Winning With Him by Lauren Blakely

Grant

With wide-eyed wonder, my friend Reese stares at the ginormous tub in my hotel, half a mile from the ballpark. She lets her tongue loll out of her mouth then draws it back in. “I want to spend the night in that,” she says longingly.

Laughing, I gesture to the porcelain vat. “Let me get you some candles, sweetheart. How about a bath bomb? Maybe a little meditation music?” I tease, then add, “Go right ahead. Get in there.”

Her big blue eyes twinkle with delight, lighting up her familiar face. “Seriously? I don’t have a tub in college, and this here is a dream bath.”

“Then live the dream.”

She sinks onto the edge, stroking the porcelain, cooing at it, even.

“Weirdo,” I say, laughing. We’ve laughed a lot tonight, possibly because Reese declared it a no-Declan-talk zone, and I was more than happy to observe the moratorium.

Reese doesn’t have classes tomorrow, so she drove down from college for Opening Day. Everyone else is coming too. My grandma and grandpa. My sister. My dad and his girlfriend. My mom and Frank.

But tonight, it’s just Reese and me until I hit the sack at ten. Gotta be rested and ready for my Major League debut.

“I’m going to bed in thirty minutes, so get your butt in the tub, woman.”

“Fine. You twisted my arm,” she says, clapping her hands. “I’ll do it. I’m going to send you a million gift cards for those spy books you love.”

“You don’t have to send me anything. I’m just glad you’re here,” I say with a smile, letting go of the teasing.

The truth is, I’m kind of nervous about tomorrow.

She turns on the faucet and meets my gaze. “Are you worried about tomorrow? First game and all?”

“Would you just like to see inside my soul a little more?”

“Ah, it’s pretty much cellophane to me right now.”

“Seems it is. But I think it’d be weird if I wasn’t nervous, right?”

She sticks her hand under the water, checking the temperature. “Being nervous is a good sign. When you want something, you’re going to have tons of feelings about it. And that’s what you have. You have deep, intense feelings about playing the sport you love in the Major Leagues. It’s incredible.”

I tip my forehead to the tub. “I do. Thanks for getting it, and me. Now, go enjoy your bath. I’m going to listen to a book while you relax.”

As I shut the bathroom door behind me, Reese moans happily. In the main suite, I flop onto the couch and click over to the book I’ve been listening to, popping in my AirPods. But I don’t even make it to the hero rappelling from the side of a bridge when my phone bleats.

I don’t recognize the number on the screen, but it starts with 415—the San Francisco area code.

My heart climbs into my throat.

I never memorized Declan’s number, but he had a San Francisco area code.

I’m sure it’s him.

Positive.

I stare at those ten digits as if I’m an astronomer getting a call from across the galaxy, a sign of intelligent life in the universe from light years away.

My breath comes fast. My pulse spikes. And my skin sizzles.

My stupid body betrays me with all this longing. All this want for him that eclipses any latent anger.

I swallow the desire and slide my thumb across the screen.

“Hello?” I sound disembodied. I feel disembodied.

A second later comes that low rumble of a voice. “Hey. It’s Declan.”

I’m glad I’m sitting, because if I weren’t, I might topple over.

“I know.” I don’t know what else to say.

“Congrats on making the roster,” he says. “I knew you would.”

I close my eyes, drag a hand down my face. A million questions flicker through my mind.

Why are you calling?

What are your secrets?

Why the hell did you break my heart?

“Thanks. Appreciate it,” I say, cool and even. The anger I thought was gone taps on my skull.

“Are you psyched for tomorrow?”

Is this really what he wants to talk about? Whether I’m happy to be starting? “What’s not to be excited about?” I say sarcastically, because . . . duh. “First Major League game.”

“I bet you homer in your first at-bat,” he says. The pride in his voice brings back what River said about Declan and me in the bar.

He was proud of you.

But so what if he was? What difference did it make? He still dumped me.

I scoff. “Don’t jinx me.”

“I’m happy for you, Grant,” he continues, his tone a little uneven, like the floor beneath him might be wobbly too. Good. “I don’t want to say I knew it was going to happen, but I had a good feeling.”

And you’re calling to say I told you so?

I’m quiet because I don’t want to let on I’m still hurt. Maybe more hurt than angry.

