that now. But my future is here, and yours is wherever it takes you."

"I don't want to be your friend. I mean, clearly we are not in the friend zone."

He laughs and looks down at his bare chest, then flicks his eyes to my bra.

I laugh and shake my head. "We have to be."

"No," he says with undeterred defiance. "You can't deny the electricity between us. I mean, that night after the frat party and just now…" His eyes blaze with heat kindling the earlier fire in my chest. "Sparky, there is electricity every time we are in the same room together. And I don't even have to say the obvious about the whole baseball connection because you know. I know you know."

He's right. When we are together, I get a high that is like being on the mound and a roller coaster, all wrapped in one.

"I want to be more than friends," he continues. "I always have. I thought what happened that night after the frat party made my feelings pretty clear but since it didn't, let me say it now—I don't just want you in my life, Jenica. I need you in it." He lets go of my hand and brings both of them to my face, cupping it. "There is no future without you in it."

"You don't mean that," I shake my head.

"I do. Fuck, you have no idea how much I do."

Sliding one hand to my neck, he wraps his other arm around my waist and pulls me toward him. Falling back against the bed, he pulls me onto his lap and the money in my hand falls to the floor as I open it and bring it to his chest with my other one.

"What you said that night, it's not true." He brushes a thumb along my lower lips "We aren't just a chapter. We are more. We have the potential to be a book because there is something special between us and I know you feel it."

I place my palms on his chest, the warmth of his body passing from him to me. "It's not possible."

"Why not?" He grabs both hands and squeezes. "With us, anything is possible."

"Because you have your future, and I have mine. Doesn't matter the bond we share. You're you and you are destined for more."

"More?" He shakes his head.

"Come on, Jake. You're the whole package. You're a great guy and an even better ball player, and one day some lucky girl is going to snag you."

"No they won't."

"Yes," I nod with determination, "they will."

"No they won't, because as long as I breathe I will want only one girl—you."

"Jake…"

"I mean it, Sparky. You're it for me. Why do you think I'm here? Would I have waited in an airport all night and then driven miles for anyone else?"

"I know you feel obligated…"

"Obligated?" He laughs. "Sparky, I am not here because I feel obligated. I am here because I need you."

"You don't need me," I let out a small laugh, ignoring the twinge in my chest. "Your life is going to be amazing."

"No it won't," he shakes his head. "Not if I destroy it."

"Destroy it?" I pull back. "Why would you do that?"

"Because destruction is in my blood, Sparky. That's why I need you. You are the one who now owns it."