Beauty and the Baller (Strangers in Love #1)(13)

I pick up Sparky and move toward the door and slip out. Honestly? I need away from him to recover myself. I put on a good front, but underneath there’s a mix of anger and sharp disappointment simmering . . .

Anger is just sad lashing out, Mama would say.

God. I miss her.

“Ms. Morgan. Wait—” he calls after me, but I’m gone.

By the time I find my way back to the kitchen—the house is a maze—Miss Texas has beaten me and holds a sheet cake, the fancy kind you get at a bakery. There’s a carefully detailed football field with little players and people in the stadium on top of it. WE LOVE YOU, COACH SMITH, it reads. Another girl lights the candles.

“Leaving so soon?” Miss Texas asks me sweetly.

A quick scan tells me Ronan is back outside, surrounded by women, waiting for the cake to come out, I guess. He captures my eyes, a scowl deepening on his chiseled face. Nope, not going to get caught in a staring contest.

I flip around and brush past Miss Texas, giving her a smirk. “Tell Marla—and Brad—I said hi.”

Mrs. Meadows follows me into the foyer, a look of sympathy on her face, one that’s surprising, and I deflate slowly, my shoulders slumping. “Did I cause a scene?”

“It wasn’t too bad. You got his attention, that’s for sure, which is more than I can say for most women.” She searches my face. “There seemed to be some . . . long pauses and tension between y’all. You both lived in New York at the same time. I’m wondering if you ever came across him?”

She is the last person I want to know about my night with Ronan. “Never.”

“Ah, I see, hmm. Anyway, breakfast tomorrow—you and him? I can set it up. Just to mend fences. Maybe freshen up a bit when you come. Wear some makeup.”

“I have no interest in being one of the women you throw at Ronan.” Been there, fucked him. It wasn’t great.

“Ronan, is it?”

Exhaustion flares, and I inch toward the front door to exit. “See you later.”

She frowns. “Are you okay, dear?”

I’m really not okay.

And it’s not just Ronan. It’s Mama’s death, Sabine, the house, being in my hometown with painful memories I can’t seem to shake, the total upheaval of my life. I left behind two good jobs and a nice apartment, and now I’m starting all over from scratch. Sure, I’ve done it before, but I was younger and more optimistic. Blue Belle needs to stick.

I push up a smile. “I’m fine.”

Leaving her there, still watching me, I walk through the foyer and out to the front porch as a chorus of female voices sings “Happy Birthday.”

“Hope it’s a good one,” I mutter as I take the sidewalk and let Sparky down. He prisses in front of me, his tail twitching.

“Have fun, hmm?” I ask him.

He throws me a look. If he had eyebrows, one would be arched.

I recall him stuck in the pantsuit, and a grin curls my lips. “You’re my ride or die, Sparky. Forever and always.”



Sabine stands on our steps as I come up to our house. She’s wearing cutoff shorts and a baggy Bobcats shirt. Her face is a replica of Mama’s, high cheekbones and pointy chin, mercurial hazel eyes. With deep-chestnut hair that’s long and thick with a slight wave to it, she’s startlingly beautiful with an IQ that makes me feel like an idiot. Born a month after our dad died, she didn’t speak until she was three, and then it was in complete sentences. She taught herself to read by four.

Her head cocks. “You went for a long walk. Why?”

“Met some neighbors.” They suck.

“There’s one hundred and seventy-nine days of darkness in Antarctica. Most of it is covered in ice over a mile thick.”

My heart swells at her dedication to geography. She has stacks of books in her room, all about different countries and locales. “Want to move there?”

She sets down the paint cans she was holding but doesn’t let them get too far. Like me, she’s an artist, and painting her bedroom different colors has been her therapy after Mama’s death. We go to Ace Hardware and pick out new colors every other day.

“No. This is where I was born, and this is where I want to live.”

“I was kidding.”

“I knew that.” She shrugs.

“I hate the cold anyway.” I inhale the September air, catching the scent of the magnolia trees nearby. The familiar sounds of crickets and frogs surround us, and it loosens some of the tension in my chest. “Did you come to find me? You wanna talk?” I sit down next to her on the steps.

We’ve talked a lot. Mama is gone. I’m here. I won’t leave you. Ever.

She rubs the jewelry on her finger, a white quartz ring with a gold band that Mama gave her. Diagnosed with high-functioning autism when she was five, she uses the ring to release stress. “What happened to the flower bed?”

“Ah, someone accidentally drove over them.” I briefly explain about the Jeep and the coach’s party, skating around the part about me confronting Ronan. She tells me she’s been upstairs in her room painting with headphones on.

“Mama would be pissed.”

She learned pissed from me. Must do better.

“Coach Smith is not your usual coach,” she adds.

“Oh? You’ve talked to him?”