Yeah, the way my chest aches, hurt is more like it.

“So, um . . .” Declan says.

I don’t help him to fill in the gap. He called; he can be the one to keep talking.

Declan clears his throat. Starts over. “I called because . . .” He trails off again. “This is hard to say.”

Hard? This is hard for him? Fuck that. Try getting dumped via text by your boyfriend. “Did you leave your T-shirt in my room?” I lash out. “Or your flip-flops? Maybe some lube you want back?”

“I’m sorry,” he blurts.

I shake my head, squeeze my eyes shut, trying to process . . . an apology. I can’t, and my volume cranks up to eleven. “What? You’re sorry?”

Reese yells from the bathroom, “What’s going on? Who’s that?”

“No one,” I call out.

Declan takes a deep breath. “Did I call at a bad time?”

“It’s Reese. We’re hanging out,” I say quickly.

“I can phone later,” he says.

“No, it’s fine. She’s in the tub.” I’m not letting him go without an explanation. One that adds up. I need an answer. But I won’t ask for it. I’m just going to let Declan keep talking.

He sighs, and I’m glad that this is hard for him. So I make it harder by waiting.

“Listen, Grant, I messed up,” he says softly.

I blink. Sit up straighter. A tiny sliver of hope spreads inside me. “What do you mean?”

“I want to explain,” he adds. “Can I explain?”

Do I want to unravel the mystery of Declan Steele?

You bet I do.

Oh hell, do I ever.

“Okay. Talk.”

“I handled everything badly. I should have called you to explain.” His earnestness threatens to seep through the wall I’ve built over the past week. All that carefully stacked stone and brick, and already I feel it crumbling.

“So you should have called to break up with me on the phone instead of via text?” I counter.

“No. I mean I should have called to tell you what happened.”

Dark thoughts invade my brain, horrible ones that make my blood go cold. “Did you meet someone else? A new guy in Florida?”

“No! God, no. Not at all. I couldn’t be with you like that and then someone else. You have to know there’s no other man.”

“Do I?” I press, my jaw tight, my voice hard. Because what the hell? How would I have to know?

“Grant,” he says, pleading.

“Why would I have to know?” I bite out, my tone as tight as my heart is precarious in his hands.

“You know what it was like when we were together. There was no one else. There couldn’t be anyone else,” he says in that same tender tone he used when he asked me to be his.

Like that, the wall collapses, and my heart cracks open to make room for him again. The quickness of it terrifies me. “I don’t know anything,” I say, trying to stay cool and calm.

Like Declan.

But then, he doesn’t sound so composed, either. He sounds stretched thin with pain. “When I arrived in Florida, my dad was at the ballpark waiting for me.”

“What did he want?” I can’t help my curiosity—I don’t have a clear idea of what’s going on with his dad. Declan barely let on what their issues were.

“He said some things . . .” There he goes again, back to doling out scant bits of information but never the full picture. “And then you had a great game, and I figured that you’d be better off without me.” Declan is leaving out critical clues to this equation. “You played better without me around. And you played better before we started up.”

“So you made the choice on my behalf,” I spit out, shaking my head in frustration. He thinks he did this for me. He went back to his stance at the start of spring training—that relationships are a mistake for a rookie.

Maybe they are, but he gave me no say in the decision, left me no options. He shut me down and iced me out.

“I did, and I’m sorry,” he says.

He goes quiet again, and in his silence, I hear a warning bell. I hear Coach telling me I made the roster. I hear the crack of the bat, the snap of the glove.

I hear what’s on the other side of the choice.

Baseball.

“Listen, Deck,” I begin, needing to stop him, to end this call before all my progress on the diamond slips through my fingers.

“Rookie,” he says, all soft and impossibly sexy, and a tingle shoots through my stomach and wraps around my heart. Just like that, I can see him and me together again.

The walls tumble completely. I ache to feel him against me. His voice says he feels the same.

And that’s too damn dangerous.

“Please don’t call me rookie,” I whisper, almost begging him to stop.

“Why?”

“You know why,” I say.

“Okay, Grant. I just wanted to say I was sorry.”

That sorry is another nick with the knife, another slice of my soul. If I stay like this with him, if I let him talk, he’ll cut me to pieces.

