Stealing Home: A Reverse Grumpy-Sunshine College Sports Romance
Stealing Home: Chapter 24

I PICK UP BREAKFAST BURRITOS AND LEAVE THREE IN THE FRIDGE for Dad. I can’t eat mine, no matter how good the bacon smells. My stomach is tied in a million knots, and every time I think about meeting with Mom a new one forms.

Even my extra-long shower, including the deep-conditioning treatment with “soothing lavender,” doesn’t help. My hands shake as I flat-iron my hair and put on mascara and slip on the red, blue, and gray silk shirt that I’ve paired with a charcoal skirt. I intentionally picked colors that wouldn’t clash with my PowerPoint background, and then I wonder if that’s stupid and change twice before I switch back to the first outfit.

When my phone buzzes on my nightstand, I almost break my ankle in my new peep-toe wedges to get it.

It’s just Sawyer.

Not just. But it’s not my mom. And that’s a huge relief, though I can’t say why.

Wanted to wish you good luck. You’ll kill it.

My lips curve as I imagine him sending that message.

Fingers crossed. I send back.

He responds with a gif of a nasty pair of feet with the toes crossed. It makes me laugh.

The main office is empty when I walk in, flicking on all the lights as I move down the box-filled hall to the conference room. We’ve got leftover promo items and T-shirts, stuff we’ll give away at the end of the season, mixed in with last year’s baseball cards and random things people can order from our website. It makes it easy to fill orders but doesn’t look great.

Nothing I can do about that now. I start the conference room’s coffee machine, pouring in mom’s favorite dark roast so it will brew while I set up the projector at the far end of the heavy wood table. The glossy portfolio I’ve created for the Perry Park Events Center is squared up in front of the first chair.

The largest church in our area is hosting their noon worship service on the field. We gave them free admission to the game that will start as soon as they’re done praying and whatnot. Apparently, there’s something biblically inappropriate about charging to come to church, but we set up a big food tent for their congregation and charged for their post-service mix and mingle. We presold twenty-five hundred food vouchers, so it should be a reasonable day for revenue, even if we don’t have a ton of people in the seats. The catering crew is out there now, but I only scheduled forty-five minutes with my mom.

And she’s ten minutes late.

I call her phone. It goes straight to voice mail.

I send her a text. In the car?

No response.

Fifteen minutes later, Meredith pokes her head in the conference room door. “Don’t you look pretty! What’s the occasion?”

I hurry to close the PowerPoint presentation and Meredith’s eyebrows pop up. “I have a meeting with my mom. Some ideas about the park I wanted to run past her.”

“Oh. That’s good.” She squints at me. “Aren’t you going to share it with your dad?”

I’d hoped that if this convinced Mom to keep her ownership, it would be good enough to show him. “Eventually.”

Mer nods. “Well, okay. Any chance you’ll be done in the next twenty minutes or so? We really need some help out there.” She thumbs toward the park.

I check my phone again. No message. “I’ll call her. This will only take me a few minutes.” Eighteen, actually. I timed it before I went to bed last night, practicing talking slowly and clearly, and leaving a few minutes for questions at the end.

My phone rings and I sigh when Mom’s name pops up. “This is her.”

“Okay. See you in a minute.” Mer shuts the door and I answer the phone.

“Hey, Ry! I got stuck with some paperwork that I couldn’t get out of, but I’ll be there by game time.”

“Mom, you’re a personal trainer. What possibly couldn’t have waited until Monday?”

She’s silent for a few heartbeats, and I realize I’ve probably ticked her off with my tone.

“We can talk after the game.”

“No. Let’s do this now.” It won’t be as powerful without the slides, but I think my speech is strong enough. I can show her the portfolio when she gets here. “I wanted to tell you what I’ve uncovered about Black Keys Entertainment and then discuss some options we can use to increase off-season revenue for Perry Park.”

“Ry—”

I talk over her. “While Black Keys is a reputable group that owns multiple money-churning organizations, they take over teams and—”

“We’ll talk about this in person.”

“Just hear me out.”

“I’m on speakerphone in my car. The connection isn’t great. And I’d rather have this conversation face-to-face.”

I swallow hard. “Please, Mom.”

