CHAPTER 21:
MICKEY
Raven fell asleep in my arms. I carried her to my bed, lying her down against the soft sheets. She didn’t have any clothes on—still. I didn’t want Samantha or anyone coming in the room and finding her naked. So I found one of my shirts and a pair of my boxer briefs. As gently as possible, so I wouldn’t wake her, I dressed her. She woke briefly, helping me get the clothes on, before she immediately fell back to sleep.
I tucked her in under the covers.
As for me—I was fucking wired. There would be no sleep tonight. It was nearly four in the morning anyway. I usually got up at six, so I figured what was the point? I yanked on a clean shirt of my own, pocketed my wallet and phone, and figured now was the perfect time for some errands. Some long overdue errands. I grabbed Sandra’s boxes from the closet, balancing one on top of the other, and hauled them downstairs. I loaded them into the bed of my truck.
First stop: Tony Christmas’s house.
I didn’t even know if he was still dating Sandra. I didn’t know if they were even serious or not or how often he saw her. But I unloaded the boxes on his doorstep. Before I left, in the pitch black darkness, I opened one of them. Using the flashlight on my phone, I inspected several of the garment labels and sizes. I made a few notes. Then I closed the box and snuck away, back to my car.
There. Now Sandra had no more excuses or reasons to ever contact me again.
I wanted to wipe my hands of her in every possible way.
That felt like a load off my shoulders. With a giant sigh of relief, I next started the insane journey that was getting to my parents’ house. They lived on Peaks Island, an island not accessible by car. The first ferry across wasn’t until five. So I had some time. I got to the ferry dock and the parking lot where I waited, rather impatiently, texting my mom incessantly until she answered. Then leaving my truck behind, I endured the twenty minute ferry ride to the island. Finally with the sun still not up, I hurried off the boat on foot. I was pressed for time—I only had ten minutes before the return ferry left. If I missed the return then I’d have to wait an hour to get back across. A phone call would have been easier, but some things were better in person. My mom had answered my texts and she’d agreed to meet me at the ticket office.
“Mom—” I yelled, calling out to her as I jogged the short distance from the ferry to the office. She stood there in her house coat and slippers. “I only have ten minutes,” I said as I came up to her. I already had an annual pass for the ferry, so there was no need to buy my return ticket. Hell, half the employees operating the ferry knew me by name—either because I played for the Sea Dogs or because I crossed on the ferry often enough.
“I know,” she answered. I’d clearly woken her up—her hair was wild and she didn’t have on her makeup. “What’s happened? Is it your brother?”
“No. Nick’s fine. I think. He said his little stunt on the roof was for a girl. I don’t know. Seemed weird.” I exhaled impatiently. I wasn’t here to talk about Nick’s drama.
“Well, I’m glad he’s staying with you. He’s been staying out with friends most nights for the past month. He’s worrying me sick. Anyway, what’s going on?”
A random man walked past us, nodding hello. Mom crossed her arms over her chest, pulling her coat tighter, looking uncomfortable.
“I need a couple favors. First, I need you to shop for Raven.” I handed over the piece of paper I’d made some notes on. “These brands in these sizes fit her. She’s been wearing the old clothes Sandra left at my house. I don’t want her in Sandra’s clothes. I don’t want Sandra to have any tie or leverage against us. Would you just buy a lot of stuff so Raven can pick and choose what she likes? Then I’ll return what she doesn’t like from the stuff you get.”
“Okay.” She nodded, glancing at the note. No problem. Mom loved to shop. And my parents had plenty of money, so it wasn’t like that was an issue. “What about a dress for the charity gala?” she asked. “Should I get her something for that?”
Fuck. I forgot that was coming up. In less than a week. “Yes. Get her a couple to pick from. Make at least one of them green. Then I want to sell the Waterford vase. I don’t even know how to go about doing that.”
“How about auctioning it off at the gala? They’re doing a silent auction this year.”
