You Are Mine (Bad Boy 9 Novel Collection)

by Amy Faye

  And every decision she'd made since then had been in an effort to make that risk as small as she possibly could.

  Other people take little risks. They might sleep around a little. They might take a class that's not important for their major. They might eat food they think they're allergic too.

  All those little risks, they add up a bit.

  Cathy didn't take little risks, because she'd already bet her entire purse on one big risk. There wasn't room for more trouble in her life, and if Jeff Hess was going to be trouble, if Jeff Hess was going to be a risk, then she couldn't afford him.

  Cathy took a deep breath as she slipped into the truck, turning to make sure her bag was still stuffed into the back seat.

  If she couldn't afford him, then she'd have to walk away. It was that simple. If he was no good, she'd do what she had to do, and what she had to do was leave him, forget that any of this had ever happened.

  It would hurt him. It'd hurt her, too, though. If it had to be done, it had to be done. Avoiding it was just going to hurt more.

  She took a deep breath and tried to convince herself to do the one thing she didn't want to do right now.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Jeff watched Cathy walking into the dance studio. It was strange how the place looked. Nothing like anywhere you would think.

  There was a certain refinement to dancers, at least the way that they presented themselves to the public. He thought of them in a similar way to how he thought of opera, which put together brought up images of people in finely pressed, thousand-plus dollar tuxedos.

  People who had so much money that they couldn't lose it fast enough if they lit it on fire. They'd still be making money faster than it would burn. People whose families had had that money so long that if their great grandfather had lit the fires, it still wouldn't have reached their butts.

  But on the other hand, you watch where dancers practice, and they take the back door of a studio in the bad part of town. Strange indeed. Perhaps it was the city, though. Perhaps other places, they're better-represented. Better respected.

  Even still, it feels odd. She doesn't look over her shoulder as she walks inside. He raises his hand in a wave that she doesn't see, anyways. Just in case she can feel it.

  Whatever's got her upset, it's a doozy. She's down. That much at least is clear.

  But whatever it is that has her upset, he can't say. And if he can't figure out what it is, he can't give her any help. He can't tell her that it's going to be fine when he doesn't know what it is in the first place.

  Maybe she's worried about the dance routine. Maybe she's worried about a pulled muscle in her thigh. If she stretches it out, favors it a little for the first few minutes, she can probably work through it. If dancers are anything like baseball players, that is. If they're anything alike at all, no doubt she's already got problems like that. She already knows full well that she can just work her way through it no problem.

  But in either case, he can't fix what he can't understand.

  He settles back into the seat and starts driving again. The roads here are busted and broken in spite of the near-constant construction. Same as everywhere, only worse. Which seems strange to think about. Wasn't Detroit supposed to be the Motor City?

  The Mecca for cars, or something like that? Where everyone owned cars, where everyone drove? You'd think streets would be important. That they'd go out of their way to take care of them. But they don't.

  The future was a long way away. And the two of them had a large pile of obstacles to climb over, no doubt about that. Somehow Jeff didn't mind the thought, though.

  If they worked at it, they were both smart. They both had plenty of experience working at things, and they both had plenty of experience taking risks. Working towards goals that thousands of people thought about, and most of them fell to the wayside.

  If anyone could beat the odds, then it would be him and Cathy. All they had to do was put their minds to it. To decide to do what they had to do to stay together, at least as together as they could stay.

  He eased the truck up to a red light and let his eyes shut for a minute, imagining it. Imagining a little boy, with her flexibility, his arm.

  They could have a future hall-of-famer on their hands, right there. A limber shoulder would be an incredible asset to any pitcher, and he'd have a big step ahead. 'Course, if he wanted to play third base, he could have that. Or he could catch. Those would both benefit from some limberness.

  It wasn't like the kid had to follow in his father's footsteps, after all.

  Jeff opened his eyes again. The light was green, and the dark red Ford in front of him had already opened up a twenty-foot gap. The pitcher pressed on the gas pedal and moved up to rejoin traffic. It was a pointless fantasy right now. He should focus on the path right in front of him.

  That was rocky enough all by itself, and he would need all the attention he could get to figure out how to walk it without getting himself hurt.

  Until he'd figured out how to solve the problems that he had in his lap right now, the rest was all just fun and games. He could imagine a life with Cathy, sure. He could imagine how happy they'd be.

  He could also imagine what she was going to feel like in his arms that night, when everyone had gone to bed and she came to see him, in the dark. He could imagine that she'd let him paint her insides. She hadn't since that first night, no matter how bad he'd wanted to.

  But he could imagine that tonight would be the difference. That she'd finally give in and see… well, not reason, certainly. See how good it would feel. How much a little risk-taking could pay dividends, not just in terms of how well the risk itself pays off, but the feeling you get just by taking them.

  He could imagine that she's got a friend with big tits and it turns into a threesome.

  But that wasn't likely. He didn't have time to imagine things far in the future. Counting chickens before they hatched was only going to get him into trouble.

