Page 104 of Serving Bunt

Pink wound up.

The pitch came in low and outside, exactly where Bennett had called it. The crack of the bat sent a sharp grounder straight up the middle, and I moved on instinct, fielding it cleanly.

Tucker was already covering second, as expected. I flipped the ball to him for the force out before he spun and fired it off to Roman at first.

The umpire’s arm shot out.

“Out!”

The stadium erupted.

We’d done it. We were going to the playoffs.

The guys mobbed me near second base, shouting and slapping shoulders. Pink was screaming something incoherent, made even more so when Roman tackled him in a bear hug. Even Soren was grinning as he jogged over.

But I only had eyes for Diaz.

He sprinted in from left field, a huge smile breaking across his face. He reached me first, pulling me into a quick, fierce hug that lingered just a second longer than it should have for teammates.

Fuck it. Let them wonder.

Let them write naughty fanfiction about us.

#Miaz forever.

“You did it,” he whispered against my ear.

“We did it,” I corrected, squeezing him back.

“Gonna fuck you so good tonight, tesoro. Bend you over and make you scream my name until you can’t walk tomorrow.”

A shiver ran down my spine. I squeezed him tighter, already half hard just from the promise.

We broke apart just as the rest of the team swarmed us, cheering and jumping. In that moment, surrounded by our teammates—our family—with the man I loved right beside me, everything felt possible.

We were going to the playoffs. And for the first time in a long time, I wasn’t afraid of what came next.

As it turned out, that was an evening of celebrating at Thorn Tavern with the whole team . . . followed by Diaz delivering on his naughty promise.

Diaz

Thanksgiving Day

“Somebody pinch me,” Pink all but squealed from his corner of the sectional. “I must be dreaming because there’s no way I just heard the word pavlova come out of Peter Diaz’s mouth.”

Nessa laughed and nudged him with her bare foot.

“Says the man who knows the Latin names for most plants,” she teased.

Pink puffed up proudly. “Angel, you knew I was a full-blown plant daddy when we got together.”

Plant daddy was putting it lightly. Pink was a man obsessed, as evidenced by the tattooed ivy circling his upper arm and the poison garden he had built behind Nessa’s house last spring.

Yep, a poison garden. Only Jared Pink would be proud of cultivating a backyard full of deadly plants. Who needed kids when you had a bed full of snapdragons?

I chuckled and leaned my head back against Matty’s thigh. “Remind me never to piss you off, Pink. I don’t want to end up as fertilizer in one of your experimental beds.”

Pink winked. “Only if you deserve it.”