Page 115 of Revival

Little by little, the family arrives. Juniper and I scoot down the row, leaving me on the end. The wind picks up, sending tickling strands of hair across my face.

“He’s going to try to talk to you.” She leans over to whisper after taking hold of Aiden’s baby.

I smile down at the little boy, but my tone is pure annoyance. “Tell him don’t bother.”

“He feels really bad.”

“He should.”

She casts a reassuring smile at her husband. “You caught him off guard.”

“So he filled you in then?”

“He did…”

The way her voice trails is like needles pricking my insides. “What? What did he do?”

“He might have shared with a few of the others.”

I cast her a sideways glance. “A few? Or all of them?”

“I think all of your brothers were in the room.” She shifts baby John into her other arm. He coos and blinks beneath his little blue sun hat.

“I’m too sober for this.” As the only girl in the family, it’s never a good day when the boys decide to band together against me. Five against one is never a fair fight.

The vibration in my pocket shifts my attention away from overprotective siblings and onto something new. Spencer’s name appears in the message notification, cranking the flutters in my stomach into overdrive. I wipe a droplet from the screen.

Spencer

Hey, gorgeous. What are you up to?

Me

Sitting through some baseball and overbearing siblings

Spencer

I thought so. Wondering how you might feel about hard launching this thing

Me

Less confident than I was about twenty minutes ago. Why?

Spencer

Because I’m already on the way to the field with Mom

Me

So less of a question and more of a heads-up?

Spencer

Exactly

Me

How’d you get roped into a high school baseball game?

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