Page 59 of Pitcher Perfect
Once she said it out loud, he acknowledged it to himself. That’s exactly what his instincts were demanding he do. Get out while he could. Get out before he fell in love with her.
Was he too late?
“I don’t know,” he said, finally, in response to her question.
“It was one challenge, Robbie. You’re overreacting.”
He almost laughed. She thought his wanting to bail was all about the climb. No. That might have sparked this epiphany, but his reason for blowing this joint was a lot more complicated than embarrassment over not being able to accept a loss.
Skylar crossed the bedroom and sat heavily on the edge of her mattress, looking down at her palms, as if she’d never seen them before.
He had.
He’d studied those pitching calluses in the predawn light for the last two days when he couldn’t sleep, his gaze continually drawn to her fingers, slack in sleep, dangling over the side of the bed. As if she’d dozed off in the act of reaching for him.
“Please, don’t do this, okay?” Skylar said now, looking up at him, so openly vulnerable his lungs suddenly grew twice their weight. “Today was the first Page Stakes where I felt like I was on a team. Around my family.” She was silent for a moment. “Maybe anywhere, really. Pitching is so solitary, even when you’re surrounded by teammates. I know my family is intense and the Page Stakes are wacky, but I feel like we have a chance. I feel... I don’t want you to go.”
Don’t you dare read anything into that.
“I have practice, Skylar.”
“I’m not trying to keep you from practice. I’m talking about in the morning. Are you going to come back or stay in Boston?”
Robbie didn’t respond. How could he?
One choice disappointed her. The other one had the potential to devastate him.
“I’ll text you after practice.”
“Bullshit.”
“Skylar...”I overestimated my ability to hand you over to someone else. Someone better.With that truth ringing in his head, he turned to leave.
Before he could open the bedroom door, Skylar’s hand twisted in the back of his T-shirt, holding him in place. “Wait.”
All at once, he couldn’t gather a breath, his chest tight with the need to turn around and look at her. Soak her in again.
Don’t do it.
“Thank you for coming. For staying as long as you did,” she said, getting herself together. Enough to sound a little formal, but sincere. “I’m sorry it has to end like this.”
End.
End?
That’s what he would do by leaving. End this, endthemfor good. Leaving before his part in the bargain was fulfilled. Not only his role as her fake boyfriend, but... the itinerary would never be completed. Jesus, if he left here without giving her making out day, at the very least, no greater crime would ever be committed. From now until the end of time.
“Why aren’t you leaving?” she whispered.
For a full three seconds, time and movement suspended, her words turning the air sluggish, even while his pulse started to beat a thousand miles an hour. Briefly, white light bled into the edges of his vision, his grip around the handle of his duffel growing less and less sure. In the end, it was the promise of her taste, the silkiness of her hair in his hands. The chance to burn himself into her brain, the way she’d done to him.
“I can’t fucking leave without knowing what it’s like to kiss you...” he said through his teeth. “When it’s just for us. Not for anyone else. Not for show.”
Clearly sensing his hesitation to go, the conflict being waged inside of him, Skylar maintained her hold on his shirt, using it to pull herself closer, closer, while he held his breath, letting it out on a big shudder when she went up on her toes, pressing her open mouth to the back of his neck and releasing a warm exhale.
“Go on. Show me how to make out, Robbie.”
Heat and hunger trampled through him. Juggernauts. “Skylar.”
