by Aubrey Gross
Rene had learned to live with it, but Jenn—very openly—thought that Rene needed to set her foot down and tell Mama that either she could accept Brad as her son-in-law, or she was no longer a part of the boys’ lives. Rene obviously hadn’t had the guts to draw that line in the sand, even though she’d thought about doing it for at least the past six months.
Jenn reiterated her thoughts on the situation. “Rene, you really need to tell your mom to either accept Brad or go jump off a cliff—figuratively speaking, of course. I mean, this is ridiculous.”
“Oh, I know. It’s just that Caden and Logan love her, and I know she adores them.”
“But what good does that do as they get older and they realize their grandmother wants nothing to do with their father? That’s going to confuse them and send a pretty bad message.”
Rene nibbled on the corner of a tortilla chip. “Right. Brad and I actually got into a bit of an argument about it the other day, and I’m getting pretty fed up. Thus, the wanting school to start back now.”
Rene taught seventh grade math, which was partially how she and Jenn had become friends; the real bonding had come over their mutual love of regency romance novels.
“So what about you? Why’s your summer been ‘interesting’ so far?”
Jenn stuffed a queso-topped chip into her mouth and shrugged.
“Nope, you’re not getting out of sharing and giving me some small amount of joy.”
She swallowed. “Fine. Well, Jo’s back in town—her grandma had hip surgery about a month and a half ago, and Jo came back to help out over the summer.”
“Jo’s your best friend who lives in Austin, right?”
“Right. Well, ends up Jo being back in town has made things quite interesting.”
Rene leaned forward, her brown eyes shining with interest “Ooh. How so?”
“Have I ever told you about her and Chase back in the day?”
Rene shook her head.
“Well, long story short, the three of us were best friends since like Kindergarten. There was always a bit of a thing between Jo and Chase, something that was always a bit different than what was between Chase and me, especially once we hit our teens. It was pretty obvious they were totally into each other, but then one day Jo just stopped talking to Chase. She never explained why, and I learned after a while that asking her got me no answers, so I stopped. It ends up she’d stopped talking to him because she’d overheard her mom hitting on his dad one day, and Jo thought it was somehow her fault and that if she stopped talking to Chase her mom wouldn’t be tempted anymore.”
“That’s kind of dumb.”
“I agree, and so does Jo now. But at fourteen? We all do dumb stuff at fourteen, you know.”
“So true.”
“Exactly. Anyway, she came back to town and I may or may not have decided it would be a good idea to throw the two of them together and essentially force them to either continue ignoring each other or finally get around to talking it out. Ends up they’re now doing a lot more than talking it out.”
Rene gasped. “No! Chase and Jo are together now?”
“More or less. They’re certainly having lots of wild monkey sex from what I understand. Honestly, I’ve been scared to ask for details considering Chase is kind of like a brother to me.”
“I can see how that would be a bit weird.”
“Yeah. The only problem is that Jo has to go back to Austin in a few weeks for work since she’s a high school guidance counselor. I don’t know what they’re going to do then, and I haven’t wanted to ask for fear of popping their little happy bubble.”
That, and you’ve been a little preoccupied thinking about the other Roberts brother.
“Wow. That’s got to be tough. Does it seem serious or like they’re just getting teenage lust out of their systems?”
“Oh, it’s serious. They’ve been in love with each other since we were kids. I just hope they get stuff figured out, because I don’t want to see either of them get hurt again. It was hard enough to watch the first time around; I can’t imagine how difficult that would be now.”
Their waiter appeared and set their plates on the table and refilled their drinks before rushing off to the next table. Both teachers ate in silence for a moment before Rene said, “So I heard a rumor that Matt Roberts is in town.”
Jenn almost dropped her fork.
“And that the two of you may or may not have been doing some pretty close, pretty sexy dancing at April’s a few nights ago.”
Jenn’s appetite vanished. “I don’t know why you would have heard something like that.”
Rene pulled out her phone, tapped on the screen a few times and then turned it so Jenn could see. And there, in all her sweaty, tank top-wearing glory, she was, dancing with Matt to “Heartbeat Song.”
“Oh fuck me.”
“Well, it kind of looks like that might have gone on a little later.”
Jenn set her fork down and dropped her head into her hands. “Where did you get that?”
“Betsy and her boyfriend of the week were there that night. She took the video and sent it to me.”
Betsy was the middle school drama teacher, which was fitting considering how much drama the woman liked to stir up.
“Do you know if she sent it to anyone else?”
Rene shook her head. “It looked like it was just sent to me, but who knows with her? I just thought you should know about it, just in case you get some flack for it.”
Jenn shook her head. “I was just dancing with him. It’s not like we were having sex in public or something.”
“But you want to have sex in public with him,” Rene stated, pointing at Jenn with her fork.
“Absolutely not.”
“In private, then?” Rene’s voice was hopeful.
Jenn groaned. “There’s nothing going on between Matt and me. We’re just…acquaintances? Kind of friends? I really don’t know.”