“I’ll see you shortly.”

And then she hangs up. I look down at my phone, expecting her to call me back, to tell me the call dropped. But my phone doesn’t ring.

At ten forty-five my phone buzzes. It’s a text from Campbell.

How did it go?

It didn’t.

I MUSCLE MY WAY THROUGH PREGAME, CARRYING ON LIKE DAD DOES. Pretending that Mom’s words didn’t bother me.

Pearson makes a big deal of checking me out when I set him up with his Field of Dreams buddy. “Dressing up for somebody special?” He wags his eyebrows suggestively.

Before I can respond, our right fielder, Brandon Johnson, steps on Pearson’s heel. Brandon apologizes, but when he winks at me as they jog onto the field, I know the incident was no accident, and I give him a grateful smile in return. I don’t know him well, but I make a mental note to thank him later.

Despite everything my mom says about the benefits of dressing professionally, the wedge sandals and fitted skirt are not as functional as my shorts and sneakers, even if they look better.

I’m going to burn this outfit in Mia’s fire pit later.

When Mia comes to help me after she’s finished her ticket office duties, I’ve shaken off my grouchiness. Mostly. Unless I think about it too much.

“Hey, sexy.” She slaps me on the butt as she walks past.

I’m trying to roll one of three giant tires off its cart and over to the gate beside the dugout, where the contestants will try to get them to third base and back the fastest. The tires are heavy, but we’ve had guys carry them the whole way. Some try my method, propping it up on its side and attempting to control the way it rolls. But in my outfit, any manhandling is a total joke. I really should have changed.

Mia tips the second tire on its side. “How’d the meeting with your mom go?”

“It didn’t.” I blow at a strand of hair that has slipped into my face. “Mom was running late, so we’re going to get together tonight.”

Mia stops midroll. “But it’s Sunday.”

Sunday. Dinner at the Rodrigueses’ house. “Oh. Yeah.” I lean the tire against the fence and walk back for the third one. “I don’t know if I can make it.”

“Your mom will be there.” She offers me the pen out of her hair, but mine won’t stay twisted up without eighty-five bobby pins. “My mom invited yours and maybe some other people.”

Mom and Ms. Vivi used to be really close before the divorce, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. But suspicion tingles across my skin. “Mia? What are you not telling me?”

Her face breaks into a grin. “Okay, fine. Campbell will be there, obviously. And I invited Ollie. Because we’re friends now.”

“Reeeally?” I elbow her in the side. “You’re friends. How do your parents feel about your friends? Especially friends who are a little too old for you?”

“First of all, he’s only a couple of months older than my brother, and I dated all of Marc’s friends. Second, my parents like all of my friends. Even the rotten ones like you. And third, it’s not like there’s anything happening between us. We’re. Just. Friends.”

“I’m going to pretend I’m not offended by being called a rotten friend.” Because she doesn’t mean it, even if it is true some of the time. “And with you, they all start as friends.”

“I’m going to pretend I’m not offended by what you’re suggesting,” she counters, trying to look like she’s tough and scary, but sucking at it. “And would you have a problem with him being something other than a friend?”

“Ollie?”

Mia shrugs and glances at her feet.

There’s so much in her body language that it catches me off guard. “You like like him.”

“Is there a reason that I shouldn’t?”

Besides the whole fraternization business, which wouldn’t stop Mia anyway, there really isn’t. Ollie’s kind and funny and goofy. He’s from Beaumont, so after the season he’d be close enough that they could keep … whatever … going on between them. Still, I don’t answer right away. And my reason for that is selfish. If Mia and Ollie get caught, Mia would get fired. Then I’d lose the little time I get to spend with her.

“If he’s secretly a dirtbag, you should tell me. Right now.”

“He’s not,” I say, quickly. “I’m a little jealous.”

She turns to face me, cartoon eyes enormous. “You like Ollie? I thought you and Campbell were—” She presses her pointer fingers together as if that sign should make any kind of sense to me.

“No. I mean, I’m jealous that Ollie would have you and I wouldn’t.”

Mia laughs and takes my hand. “Getting a little ahead of yourself, Ry? Nothing’s happened between Ollie and me.”

Yet.