Game On(72)
“You’re right!” I called. “That did cheer me up.”
He returned, unfortunately wearing a pair of boxer shorts, his hands behind his back. Gathering the sheets around me, I sat up as he came to the side of the bed.
“Pick a hand,” he told me.
I pointed to his left hand and he grinned, drawing his hand out from behind his back and handing me an envelope.
Confused, I opened it to find a brochure for Houston Community College.
“What’s this?” I asked, turning it over. The other side was an enrollment form, one that had already been filled out in my name.
“You told me once that you hadn’t been able to afford to go to college.” Nathan sat down on the edge of the bed. “Well, it’s not some big fancy school, but you can take classes there and still keep your job at the Register. Once you have your degree, you can do whatever you want with it.”
A lump formed in my throat.
“You got me a college degree?”
Nathan shook his head. “You’re going to get yourself a college degree. I’m just going to help by paying for it.”
“I don’t know what to say,” I told him, my eyes filling with tears. What had I done to deserve a guy like this? I leaned over and kissed him. “Thank you.”
“Well, before you thank me.” He now looked nervous. “I think you should find out what’s in my other hand.”
I had totally forgotten that he had presented me with two options when he came back into the bedroom. What could possibly top the world’s most incredible gift? But still, I pointed to his right hand.
He withdrew it from his back, his hand in a fist. When he opened it, my heart stuttered to a stop.
“Will you marry me, Sophie Hall?” Nathan asked, a sparkling diamond ring resting in the middle of his palm.
I was pretty sure I had lost the ability to speak.
“I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Skee-ball and Titanic and on-the-record questions and you. So what do you say, Sophie? Marry me and make me the happiest man in baseball?”
“Yes,” I somehow managed. “Yes, I’ll marry you!”
Tears spilled down my cheek as he slid the ring onto my finger. Then he took my face in his hands and kissed me until I thought I might explode with happiness.
Homerun, Hall, I thought, smiling against his lips. Home-f*cking-run.
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ONE
So a girl walked into a bar.
It wasn’t a joke, it was my life.
Which, actually, now that I think about it, sometimes feels like the same thing. No comments, please.
Besides, tonight was the beginning of my new life. It was the first step in a direction I’d wanted to go for a long damn time. So where was I? Ah, yes. I walked into a bar.
It was a nice bar, at least. In fact, it was really a lot nicer than any bar at a mid-range hotel—the only one my supervisors were willing to spring for—in a mid-range part of Charleston had any right to be.
The lighting was soft, but not so much so that I couldn’t read the print on the bottles, glowing yellow and orange lamps bringing out the warmth of the polished walnut bar and booths, as well as the striking red brick of the walls and the paintings that adorned them. Some kind of mournful violin music was piping over the sound system, just loud enough to make itself felt and give the chatting patrons a bit of privacy.
A profile caught my eye, a man silhouetted by the soft golden light, facing away from me. I admired the strong lines of his shoulders and the way that his auburn hair caught slivers of light even in the semi-darkness, throwing out glints of gold like sparks in a low-burning fire. Perhaps feeling my eyes on him, he turned. Before I could look away, our eyes met, and a shock of electricity pierced through the distance between us.
Those eyes…deep and knowing, traveling across my face before wandering down my body and back up again, slow and leisurely as if he could feel every inch of me through his gaze alone. I felt my body heat up under his stare, my blood singing in anticipation at the offer his eyes were making. A smile began to stretch across his face, as if he could read the eager acceptance in mine.
I looked away quickly. Research, Ally! I reminded myself. Not banging hot guys. Research is why you’re here tonight.
I hurried away to the other side of the bar before I could give into temptation.
The bartender—a wizened old guy with kind brown eyes and a face that looked like it had been there to meet Mark Twain—didn’t bat an eye when I told him what I was after, and after a brief chat with the waitress he got me a corner booth, tucked away behind a stuffed cougar that looked like it had time-traveled directly from the print ads for a 1950s Boy’s Adventure magazine.
Camouflage was definitely necessary; I’d overheard the Douchebros—and I promise I’ll go into more later as to why I even have a group of people in my life worthy of that title—bragging about how tanked they were going to get, and my plans for the night did not include fending off drunken advances, trying to tune out comments about the size of my ass respective to my brain, and counting how many times they could fit the word ‘bro’ into a single sentence.