“I didn’t even know you knew him. I mean, seriously, Jenn, why’d you hold out on me?”
“Rene, I’m best friends with his brother. Of course I know him.”
She absently waved her fork in the air. “Details, details. You’ve never once mentioned him, so I just assumed you didn’t really know him despite being best friends with his brother. So now I find out you do know the Matt Roberts, and I find that out by seeing a video of you grinding your ass against his crotch and yeah, I have some questions.”
She hadn’t been grinding her ass against his crotch, had she? She didn’t think so, but she had drank a lot of margaritas that night. “Let me see that video again.”
Rene handed her the phone and Jenn pulled up the video. Watched it. Again. And again. Her body and face grew warm and her stomach dipped. Crap. Her secret was out.
She wanted Matt Roberts, and the video evidence was probably already uploaded to YouTube.
Shit.
She sent the video to herself before handing the phone back to Rene, who was watching her with an expectant look on her face.
“So, friend of mine, want to tell me how your summer’s really going?”
Jenn motioned towards Rene’s phone. “I think that video pretty much sums it up.”
“Lots of bumping and grinding with no heavy duty action?”
“Something like that.” Unfortunately.
#
She was prepared that evening when Matt knocked on her door. Not that he’d let her know he was coming over—as far as she knew he didn’t even have her phone number—but Chase had mentioned earlier that Matt had had a doctor’s appointment in San Antonio that morning, and Jenn had had a feeling he would show up on her doorstep that evening.
Why she’d had that feeling, she didn’t know. But she had, and she’d been right. So there. Or something.
She closed the door behind him and didn’t bother with niceties before saying, “So, there’s kinda sorta a video of us dancing together on YouTube.”
Matt sunk onto the couch and sighed. “S
eriously?”
“Seriously.” She sat down on the other end of the couch, curled her feet underneath her and launched into the story about her conversation over lunch with Rene earlier, and then how she’d sure enough found the video uploaded to YouTube when she’d searched after getting home.
“It’s not a big deal, Jenn. We were just dancing.”
“Yeah, but how’s the team going to take that? You’re on the disabled list right now for a really traumatic brain injury, and there’s video of you dancing at a bar with bright lights and loud music.”
“I’ve been cleared to do those things, just not to play ball.”
She looked at him—really looked at him—and saw the lines of worry etched across his face. Even worse, his voice was almost despondent. She uncurled her legs and nudged his thigh with a foot. “What’s eating you?”
He rolled his head on the back of the couch and looked at her, his hazel eyes dull, and she felt a swift ache in the vicinity of her heart. No, not allowed. She could not start feeling sorry for him.
He shrugged. “Doc says my skull’s healing nicely.”
“That’s good, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Then why the woe is me vibe?”
Matt closed his eyes. “He still can’t clear me to play.”
“Matt, you just took a line drive to the head a month ago and had brain surgery. You’re smarter than that. You know you’re not going to be cleared so soon.”
“You think I’m smart, huh?”
Jenn scoffed. “You and I both know there’s a lot more going on upstairs than you like to let on. That’s beside the point, though. You’ve got to be realistic here.”
“I’m so fucking tired of everyone telling me to be realistic.”
“What do you want us to say? Do you want us to tell you, ‘Yeah, Matt, go get back out on that mound before your head’s had a chance to heal. Another line drive won’t kill you.’ Because it could, Matt. You’re lucky this one didn’t.”
“You don’t think I know that?”
“I know you do. So why the rush?”
He stared at the wall across from them and slumped into the couch, body language that was completely uncharacteristic of him. “Baseball’s all I have.”
His quietly uttered statement filled her with sadness. Shit. I cannot feel sorry for him.
But she did. She was naturally empathetic, but she’d long ago turned that off around Matt, because to be that way near him was to ask for heartache. Somehow, though, over the past few days, the walls she’d built had slowly begun to crumble. They were still there, but missing a few bricks here and there.
She wasn’t sure she liked it.
“Matt, you have so much more than baseball.”
“Logically, I know that. I have unfinished business, though. We were so close to winning the World Series last year, and after we lost in Game Seven I vowed to make it back this year and win it all.”
“You have no control over that.”
His head snapped towards hers. “Yes, I do. I’m the ace. I go out there and I pitch lights out every time I’m on the mound. I go as deep into games as I can, throw as many pitches as I can without hurting myself. I was throwing a fucking perfect game the night that ball hit me, Jenn. A perfect game, and that was the third I’d flirted with this season so far. We have all the pieces, and we’ve been firing on all cylinders all season long, starting back to spring training. So yes, I do have control over us going to the World Series and winning.”
“There are eight other guys on the field with you,” she said quietly.
“But I’m the leader of the team.”
