Unforgettable (Cloverleigh Farms #5)(62)

“Perfect.”





Eighteen





April





I woke up in the middle of the night in an empty bed. The room was so dark I could hardly tell whether my eyes were open or shut. I heard a noise and sat up. “Tyler?”

“Go back to sleep.”

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing.”

I reached over and switched on the bedside lamp. Blinking in the light, I saw Tyler standing as far back as possible from the full-length mirror, sideways, eyeing himself in the glass. He wore a pair of sweatpants, and his hands were balled at his chest, as if he were on the mound, about to throw a pitch.

And then he did it—went through his entire motion, from windup to release, and I gasped, expecting the mirror to shatter when the ball struck it.

But he hadn’t thrown a ball. He’d thrown . . . socks?

“Hey,” I said, watching him retrieve the socks and go back to where he’d stood. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing. I do this when I can’t sleep sometimes.”

I bit my lip. “Why can’t you sleep?”

He shrugged, getting into position again. “I don’t know. I just can’t.”

“Is it because of that reporter?”

“I don’t know.”

“Or the asshole dad you told me about? The one at practice?”

“I told you. I don’t know.” He wound up and threw again, and even though I knew it was only socks, I still winced when they hit the glass.

“Is it me?”

He went over and picked up the socks. “It’s not you.”

I didn’t believe him for some reason. Not entirely. “Come talk to me.”

“I don’t feel like talking, okay? Just turn off the light and go back to sleep.”

In my head, I went over the last couple hours before we’d gone to bed. Had I missed something? We’d gone up to his room, ordered dinner, watched a movie, and gotten naked before the credits even rolled. The sex had been incredible, as usual—maybe a little less loud and playful than usual, but he’d seemed fine afterward. Or had I fallen asleep so quickly, I hadn’t noticed that he wasn’t?

Naked, I slipped out from beneath the covers and went up behind him, wrapping my arms around his waist and pressing my cheek against his bare back. “If you don’t come talk to me, I won’t be able to sleep either.”

“Then I guess we’ll both be up,” he snapped. We stood there for a minute, then he exhaled. “Sorry. I had a bad dream. One I used to have all the time after I couldn’t pitch anymore.”

“What’s it about?”

“Being buried alive.”

“Oh.”

“By a cement mixer.”

“Yikes.”

“And the wet cement starts to harden right away, so I can’t move. Can’t save myself. My arms and legs and hands are just . . . stuck. Useless.” He rolled his shoulders. “So I had to get out of bed and move. Remind myself I’m in control.”

“Of course.” I kissed his spine. “Do you have bad dreams a lot?”

“I used to. Since I quit baseball, not so much anymore.”

“So what brought the dream back tonight?”

“I’m not sure. Could have been that reporter, I guess. Or Brock, the asshole dad.” He paused. “Could have been the talk I had with Virgil this afternoon.”

“About what?”

“Just some stuff about my father.”

“Yeah?” I wouldn’t press. Instead, I gave him space to tell me about it if he wanted to.

A beat went by before he spoke. “I asked Virgil if he thought my dad would’ve called me a quitter. If he thought my dad would’ve thought less of me for giving up the game.”

“And what did he say?”

“He said no, of course. That’s what he had to say.”

“You don’t think that’s true?”

“I can’t decide. I want it to be true, but . . . baseball was the only thing I ever did that made my dad proud. Without it, what’s left?”

I swallowed hard. “How about the rest of your life? All the amazing things you’re going to do and be? Maybe you can’t see them yet, but I can.”

He turned around and looked at me. Took my face in his hands. “No one has ever seen me the way you do.”

I smiled. “Maybe no one ever bothered to look beyond the surface—I mean, you’re Tyler Shaw. The surface is pretty nice to look at.”

He kissed me hard then, and deep, his tongue penetrating my lips, his hands sliding into my hair. The kiss grew hotter as he moved me backward toward the bed, shoving his pants down, and lifting me onto the sheets.

“God, April,” he whispered as his mouth traveled down my throat and his hands roamed over my skin. “I want you so much. I want you so much it scares me.”

“Why?” I arched beneath his lips and tongue and teeth and palms and fingers as they moved over my body. I put my hands in his hair.

“Because I keep imagining this life with you, this life full of things I’ve never wanted before.”

“What kinds of things?” As much as I loved his dirty mouth, his sweet words were just as thrilling, and I wanted to hear them all.