Chapter One
Karoline - Three Years Ago
One of these days,that yellow softball hurtling towards me is going to whizz past my glove and sock me in the face if I don’t keep my eye on it instead of watching the world’s most handsome man gun it at me. With a resounding pop, it lands in the pocket of my glove in the nick of time.
The way his brown hair swishes as his tall, muscular, tanned body leans into the follow-through of his throw takes a day offmy life because of how long my heart stops. Why in the world have I not told the man I’m in love with him yet?
After wiping the sweat from my palm onto my oversized t-shirt, I throw the ball back.
Oh, that’s an easy question to answer. Mason Kane is entering his junior year of college at twenty-one, and I’m one month removed from graduating my homeschool program at eighteen. He sees me as another little sister. He’d chuckle with amusement and pat the top of my head if I told him I loved him and had for several years. “Good one, Vroom,” he’d say, using the ridiculous nickname he’d given me. He couldn’t call me “Kar,” short for Karoline, like every other reasonable human would. He decided on “Vroom” because “Kar” sounds like “car,” which if you drive the right one, can go fast, and I’m the fastest girl on Dallas High’s softball team as he witnessed for six consecutive seasons.
I never said Mason was the brightest crayon in the box, but he sure is the hottest—a smoldering maroon that burns deep and long.
I’ve already caught his next throw, and I’m preparing to return it when I tune back into what he’s rambling on about.
“She’s using me. I’m sure of it,” Mason says as the ball I’ve just lobbed hits his glove. Can I tune back out now? The last thing I want to hear about is Mason’s love life with a sophisticated, adult college woman.
But instead, I play the helpful friend-slash-little-sister and give him sound (and selfish) advice. “Then just forget about her, Peppermint.” Yeah, I call him Peppermint. Mason… Mace… Pepper spray… Peppermint… Last name Kane… You get what I’m saying?
You can’t judge me.
He calls me Vroom for crying out loud.
He releases a dramatic, long-winded sigh, holding the ball in his gloved hand and running his other through his thick, chocolate-colored hair. Mason could be a sweaty sports model in his black athletic shorts with hemlines that rest right above his knees, filled out nicely by thighs that could save lives with the power they hold. The white moisture-wicking shirt he wears fits in all the right ways—tight around his rounded biceps and broad chest while hanging a little loose in the torso where I know from personal experience that a four pack of abs sit. God didn’t give him six or eight because He knew Mason had to have some physical flaw.But was it really a flaw?My mind laughed.Heh. Nope.
While he never played sports in high school, it wasn’t because he didn’t have the talent or skill to. He preferred to spend all his time creating music, which is why he up and left me during the school months to go to Nashville for college.
Mason is phenomenal on a guitar, and let’s not forget to mention how angelic his deep, breathy voice sounds when he sings. I have no doubt he will make it big one day. I’m not sure why he hasn’t other than he’s not actively pursuing a record deal. Or maybe it’s because he’s too focused on girls and partying seven days of the week.
“Impossible,” he finally says. Mason looks at me from across the yard. He’s not so far away that I can’t see the sheepish grin cross his perfect lips, though. “I think she might be the girl I’m supposed to marry. If she’d let me take her out on a real date instead of only asking me to accompany her when she needs a stand-in man on her arm.”
Mason throws the ball back to me, and I catch it with gritted teeth.No, Mason. In fact, she isn’t the woman you’re supposed to marry. I am. Can’t you see that? You’re in college, supposed to be smarter than me, and even I know we are meant to be together. How about asking me on a date, you big oaf?
Instead of revealing my inner desires, I release a haughty snort. “Her loss.” Then I use my missile of an arm (thank you, left-field position) to gun the ball back to him.
He jerks his glove in front of his face out of self-preservation just in time to snag the ball, making anoofsound as he tosses his glove off and shakes his hand. “Easy there, Vroom. You trying to take my hand off?”
I casually rotate my right arm and then stretch it across my chest. “Just needed to stretch out the arm. Season ended a month ago and I haven’t gotten to let loose in a while.”
He laughs with a shake of his head then proceeds to sit down under the magnolia tree that’s a few paces behind him. “Count me out then. You’re too powerful for me, Karoline.”
My heart stutters at the sound of my name spoken in his bass-level voice. How can a twenty-one-year-old sound like he’s a grown man? Then again, as I keep my eyes locked on Mason and restrain myself from skipping to sit next to him under the tree, my heart flutters because he is very muchhomegrown.Gone is the boyish roundness to his cheeks. He is becoming all lines: sharp but filled-out angles. He shaves his beard, but I know he is capable of growing one based on pictures he posts when he’s away. Every time he returns home from Nashville on break, he seems to have evolved even more into a man.
And he’s always got a new girl he’s talking about, but that’s beside the point. None of them have lasted…
I plop down next to him, silently chastising myself for not being more graceful like one of his college girls would be. Also, I shouldn’t sit this close. I reek of sweat. June in Dallas, Texas, is not to be messed around with. Layers and layers of deodorant are required to survive not smelling like a boys' locker room at all times. It’s a smell I only know from softball tournaments where we had to utilize said locker rooms.
I scoot away.
“What? Do I stink?” Mason sniffs his own armpit and scrunches his nose. I spit out a laugh. He may be becoming more of a man, but that doesn’t stop the boy I know from showing through his new and improved body every now and then.
“No, but I probably do. Just protecting you from my softball sweat.” Mason leans over, one hand planted on the ground to keep him from falling into me. As his face nears mine and our cheeks touch, I stiffen. His proximity has encased me in stone. He sticks his nose in the crook of my neck and sniffs.
Before I can regain mobility in my body and shove him, he pulls away, his eyes closed and a soft hum coming from somewhere deep inside his throat. “You smell like dirt and summer. And I believe there’s a hint of lavender.”
That would be the layers upon layers of deodorant previously mentioned.
But full stop.