“Yes. Matt, though, don’t you see? You’re putting unrealistic expectations on yourself. Baseball is as much an individual sport as it is a team sport. Each individual has to play well, and those individuals have to play well together as a team. If one guy’s in a hitting slump, you don’t just shun him, right? No, you don’t. You pick him up. Other guys in the lineup produce hits and runs and know that he’ll eventually come out of it. Every pitcher has a bad night where he just gets shelled. Do the guys lay into you for that? Or do they pat you on the butt and say you’ll get them next time?”
“You know they don’t lay into a pitcher for having an off night. It happens to everyone.”
“Exactly. So this isn’t on you. The entire season isn’t riding on your shoulders. So stop forcing it and just focus on healing your head.”
“That’s easy for you to say; you’re not a major league pitcher.”
“Thank God. If I were as whiny as you are I might have to shoot myself.”
He glared at her before shaking his head and smiling. “I knew coming over here would make me feel better.”
Jenn rolled her eyes and tried her damnedest to ignore the warmth sluicing through her body at the sight of that grin lighting up his eyes. “See? That’s how I know you’re still fucked in the head—you thought coming over here would make you feel better.”
He barked out a laugh. “One day, I’ll get you to admit that you like me showing up over here unannounced.”
“Not gonna happen.”
He shrugged off her denial. “Whatever. So about this YouTube video, care to show it to me?”
#
Jenn retrieved her phone from the coffee table and pulled something up on it before handing it to him. He took the phone from her and hit the “play” arrow, watching as the two of them danced like no one was watching and they had a private room.
Matt chanced a glance at Jenn. Her cheeks were tinged a faint shade of pink, and he wondered what embarrassed her more—the fact that she was now a YouTube star or the fact that she was now a YouTube star with him.
The video came to an end and he handed the phone back to Jenn. Their fingers brushed and briefly tangled in the exchange (he may or may not have done that on purpose), and Jenn’s blush deepened. She snagged the phone out of his hands and curled her fingers around it in a death grip.
“It’s pretty bad, huh?” she asked.
He wasn’t sure if she was referring to the fact that the video existed or the fact that for a few minutes on a Friday night in a crowded bar, they’d been unable to hide their attraction to one another.
“I don’t know, I think we’re both pretty good dancers.”
“Be serious here. You know what I mean. Couldn’t this get you into trouble with the team?”
The video was a bit of an inconvenience, but nothing he didn’t think he couldn’t explain to the team’s powers that be. “They might have a few questions for me once it reaches the team office, but I don’t think it’s that big of a deal in the grand scheme of things.”
“I’d hate to think that they would question you over this, but I also know how these things work. All it takes is one tweet, one person questioning if you’re taking your injury seriously enough, for all hell to break loose.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “There’s already a ton of Twitter speculation. Might as well add fuel to the fire, right? That being said, I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“Getting dragged into the mess that is my life.”
Jenn raised an eyebrow. “Um, didn’t you pretty much drag me kicking and screaming in that mess the first time you showed up over here unannounced?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t mean to drag you into the public mess.” And he really hadn’t.
“Whatever happens, happens. There’s not much we can do about it now. I mean, if you asked to have it taken off of YouTube that would just add fuel to the fire.”
“Exactly. I suggest we don’t even acknowledge it. If it gets picked up and goes viral, that’s one thing, but for right now we’re better off acting like it doesn’t exist.”
Jenn turned the phone over in her hands. “You know that if Chase, Jo or Owen sees it they’re going to have questions. Or—oh shit——your mom.”
Jenn was close to his parents—hell, they’d considered her the daughter they’d
never had since they were kids—and his mom could be like a dog with a bone when she got hold of something involving one of her children. He wasn’t sure how his parents, his brother or their friends would react if they thought something was going on between him and Jenn. In all honestly, he wasn’t sure he wanted to find out.
“I think Owen’s put two and two together, at least a little bit,” he finally said after long, silent moments.
Jenn removed a ponytail holder from her wrist, gathered her hair behind her head and secured it into a messy spray of curls on top of her head. It should have looked ridiculous, but instead he wanted to run his fingers through all that wild red and bury his face in her neck.
“Yeah, I think so, too. He hasn’t said anything to me about us since the Fourth, but that’s just how he works; he knows I’ll spill when and if I’m ready and won’t push me.”
“He warned me not to hurt you.”
Jenn glanced away, her features pinched. “Little too late for that, isn’t it?”
He wanted to reach over and touch her, slide closer and pull her tight against his body. Instead, he stayed where he was. “Are we ever going to address the elephant in the room?”
“What elephant?” She’d rounded her eyes into what he figured was supposed to be an innocent expression. It looked anything but that.
“Jenn…”
“Listen, Matt, there’s no point in rehashing past mistakes, right?”
Wait. Mistake? She thought that night had been a mistake?
Logically he understood how she could feel that way. Illogically, he resented the fact that she thought the most earth-shattering sex he’d ever experienced had been a mistake.
“Right,” he ground out, willing to let this woman see his pain and frustration regarding his career, but somehow unwilling to let her know she’d just cut him off at the knees with a simple, offhand remark.