Hell yes! Sandra would be at the gala. She was one of the organizers, along with my mom. What an excellent, giant ‘fuck you’ to sell it at the very event she helped throw every year. “Perfect.”
“Was that it?” She glanced down at her watch. “You have three minutes.”
“Yeah, I’ll call you.” I actually wanted to ask a few more things of her, but it was more important that I got back home to Raven. I wanted to be there when she woke up.
“So you and Raven are together then—that didn’t take long,” Mom commented.
Here is comes.
“No, it didn’t take long—only fifteen years,” I said curtly. “And I don’t need the lecture.”
Mom gasped like she was offended, when she knew exactly what I meant.
I clarified. “The lecture where you tell me she’s not good enough or right for me. That I shouldn’t settle. That I’m still young and should just date right now, rather than getting too serious with any one woman. That lecture.”
She smacked her lips, giving me an eye roll that could have won an Oscar. “I like Raven. There’s no lecture this time.”
“What?” Hold the fucking front door. The woman who enjoyed ‘heart-to-hearts’ and speeches, probably just to hear her own voice, wasn’t about to give me a laundry lists of reasons why I sucked at picking the right woman. Holy crap! “Okay, Mom,” I said, hardly believing her. “I gotta go.” I gave her a quick hug before I turned to leave.
“I’m serious.” Mom called out after me. “I don’t know her all that well, but she’s different. And I’m pretty positive she isn’t with you for your money.”
“Or your money,” I yelled back as I jogged off.
It was no secret my parents were wealthy. When it wasn’t baseball season I worked for my dad. Good thing too because minor league players make shit money.
I returned to the ferry, taking it back across the water, back to the mainland.
After, as I drove back to the house with the sun coming up, I realized that for the first time in years I felt very content. I’d spent a lifetime chasing my dream of making it to the majors—something that had always been slightly out of my grasp. It was stressful and infuriating to work so hard at something only to fall short each and every year.
I constantly beat myself up over that failure too. Since Raven arrived, between throwing off my pre-game sex routine, and the whole cutting my foot thing, I’d really screwed up any chance of getting called up to the majors this year. There was always next year, but it felt nice taking the pressure off. And what felt even nicer—knowing that, either way, when I came home at night Raven would be there. Samantha too.
Fuck—I had a family. Or at least, if I continued on my current path that was the future I could envision.
As claustrophobic as that might have made me once feel in life—the whole idea of settling down, and the whole idea of kids—it hardly seemed scary now.
“Wow,” I said aloud.
I pulled into my driveway. Locking the truck, I hurried inside and straight up to my bedroom. Raven was there, where I’d left her, her hair wild and sprawled out on my pillow. She looked beautiful as she slept. If I wasn’t terrified I’d freak her the fuck out, I might have woken her up, gotten down on one knee, and fucking proposed to this woman. I loved her. I wanted her to be mine forever. When I thought about the years she spent missing me, the years I spent missing her, it made my throat burn. I needed to do everything to insure she never stepped a single foot back in Pecan ever again. I needed to do everything to insure I never lost her ever again.
Crawling into bed with her, she made this sexy little moan in her sleep. My alarm would be go
ing off in about ten minutes, so I savored the last few moments of what might have been the most perfect night of my life. On several occasions over the years, I nearly got rid of that shoebox in my closet—because missing Raven had been brutally painful at times. But every time I tried I’d never been able to toss out the old letters. Thank God for that. I could see it in Raven’s eyes last night, as she read letter after letter, how much saving them had meant to her. None of my words as a kid had been poetic, more like the embarrassing ramblings and bad grammar of a lovesick child, but Raven had read them like they were everything to her.
I inched in closer to her, pulling at her hips, needing her near me, needing to touch her, wanting a repeat of last night.
“Is it morning already?” she asked, her voice heavy with sleep. She turned and rolled into me, nestling her face in against my chest.
Instantly I felt the familiar rush of heat run through me that her nearness provoked.
