As they headed into the seventh-inning stretch, his phone vibrated in his pocket. Hayley. He’d ignored her call an hour ago.
“Hayley’s calling,” he told Tag. “I should take it.”
Tag gave a distracted nod as Sam headed outside where he could hear. He answered as he exited the building. “Hey, Meatball, how’s it going?”
“What did you do?” Hayley said by way of greeting.
“Well, hello to you too.”
“What happened with you and Sadie? She was perfect for you—even I could see that.”
He really didn’t have it in him to review this with Hayley. Not that it was her business anyway. “It just... didn’t work out, that’s all.”
Hayley gave a huff and he imagined her eyes rolling back in her head. “That’s exactly what she said.”
“Because that’s what happened,” he said, then curiosity got the best of him. “What else did she say?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know. Why don’t you call her and apologize and then you won’t have to interrogate me.”
“It’s complicated.” Because Sadie hadn’t wanted him to begin with. And that bothered him more than he could say. Made that wound in his gut open. “Just let it go. These things happen sometimes.”
“They don’t have to happen. You could actually work out your problems instead of just giving up.”
“Some things can’t be worked out, Hayley.”
“They can if you try. If you compromise. If you care about each other enough, and I can tell you do.”
Maybehedid. He paced the strip of sidewalk in front of the restaurant, wondering what else Sadie had told her but not desperate enough to beg. Probably best if he didn’t know anyway. It would only give him reasons to keep thinking about her—and he really had to stop this nonsense.
“You blew it, didn’t you? You broke up with her and she was just too kind to say anything bad about you.”
Nice of his sister to take his side. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t know anything about this.”
“I know she’s sitting in New York, and you’re probably sitting around your apartment sulking over something you could fix if you really wanted to.”
Sam stopped in his tracks. His heart stuttered. “She went back to New York?”
“Yes, she went back to New York because you moved back to your apartment. What did you expect her to do?”
She wasgone. Miles away. States away. And now he couldn’t imagine her out on the deck typing away. Or jogging on the beach, the wind ruffling her hair. He couldn’t picture her dancing around her kitchen or nuzzling Rio or watching a movie with her bare feet propped on the coffee table, toenails painted purple.
Good.He shouldn’t be picturing her at all. She sure wasn’t picturing him.
“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Hayley barked, then hung up.
Sam frowned at the phone. Teenagers. What did they know? Feeling lower than he had all weekend, he pocketed his phone and rejoined the rowdy fans for the seventh inning.
Thirty-Nine
Everything that happens in your story should push your protagonist toward herepiphany, a moment when she comes to grips with a truth about herself or the world around her.
—Romance Writing 101
Sadie was beating her head on the back of her chair when an incoming call vibrated her phone. Caroline. Willing to reach for any distraction, Sadie answered the phone with a disheartened hello.
“Good grief, you sound terrible. Meet me at the coffee shop. I’m between jobs.”
“I can’t. I’m almost two weeks behind schedule and I’m stuck.”
