Page 65 of On the Line
Berkley snorted, and Brent pulled her into his side. “Well, we’re happy for you,” Brent said. “Does that mean you’ll be sharing a room when you come up to New York in August?”
“New York?” Lexie asked.
“Brent turns thirty at the beginning of August, so we’re planning a trip up to his family’s cabin for a week or so. You know, so we can celebrate before training camp starts and life gets crazy again.”
Lexie looked up at him. “Did you know about this?”
“Of course I did,” he said. “Brent mentioned it months ago. How did you not know?”
Lexie shrugged. “I’ve been a little preoccupied.”
That she had. Ever since she agreed to be his girlfriend, Mitch had barely let her out of bed.
And now that his season was over, he didn’t plan on letting her leave his sight for the foreseeable future. They’d already discussed him traveling with her when she had to go out of town for work, and they never spent nights apart if they could help it.
She’d also surprised him by clueing him in on her deal with Amelia. From the very first moment they met, this woman had barricaded her heart with rebar-reinforced concrete blocks so thick Mitch never expected to break through them, though he’d been more than willing to try. The fact that she was willing to open up to him now…they were leaps and bounds from where they’d started, and he was incredibly proud of her. And proud of himself for being the kind of man she could trust and lean on.
Telling their friends about the change in their relationship status was incredibly painless. Not a single person that knew them was surprised, which made the announcement smooth sailing.
But now…it was time to tell their families.
Well, it was time for Mitch to tellhisfamily.
Lexie avoided contact with her parents like the plague. She still hadn’t fully opened up to him about what the Monroes were like and why her relationship with them was so strained, and he wasn’t about to force her to. Eventually, she’d trust him enough to tell him.
It was a spectacularly sunny day in late May. There wasn’t a single cloud in the sky and just enough of a breeze to keep the eighty-five-degree heat from being suffocating with humidity.
They were on the way to his mother’s house.
So she and Lexie could meet.
And Mitch was absolutely giddy, despite Lexie being pale-faced and uncharacteristically quiet in the passenger seat next to him.
He reached across the center console and took her hand. “You okay, babe?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m not okay. I’m nervous as fuck.”
Mitch chuckled, but asked, “How come?”
“I’m not the kind of girl you bring home to mom, Mitch.”
The admission punched Mitch in the gut. How could she ever think that? This insanely talented, smart, funny, driven, loyal woman?
“You absolutely are the kind of girl I’d bring home to my mom, Lex. Otherwise we wouldn’t be doing this.”
“What if she hates me? She knows about all the bullshit I put you through.”
“She’s not going to hate you. Yes, she knows about all of that. But it was just growing pains. She has to understand that you don’t open up to people easily. And that the way our relationship has unfolded so far is exactly how it was supposed to happen.” He brought their clasped hands to his mouth and kissed the back of hers. “Plus you’re stuck with me now, so she’s going to have to get used to it.”
“Stuck with you, huh? I think you’re the one who’s stuck with me. God only knows why you want to be,” she said with an eye roll.
Mitch sighed. “One day, Alexandra Monroe. One day I’m going to make you see yourself through my eyes. Then it’ll all make sense.”
She gave him a dubious sidelong glance, but didn’t argue.
When they arrived in front of his mother and stepfather’s stately white brick house, Lexie turned a terrified gaze on him. “I can’t do this.”
He rolled his eyes. “Stop that right now and get out of this vehicle.”