And for what?

For an apology?

He said he was sorry. That’s why he called. Mission fucking accomplished.

“It’s Opening Day tomorrow,” I say, grasping for any bit of willpower. “Don’t do this to me right now. Please don’t get in my head. I accept your apology. Let’s just move on.”

“I don’t want to get in the way. I never wanted to get in the way,” he says gently, but like this is hurting him too.

Even so, this is barely the beginning of an explanation.

This is Declan not letting me in again.

This is a man who isn’t ready.

And, I know now, neither am I.

“Good luck tomorrow, man,” I tell him, meaning it. “I wish you the best.”

“Same to you.”

Then I do the hard thing.

I hang up.

Declan turns out to be some kind of oracle.

Well, not completely—I don’t hit a home run. But I snag a single in my first Major League at-bat, knocking in two runs.

We go on to win the game, and it is utterly exhilarating, more so than I ever imagined.

Even when I have to see my mom and my dad afterward, going through the motions. I take pictures with them, I hug them and say hello and make small talk and ask how they’re doing. Even when Frank brings me in for a hug too, it doesn’t dull the shine on my day.

All of this stuff? My parents? My mom’s boyfriend?

I’ve got it.

I’m good with it.

The past isn’t my albatross—the present is.

That’s why I grab a minute alone with my grandfather after the game—to focus on someone besides me. We go to a coffee shop near the ballpark. “What’s the story with your knee, Pops?”

“I’m going to have the surgery in a few months.” His sigh turns into a what-can-you-do shrug. “But it’ll be fine.”

“Can you wait till the end of the season so I can help out?”

He shakes his head, laughing lightly. “I can’t. But can you trust me that I’ve got this covered?”

“I want to help,” I say.

“You offering is all the help I need.”

“What about a physical therapist? Can I get you one? Regular PT would be good for you.”

My pops smiles, lifting his coffee cup. “It’s nice of you to offer again. Sure.”

I grin too. “Thank you for not protesting.”

“I can tell it’s important to you. And you’re important to me.” His rolled sleeves show the detailed ink on his arms, and he runs his hand over the bands that look like water. I have matching waves on my arm, something that connects us.

I meet his gaze. His eyes are lighter blue than mine. People always used to say I have my mother’s eyes, but I knew I had his. “You know you’re like my dad, right? That you’re the real father to me?” I say, choking up.

His lip quivers for a moment, but he nods, resolute. “I know. And you’re a son to me,” he says, and then he wraps his arm around me and squeezes, and I know my life is going to be as great as I let it be.

I’ll get over Declan. I’ll get over the heartache and move on. But I have family, and that’s what matters the most.

After Pops drains his cup of coffee, he sets down the mug, takes a breath, then turns to me again. “What happened to the guy you met in spring training?”

I offer up a sad smile. “It didn’t work out.”

He pats my hand. “You okay with that? Or do you miss him?”

The question is an excellent one. Maybe I’m lucky here too, because I can answer with the truth. “A little of both, Pops.”

Over the next five months I play like a fiend, determined to have the best rookie season anyone has ever had.

By all accounts, I am.

Declan doesn’t call again. I don’t call him, either. When I go out with the guys on my team for a burger or a game of pool, we sometimes catch glimpses of his games playing on the TV at the bar.

Crosby mentions him from time to time too, dropping tidbits about their latest running bet on who will have a better batting average, or who will smoke out the other team when we play our series in September. Chance will relate their text thread about the absurd trivia they are dying to feed the teams’ Jumbotron operators.

Did you know Chance Ashford throws a ninety-eight-mile-an-hour fastball, but is afraid of spiders, mushrooms, and peanut butter?

Did you know Declan Steele studied art history in college and his favorite song has always been “November Rain,” which he’d like to sing a cappella to the ballpark tonight?

Didn’t know that about Chance.

Didn’t know that, either, about Declan’s major.

I don’t let on, though, that I know he likes Guns N’ Roses. I simply nod and smile at all the right times.

In September, the team will travel to New York for our series against the Comets. It’ll be the first time I’ve seen Declan since the morning he left.

I didn’t know how I’d feel when the day came, but now that it’s here, I’m ready to face him. So damn ready.