  He'd like any of those things, but you don't get what you like, and you don't get what you want. You get what you ask for, and you get what you work for.

  He'd always known that, on some level. There's only two deciding factors. First, you have to put yourself in a position to get what you want. You have to tell someone, hey, don't forget about me when the space opens up, and you have to remind them every so often that you want it.

  Second, you have to work your ass off to make yourself the most likely candidate.

  You don't take the mound by walking onto your high school team and saying you'll play whatever position they need. They'll put you at center field. Nobody wants to play center field, so they all need one.

  You want to pitch, when they ask what you want, you tell 'em you want to pitch. Then, they'll put you on the list of dozens of assholes who all wanted to pitch.

  Then, step two, you work your arm until it's better than the other guys.

  He wanted a future. There was more to his life than baseball. He'd still be alive after his arm was burned out and he was too old to stand on the mound. He'd still have to figure out what to do with himself when he was forty years old.

  Some guys tried to stick around. Tried to pitch until they're fifty. Clinging to desperate hopes as they descend the ladder, throwing hit-parade after hit-parade.

  If he wanted to have a future, he had to do three things. Same as everything else in life.

  First, he had to figure what he wanted. He knew what he wanted.

  Second, he had to tell her he wanted it, and he was pretty sure she knew.

  Third, he had to earn it.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  She should have told him that she was breaking it off when she first had the idea. It bothered her that she hadn't, but…

  Cathy couldn't do it. She couldn't do it when she'd first had the thought, or the night before. Then she'd fallen into bed with him again, and then it was too far gone. How was she supposed to say, well, that was some great sex, and I do like you, but I
think we should stop having great sex for a while. Maybe forever.

  Then, what? You walk away with a wave and a smile and you don't come back again? That was a laugh. No way in hell was that how things were going to go.

  So since she wasn't going to get off the train, she was headed for the end of the line. Or at least the next station. The next time that things got weird, the next time that it looked like a real risk, she'd step back, and this time she'd step back for good.

  But if it was a one-time thing, if they weren't going to be facing much in the way of trouble, then what was the harm in sticking around a little longer?

  And, to her surprise, they didn't face anything in the way of trouble. Things went smoothly. Smooth sailing for miles and miles and days and days. Until she almost got to the point where she thought that things weren't going to go back to being bad.

  Maybe she wasn't wrong. Maybe things would be completely fine, after all. It wasn't as if she wanted things to go sideways.

  He laid there with his shirt off, her fingers tracing the tiny muscles between his ribs. It was an attractive look, one that you couldn't fake. You had to be strong and you had to look good to get those. Not like biceps, where they get bigger if you get fatter.

  They were silent a while. You had to be, in the house. They were quiet, and they waited until everyone was asleep, but if you spoke too loudly, there was always the risk that someone might hear.

  If someone heard, then they'd investigate. Simple as that. So you had to stay quiet whether you liked it or not, and Cathy was good at doing what she had to do.

  "Just a week," he said finally. Out of the blue, and with nothing else. Whatever he'd been thinking about, this was the first time he'd said it out loud.

  She didn't need to wonder what he was thinking about, though, because she'd been thinking about it, too. In a week, he'd be moving down to Florida for nearly three months, to train with the Tigers. Near three months of absence.

  Absence, as they say, makes the heart grow fonder. But did they really want to be apart so long? After all, this was only going to be the beginning.

  He'd be back, in kicks and spurts, in April. But then he'd be on the road clear through Autumn, and if they were to do well enough to make the Playoffs, then he'd be gone even longer.

  Meanwhile she'd be preparing for her move to New York, and by then she wouldn't see him except maybe on holidays. And she wasn't ready for it to be over, in spite of all her worries. In spite of the fact that she shouldn't have been thinking about any of it.

  The right move was walking away.

  They had both known that it would come to this. That was why they'd started seeing each other in the first place. Why was it that now that the time had come, the time that they'd both known would come for months, they were getting all tied in knots over it?

  It was stupid. That was the reason, really. Because they were both idiots, and couldn't keep their hands to themselves.

  "Yeah," she answered, finally, lost in her thoughts.

  "I guess that's the end, then?"

  "I guess so."

  "I want you to come with me. You can train down there, and you'll be able to put it on a resume anyways. More experience is more experience, isn't it?"

  Cathy took a deep breath. Not really. But in theory, sure. She could go down, meet some new people. Glad-hand a little. There would be places down south that were just as good as any place up in Detroit. So really, it was a lateral move at best.

  But that totally ignored all of the other things. That assumed that all things were equal, and they weren't. So she'd like to come. Of course she'd like to come. But that just wasn't an option for her, and it was never going to be.

  Cathy opened her mouth to refuse him. And then she closed it again before she spoke. It would be easy. All she had to do was to say 'no,' and he'd listen to her. 'No, I can't,' she'd say.

  His voice would get real quiet, but he'd respond, 'I get you.'

