Page 40 of Sweet Spot

Which made me wonder which part of that made Isaac melancholy. “I count myself incredibly lucky. What about you? What are your friends like?”

“I probably shouldn’t admit this on the first date, but I’m not very good at keeping friends.” He faked a smile as the waiter brought out our meals, placing them strategically across the table. He sloshed more wine into our glasses before bowing and retreating. “Well this all looks delicious.”

The smells made my mouth water and I dug in, letting Isaac have some space. I got the impression if I pushed too much he might clam up, but if I let him think, he’d speak what was on his mind.

After a few bites, he did. “Most of my friends were ballplayers. When I quit all those friendships drifted off. That was partly my fault. I had Rosie to focus on and kids are a handful. But even my island friends…I don’t know. We’re friendly but we’re not close. Not like I am with Everett. When Chris moved back I thought we might be friends. Especially with his stepson and Rosie being friends. But then I became his manager.”

I didn’t have a child, so I didn’t know how much of a factor parenthood had in keeping friendships, but I had to imagine it was a lot. “You and Coach Gordon seem close.”

“We are. He’s one of those old college friends. We have stayed in touch over the years and being back in the same space, it’s like we’ve always been friends with no gap in between.”

“I hear that’s the real test of friendship.”

He nodded, then groaned as he tasted the ravioli. “You weren’t joking. Holy moly that’s good. It melts right on the tongue. I swear the pasta dissolved!”

“The pasta here is so good I almost don’t eat it at home. Almost.”

“Gordo and I are a good team. And maybe after we get the first few series under our belts we can focus on something other than baseball when we talk. We’ll see.” He tried a meatball and made another of those wonderful sounds low in the back of his throat. It sent a shiver down my spine. “What about you? It seems you work alone? Does that get lonely?”

That was probably the only downside to my job. I had an assistant, but that was purely boss-subordinate work. Sometimes I struck up friendly relationships on my jobs, but then they ended when I moved onto the next job. “If I really thought about it, yes. It does get lonely. And maybe that’s why I’m such a workaholic on these assignments. If I keep my head down and get the job done, I don’t have time to notice how much I’ve isolated myself. Mei and Jeri give me a hard time and my sister shows up in my apartment to cook me dinner. They force me back.” And as I thought about it, I began to realize how many friendly relationships I had already developed in my very short time with the Mantas. I really liked Eve Spencer and her sister June. Marta in accounting and Ryan in sales. I even had a fondness for annoying Eli Stirling.

And then of course there was Isaac.

Eli’s suggestion I stick around permanently floated through the back of my mind. A job I stuck at? With people I enjoyed being around?

“That’s interesting,” Isaac murmured.

“What is?”

His eyes darted around as he thought. “You have people who drag you back from your work. It’s made it possible for you to lose yourself in it without getting lost. I wonder what my life would look like today if I had that.”

He must mean baseball. Everyone said he quit because of Rosie, but it had to be more. He spoke fondly of his family. I assumed they had a good relationship because of that, but maybe it was more complicated than that. Maybe they weren’t supportive of his being a single dad.

I let him change the subject. We got lost in conversation after conversation, flowing from college stories to favorite movies, and back to childhood memories. But the thing that surprised him most of all was learning my dad was a musician.

“Really?”

“It’s true. He put on a suit my sophomore year of high school and kept it on until I started college. He made enough money in those three and half years to help put Allie and me through college. Then back to the gig work.” I loved my dad, but every time I told that story something twisted inside me. It was always sad.

Isaac sat back, stroking his chin as his eyes wandered over me. “So that’s it.”

“What’s it?” The plates were mostly empty and we were both full, but the waiter had very smartly kept his distance all night.

“The suit thing. At Reds you seemed very confused to be flirting with me, and then when we met the next day at the stadium you seemed confused and a little disappointed in the suit. I couldn’t figure you out.”

It was like I was under a spotlight. Hot, intense, and unnerving. “I like your suit tonight. It’s very, very sexy.”

He nodded, ignoring me. “Oh I don’t doubt you like. I like it and I don’t generally like getting this dressed up. But it also confuses you. Every time you see me in a different outfit there’s a moment of confusion and appreciation. Enough that I notice it.”

This was a deep, moral flaw of mine and I did not like that Isaac saw it so clearly. But he also seemed to understand why. “I have been trying to figure this out for weeks. If you have the answer, please tell me.”

His eyes sparked with curiosity once again. “What happened a few weeks ago? The night we met.”

The spotlight got even brighter. “I had a bad date. Someone who wore expensive suits and made a lot of money. I thought he was exactly the kind of guy I wanted to date. But it turned out he was trash. And then I walked into Reds and this guy with a beard and flip flops turned me on, and ever since then I’ve been trying to figure out why I spent all these years chasing after toxic men and making snap judgements about others.”

Isaac’s face turned to stone. “A bad date?” The growl in his voice was both angry and very sexy.

“Forget about that.”

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