“Sorry I woke you,” I whispered. I dug my fingers through her soft hair and inhaled the sweet scent of her.
She surprised me when she ran her hands down my chest, exploring over the top of my shirt. Normally she wasn’t much of a morning person. “It’s nice waking up to you.” She sighed.
“Yes?”
“Really nice.” She moved her warm, soft hands under my shirt
Shit, yes.
Just then the door to my bed room swung open. In came Samantha. I gasped, startled, having forgotten all together that the rest of the world existed. Raven pulled her hands from my inside my shirt, rolling away from me. Samantha padded across my hardwood floors and come up to Raven’s side of the bed.
“Can I get in?” she asked in her soft little voice.
“Of course.”
Raven scooted over to make room for Samantha. I moved too, hanging off the edge of the bed now. My heart beat a little harder as I waited for the line of questioning from Samantha. I figured I was about to get an interrogation like the one I got the very first day I met her when she’d been hiding in the shadows of her grandmother’s trailer, protective and defensive of her mom. This small person was only seven—but I don’t think I’d ever needed someone’s approval more.
But no questions came. Samantha only nestled her mom’s shoulder, and closed her sweet little eyes, falling back to sleep almost immediately. Raven and I had shared a kiss or two in front of Samantha—maybe Samantha had already accepted that her mother and I were together. Maybe she thought nothing of it. Maybe she just didn’t care either way.
Raven shifted, her eyes connecting with mine across the top of her daughter’s head. “Sorry,” she mouthed.
She had nothing to be sorry about. Raven was a package deal—two for the price of one. And I wouldn’t want her any other way. I did, however, need to get up, before my alarm started blaring and woke Samantha now.
Carefully, I moved out of bed. I clicked off the alarm on my nightstand.
“You have to go?” Raven whispered.
“Yeah.” I kept my voice low, walking to Raven’s side of the bed. “I have a meeting and a morning workout. I’ll be back in a couple hours. Oh...and there’s this charity dinner thing in a couple days. It’s for the team. We do it annually. It’s pretty fancy. I have to go. Attendance is mandatory. So…would you be my date?”
It seemed like a simple enough thing to ask. But as I stood over Raven, staring down at her in the bed with Samantha, a pretty pink blush hit her cheeks.
“You want me to go?” She seemed anxious by my request.
“Yeah. My parents will go. Maybe Nick could watch Samantha. It’s adults only.”
She shrugged. Most girls I knew would jump at the chance to dress up for something like this. Raven wasn’t most girls though, and I couldn’t tell what she was thinking.
“You sure you wouldn’t rather bring someone else?” she suggested.
“No.” Fuck, no. I shifted on my feet. This wasn’t going quite like I’d envisioned. “Please think about it. I want you there. The idea of going without you sounds like pure torture. Anyway…I have to get going or I’ll be late.” I bent down and gave her a small kiss before walking for the door.
But just before I left, Raven called out. “I’ll go. I can’t promise I’ll enjoy it, but I’ll try.”
Raven kept doing that—surprising me when I least expected.
CHAPTER 22:
RAVEN
Why had I agreed to this stupid thing?
I had knots in my stomach as we drove across town to the ferry. Mickey’s parents lived on an island. A real life, honest to goodness, island. I hadn’t known that about them until about twenty minutes ago. The only way to reach their house was to take the ferry across. And Mickey had just warned me “it’s big” as if that needed to be stated about their house.
“Define big?” I asked. I thought Mickey’s house was big.
“There’s a gate and a separate guest house. That sort of big.” Nick chimed in from the backseat.
“Okay then.” I muttered. So the exact mansion I always imagined Mickey living in as a kid.
We had Nick and Samantha in the car, since Nick was babysitting, and I was getting ready at Mickey’s parents’ house. Mickey had enlisted his stepmom, Pamela to pick out some dresses for me. I hardly knew how to feel about this. It was either a sweet gesture. Or he’d been too afraid by what I might wear to let me buy something on my own. My first pay check from the library wasn’t coming for another week, so I didn’t have too much of an option in the matter either way.
