Blake’s phone alarm sounded and he jumped up. “It’s my turn with Elise.” He grinned, dumping his half-empty plate in the trash on the way to the physical therapy room. Elise gave excellent massages, but she saved her best work for Blake.
“He didn’t even pitch tonight,” complained Brayden.
Juan made the sound of a whip cracking, and they all chuckled.
Dustin looked down to find a frowny-face emoji staring back at him. A thrill skated through his body knowing Clover would be sad he was gone.
How long?she asked.
Six days. Three in DC and three in Texas.
Then it’s the All-Star break?
Someone has been reading up on baseball.
Slow night at work.
“Hey. Hey.” Juan snapped his fingers between Dustin and his phone.
“What?” Dustin scowled.
“Bring her to the home run derby party. I want to meet this chica.” Juan’s dimples deepened.
Dustin chewed the inside of his lip. Bringing a woman to a team function was a big deal. “Are you going?” he asked Brayden.
He nodded, noodles hanging out of his mouth for a second before he slurped them up. “Me and Tilly.”
No one from the Redrocks team was invited to play in the All-Star game this year, but they had their favorites, guys they’d played with in the minors or played against.
Clover would eat it up. She was a baseball innocent. Who knew which team she would follow if she’d grown up on a steady diet of little league? He felt lucky to have been the one to find her before she was corrupted by a Yankees fan.
“‘Kay. But you’d better be on your best behavior.” He pointed at Juan before sending the text and getting up to dump his plate.
The late hour and the lost game were getting to him. Clover wasn’t the only one who’d stayed up playing catch the night before. After she left, it took some time for him to settle down. He kept picturing her in his kitchen, and he almost ran out to buy cereal so he’d have something to offer her next time she ran into his garage at midnight.
Maybe she’d fallen asleep. Clover hadn’t responded to his invitation and it had been a full fifteen minutes. He grabbed his bag from his locker and headed through the halls to the players’ parking lot. They’d had a late night, and then she’d been up for work at The Pantry before coming to the game and then going to the hotel. He liked that she was a hard worker, making her way in the world. His family would like that, too.
Before his thoughts moseyed any further down that road, a text came in.
Okay, I figured out what a home run derby is, and I’m in.
He laughed out loud in the parking lot, not caring if anyone thought he was nuts.Great. It’s a date.
The three little dots were still, and he wondered if he’d pushed too far by labeling their time together as an official date. She didn’t back out, but she didn’t respond. No “great” or “I can’t wait” or even a smiley-faced emoji. He hadn’t meant to, but he’d shifted things between them. After a half hour of debate, he decided it was a good thing. They were either going to move forward or fizzle out. He’d like to do the former, and just like when he stepped up to bat, he expected to hit a home run. Unfortunately, dating was like stepping up to the plate: no matter how bad you wanted the home run, sometimes you were caught looking.
Chapter Twenty-One
Clover put on the parking break and looked out the passenger window to the park across the street. It wasn’t a particularly nice park. Patches of yellow dotted the grass, and the playground equipment was in desperate need of a paint job. The faded navy blue and mustard yellow showed signs of rust.
What this park did have going for it was trees. Real trees that provided shade for someone in need of a nap or shelter and a place to spend the night. The thought process wasn’t a new one: if you didn’t have a friend to watch your back, put your back up against a tree.
Reaching into the back seat, she retrieved four essentials bags and bottles of water. The crinkling noise reminded her of when she’d given one of the bags to Dustin, and she smiled thinking about him. Maddie said he’d called the night before but had declined to leave a message. She and Clover debated for forty minutes about calling him back. In the end, they decided that since he hadn’t left a message, that meant he wasn’t expecting her to return the call, which was a bigger disappointment than Clover cared to think about. To get her mind off of Dustin, she’d decided to spend the morning handing out essentials bags.
She took a deep breath before tucking her keys in her front pants pocket and heading across the street. A man sat under a large oak. He had on olive-green pants and a black shirt. Not exactly hot-weather-friendly clothing. She held out a water bottle. “Would you like a drink?”
He eyed her.
Clover had purposely worn her oldest pair of jean shorts and a misshapen green tee with a pair of flip-flops. Her clothing was clean, but she was far from pressed and dressed.