  Even imagining him sounding like that felt like her heart was getting ripped out of her chest, though. She took a breath and tried again. The words didn't come out the way she meant them to. She wanted to say, 'I can't.'

  "I need to think about it."

  That wasn't what she'd thought she was going to say. It wasn't what she should have said. She should have said, 'no, I can't.' Or 'I have to stay here.' Or 'wouldn't that be weird, bringing your sister down with you?' Or any of a thousand things.

  Refusals. She should have refused.

  But she didn't, and the more that she tried, the less that it would come out the way that she wanted to.

  So instead she turned her head and pressed a kiss against his chest, enjoying the feeling of his muscles tensing just a little under her lips. Her kisses traced a line down his body, until her mouth found something else to do.

  Something more productive than lying.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  If she wasn't going to come along with him, what the fuck was the point of coming along to the airport?

  Did she think that he was going to suddenly change his mind? Did she think that he didn't know which was way up? She didn't want to come, then she didn't have to come. No big damn deal.

  But if she wanted him to get down on his knees and grovel, tell her how he'd die without her or some shit…

  Well, he wasn't going to. He'd leave, and she'd let her timer run out and then oops, it wouldn't be her fault that she couldn't come down. She would have, maybe, but now he was gone and the opportunity was passed and sorry I guess not. Maybe next time, except that there was zero chance of that.

  He takes a deep breath and steps into the line, his jaw set. There was no need to be so upset. When he'd made the offer, it hadn't been a big deal. He'd known that there was a good chance she'd refuse, and that had been fine by him.

  Yet, now he was getting all bent out of shape over her refusal to give a straight answer? What the fuck was he thinking?

  Whatever it was, he was a God damn idiot. That was for sure. It was something about the fact that she wouldn't just come out and tell him. That she wouldn't talk to him about it. Something about it irked the hell out of him, and he was resentful about it.

  But what was he supposed to do? Tell her that? Not fucking likely.

  The line went slow. It always does, in airports. There are a thousand reasons to hate the places. This is just one of them, but it's a good one. As good as any.

  An overweight black woman who looks like all T.S.A. agents—simultaneously bored because their job is useless, and bitter and full of resentment because their job is useless—points him into the left line instead of the right.

  Whatever. He follows along. Slips his shoes off, because some asshole had to put a bomb in his shoe ten years ago, and now they get to check everyone's shoes. It's only a matter of time until someone slips a bomb up their rear, and then the routine cavity searches begin.

  They must have told him the instructions about six times in the forty minutes he spent in line. Shoes off. Photo I.D. out. Boarding pass ready for inspection. Electronics out of the bag, in the separate tray, along with any metallics—belts, rings, necklaces—And then a minute later they'd repeat it again, as if there were some chance that he might not have been listening, but now he'd decided that he might as well follow along with the rest of the class.

  He'd already packed for the occasion, though. A pair of track pants and a tee shirt. Too chilly for the shirt in Detroit, but he could afford to be a little cold. He regretted not bringing a coat when he was outside here, but he'd be in Florida in a few hours and he'd regret having the coat with him if he brought one. Then he'd regret it for hours, instead of minutes.

  He looks back over his shoulder. It's easy to imagine that she's sitting outside, where he left her. There's a blue sedan, curved lines like all the cars these days. Ostentatious and modern. Nothing like the car she drove. But if he just let his eyes slip a little out of focus, squinted a little…

  He could imagine that Cathy's
sitting out there, worrying about him. Thinking about how much she wishes she'd changed her mind.

  But she's not.

  Whatever. He shakes his head again. No reason to think too hard about it. Sure, he was pissed about it. Sure, he'd rather she'd changed her mind.

  That wasn't an option any more. They were past that. If she was going to change her mind, she had to have done it weeks ago, not minutes ago, but even the very last minute—past the very last minute—had been twenty minutes ago, when he'd first stepped into this God forsaken line.

  He has his bag open, slung over one shoulder. Inside it he's got his phone, which he'll have to pull out when they get there.

  It seemed like an eternity, but really it was only half of an eternity before he finally got his chance to be scanned. There had been hundreds of airports in his past, and they were almost routine by now.

  Somehow, the frustration at the security didn't feel routine, though. It was like every time that it happened, he was having a scab picked open again, as if for the very first time. How wonderful.

  He let out a long breath.

  If Cathy didn't want to come, that was fine. If she didn't think it was appropriate, she didn't have to join him. If she didn't want to miss out on her stuff in Michigan, that was fine. She didn't have to join him.

  If she didn't want to spend any time with him, that was fine. She didn't have to join him in Florida.

  But the least she could have done, if she wanted to show him one ounce of respect, would have been to tell him so.

  What she'd done instead—

  He put it out of his mind. He had other things to focus on, not least of them the training that was about to get started. He'd have so much on his mind that he wouldn't have much time to worry about her.

  Which was exactly what he needed right now. Something else to occupy his mind, occupy his body. Because Cathy had too much space in it.