“It’s not that big,” Mickey clarified. But I could tell he was lying now.
In the distance I saw my first glimpse of water, gleaming in the bright sun. In the whole time we’d been in Maine, I had yet to take Samantha to see the ocean. I’d promised her, but hadn’t gotten the opportunity. The ferry crossed ocean water. I’d never even been on a ferry or boat of any kind. So, Samantha and I were both about to experience a whole lot of firsts.
The ferry operated on a precise schedule. Mickey timed it right so we got there with only minutes to spare. He drove his truck into a line of a few cars, and then a minute later right onto the ferry. “We can wait in the truck. Or we can go up top for a minute. In the summer months the ferry is always crowded with tourists. It might be better to wait down here.”
A few tourists were hardly going to stop me. I already had my seatbelt off and my door open. Suddenly all thoughts about this stupid gala, the stupid dress I had to wear, the fact that stupid Sandra would be there tonight, and the piranhas feasting on my stomach insides—all those things melted from my consciousness.
The ocean! I had to get up on the top deck of this boat to see it. “Come on, Samantha,” I said, knowing she must be thinking the same thing as me. She unbuckled and followed.
“Stay with the car, Nick,” Mickey told him, also unbuckling, tossing him the keys in the back, before he followed after us.
“Gladly,” Nick answered, staying with the car.
The three of us went up top as the ferry had just started to move. It moved painfully slow away from the docks. We found a few open, bright red seats and sat down to watch the process. Samantha was so excited she was literally bouncing in her seat. Truth be told—so was I.
“Is this your first time?” Mickey asked, like it suddenly occurred to him.
Mickey looked exceptionally handsome today, with the sun gleaming off his sunglasses, this cocky movie-star-worthy smile on his lips, as he figured out my tiny secret. Yes, I’d never seen the ocean. People kept noticing Mickey too. The workers on the ferry, a couple random passengers had told him hi, and one guy even asked him when he’d be pitching again. In three days he’d told the man. I had no idea Mickey was a mini-celebrity around this place.
“Yes, it’s my first time,” I answered.
This seemed to please Mickey. “Let’s stay the night in my parent’s guest house tonight then and in the morning we can go to the beach.”
Um…I wasn’t sure how I felt ab
out this. But before I could say anything, Samantha immediately jumped all over that idea. “We can go to the beach?”
“Yeah. My parents live on the beach—but their beach is rocky. There’s a sandy, public one we can drive to.”
I swallowed, staring off at the water. What was I getting myself into?
Before long the ferry came to the dock on Peaks Island. The three of us left the bright red seats and returned to Nick and the car on the bottom level of the ferry. After a few minutes of waiting, we drove off and onto the island. Peaks Island was such a contrast from Portland. Like a whole different—beach town—world. Almost like stepping back in time. I’d never seen anything like it. It was beautiful.
Mickey drove slowly. But didn’t take much time before we were pulling up to an enormous gated house with the blue of the ocean just beyond it. Oh God—they were fucking rich. Like more than I’d been imaging. The house was easily the biggest house I’d ever seen, made of beautiful stone, and it sat on this small hill that overlooked the water. We drove down a long, unpaved driveway, right up to the front door. Mickey parked and we stepped out. Outside the car, I kicked at the gravely ground, while my insides went turned straight into pudding.
Also—there it was—I noticed the second house on the premise, easily big enough to be someone’s actual home, but I had to assume it was the guest house he’d been talking about.
Instantly I felt underdressed, undereducated, under…everything. Had I known Mickey’s parents lived in this sort of house when I’d first met them, I would have been about a million times more anxious.
I tugged nervously on my shirt now.
Mickey led the way inside. The house was bright, open, and airy. “Mom! Dad! We’re here!” His voice echoed off the walls and vast space. “Hello! Anyone home?”
Crazy Sexy Notion Page 16